Painting Class Week Three

Week Three started out with a lot of frustration. I was unhappy with where Week Two's painting had ended. As I was working on the painting I had to stop myself twice from packing up and leaving. This is my biggest problem with my goal to become an artist. My frustration. When I was a child I would spend hours and hours drawing. Maybe it is the pressure I put on myself to succeed. I have lost the joy of just creating a painting. Because I have lost the joy I tend to put of painting. Because I put off painting, I am not developing my skill. In order to become successful, I must develop my skill further, so I must paint more, so I must get past the frustration! It's a viscious cycle!!



As I was wallowing in my frustration the deep resonating base thumping from the exhaust fan made me almost pull my hair out.

I did stay with it, mainly because I had paid to be there. As I finally gave up on trying to perfect the composition and began working with a deeper blue to create the background I found my frustration leave, and the fan noise receeded. Note to self...bring ipod next week.



I had a chance to speak with the instructor at the end of the class, and mentioned my frustration and how I pushed through it, and she told me to remind her next week and she will tell us a story about that. It seems I am not the only frustrated wanna-be artist in the world.

I have been tenative with my lights and dark, which is typical, but will have to loosen up on those next week as it is our final week on this project. Or I should say in two weeks. Next week we have off. You can start to see the shape of the pair and not just a flat shape.


I put a complete new layer of paint on everything except the gray cup that is holding the orange and the insides of the vase and burnt orange cup.




Now, some of you may wonder why this is a successful composition when things are behind things? Why did I choose to create a painting like this? Below I pointed out my limited availability to a good location. That was one of the reasons I chose this composition. I believe the composition creates an interesting negative space. Meaning the space around the objects is interesting. None of the objects touch the edge of the painting (a big no-no) and when the painting is finished the colors I have chosen will be intermixed amongs the entire painting. That means there will be blue in the shadows, greens in the pear, yellows as highlights, etc. etc. This while it might seem unatural, will create interesting things for the eye to look at and keep the eye moving throughout the painting instead of becoming stagnant.

I apologize for misspelled words. Spell check doesn't seem to be working.

2/8 Class - Thumbnails and blocking in colors

Class last week was more than a little frustrating for me. I guess that's why I haven't posted about it sooner. So here's my list of things that frustrated me:

1) I wasn't paying attention when the still life was set up and got a bad location. I was getting supplies out and looking at handouts before I realized she had set it up in a different location than what I was anticipating. I was able to adjust and found a spot very close to where I had originally set up, I just had to look "between" two other people.

2) I had a very nice composition sketched up and it didn't transfer well. I am going to work on that first thing this week.

3) I am very disapointed with my colors. I have had time this week to think about what is disappointing me and I have decided it's the pastel coloring. The table cloth is a pastel purple while the vase, upside down pot and cup behind the vase are a brownish terra cotta color. Pastel colors are NOT my thing. I have something in mind to change the palette to. My goal today is to find some examples to take in and discuss with the instructor. I have to if I want to truly learn in this class.

Class Canceled

Grrr! I didn't find out until I turned the corner of 7th floor to see the door locked. Our instructor had a family emergency and had to cancel last minute.

Oh well, I got some shopping done. Picked up a few more brushes and some burnt umber and burnt sienna.

Getting to Know Acrylics

I'm going to do a series of posts about getting to know acrylics as I go thorugh my class.


So far this week I've only had one opportunity to sit down and paint. Well, let's rephrase that, I only took one opportunity to paint. I took plenty of opportunities to clean my painting area, so that's good, I guess. I have class again tomorrow and between then and now I have bills to pay, soup to make for Bingo, girls to take to basketball practice, piano lessons, and a beef meeting. Oh, and I got called in to work between 12 and 3. So, maybe tonight at 9:00 I'll find time to paint again.


Here's the painting I started in class last week. I decided it wasn't worth the time, effort or paint ot finish it. I had a #8 round brush to work with, and it was much to small for the job. The canvassette is 16x18 or some such crazy too big size.

For this second painting I cut the canvassette in half. No use wasting paper. What I found on this painting is that I need to not be afraid to use the dark. The final paint applied was the dark on the left edges of the fruit. (This is an orange and a lemon, not a tomato and a balloon! Although I will admit it's hard to tell) That little bit of darkest paint helped tremendously.

I'm still struggling with the fast drying acrylic. It drives me batty that I can't go back to an area and apply water to change it. I need to learn to layer.

I am eager to go to class tomorrow, just wish I had spent more time painting this week.

Paint Class

I have enrolled in a painting class and had my first class this last Friday.

I was very impressed with my instructor. She was very informative on supplies had us do an icebreaker and gathered information on each of us on our experience and expectations.

I feel that this will help me get painting on a regular basis. This week I plan on painting each day, and returning on Friday for further instruction.

The class was offered as a oil or acrylic painting class, so as I was going over the supplies needed I decided to try acrylics. I haven't worked in acrylics since high school. I decided on acrylics mainly because they are less toxic than oils. Plus I had a few acrylics on hand from a different project I had started.

The class runs for 3-1/2 hours and the first 3 hours were explanation of the supplies and a demonstration of a monochromatic still life. This left just half an hour to paint.

I started mixing paints as instructed and was pleased with the colors I created. Once I started laying the paint on the canvasette I realized I hadn't mixed enough. So, back to mixing I went. At last I got the background done. It took forever because my size 8 round brush (recommended) just didn't fill up the background as quickly as a bigger brush would have. My next problem arose from the paint drying out. I have been working with color pencil, water colors or oils. No drying out there! It was very frustrating. I either have to work quicker or come up with another plan. It will be a challenge.

For now I am cutting my canvesette papers in half to do smaller scale paintings. Most of the work I do this week will be monochromatic still lifes.

Mick and The Old Farm

S recently found this watercolor and piece I did a few years back. She asked if she could have it. She often asks to have my art work. I told her she was welcome to it but I needed to scan it first...so at least I have something to post! I am still working on the Kelzon piece and I have begun a charcoal of N and Classy at last year's state gymkhana. Unfortunately the cats smeared it. Grrr!!!

An experiment

I have been admiring Maggie Greywaren's art for a couple of months now. Her blog turned me on to Daily Painters and has me trying a new medium.

After Christmas I ordered some Dura-Lar Mylar and dug out my Prismacolors from the cupboard. This week I have been playing around with a painting of Kelzon using the techniques Maggie explained on her blog.

I first did a quick study to determine where the lights and darks should go in the painting. Here's a picture of it. I actually like this little sketch, although it doesn't really make me think of Kelzon. It is a cute little horse though...




This second picture is after the first little bit of color I put down.



And this last one is where I am quitting today, or for now anyway. I am getting pretty frustrated so I will take a break (and feed the real horses). It's not as bad as I am imagining - especially if I look at it from a ways away.

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