Combining class techniques

The real reason to take art classes—not to slavishly mimic whatever the teacher is doing (at least, not after the first learning-curve time), but to find techniques you like and that work for you, and combine them in a new way.

I did the LFI2021 class with Tiare Smith Woods yesterday, in which we layered gesso and acrylic paint underneath our image, and really liked the effect, although the image wasn't exactly my cup of tea.

Meanwhile, over in my challenge at Olga Furman Art, our week's theme is to paint nurses, and Pamela Vosseler did a great demo of painting quickly and loosely on a brown paper bag, using charcoal as the underdrawing and blocking in the painting with a palette knife before putting in finishing touches with a brush. So this morning, I decided to "put my hands together" and combine techniques.

The background colors had significance—I did my best to mix the ubiquitous mint green color you find on most hospital walls, and then added in red and yellow for the stress and trauma you find there. I drew the reference nurse in a medium charcoal pencil, then blocked in the headscarf and apron with a palette knife and white gesso. I decided not to fill in the face with color, but rather to layer and indicate features over the top of the background colors, and had great fun combining thinned-out colors to delineate her face without obscuring the details behind.

I used slightly thinned-out Payne's Grey to accentuate some shadows and to block in the dark dress under the apron. In the reference photo, the collar is a print, but after trying out a few things I decided to leave that, too, untouched.

I'm honestly quite happy with my results—maybe there are media other than watercolors in which I will learn to feel at home!

"Nurse, 1930s"—gesso, acrylic paints, charcoal pencil, on 140-lb. Fluid hotpress watercolor paper, approx. 7x12 inches.

Layering

This week's teacher was a doll, and therefore I hate to say that her lesson result was just a little "twee" for my taste. But what I did like was her sense of adventure and play.

This painting has a layer of gesso, rolled on with a brayer; a layer of five or six different colors of acrylics, spread around with a palette knife and then scratched into each other; then the sun (or in the original, the moon) and the picture of the girl are drawn and painted on the top; then we came back in with some more gesso, both free-hand smudging and also some stencil work; and to finish it up, we simply took a white gel pen and scribbled all over it! So even if the girl and sun are not necessarily what I would do on my own, all the techniques to go under whatever I do end up doing are really cool!

"Sun Worship"—gesso, acrylic paints, flow-aid, charcoal pencil, gel pen, on Fluid 140-lb. hotpress (smooth) watercolor paper, about 8.5x11 inches.

Seeking inspiration...

...from YOU! I found out today that the 30-day challenge from Olga Furman consists of only four themes, and we will only receive those once a week for the month. Furthermore, the theme is consistent, so the one we received yesterday, rather than being a one-day challenge with alternates among which we could choose, was instead seven photographs that we were supposed to paint from for seven days. But the first theme was "nurses," and even though I highly value them (especially now), I don't really want to paint a bunch of anonymous nurses for a week! I did Florence Nightingale and might do one other, but that leaves me at loose ends for material for at least three days a week (I still have my weekly lesson with Kara Bullock, plus some other resources).

SO: I'm going to open this up! If you have a mentor or muse out there who you think deserves to be painted, put their name in the comments below, or hit me up on Facebook or via email if you have it, and I will consider painting that person sometime during the next 30 days.

Please note that this is NOT about you getting me to paint your mother or your dog for free; it's about seeing a painting of someone you think is an interesting subject for me to take on!

Ode to Women

Olga Furman Art is sponsoring a 30-day portrait challenge (one a day for a month) in honor of Women's History Month. Deb Weiers posted it on her page, and I thought it looked intriguing. We start today and finish on March 8th, which is International Women's Day. Olga is providing one theme plus five possible reference photos per day, some with complete demos by guest artists, some with "WIP" photos, and some just the reference. I didn't think I had enough to do with my weekly class, so I signed on for this challenge as well (HA!). #AnOdeToWomenChallenge

The first day's theme is "nurses," and we had five photos, some old, some new, some black and white or sepia-tone, some in color, and some different styles were demonstrated. I chose to paint from the Florence Nightingale reference, since she IS the mother of organized nursing.

The photo was in black and white, so I decided on a monochromatic treatment. But I didn't want to use black/gray, so I gave the paper a wash of pale turquoise, and then painted her portrait in indigo blue ink, following up with shadows and contours in purple. You would think that purple would be the darkest, but the indigo is actually more dense, so I went back in with some indigo for the heaviest shadows as well.

I'm pretty pleased with this, both as a likeness capture and as a piece of art. I thought afterwards about going back with a part-purple wash for the background, coming in from the corners with the purple and then shading into turquoise again to keep it light around the figure, but I didn't think of this until after I did the lettering, and although the black is water-resistant, the white accents are not, so I left it as is.

Pencil, Daler Rowney inks, Uniball Vision pen, white Signo gel pen, on 140-lb. Fluid coldpress (rough) watercolor paper, about 8.5x11 inches.

 

Once more into the assignment...

I decided today to try another of these Nancy Drew Mystery book covers in acrylic. I felt a little more confident this time, and am also happier with my result, but I'm not sure that it will ever be my medium. I've just been painting in watercolor for too long and enjoying it too much, as opposed to the struggle with thick, plasticky, quick-drying goo!

I got the proportions off a little on this one, and decided not to put the "By Carolyn Keene" at the bottom, since it's a little more square in format. Also, I simply drew the title this time using a watercolor pencil, and then went over it with some water to "activate" the color, but the texture was so heavy down in the grass that the soft pencil wouldn't work, and I was too lazy to draw it out and paint it the old-fashioned (laborious) way.

Pencil, Golden acrylic paints, watercolor pencil, on Fluid 140-lb. hotpress (smooth) paper, approximately 7.75x9 inches.

Humility

Humility, thy name is acrylic! I haven't painted with acrylics in 35 years, and even then it was on great big canvases with vague landscapes or giant fruit that worked well with its painterly aspects. And I only did maybe six before switching forever to watercolor! But this week's assignment for Let's Face It 2021 was to reproduce the cover of a Nancy Drew mystery, and working that tiny in acrylic was an exercise in frustration.

I'm going to post it despite its many shortcomings because, simply, I want credit for perseverance! I won't get it for much else: She looks more like a raddled hag than a sweet young thing, and the angle on the hidden staircase is so extreme that no human could climb it (so much for perspective). But...I painted it without benefit of underdrawing, I just jumped in as the teacher instructed and painted first the big shapes, then the smaller, then the details and accents. It was hard. That shows. But it's good to try something new, and maybe eventually someone will want a LARGE painting in acrylic and I can learn to shine better in that medium.

Golden acrylics on 140-lb. Fluid hotpress watercolor paper, approximately 9x12 inches.

Writer worship

I am not a religious person, but that doesn't mean that I can't be spiritually moved. Poignant music, an evocative poem, a beautiful spring morning—sometimes they choke me up. And sometimes it's wonderful writing that resonates with something deep inside of me. Some of that writing has been authored by Ursula Kroeber Le Guin. People label her as a science fiction writer and therefore ghettoize her writing to some extent; but she was simply a powerful, brilliant, and deep author of books that sometimes feature strange gods, inhabitants of other planets, dragons, or the first peoples of California.

I chose today to continue my somewhat haphazard plan of painting authors, and I decided to do Ursula. I undertook this with trepidation that I didn't feel while painting someone like Joyce Carol Oates, whose work I respect but who does not evoke any deeper feeling for me. Ursula is one of my top five of all time, so I had to do her justice.

I don't often surprise or impress myself by feeling like I have done the best I could do when painting a portrait, but I can say with 98 percent sincerity that I'm really happy with this one and that I feel I have outdone myself. I contemplated putting a quote on it, but how could you choose just one from her oeuvre of brilliance? So Ursula's face speaks for itself, and the background gives a little hint about who she was and what she loved. 

Pencil, Uniball pen, Daler Rowney inks, watercolor, on Fluid 140-lb. cold-press watercolor paper, about 7.5x11 inches.

P.S. My favorites are: The Dispossessed, The Left Hand of Darkness, the Earthsea books (six) and The Telling, but I also love almost everything else she has written, especially all the books in the Hainish Cycle.