Wild irises along the river, plein air

A beautiful spring day along the American River, I went out to enjoy the river and sun with some friends. Of course I was inspired to do some painting, with the wild irises all in bloom along the banks.
Why do I paint? I paint because it allows me to escape from work and go within to find joy. Painting creates an intimate connection with my subject, in this case, my favorite model, Mother Earth. This plein air painting done at William B. Pond is a perfect spot for demonstrating this: a quiet spot away from the bustle of the city where I can reconnect with nature.

I actually painted this same tree cluster a couple of years ago as one of my first plein air paintings, but from a different angle, William B Pond.  It is amazing to see how much my painting style has improved over the last couple of years.

Portrait of a pug

I recently went to a demonstration by Steve Walters and one of his tips to keep energy, passion, and spirit in a painting is to put bold colors down first as a kind of abstract under painting.  I thought I would give it a try with a photo of a pug that a fellow artist, Michael Salmon, shared. I think that the colors help keep the painting whimsical and it helped break up some of the black.

Lady in pool, watercolor

 I've always been fascinated by the way light and water react with each other. A reflection in the water is one thing, but when it is just the surface of the water bouncing the light around...that's a challenge I  had never attempted...before now. Thanks to fellow artist, Kelly Murphy, for the photo reference.
The first pic is after my first couple of washes, trying to save my whites ( I really need to invest in some masking fluid), and trying to get a gradation to represent the steps in the pool, while using the right side as an experimental area.  The next step is to add in the color of the lady, the shadow around the hat, and a few more tweaks with the water. I thought I might stop here, but then I decided to lift some of the color to create some highlights in the water. The larger areas I used a Mr. Clean sponge, but in order to lift the finer lines, I used a stiff wet brush. And lastly, to crop off the right side.
I'm ready to go for a swim. Anyone got a pool?

Woman with flower basket, pencil sketch

Ok, after last week's portrait practice, I decided I better practice some more. Here is a sketch I did during a watercolor workshop by Steve Walters. Even though he was up on stage and I was sitting in the audience, it was still easier to sketch from a photo than from a model. Here is my interpretation of the portrait he was working on in pencil. My next challenge will be to interpret this in watercolor.

Steve Walters' photo, sketch, and beginning of his watercolor demo.

Portrait practice, sketch and watercolor

It has been more than 6 months since I have painting from a live model so I'm a little out of practice. I headed over to Patris' Studio since it was the second Saturday of the month which is when they usually have a clothed model doing a long sitting. When I got there, they told me they have not done the model on second Saturday since the beginning of the year, but they just happened to have a model doing a long sitting for another artist that was there that day. Just my luck that I showed on the right day of tje right month.
I decided to start with a quick pencil sketch, just to get some practice with proportions. I think I was off a little bit. The other artist that was there used the word "unresolved". The sketch is still unresolved!

I decided to move on to watercolor. With an overhead spotlight, her eyes fell into dark shadow, which gave her an odd look, but overall I think it turned out well. Her eye on the right though is still... unresolved!

gristmill plein air reworked

Sometimes after letting a painting sit for a while, I will go back and see if I can improve on it.  Usually it doesn't take a month before I do this, but in the case of my Gristmill Plein Air painting, it has been longer than that.
It did not seem quite finished but I could not quite figure out what it needed.  I decided to post it onto a facebook paged where fellow artists critique your work.  Wow, talk about putting myself out there! There was lots of input as to how to improve it.  One of the comments was that the waterline cut the picture right in half, it looked like two different paintings put together, and there was no point of focus.
So I decided to just go for it, and try to apply some of the ideas that had been thrown out there.  I raised the waterline and broke it up with some grasses. I lightened the foreground a bit and darkened the background to try to create more depth in the painting. And I added a point of interest, the fisherman. I rarely put people in my plein aire paintings so this was a big challenge. He looks a little stiff but I think it works.

 

Before

After

Mealtime for a monarch

This painting was inspired from a photo posted by a fellow painter in the Group Watercolor Painting community. It is not something I would normally choose to paint, but in order to grow, I have to be willing to step out of my comfort zone. The layout of the photo was very similar to the one I had created in my sketch of Skull Moth Flower, but I never challenged myself to paint it.
I loved working on the butterfly, as it had lots of geometric shapes and lines. The flower on the other hand was where I felt I was struggling. I could probably go in and work the flower some more, but the butterfly is where the focus should fall, and so I call it finished.