It's Still Life :-)

A bit tardy, the final painting for Table Top: Drawing and Painting is finished.  Class was so enjoyable and I explored still life painting, a subject that never caught my fancy before.

Here's the still life:

"The Oval Table"

This is how it began:

Whoa, something is different...

The table changed, the flowers changed and some of the veggies became fruit.  How did that happen?  As I think back, I was focused on the paint and I let go of the power of the "line"; the application of paint and the colors indicated the direction of the painting.

As odd as it sounds, relinquishing control is empowering :-)

Fairy tales' end

Carla's online class, 2014: Year of the Fairy Tale drew to a close this month.  A great experience, I enjoyed the class structure where there is a research period followed by drawing, painting and mixed media work.

Final fairy tale art: adding some color to the title page.

Graphite, ink and colored pencil.

I benefited from this year-long class through exploration of techniques (new, old, experimental) so much so that I am eagerly awaiting "2015: Year of the...???"

Miss You, mixed media journal page

The feelings reside in my heart and at some point crystallize into words:

My sweet Romeo.

I appreciate that creating art around the memory and emotion helps me in some indefinable way.

Table Top Paintings

More still life work from Diane Culhane's online class, Table Top: Drawing and Painting.  I am finishing up the painting assignment.

The emphasis again is on laying down transparent layers and then building more layers, both transparent and opaque, on top.  I became so involved with the technique, I let my improvising slide (see this post).  I figure I will get better with practice :-)

Beginning with a graphite drawing (on a birch panel), transparent layers of primary colors are quickly applied, a nice way to get the paint brush moving and paint on the panel:

Initially two green peppers and a pear...

However, after laying down more and more paint, I decided that apples were calling me more than peppers, hence:

"Pear of Apples"

Mixed media, glazing

The world outside has gone cold and snowy white, but in my studio it's color-wow time :-)

Glazing (the current Table Top: Drawing and Painting lesson), layering transparent color upon color is a lot of fun and perks up this gray day.  Choose some acrylic color, gel medium.  Ink a simple still life sketch and then go...

 

The colors glow.

Improvise

No color this time, simply graphite line work and smudging - and still life, an assignment from Diane Culhane's online class, "Table Top: Drawing and Painting":

I love to sketch.  Vellum is a fabulous surface.

This drawing was fun.  First placing some objects, playing with a variety of line weights and levels of intensity - basically improvising the foreground and background :-)

Vellum-luscious

Ink and colored pencil on vellum - so enjoyable.  There is something about the application of either medium that is rewarding; very smooth, not slick, which results in a nice amount of control.

More class work from Diane Culhane's online class, Table Top: Drawing and Painting:

I have a greater appreciation of bottles :-)

Still life as subject matter... its appeal is growing.

Hatching(s)

Usually I don't gravitate toward still life drawing; and that is why I wanted to explore it.  When Carla Sonheim offered Diane Culhane's online class, "Table Top: Drawing and Painting" for a second time, it was an opportunity I had to seize :-)

I have taken two other class by Diane, Between Speech and Silence and Paint Your Garden and I thoroughly enjoyed them.  I like Diane's whimsical, exploratory approach to drawing and painting and her teaching style is fun.

So on to some drawing.  This is a warm up sketch, wonky lines and all:

graphite and charcoal

Next, all kinds of hatching...here, begin with a quick sketch for placement and then just let the colored pencils go:

colored pencil on black card stock

Inking

I completed an imaginary landscape:

It is waiting for color...but I haven't chosen a medium.

I documented this drawing from the initial sketch and over time the changes and additions.

Sketch:

 

Interim 1:

 Interim 2:

 

Interim 3:

Interim 4:

Documenting my process helped me to limit the population of objects.  Each time I stopped to scan the drawing's progress, I could evaluate the density of images and rein-in or just stop the addition of imaginary things :-)