Showing posts with label colored pencils. Show all posts
Showing posts with label colored pencils. Show all posts

Sunday, September 14, 2025

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

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










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Saturday, June 14, 2025

Creative Mindfulness with Casey: Peru Inspirations.

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We have had two Creative Mindfulness Mather classes this month with Casey with prompts from Peruvian Art.

Mather Classes
Mather classes


Casey took a trip to Peru in May...and came back so excited about all the arts, fabrics, scenery of the country which she will be sharing for the month of June. 


Mather classes

Our first class on Peru was Rainbow Mountain or Mt. Cuzco, Peru. Yes, this is a real place. There are a ton of photos on this location, and it seems the colors are different certain times of the year. The shot on the right is an actual photo...and you can see the tiny people at the base of the red part, walking. Left is Casey's take on the scene.

Yes, the hues can be very bright, depending on the angle of the sun and time of year. 
Here is a clip of a Pinterest photo...

Pinterest

I love the jacket that has all the colors and variations in it similar to the hills. The colors occur because of all the minerals in the different layers that were upheaveled when Teutonic plates converged and created the Andes mountains.

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Anyway, our prompt was to draw our own mountain, and hills, background and sky and fill in each layer with whatever color we wanted.

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Creative Mindfulness is all about getting lost in your work, and filling in all the stripes of my mountain with pencils was very soothing. I might try a water color in the future,  I  increased the width of the lines in the foreground, to give an idea of detail and closer proximity, and used more faded colors in the background hills. I scribbled the sky and clouds without any details.

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I used black Sharpies, pencil, eraser, and colored pencils, and later watercolor washes.

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I do love becoming lost in a project...it's the journey not the destination.

The next week, we had something entirely different.
HANDWOVEN FABRICS. 

Here I used a few pencils, markers, and some water color washes, and I chose to tape off some straight lines...because I simply can't make a long straight line....LOL.

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The patterns are from weavings in clothing and rugs. Peru is known for it's Alpacas and Lamas and some sheep, and the gorgeous uses of natural dyes and colors.


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We were encouraged to make lines, similar to the ones on the left example.

mather classes

A black and white breakdown of all the images in the block patterns was provided on a worksheet. 
Mather handout

Enlargement of some of the motifs used in the fabric example. These showed the simplicity of the images. I chose to use some for my blocks, as well as horizontal dividing bars to break up the designs. Again this was a starting point for our own take on the patterns.

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I used a light sticky tape for my 3/8" lines...way easier to do than drawing long straight lines and protecting the surface from my screwups while adding my designs.
 I didn't remove the tape until all the drawings and coloring with pencils was done. Once removed, I washed all the areas with earth-toned subdued watercolor washes.

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The muted washes filled in all the blank spaces and didn't overtake any of the pencil sketching. I did add the shading on the stripes afterward with pencils as they were too blank for the rest of the design. I criss-crossed my brushstrokes to give the idea of warp and weft. Here you can see where I removed my outside tape and then just had to add one more swoop of the brush.

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The larger images on the right and left edges were what I imagined would be on a rug. 

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I took some of the motifs from the right and enlarged them for the outside left, and similar for the right side. Again, experimenting with my take on the subject. 

Mather Classes

I really love these Mather Classes for the different artists/artforms we explore each week. I really enjoyed both of these artforms and the information on Peruvian art.

Again, Mather Senior Classes are free on Zoom for 
Seniors over 55....and are available, HERE. 
I appreciate the interaction and being able to ask questions, share on a community facebook page...and most important LEARN new techniques and materials, in a safe and congenial space. The instructors I've had,  are all Art Therapists and excellent.

Have you ever done 
Artwork from a vacation trip? 


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.  














 

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Thursday, October 24, 2024

Mather Class: Creative Mildfullness.

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October has been a "Life's Challenges"or "Hell in a Hand-basket" sort of month, as Auntie Nana used to say. Her other favorite saying was, "Cat's-Asstrophe", which was the Iowa-way of mild swearing. Me, today I would use the full blown F---K October with an extra Kick-in-the-A-S/pants.

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We had a dear friend take seriously sick and pass away in a matter of 15 days or so. Honestly a  blessing in disguise. BUT, my Hubby is executor for his messed up 'Will' which got signed, but the attorney is in a different county than the Friend, or us, so it is now all in Filing Limbo waiting for a judge to certify it.

Meanwhile, we had his property to take care of and his animals, too. Arrangements had been made following the will, but neither location was aware of our friend's wishes. UGH. So literally Cats'-Asstrophes and Parrot's-Asstrophe, as we scrambled for proper places for these sweet creatures. We did and they are doing well.

We personally don't have animals now, because we are too old. Our kids have allergies, and we are toddering around barely upright now in our late 70's, so having animals just isn't a safe or good idea. Making accurate plans for your animals is a must, with arrangements made ahead of time.

And, in the middle of all this, 5 days after the friend passes---I have heart surgery! Gracious, I'm doing fine---but with all kinds of restrictions. So, I'm more into the Chicago type of Profanity at this point.

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Monday, I finally get to take my Mather Creative Mindfulness class, which is an experiment in being in the moment and relaxing, which I really needed.  

The class begins with an emptying your mind relaxation exercise, which I definitely needed. Monday was a week after my surgery, and my muscles and mind were still pretty wrought up. 

However once my creative juices start flowing--- LOOK OUT! 

This particular class was arranged around aspirations-You know those, "I'm brave, wonderful, and competent," etc.- BS.

Well, I don't do aspirations. Life is complicated enough without having to follow resolutions, aspirations, or more rules and goals to fail at. I'm more of a kind of "Go with the Flow" girl, always managing with plans B through F. When it gets to the G-plan,  ...I sort of stutter and stumble a lot. 

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One of the class suggestions was to start your project with  ripped magazine words, artwork or phrases to start your process. These are inherited publications from a friend. Definitely OLD and REDO.

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We only had an hour, and I started 15 minutes before and ripped my little heart out and start pasting this and that on a large page of Water color paper when we were to begin.

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12x18 Canson rough side

The class TIME always goes pretty fast, and I pasted a load of bits of mind-bursts in some sort of order that might make sense, I even used a few photos of artwork, here and there, altered them and started my own scribbles with sharpie's and alcohol markers and then added some more color with colored pencils. 

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 And faster than you can say POOP, our hour was up. We ended with another relaxation session and some poems about Fall. I ended up working another hour or so with markers and drawing details.

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Today, Thursday, I added more pencil, ink, and some layers of watercolor washes to bring down all the white tones. 

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When I removed my tape holding the paper, some stuck badly, so I washed all those rough edges in black, the textures of the torn edges was even more interesting.  

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The Final  Artwork.

I usually never use black in any of my artwork, but this POP-ART style sort of demanded it. 

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 IF I framed this it would be with a black Mat and a black Frame and probably would put it down in my work room.
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But it really isn't ART, only my personalized process, which is far more important than the final result.

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Calling this, "Profane October".

I may chop this up into sections and use it somewhere else. It was a Fun Project! and I'm always surprised at the results.

 Materials I used:

Canson 12 x 18 watercolor paper

Magazine tear outs from these magazines I inheirited from a friend.

Gluestick- I had three old ones the Scotch one was the best.

Fineline markers and pens, Sharpie, etc.

Alcohol Markers -5 Below brand (LOVE THESE!)

Colored Pencils-PrismaColor (bought with 40 off coupon Michaels.

Watercolors-these came with my easel kit--I think they are semi opaque, so maybe a gouache type watercolor a just a bit grainy--(Michaels) Nice depth of color though.

I may Modge-Podge or spray seal this entire page. We will see, when it fully dries.

I'll keep you posted.


How's Your Week Going? 

Any Cat's-Asstrophes? '


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.

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







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