Quick overview of Class Creative Reset with Louise Fletcher

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Louise Fletcher's Creative Reset was a freebie class of 10 days---with an 5 extra days of discussions and prompts/demos. 

Louise is an amazing giving teacher...allowing you to expand your work...become more creative and releasing the artist within you. Nothing is copied, but you work on your own with prompts rather than instructions. This is some of the works I did in those two very long weeks.

Louise's 'Find Your Joy' classes are over $1300, so I was happy to soak up all the free information I could. She has lots of demos and short bits on You Tube and I will be going through every single one. If you are interested Louise Fletcher website is HERE.

I'm still trying to find my style, and I know it will take time. I'm hoping I'm somewhere between realism and abstract. 

Thanks for looking.

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All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, unless otherwise designated. I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions, posts or any products shown or anywhere I shop.

Thanks ALWAYS for visiting!

I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question. Please don't use my photos without my permission.

 Sandi Magle

OldNewGreenRedo

Really USING GESSO for huge texture with Watercolor Painting.

 The class I was this month had many prompts to push yourself where you are uncomfortable. Great idea, because you never know what will move your art work forward.

Using a scaled down version of the 'dried arrangement', I used a larger piece of paper, sketched out my composition and then really slathered and dabbed the gesso on my heavy water color paper with ABANDON...really as loose as I could go and still stay within the planned sketch.

Setting up the arrangement, I left more air between the stems.

The tall stem is actually a Hollyhock stem that the buds never opened but dried on the stem. The thistle type are Sea Holly, that were quite small and also dried before fully blooming. (It was so dang hot here in JULY....ugh). I liked the graduated shading in the background lighting on the old board. 

Chinese lanterns that are normally orange upon full growth, but again dried from the heat, they had plenty of water...just wilted as shown by the curled leaves.

The dried Hydrangeas are every shade of brown, each fully grown petal curled as it dried on the plant.

I'm using artistic license to add some color to these but also giving the illusion they are dried. Here's a closeup with more air around the vase...you can see the crazy pattern, this vase is pre-1890's the best I have been able to date it.

I used watercolor pencil for sketching, and really slashed and smashed the gesso on. This time I didn't tint it...because I decided to wash the background right over all the gesso and marks with big sloppy brush strokes

First pass...of colors.

Here's my first drippy wet layer...you can see how the gesso where thick actually repels the paint. I'm again working with a blind picked limited palette, one from each of my color groupings but no blues I pulled a green by error, but kept it as a totally warm palette.

CadYellow Pale, Pthalo Yellow Green, Winsor red (a nice cross between a cool and war red), and Van Dyke Brown, I also tested washes on here.

I did a ton of mixing my colors, but only seldom used my water spritzer.

While the washes were still wet, I added some sloppy drops and wavy leaves and lines here and there. 

This is when I began dabbing off color with a paper towel and then rubbing color on with the same towel elsewhere.

Some of my lines became long pod shapes (not in the original arrangement), I don't remember the name of them, but often they were smooth brown hard pods with speckles and striping. (upper left). 

At  this angle, I think you can see the texture and buldup of the gesso as well as the watercolor layers giving the ILLUSIONS of depth through shading.

I tried to keep this area light...but all that texture eats up positive and negative space. I'm happy with not working the burrs to death, keeping them airy.

The whole painting, titled 'Fall Layers'.

I think it is still overworked, I scribbled some shadows here and there, added a few lines in colored pencil with White, med. dark Green, and Burnt Sienna. 

 
The last thing I did was take an eraser to all the raised gesso edges and also scraped/erased highlights on to the glass pitcher. I really scrubbed down that pitcher until it began to shine!

I'm happy as it is, but it's still very busy. 

I'm allowing myself one more try...sometime this week. 

Thanks for looking.

DO YOU EVER DRAW or PAINT in a SERIES? 

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Metamorphosis Monday

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All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, unless otherwise designated. I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions, posts or any products shown or anywhere I shop.

Thanks ALWAYS for visiting!

I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question. Please don't use my photos without my permission.

 Sandi Magle

OldNewGreenRedo

Using Gesso as a 'Painting' medium or base.

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While gardening and cleaning out flower beds, I was just getting rid of the really dead stuff, I collected some interesting bits and pieces.

Three very brown dried Hydrangea blossoms

A Long dried stem of HollyHock. The seeds weren't even exposed as blossoms and had dried on the stem un- opened.

and 2 branches of Chinese lanterns were dried green before they even turned orange. I planted 1 package maybe 4 years ago and they show up everywhere as a weed now.

I plopped them in my thick weird glass pitcher (squared fence picket pressed glass). 

The pitcher is before 1891 and made by King Son Glass Co. in Pittsburgh, Pa. It's weird and chunky, thick but that wonderful slightly blued/green/clear glass of that period.

The pitcher is very heavy, but the dark hydrangeas...really visually weigh a bit themselves.

I chose a large sheet of Water Color paper and used the back rougher side.

In an attempt to loosen up---I scribbled with yellow, turquoise and gray(silvery) watercolor gel sticks. I love using these as you can erase your lines simply by painting water on them and the colors mix well with regular wc. 

The gray mushy stuff is textured gesso which I lightly tinted with gray and smeared on with a serrated plastic carry-out knife. I wanted to get some texture going on this piece...all the petals being so tactile. I even dabbed gesso on with my finger tip to give the feeling of round petals.

Closeup on the pitcher and thick glass and a stray lantern on the table. 

My limited palette was made from Cadmium Yellow Med, Carmine, Ultra Purple, Viridian, and Van Dyke Brown--a rich deep almost black brown which I used for the dried up leaves and mixed with so many of the washed out earthy colors. All the colors on the sheet were mixed from those 5 colors.

I didn't paint everything brown and went more for imagined light source on slightly green foliage and flowers. 

It's very busy, but I enjoyed working on top of the gel sticks, and the slight shimmer of the gray gel stick was perfect for the glass. I painted out 99% of the white paper again, only leaving the glass void of some paint.

I named this 'Last Bouquet', in honor of the end of summer. 

I think I will try the same vase and flowers on larger paper with more 'AIR' around it and even looser...maybe with different colors. I guess we will see. I'll also use gesso more and maybe with more fingers!!

Happy Painting!

If You enjoyed this post please FOLLOW IT in the upper right hand corner, to get just one email of each AD-Free post.

I will post at the following Link Parties, I hope you visit them.

Love Your Creativity

Metamorphosis Monday

All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, unless otherwise designated. I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions, posts or any products shown or anywhere I shop.

Thanks ALWAYS for visiting!

I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question. Please don't use my photos without my permission.

 Sandi Magle

OldNewGreenRedo

Midwest Gardening: Favorite Zucchini Breads and Muffins

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With the crazy rains we had and heat this year, itsy bitsy zucchini one day, were submarines the next. 

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Here's a few SUBMARINE Zucchinis that were lurking where you couldn't see them.

There is nothing wrong with large Zucchini and they make the best bread and muffins when shredded.

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I had this nice clean kitchen, so I just had to mess it up!

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We love fresh baked breads and muffins, mostly because I can control the sugar and fat in them and add more spices for flavor instead of fat and sugar.

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Our Christmas gift last year was a new chopper---and boy does it do a great job on Zucchini, I pushed in large pieces of cleaned and seeded Zucchini in the hopper.

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And this is what we ended up with. That's like a  quart and a half of shredded Zucchini.

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Here you can see the process. I had 3 big Zucchinis to shred. The bowl in the middle is the waste which will go into the compost pile.

I bag my Zucchini into 4 cup bags---Most of my recipe's call for 3 cups---but when it thaws there is so much water, that the 4 cups become 3 drained. When using fresh just follow the recipes, no need to drain.

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Garden waste for the compost pile. We compost everything but meats, oil waste and banana peels. I also avoid strawberries and other berries because you can't control berry plants once they get going.

Here are my now for my favorite Zucchini recipes:

These were super nummy!

I've made these with corn/canola oil instead of butter..and still delicious, I use 1/2 whole wheat flour, and I've used plain milk, or almond milk for those who are dairy free. Totally delicious.

I did a huge batch of these today...if I'm going to mess up the kitchen, I'm going to really mess it up.

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I've added unsweetened coconut instead of nuts, nummy. I also use unbleached and whole wheat pastry flour and add vanilla.

These are quite sweet, if I want to I use a simple powder sugar glaze instead of frosting. I use the darkest chips I can find...small ones get lost in these though.

My favorite recipe---tried and true.

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Zucchini Bread or Muffins. 

this recipe is from the 60's...still nummy and upca

2 cups of grated Zucchini (skins and all)

1 c. of oil (canola or corn works fine)

3 beaten eggs

1 tsp or more vanilla

3 cups of flour ( I use 1/2 unbleached 1/2 whole wheat)

1 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

1+ tsp. Cinnamon

1/2 T grated lemon or orange peel or 1 Tbsp lemon juice

when I use orange peel I add 1/2 tsp of nutmeg.

optionals

1 cup chopped nuts or unsweetened coconut

1 cup of raisins or other dried fruits

I've substituted 1/3 of the sugar with unsweetened apple sauce, which brings down the sugar in these and add 1 cup of slow cooking oats to it also.  I've used this recipe for muffins also! Don't be afraid to fool around with recipes...just remember you need baking soda with any kind of fresh fruit.

Breads Bake at 350 60-70 minutes, 

Muffins 25-30 minutes

Makes 2 bread pans or LOTS of muffins.

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Apologies to anyone I stole these recipe's from, sorry I just clip and file them and I usually change them anyway. 

Hugs and Happy Zucchini Baking!

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I will post at the following Link Parties, I hope you visit them.

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LouLou's Girls

All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, unless otherwise designated. I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions, posts or any products shown or anywhere I shop.

Thanks ALWAYS for visiting!

I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question. Please don't use my photos without my permission.

 Sandi Magle

OldNewGreenRedo

Gardening, Canning, and Self-Analyzing my Art.

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Well, I'm on my 10th day of Covid, I'm negative now, but still YUGGY!

Poor Hubby is hacking away and still +...all our big plans have been cancelled for two weekends, and we are going to have the Fish Boil next week if everyone tests negative.

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I have been in the garden this week. I did an 8 pint jars batch of Sauce; Hot peppers, garlic, onions, peppers and tomatoes...with lemon juice and salt. 

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Tomatoes taste fabulous this year, but they are just small and dense...crazy hot weather made everything stop producing for weeks. I didn't skin them, but blended the sauce with my creamer/blender.

We've had tons of rain, so every plant, bush, and flower is huge, but the veggie blossoms were too wet to be pollinated. Pickles are now drying up with crazy shaped weird cucumbers still on the vine. I never even did any fresh pickles made.

 The Crookneck bumpy Squash has been prolific and tasty. Last night we had small ones hollowed out and loaded with chopped Zucchini and squash seasoned and tossed with oil and Balsamic and roasted in the toaster/airfryer. NUM! I use salt free seasoning mixes and just a splash of Balsamic vinegar.

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Zucchinis of course are not there one day and then submarines the next. I don't think we will get any Beets, Chard or Carrots unless the large planters produce...it's so thick in there with squash leaves, who knows. Surprisingly the 'Broccoli has been good even with the heat. 

So much for vegetable gardening. 

Hubby has projects going (left for over a week) painting the back deck a dark forest green to give it a couple of more years of life. We will be doing paving stones professionally in the future, and repairing this and that. He has a new wire fence wall for the East side(for critter proofing----LOL), sitting and waiting for the mesh.

I managed to get the porch finally cleaned and cleared with the cooler weather, but I only seem to be able to do a couple of hours of anything.

In the studio....well...I'm taking an additional 10-day class with Louise Fletcher...in finding your style, finding what you like-through exercises and some serious analyzing of what you accomplish in class or don't. 

Do you paint/draw for yourself?---or others? 

Do you give a single bit about what others think?

What do you like about your work? 

What do you Dislike?

She asks some tough questions, and since I have no intention of ever selling anything...I do it for myself...but ....do I????

I share with you, for validation or to share the experience? 

Questions, Questions, Questions????

The classes are  supplemented with Q&A sessions as well as a sharing work on an FB private group. Golly I'm amazed at how so many students have such SERIOUS ANGST about putting fricking lines on a paper....jeesh! Louise's entire emphasis is on PLAY to see what you like doing? Interestingly it was the blind self portraits that people were angsting about...looking in a mirror at your own reflection...really!

Anyway, What I have learned so far.

I'm finding out...I don't like black (I already knew that) and I don't like white paper showing(I really don't like that). I love line/color movement and some sort of balance or composition. I love COLORS--all kinds of color. I love working in more than one media at the same time. I really work fast....so fast I am done far ahead of the timed sessions end. Here's a peek at a one of the studies.

15 minuted each, a Limited palette to mix your own colors, realistic subject matter, I chose watercolors as my main medium. No. 3-4 we added another drawing mediums first...then paint.

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My set up...with all the finished pieces. Each one was less than 15 minutes...except the last one was 14:50.

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No. 1...I was too caught up in the patterned cloth...and watercolor mushes when you work too fast and runs into each other. I was using colors full strength and too much water...so the colors are fighting each other.

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No.2 I worked in more simplified layers and got everything under control? I was compelled to paint blue/gray in the background...If I work on this further I will totally darken the background do a very dark shade.  I like the movement in the red cloth...the leaves are-Eh!

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No. 3 We added an additional drawing medium here (I chose watercolor gel sticks...which was the turquoise and bright yellow)-t

(These sticks break down in water and I LOVE THEM!)

The pitcher/pot got some attention and some gray/black/white treatment. My last bit was the dark green lines here and there...I like the mixing of the green/brown which was the red, blue and yellow mixed together. I actually left the white background...but, so want to paint it brown...lol.

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No. 4 Well by now I felt I had explored the horizontal, so I flipped the paper vertical.

The pot was worked/clarified with water color pencil and the wc gel sticks are the base of the leaves. I am happy with the stoneware/white glaze on the pot and actually left some paper white. I like the leaves in this one, using the red/green to create the brownish tones...bits of the dark green surfaced here also, and I would use more of that if I had time. This one was right down to the end of the 15 minute limit. I also like the red balance on this one...amazing how a color can take over a piece, and here the red doesn't.

MOST IMPORTANT...I'm learning to STOP when I am done, or satisfied....and not having to ponder on what to do next. Setting a piece aside and then going on to the next idea...on another paper. I think I will work everything in a series now, exploring what works and what doesn't. I'm still analyzing all my other class work with Louise, we have quite few projects yet to go. So that will be later...

Besides all the analyzing today, I used up a bunch of scraps and paper samples, cards, cardstock, printer paper, various papers ripped from sketchbooks, some with marks or splaxhes  and Aged/Altered them from techniques from Graphics Fairy in her Aging Papers series.  She really does share so much, I know she has a paid subscription, but I have been following her freebies for probably 10 years...and what a trip it's been. 

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The finished papers with the warm tones and neutrals with greens will be perfect for Fall projects. The Papers have coffee washes, washes made from Pthalo Green, black, Cadmium Yellow Deep, Pthalo Blue, Lemon Yellow Lt, splatters and lots of energy. I can't wait to use them in Collages and Drawings. 

I think once a week, I will just paint pieces for chopping up...for other works. Great way to utilize...mistakes, messes, and odd bits of papers. 

Well, that's it for today...Have a great holiday weekend, we are in quarrantine...so who knows what else will get done. New Mantra

Please Paint for Yourself!

I will try and respond to every comment and answer every question. 

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All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own unless identified, I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions, posts or any products shown.  

 Please do not use photos without linking back to this blog without my permission.  

Thank you for your cooperation, 
Sandi 

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