Snow business...

for one day only - Thursday - and then a return to the beautiful weather we've been enjoying.  To note this little weather blip, here's a bit of word art OPI that came to mind:

Mixed media - from my art journal.

Until then I am keeping the windows open and luxuriating in the perfect autumn weather.

Creating abstract patterns is relaxing; it feels like my brain is coasting along while also being completely absorbed in... something :-)
Here is one for today:

More mixed media - from my art journal.

I might as well go completely "art journal" and include this little quick little lion face doodle:

Graphite.

Color and not

Beautiful spring-like weather this morning.  Remy and I were sitting out on the deck listening to the birds and taking in the sunshine.  He likes to flop over and lay his head on my leg and snooze; this being springtime, I come away with a covering of dog fur - major shedding.

This is photo of Remy from earlier this year taken in harsher light:

He's interested in something in the distance.

I've been working away daily in my art journal since early last November.  I am experimenting with the format; the Draw and Misc sections have increased in size.

Here is some color:

Copic markers and gel pen

And some black and gray:

Gel pen

A map drawing

I like to look at maps.  I thought I would draw one of my own.  For this one I used pen, inks, and graphite - undeniable favorites of mine for drawing - and they are great map-making tools :-)

This is the map from today- the "Map of An Unplanned Interaction":

Ink, Copic markers, Sharpie markers, graphite

With no artwork in mind

I am taking Cat Bennett's online class, "Making Art a Practice".  This is some of my "output" from the first week's mark-making exercises:

Colored pencil, ink, graphite.

Water color crayons

The exercise is about making marks with no specific finished piece in mind, and if specific imagery begins to appear, then move away from it, i.e. if the shape is beginning to resemble a flower, then avoid making actual flower shapes, resist the urge to turn it into a landscape or more likely in my case, a dog :-)

Copic markers, ink, pastels

Gelatos, ink, paint pen

I am surprised by how "guilty" I felt - using TIME every day (!) where my goal is not a finished piece, but instead those of experimentation and exploration.  It's liberating :-)

More abstraction

from Karine Swenson's "Elements" class.  The assignment was to select four to five color chips, mix the colors and then use them - with black and white - in an abstract painting.

I chose a tetradic color scheme and here are the mixed colors on my palette:

Here is the resulting painting:

I love the individual colors and in pairs they are quite lovely; however, as a group, using them was a bit of a challenge :-)

Abstract Shape

More "Elements" (Karine Swenson's online class) work - this time the focus is on shape:

Mixed media collage

Paper collage

Paper collage

Using line

The next lesson from Karine Swenson's online class, "Elements", was creating an abstract design using line and linear variety from the previous exercise.

The assignment was to produce a painting using these same elements:

18" x 24" acrylic painting

Into the abstract

I just finished taking an online class - "Elements" - taught by Karine Swenson.  The primary focus of the class was abstraction.

The first lesson had to do with form and mark making.   I used graphite, charcoal, ink, conte and marker:

My favorite :-)

Introducing the grid

Painting assignment, Lesson 5*:

Line and circle doodling on a grid

I enjoyed painting this so much I did another one :-)

"Signal"

*Diane Culhane's online class, "Doings of A Doodle"

Abstraction

More Year of the Spark - Carla and Lynn both teach and this time Carla is up.

I think the goal of this lesson is to become comfortable with abstraction.  

Essentially, look at a scene with the intent of creating a sketch that minimizes photo-reality and instead focuses on lines and shapes, patterns, forms, etc. that are appealing.  

And then from that sketch create another one where the focus changes from that of "representation"  to one of "qualities", e.g., abstraction, of those shapes, forms, patterns.

Here are three sets of sketches.  For each set, the sketch on the top is the interpretation and the sketch on the bottom is the abstraction.

First set:

park scene

abstracted - emphasizing line variation, form

Second set:

amusement park

abstracted - emphasizing shape and shadow

Third set:

kitchen

abstracted - emphasizing form and texture

I enjoy working in the abstract :-)

Carried away...

creating imaginary flower blossoms:

I had intended to work for a few minutes embellishing the watercolors I had left to dry. However, some time later when I figured I was done with this, I realized the sun was setting. Where did the time go? I just love it when I am working and I have no notion of time passing.

Imaginary blossoms.

So what do I think of the blossom study? Some of them work as blossoms and others are more from outer space :-)