I had great plans this spring, I was going to paint and post flowers that inspired me as they bloomed in my garden, beginning with some lavender crocus that bloomed on Easter morning.
I set out with brushes in hand and a new book to inspire me, "How to Paint fast and loose and bold" by Patti Mollica, determined to get my art process loosened up and faster so I could keep up with my flowers.
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| April 9, 2023- Easter morning awakens. |
I started off okay with a clever type of value study I learned from Patti's book. Look at each line horizontally and notice how the same color looks so different on each different grey background. A color can shout out "here I am" and then almost disappear depending on the background behind it.
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| Background color sets the mood! |
I painted a couple of small color studies to test out my color choices. Note the May 13th date on the left hand page, I'm all set to go for finishing a painting for my May blog post.
Then I decided on a last minute whim to go visit family on Memorial Day weekend and ended up with a surprise, an extreme allergic reaction to what the doctor thinks were 6 mosquito bites, seriously?!? Whatever it was, I did not feel well for over two weeks, I felt fatigued and my balance was off.
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| Testing, testing, testing!! |
Now it's June and I'm feeling mostly better. My plan on this painting was to follow Patti Mollica's advice and try to use more paint and fewer brush strokes, really think about how I'm going to be efficient and not overwork the paint. Here I go, all on the same day...
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| Background wash, one brush! |
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| Darkest value defines the light. |
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| Bring on those green leaves! |
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| All dressed up in lavender. |
Boom, layer after layer going on, valiantly resisting the urge to touch up any of the brush strokes and then my painting time is up that day.
We had made plans to go camping for two nights, something we haven't done in years. We have a grand time getting there, camp site is great, all is going pretty well until evening and then I don't feel well, I feel so dizzy. I can't sleep all night, the next day we hike a little but I am getting worse. We go home and I try to figure this out, I've had these attacks before, and I try all the things, but this just wants to hang on and on and on!
No painting happening, I don't have the energy or focus for it. June passes by and now it's July before I finally feel up to figuring this painting puzzle out.
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| Orange completes the look! |
I wasn't certain how I was even going to
finish this painting, I felt so discouraged about all the set backs and
then I didn't really like how it was looking! I couldn't quite put my
finger on what was bothering me, all the brush work looked pretty good
and the values are right, I think... then I compared it to my photo and
realized the foreground is a bit too bright for the flowers to really
stand out, so I broke the "fast and loose" ideals and painted over the
foreground again to darken it.
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| No shining stars without the dark. |
What a journey, and I still can't decide if I like this painting or not, the brushwork in the foreground isn't as nice and the crocus look too stiff and heavy to me. At least I learned some new techniques and it is done. I don't like to leave paintings half done because they haunt me, seriously, they do!
Happy Creating and Persevering...
(Sometimes creating involves not giving up, even when you want to.)
>^-^<
Tina
p.s. I am feeling better, not 100 percent, but better. Possibly some sort of virus messing with my inner ear and taking it's sweet time to heal. Thanks for reading!
