FEBRUARY PAINTING CHALLENGE / MARCH CHALLENGE REVEALED

The month of February even had an extra day this year and I managed to paint only two paintings! I had hoped to explore my challenge a little more but I think I will move on. I hope you enjoy the paintings that were sent to me by some of the followers of the blog inspired by this month's challenge.

For March, I wanted to start with a drawing and turn it into a painting. One of the exercises in the "Learning to Draw..a creative approach" by Kaupelis is my choice to start out the month. I may add additional drawing challenges later. Using watercolor paper, wet the paper (you can experiment with different degrees of wetness) and draw on the wet or damp paper with ink. You can use a pen or any instrument that will make a mark. You can use more than one drawing tool on the image. The wet paper will cause interesting effects. He suggests India Ink but I think I will use either acrylic ink or liquid Hydrus watercolor because I want to make a completed painting from this start. You can just do the drawing or continue to work with the image into a more finished piece.

I just received a great painting from Barb Sailor which is a more complicated variation on this idea. I am posting her description of the process she went through plus the image.

Hi Myrna,

Just wanted to send you this painting because I got the idea for the Elegant Writer from you and wanted to show you my results.

I finished this painting a couple of weeks ago. It was actually started about 4 years ago when I painted a picture of an Ohio barn with lots of trees in a sunset. I hated the painting and it has been sitting around for 4 years. A while ago I decided to cut up the painting into assorted squares and rectangles and glue it to a piece of illustration board fitting the pieces together into an abstract design mainly in the colors of a sunset. A couple weeks ago I collaged white tissue paper over the design and then, when it was dry, I dry-brushed white gesso over the top of the collaged tissue paper, catching the texture and allowing some of the sunset color to glow through. I then drew my portrait of the woman with a black Elegant Writer Calligraphy pen and completed the painting by spreading the black ink with watercolor brush and water and some davy's grey watercolor paint. My source for the drawing was the body of one person and the head of another which I cut and pasted on the computer to create a 'new' person.

Thank you for the creative idea.

Regards,

Barbara Sailor



You might want to try a painting of your own with this idea. If you think of other variations that interest you, go for it! This challenge is meant to be a stimulus for creativity. Let the March madness begin!

MORE TRAVEL SKETCHES

A last minute decision found me back on a plane to meet up with my siblings in Denver. We haven't all been together for a long time. I will be turning around and going back to Denver next Tuesday to teach a workshop in Littleton next Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I printed out a number of photos of George James which I took in the workshop so I would have something to work on during the trip. I choose to draw with a pen so I cannot erase. Each drawing is an attempt to correct the errors I noticed in the last drawing. I like to draw over and over rather than erase and erase. This way you have to redraw everything and consider every line in relation to the whole. You can see how each drawing gets more a more accurate likeness.

While I was in Denver, we went to the bookstore so I could get an Artist Magazine for my sisters and brother. While I was there I discovered another drawing book by Robert Kaupelis called "Learning to Draw..A creative approach". It has some wonderful drawing exercises plus examples of master drawings and student drawings. If you are struggling with drawing or want to do something more interesting than these "atelier" type of images, you will fall in love with this book. I can't wait to try some of the ideas.

Tomorrow is the last day of the month. I will post the paintings people sent me recently and reveal the next challenge.

ANOTHER SATURATED WET PAINTING

This is a painting I did after the workshop in Michigan. It is of my youngest son, Joel, when he was about 5 and in his Halloween costume. This painting was accepted into the California Watercolor Society national show. The workshop in Michigan by Mr. Roycroft was an interesting one. Someone asked him if he learned his painting process from Nita Engle but he ignored the question. He does not give others credit. I try to always give credit whenever I can. I appreciate original ideas and think the owner deserves the credit. Passing on what we learn from others is also very important to keep the flow going. No two people will do anything exactly the same so there is no fear of "copying" in my mind. I am posting an interesting article I found on a blog called Creative Creativity: A Daily Guide To Creativity And New Ideas
Enjoy!


Don't Save Your Best Ideas For Later - Creativity Tip
Posted: 20 Feb 2008 10:29 PM CST
There's a concept floating around that each person gets only a limited number of ideas in their lifetime.
Well, maybe no one ever says it out loud, but they treat their own ideas that way.
Instead of using their great ideas as they have them, people squirrel them away and store them on an idea shelf in their heads where they gather dust. And there are only so many ideas you can fit on that shelf, so instead of constantly coming up with new ideas, they just wander over to the dusty mind shelf and look at the great ideas they've never used. Afraid that if they use them, there will be a terrible empty spot on the shelf that will never be filled.
But, we know that's wrong. The truth is that as soon as you use your best idea, you come up with a better idea. Burning through them quickly lets you cycle through ideas at top speed.
Even writing an idea down in a notebook will let you come up with a new idea. It's amazing what clearing your mind of a little clutter will do.
Do a little mind cleaning and act on all the "great ideas" that are sitting on your dusty idea shelf. I promise you, you'll have more great ideas than you can use in your lifetime.
And no one lives forever.
That's probably the best reason for using your best ideas right now!
(you know, death
Top Yourself!

Posted: 24 Feb 2008 02:24 PM CST
This is an extension of the last post, Don't Save Your Best Ideas For Later.
Don't be afraid to top yourself. Once you have successfully created something, your instinct will be to stay safe and only change the formula only slightly when you begin your next project.
Instead, why not top yourself every single time? Why not set your standard for each project so high that while you're working on it you can't possibly conceive of any way to improve upon it. Burn up the concept behind your work so totally that by the end it is curled up exhausted in the corner of your brain.
Of course, this way of working requires an act of faith on your part. It means every time you start work on something you are entering uncharted territory - traveling through the bits of ancient maps that said "here be dragons" or  "end of the world." It requires you to trust that you don't have a limited number of ideas and that you should parcel them out in tiny quantities in everything you do.
The phrase "Jumping the Shark" has made some people afraid to take chances this way. Inherent in its meaning is the idea that once a certain change is made, a concept or artist or actor or writer or series will never be good again. Truthfully, what kills most of these things is an extended lack of change that results in a gradual decline in quality and audience interest followed by a change forced from the outside onto a uninspired artist or team.
Instead of shark jumping, think about "Jump and a net will appear." Take a chance that you might fail because you are unsure about where your heading next. The universe takes care of artists who jump off of creative cliffs without looking. Besides, if it doesn't, you'll land right next to another steep cliff you can jump off of and keep jumping until that net does appear.
Take the artistic champ of topping yourself every single time.
Jump and a net will appear.

GALLERY CONCORD'S GUITAR

I was sitting at the Gallery Concord on Saturday. This was the first chance I had to see the guitar we are painting for a charity auction. The City of Concord is sponsoring this event. It is along the lines of the cows, hearts, horses and others that have been so popular in the past few years. We decided to have each member of the gallery create a small painting. These were reproduced and collaged on the guitar. The guitar is life size. Old used paint tubes and brushes were glued to the base. I think it is looking great. It needs to be varnished and then I think it will be done. My contribution is on the back. It is the little girl. You can see my signature. It will be interesting to see who bids on this piece and where it will wind up. During the promotion, it will be on display at the gallery. If you are in the area, stop by and see it up close.

CHENG KEE CHEE'S SATURATED WET TECHNIQUE FOR PORTRAITS

I have noticed on Sandy Maudlin and Rhonda Carpenter's blogs some beautiful paintings done in the saturated wet technique first introduced by Cheng Kee Chee, the master of this idea. I have developed a modified version for portraits that I thought I would share. I have not had the privilege of taking a workshop with Mr. Chee but learned this process from a workshop in Michigan from Roland Roycroft. I love his landscapes and wanted to learn how he did them, so I took a workshop vacation up in Michigan a few summers ago. I was not capable of mentally processing the way Roland does in his poured landscapes. He masks out both positive and negative shapes at the same time. My brain could not think this way. I could do one or the other, but not both at the same time. In the middle of the week Roland introduced the saturated wet technique and I fell in love with it. I always want to do portraits but I found that I could not wipe out accurately without some markers. I reasoned that if I drew the image on the page and then painted in the darks with a staining thalo blue I could then wash it off, soaking the paper and load it back up with beautiful rich color and wipe back out with accuracy because you could see the thalo blue on the paper. It worked!!! I love the unexpected color in untraditional places that this process produces. This image is from a photo that my father took of me as a little girl. I made the mistake of stapling the paper too close to the image so it is not able to go successfully under a mat. Perhaps I could trim the paper and float the image. It is these small details we need to keep in mind or they will trip us up in the final result.

PAINTINGS FROM GEO. JAMES WORKSHOP

I hope everyone enjoys the slide show. I didn't get the full names of a few of the participants. The images are reversed, and the color is slightly off but you can still see the beauty and variety. It was such a fun group of people to spend time with. One person came down from Oregon for the opportunity to work with Prof. James. I have put my painting in the slide show and also posted it above. I like the color and value shifts. I had fun with the figures. They are from some of my figure drawings. The imagery in the painting is strange but it was fun experimenting with the ideas of paint application and light and dark patterns. Check out Sandy Maudlin's blog. http://www.sandymaudlin.blogspot.com/ She has shared some additional information for working with YUPO. As soon as I get a free moment, I want to try some of these techniques on the Tyvek.

GEORGE JAMES DEMO DARK LINKAGE & WHITE PASSAGE

Today was the last day of the George James workshop. Everything came together and people finished paintings with pretty amazing results for a workshop effort. I was able to photograph each one and I will post that slide show tomorrow. Today I am sharing the two small demos George did to explain his way of designing shapes. One strategy is to have dark shapes connecting through the painting. He calls this linkage. If you do the same with light shapes, he calls this passage. He demonstrated both. This is a concept I think I will be able to utilize in more of my paintings. It doesn't work if you are following the logic of how light works in the real world. He calls this "light logic". His method is arbitrary light and dark shapes with a focus on design and contrast. You create a very different kind of painting using this idea.

The second part of his morning discussion dealt with entering competitions and the jurying process. I found this information very very valuable. He described the heirarchy of types of shows. Starting with local shows, then regional, national and lastly international. The competition increases as you move up in the heirarchy. The awards also increase. The larger the prize money, the tougher the competition.

There are two types of judging. One is a single judge and the other is multiple judges. A single judge has more time to look at the slides and review them to make his decision. In this case, where your slide was in the pack was not very critical. When there are multiple judges, they all get together and decide at one time. George noticed that the judges were being hyper critical of the first few trays to insure a top notch show. If there are 3 judges, then if all 3 vote yes the painting is in, if 2 vote yes it may be reviewed if they need more paintings after the first round of viewing is done. If only one or no judges vote yes, the painting is out. George decided to send his slides into competitions somewhere in the middle of the receiving dates to position his slide past the first trays because the slides are placed in the slide trays in order of being received.

If you are accepted into the National Watercolor Society, you have the option of sending in an additional 3 paintings in mats to be reviewed by a panel. If they feel your work is up to the society standards, they will grant you signature membership. I always thought it was a separate viewing from the painting in the show by a different group of people than those who selected the show paintings. It turns out they put a slide of the painting accepted into the show on the wall and then place the additional 3 paintings underneath that so they are seeing all 4 at one time. Therefore, it is best to have all 4 related in subject matter and definitely of the same degree of excellence.

The other piece of information I found interesting is that the American Watercolor Society has quotas on how many signature members can be in their yearly national show. They are competing against each other for these slots. That way there are always opportunities for the unaffiliated entries to be accepted.

George shared how he evaluates slides submitted for a show where he is the single judge. This is his method and not necessarily the way all judges do it.
He receives the submitted slides which have been placed in order of being received. He views them at his home and can take as much time as he needs to decide. He is given the total number of paintings he can accept for the show. This number is related to the exhibition space available. Let's say there are 700 entries and space for 100 paintings. The first thing he does is go through the slides and get a feel for the range of SUBJECT matter. The next thing he looks at is CRAFT (how well painted)
Next he pares it down to 200 paintings. If more than one slide was permitted to be entered per person, he eliminates all but one per person. Now, to get it down to the exact number of paintings for the show, he looks for STRONG DESIGN, STRONG COLOR and UNIQUENESS. The juror is always working towards a balanced show in terms of subject matter and styles of painting.