Painting trade

Next Monday, the fine ladies from class are coming over for a lunch and painting trade. We've been trading journals for awhile, but this time we are going to trade a painting, 12" or smaller. I'm kind of excited. These ladies paint in oil, acrylic, watercolor, etc. So, who knows what we'll get. I'll post pictures of the luncheon and the paintings traded next week.

The ATC

Today, I've been doing a million errands and small jobs. And as it is officially "Be A Total Jerk At the Grocery Store Because YOU Are The Only One Who Still Needs Something For Thanksgiving" season, I've needed to do small things to make me happy. Today I worked on a few ATC's in between laundry, raking leaves, shopping, etc etc. If you're not familiar, the ATC is the Artist Trading Cards. There are a lot of ways to go with this little buggers. The only rule is that they are of a uniform size (2x3 inches) and that they are NOT for sale, they are for trade. Of course, there are artists out there who create such MAGNIFICENT works that they simply MUST sell them (note sarcasm) that you can sell them as limited edition some sort of nonsense or other.

Also, people do all kinds of things with these. From textiles, to collage, painting, sewing...you name it. I of course, just paint mine. And almost always in watercolor for the simplicity and speed.

Like my rant on 'journaling for journaling's sake, where people get so caught up in creating this masterpiece of work in a journal that will earn a spot in great libraries like Da Vinci's codex...again with the sarcasm. I think I'm hungry. Anyway. I think that the ATC should be a quick outlet to create something transient. After all, the point is to trade them away. Sometimes I work out compositions for larger works, or just play with color, or...whatever.

So, here are two that I did today. Enjoy.

A small one for warm up

Many of the artists I admire do several paintings a week. This can be a crutch in itself not unlike my little rant on sketchbooks and ATCs, but those whom I admire paint this often because thier style lends itself to it. My paintings can take anywhere from a week or two to a year. But I try to complete a few small ones once in a while to keep loose and reconnect with color and just have fun with paint. Here is yesterday's.

Small Pears (Oil on canvas 5x5)

The holiday rush begins

The fall weddings are over. The Halloween party is over. Thanksgiving is a week away. If we wait until we have 'time' to paint, it will never happen.

I find myself jumping between oils and watercolor (didnt I ever learn that oil and water dont mix?). Also, I find I waffle between works that take weeks and 'paint a day' type work. I have the time, I wish I had the tenacity to finish a work, even a small work, every day or two.

Here is one of my latest. I rarely paint anything with a thought to it's given ending location. Usually I dont paint for myself anyway, but in this case, I needed something to go over our couch. The room has a lot of roses in it. I am also spoiled in that the house itself often has roses as I have the most generous husband in the world. So, the subject, the color, the size...all came together. Sure, I'd include it in a show and even sell it if the opportunity arose, but for the time being...it's already found its home. I hope you enjoy it.

(Olive Roses. Oil. 36x36)

Monochromatic Painting

This week the task was to create a monochromatic painting. This is a 36 x 36 oil with only Windsor and Newton's Olive green and Titanium White. Now the technique that I like to teach with the 'seven steps' used by the Old Masters is similar, but I kind of combined steps 3 and 4 and used white in what would have been my underpainting. My monitor is a bit screwy and I think the ratio is off so everything looks stretched horizontally to me. Hopefully, this looks alright. enjoy.

Today's painting

This is today's practice painting. I'm doing a larger painting that features this peeled orange and I thought it'd be fun to do a small study. It's 5x7 oil.

The rest of the painting has one of my favorite bowls. A small silver bowl with a blue laquered interior. I like the green background. I may use it for the large painting as well.

I spent some of this afternoon browsing through a book about the Dutch masters. I'm quite partial to the portraits and especially the still lifes. I dont know that I'd ever try one of those complicated fru-fru flower ones, but I love the variety of surfaces in the paintings. Big pewter tankard, silver dish, always a peeled orange for some reason. sometimes bugs or a dead fish. Not sure the point of the bugs or fish. But...I love the look and I love the challenge of the different textures.

So...just thought I'd post todays work while the big one is in progress.

Christmas in August

First...here's a tiny fellow on the easel right now.

I walked out to the mailbox today and when I opened it up, there was a bright light and angelic singing... Turns out, it was the Blick 2010 Art Supply Catalog. Woohoo.
It was reminiscent of those days when that huge Sears catalog would arrive and I'd sit somewhere comfy and look at every page of the toy section and dog ear pages and make a note for my Christmas list. Yesterday was kind of like that. I made a cup of tea and curled up in the big chair and dived in.
Some people might flip right to the oil paint page, or the canvas, or to printing supply. Not me. I look at every page. I read every description of the product. There are paint companies that I didnt know existed. There are ones I thought were long out of business. There are ones that probably SHOULD be out of business. I scan paints I never heard of to see how much their Cobalt Blue was (always the pricey one).
I think we as artists can easily get stuck in a groove. I use THIS paint, and THIS brush and THIS canvas or whatever and we forget to look around at all that is possible. Forget that there are new advances and old techniques. New equipment and old favorites.
Through the years, I switched mediums every few years or so. I did charcoal, then pen and ink, then ink like watercolor, then pastels, colored pencils, illustration, still life, animals, portraits, abstracts....The bad part of that was that sometimes I feel that I dont have a particular 'style'. That if I showed 20 works in a variety of the range that I can do...people wouldnt necessarily be able to say, "ah, that's a Karen May...I like her work). For example, I recently showed 4 works at a financial centers open house shindig. I went to the open house and listened to people tell me what artwork they liked and yadayada. More than one person said "I really like these" (pointing to my 2 photorealistic oils), but I also like those (across the room were two oil landscapes that I'd done). I was flattered that they picked out my work as their favorites, but they had no idea that they were the same artist.
Anyhoo...I digress. I think that we should remember to look around and try new things. It doesnt have to be goofy and dangerous or expensive...just pick up some oil pastels for a change and sketch. Grab a travel watercolor set and do a few florals. God forbid...pick up a pencil and practice drawing again.
The catalog keeps me in touch with that. Just look at what's out there. Every new page and section I was like "ooooh....ahhhhh". What's next? what havent I tried? Silverpoint? Encaustic?
I am like the buffet at the Belagio. Give me some of EVERYTHING!!!!