Fantasy watercolor landscape

 I usually base my landscapes on a photo I've taken, but this landscape was fabricated from my imagination. Well, maybe not completely from my imagination because I did use about 4 different reference pictures and combined them into this fantasy landscape.

Figuring out where the light souce comes from is one of the most challenging parts of creating an imaginary landscape. It seems kind of like a night scene with the stars and "moon", but the rest of it seems like daytime. Maybe I should go darker with the sky and redo the stars to make them stand out more. I will let it sit for a while and come bake to it...what do you think?

Cosmos, spraying watercolor

OK...finally left Maui and back to mainland mind. Nothing like getting back on track than my Artist's Way group. They always stretch me out of my comfort zone and try something new. This month, one of the artists in the group brought liquid watercolors in spray bottles. They were the little travel size bottles with a little pump on the top. I had to let go of any control and just let the sprayed paint land where it may. Trying not to get too much water on the paper was a challenge. Once it started coming together like a starry sky, my mind envisioned seeing the Milky Way from the top of Mt. Haleakala...oops, Maui reference.

The last couple of steps that I did was to splatter some white onto it with a bristled brush, and then spray it with an iridescent gold. It all depends on what angle the light hits the painting as to whether the gold shines or not.

I later saw this image online of NASA's largest picture ever taken and it reminded me of my painting!

Full moon inspiration

Inspired by my Artist Way group, as well as the full moon last night, I created this piece around a quote that I had found on social media by Diana Cooper.

Today's full moon opens you up to your true soul energy.

I am not thrilled with my lettering skills (done with a sharpie), but I have been wanting to have an excuse to try splatter painting with a toothbrush for a long time.

Flame in the woods - photo progression

A friend of mine had asked me to do some illustrations for a book he's writing. As I read through his draft, this scene came to mind. It's similar to a painting I had seen by Gordon MacKenzie titled "Under the Stars". I should have used masking fluid on this piece to help build contrast on the trees, but I decided to try painting around the negative spaces of the trees. Creating a gradient from light to dark AND avoiding painting the trees is a challenge. I probably built more layers of color on the piece than any other piece, and the 90 lb. paper I used took a beating! I need to start working on heavier weight paper! Enjoy the first draft of "Flame in the Woods".

Watercolor of a starry night

Now that we are finally getting some fall weather here in Sacramento, I was reminiscing about a painting that I thought of doing while camping this summer. One of those scenes that I only wish I could capture with a camera: a starry night under the trees!
And then after attending the Rancho Cordova City Hall art show themed "UP", I could not resist putting this idea onto paper! The perspective definitely makes you think of looking "up".
I have been wanting to try mixing salt with watercolors for a while and I thought it might create a "starry" sky. Not quite as dark and contrasting as I had hoped for, but definitely interesting texture. Once I was all done, it reminded me of one of the paintings from the Subaru commercial with the plein air painter! Ha ha!

Starry night

We were at a friend's house trying to figure out a Sip & Paint class...Drink & Draw?  Painting & Partaking? Anyways, we were deciding on a painting to create with non- artist type people that were there just to have fun and we decided on Van Gogh's Starry Night. Although it looks simple enough, and was very fun to paint for me, it is very complex. The impasto brush strokes, those small and short ones throughout the painting are very difficult too duplicate.  And then to complicate things even more, I was working with acrylic paint, which I rarely do...but the wine helped :) My favorite part was actually the little town.

Here is Van Gogh's original Starry Night:

My preliminary watercolor sketch:

And my acrylic rendition:

And the one my friend Rhonda did (still not quite complete):