Two-tone

Today I felt like painting in watercolor only (no pen outline), and I wanted to find the colors in the brights and shadows, preferably using as few as possible. So I painted this girl almost exclusively in Opera Pink and Prussian Blue, with the exception of a few Indian Yellow skin tones, and the eyes and hair. And even those have undertones.

It turned out fairly successfully, although I initially planned for the blouse to be white lace; I should have stopped and thought it through better and painted it in only shades of gray. In trying to distinguish the see-through parts from the solid parts by also using the pink and blue, it became a little busy and also not at all like white lace! But I'm pretty happy with the subtle and delicate tones of the face.

The background is another story—someday I will learn to paint a nice solid smooth wash, but today is not that day. I painted it a darker shade of the blue and then, when it dried all blotchy, went over it with a coat of Payne's Grey, purposely making it streaky, like that's what I planned. Shhh, don't tell anyone.

"BluePink Girl"—pencil and Paul Jackson watercolors (and a teensy bit of white gel pen) on Fluid 140-lb. coldpress watercolor paper, 9x12 inches.

Opal Lee, the portrait

I guess I wasn't done with Juneteenth or with Miss Opal Lee; and this one came together pretty effortlessly. I wanted to incorporate the colors that represent Juneteenth, which are red, yellow, green, and black, so I did a tricolor stripe across the wet page as the underlayer. My original plan was to paint around the figure with black gesso once I was done with everything else, so that the other colors only appeared in the figure; but once I was done I decided that would be too dark, and anyway I liked what the colors were doing around the edges.

The saying is not something (that I am aware) that Opal Lee specifically said; but it's definitely true, given the persistence with which she has spoken up to get our government to recognize Juneteenth as a national holiday.

"Juneteenth Opal"—Daler Rowney inks, pencil, watercolors, Uniball pen, Signo white gel pen, on Fluid 140-lb. coldpress watercolor paper, 9x12 inches.

Opal Lee and Juneteenth

My librarian friend Susan Minobe is always up on the latest news on the internet, and she posted an article about Opal Lee, the 94-year-old activist who walked for miles—literally and figuratively—for decades to bring attention to Juneteenth and petition for it to be a federal holiday. On Thursday, she was invited to the White House to see President Biden sign that dream into law.

For those who don't know what Juneteenth is: The slaves in Texas were not told they were free for two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation freed them. So General Gordon Granger and 7,000 black troops marched from New York and New Jersey to Galveston, Texas, and on June 19th, 1865, he read out General Order #3 that said all slaves are free, and proclaimed that the Emancipation Proclamation would be enforced. The day is also known as Jubilee Day; now it will be properly celebrated every year.

I saw this picture of Opal Lee on one of her many marches, and wanted to commemorate it by painting this picture for 30x30 Direct—no lines or drawing, just painting direct to the paper. The scene captured my imagination because of the variety of figures and the cast shadow beneath them.

"Juneteenth"—Paul Jackson watercolors in Bee mixed media sketchbook, about 7x5 inches.

Feeling my way

Today I wanted to try doing a semi-abstract background and then put a portrait on top of it. So I taped off parts of the paper, and on other parts I pressed bubble wrap to the ink to give texture, and I watered the ink here and there so it would run, and tilted the pad of paper back and forth to get it to go in different directions, and got a fun background. But who to put on it?

I went through a bunch of reference photos I recently downloaded from Unsplash, and this girl jumped out at me. I wanted the challenge of the extreme tilt of her face, with everything foreshortened and leading with her chin. I also loved her wild head of ringlets, and even the dress she was wearing.

So, I started working on her, using only ink at first; but I couldn't get some of it dark enough over the top of the intense colors in the background, so I looked around for a remedy. I had just received an order from Dick Blick that included a complete set of Conté "crayons," which are a little finer texture than straight charcoal but operate in much the same manner, and come in varying shades of brown, sepia, sanguine, noir, and white. And since the first challenge I was having was getting the highlights in her face to stand out, when the paper behind it happened to be dyed dark turquoise, I broke out the white one and, starting there, gradually went over most of her face with the varying shades. I haven't used charcoal since drawing class at Valley College in 1999, so I had to get used to a different kind of shading.

At first, I just painted her hair with Payne's Grey, but again, it wasn't strong enough against the background, so I went back in with the charcoal-colored conté, and pulled ringlets out, then smudged them with my finger. It ended up being a little too smudgy, so I tried some Elegant Writer, but it wouldn't activate much over the top of everything else, so I also accented the ends of the curls with my Uniball. Then I decorated her dress with the Uniball and some gel pens, and decided I had gone far enough!

The colors and textures  under the face and neck are a little weird, but I think it gives some extra personality. I don't have any fixitive, so I went over the hair with some more Payne's Grey, hoping to lock the charcoal into the paper, but I will eventually have to get some to seal off the face as well. I scanned it successfully, but had to wipe down my scanner glass after!

  

"Jamilah"—Daler Rowney inks, Conté crayons, Uniball pen, gel pens, on Fluid 140-lb. coldpress watercolor paper, 9x12 inches.