Becoming an Artist

Untitled. Abstract following composition #11, trying to find some peace and joy in these crazy times. This morning I woke up angry. It started with the crow at 5 a.m., and I never got back to sleep. But really it might have been the day before, when I went to work in my studio and decided on four things I wanted to get done. I tackled the hard one first, a full-scale drawing for a "real" painting I'm working on. That took an hour and a half, at which time I was tired, hungry, and had a headache. I never got back to the studio to finish the other three. I enjoy drawing, and this morning when I looked at the drawing, it actually made me smile. So I'm not sure why I was so angry about my studio time yesterday. I drew on drawing paper instead of directly on my painting, so I can reuse it for future paintings. It was time well spent! I think my anger (maybe it's just frustration) has something to do with how "easy" making art is for everyone else and ho...

Trying different color approaches using open acrylics and composition #7. Recently I realized it might make sense for me to have three painting projects going on at a time: a landscape, a floral, and a still life to use as a vehicle to hone my skills. I've never been one to work on multiple paintings as I get confused (read frustrated) easily, and I haven't had enough time to work this way. (OK, I admit, I haven't prioritized enough time to do that. I could have easily fit in some art time by not watching Big Bang Theory reruns.) Trying two versions of my scene, one that focuses on the sky and one that focuses on the land.  Here's the interesting part—I'm already starting down this path, almost by accident. I finished composition #9, which is round two of trying to figure out a scene from Arches National Park. I think I'm getting somewhere! I like the second version better, which surprised me as it was the sky that originally drew me to the scene....

So much for posting every day, for doing a daily composition. I am moving forward but being kind to myself when my progress is slow. When I wasn't working on my compositions because I was—once again—discouraged, I spent several hours loading my photos from my new camera into the classic version of Lightroom. I had been using the cloud version, was frustrated, and my husband had determined that the desktop version would suit both our purposes better. So I had a chance to revisit my 500+ photos from our trip to Arches National Park over Christmas. I also applied the "auto" filter to many of the photos, and poof, like magic, the photos were taken from good to amazing. I have some really good photos in the bunch! It got me to thinking, why aren't I satisfied with the photos as a means of artistic expression? Why do I want to paint from them? What can I not express by printing/sharing the photos that I want to express via painting? And furthermore, what do I want to ex...

Over Christmas we spent three days in Moab. Glorious. Arches National Park is one of my favorite places in this country (not that I've seen everything I want to see yet). We both had new cameras and set out to capture this beautiful park. We first entered on Christmas day after a fresh snowfall. No one was there, literally. So amazing. I didn't do any sketching or creative journaling when we were there and I regret that now, five months later. I wish I had captured my feelings there and then; now I have to rely on memory. Both weak. Need to try again. It would have been so easy to do one of these composition sketches right there, in the car, with the scene directly in front of me. Then pull out my mini travel watercolor set and capture some of the colors and values that were intriguing to me, along with a few words to describe the joy I was feeling. But I didn't. It was cold, it would take time, I just wanted to "be" and not do. About a month ago, working ...

And the winner is, #9! This morning I reread the first chapter in Patti Mollica's book, How to Paint Fast, Loose, and Bold , in preparation for today's composition practice. I have to admit, doing the pear again sounded pretty boring and I really wasn't looking forward to it, but I'm SO BORED of the day in and day out sameness of sheltering in place that I decided my daily composition couldn't be any worse. Besides, I was curious about one of the methods Mollica suggests: using white and black drawing tools on gray paper. I knew I had bought a gray sketchbook last year that I'd never used; took 30 minutes to find it. And I remembered the cutest Conte Crayon stocking stuffer I had bought, I don't know, 10 years ago and had never used (seeing a pattern here?), and luckily we still had a pear in the house. (By the way, I've been drawing Packham pears, which are quite oddly shaped.) Today I decided to work in a square format, thinking that maybe, eve...

Composition #6. Unclear values; boring arrangement. Ended my five-day streak and took a day off from these maddening compositions. The next day, for composition #6, I set up my three Roshi teapots and lit them from the side to noodle on an idea I've had rolling around in my head. These teapots are HEAVY. And when I think of them, I think solid, strength, reliability. I thought a horizontal composition would support that concept. An hour later, I had a three-value drawing with five values, an awkward light pattern that seemed inexplicable, no focal area, and an idea that's a dud. Even my husband thought the layout was a tad boring (he was trying to be supportive). UGH. The only good thing was that I got to draw my teapots, which I enjoyed greatly. The one on the left looks like a cantaloupe, the middle is a beautiful grayed violet, and the tiny one on the right is a patterned white. Luckily for me, a book I ordered several weeks ago, to help me learn acrylics, arrived: H...

For composition #5, I searched the backyard again. (I miss Sycamore Grove park.) Not much in the backyard, especially at 4 pm, before the sun is low in the sky. This morning I had reread the section on armature in Ian Roberts' book, and I was looking for an armature that would hold my daily composition together. Something easy, preferably. Composition #4, with mutated chair. It turns out I had used a triangle armature (converging lines) without even thinking about it in my single pear composition (the two lines where the table top meets the wall). And my area of interest fell on those lines. These are all good things. I just wish I had done them on purpose instead of by accident. So when I set out to find something to work on in the backyard, I kept the possible armatures from the book in my head. There were some nice shadows across the patio and sliding glass door, so I positioned one of our patio chairs in the light, half shade, half shadow, creating (so I thought), a ni...

Composition #4. I think this one works.  Yesterday I realized that I had messed up my values after seeing the black & white photo, but it turns out, I was only partly to blame. It was that red filter I used to help me see the values. Turns out that a red filter doesn't see value in red the same way as it sees other colors. Probably something about wavelengths of light, but I don't want to study that right now. For my still life, I had used a red sheet of paper for part of the background, and the filter read that a lot lighter than it actually was. My quick, small acrylic painting. Finally, I get the composition/painting duo done in one session. A quick Google search reveals that a lot of artist use TWO filters, a red and a green. I suppose that makes sense, for instance, in the case of landscapes, where one scene could have a lot of trees and another could have a lot of red land (Sedona!). I might buy a green one to add to my art kit, but then again, maybe after c...

Grayscale photograph of simple still life.  I've been rereading Carol Marine's book (and thinking I should change back to oils as acrylics are only slightly easier than watercolors) and came across her three-value wording: dominant, secondary, and smidge. Of course, everyone talks about mama, papa, baby (which I first read in Tony Couch's amazing book, Watercolor: You Can Do It ). So I set about to create a very simple still life to force three distinct values, each being of a different size. This was more of a challenge than I thought it would be! Composition #3. The intention was that the light value be "dominant," the dark value be "secondary,"  and the medium value be the "smidge." OOPS. And composition #3 STILL took me 30 minutes to draw/shade (plus another 15 minutes to set up the still life). Here's my critical voice chirping in...I'm not happy with the drawing; wish it were more accurate. But the values! Now I'm c...

Oh, values. The bane of my art existence. Why can't I get this? We're talking basics here, but I just can't seem to translate what I see/want to paint into something that is effective from a value point of view. So for composition #2, I dug into my plein air bag (dusty from long storage), and pulled out some tools I bought years ago and never really used: the EASyL Viewfinder and ValueComp from Artwork Essentials. Composition #2. Started as a rectangle but the value masses looked better in a square format. Since it was a beautiful spring day and we're still under shelter-in-place rules, I walked around the backyard with the red film to my face until something came into view where I could see three distinct values (light, medium, dark). It actually wasn't easy to find. Most everything was mid-tone. Anything I would have considered painting in the past was mid-tone. Even light shading an object was not enough to create a "value mass," as Ian Roberts s...

So, reader, let's jump right in. It's week six (or so) of California's shelter in place for Covid-19 and after much thinking, journaling, dabbling, I've decided once and for all I want to "figure out" this art stuff or quit. Well, maybe not quit, but at least decide not to be a "real" artist and instead just play. The problem is, it's not in my nature to just play. Composition #1. My drawing skills are rusty, to say the least. Here's the plan I've been using for years, which really hasn't been working: order more books, watch more videos, buy more online classes, take more in-person classes, try this method and that method, get confused, go insane; repeat. But with all this time on my hands and no outside distractions, I've had a chance to ponder, what do all these other artists I admire have in common? I've decided it's a dedication, a plan, a method of self-study. So I've borrowed from a few of my heroes, and I...