On why I paint....

Came across the following on another artist's website.  She finally was able to put into words what every artist feels but doesn't know how to say.
"My painting philosophy is very simple. I paint because I can't stop. I don't know exactly when I became obsessed with watercolor painting. It caught me when I wasn't paying attention and changed my life. I no longer look at the world without seeing common things in a special way. "

So I was thinking that this week is crazy busy straight through the weekend, and how it would make life easier if I just skipped the figure drawing studio tomorrow night.  Then I started reading about various artists online and came across a pastel workshop here in Atlanta in May by an artist named Duane Wakeham. I wasn't familiar with him until today but apparently he is big-time in the world of pastel artists.  I came across the following online:
"Wakeham shares this breakthrough in his workshops, explaining to students that if they’ll do only 10-minute paintings the entire time, they’ll learn more about painting than if they do one painting each day. “Doing quick studies keeps you thinking about painting,” he says, “and it sharpens your skill in summarizing what you see. You develop your ability to say as much as possible with the minimum amount of time and effort, forcing yourself to see and think in terms of large shapes and simplified patterns of light and dark, instead of getting bogged down by details.”
Guess I have to go to class tomorrow.

Venice Value Sketch

Here's how I got started. I new it was important to emphasize the light going down the canal so I tried to play up the contrasting shadows and exxagerate them a bit.

My Sargent Imitation

This scene is from our engagement trip to Venice in 2006. I've been avoiding the photos I took of the canals as subjects for paintings, only because there are so many different elements all over the place. It took some serious editing to get this simplified so the drawing would make sense. I enjoyed trying to imitate Sargent's style and it came in useful when I got to a difficult area. For example, the gondolas were full of different items that I simply took out and made a varied wet wash. I tried to preserve the light areas as much as possible to maintain the strong value contrast and frequently referred to my value sketch which I will post next along with the original photo. Overall, I think the composition is strong. The drawing could have been a bit more accurate. This really would have been an ideal subject for a large painting (18x24) but given the time constraint (my 3 hour class, plus about 2 hours at home) I really couldn't go bigger than 11x14. I am satisfied with the result and am now an avid Sargent fan.

Something new to get into!

So one of the classes I've been going to on Wednesday's at the AAC is a figure drawing sketch group. It's 2 hours of drawing 1 to 30 minute poses of a model. I've been really struggling with the face on the models so I just got several new portrait drawing books to help me out. Also I am hoping to take a workshop from a local artist that I met last weekend that is about painting heads and the figure. Take a look at her work here: http://mmatthews.com/ . Surely she can teach me a thing or two. This is one of the new skills I am attempting to take on with gusto!

I'm excited about how active the arts are in Atlanta. In the past month I've found all sorts of things to keep me busy with classes, workshops, and demos. I went to a demo last weekend at the Buckhead art store and was really impressed with the turnout- probably about 50 other "recreational" artists like me :-) Then I spent the rest of my spare time reading the portrait books so I didn't actually paint the rest of the weekend. I feel like I am in the awkward stage that I go through periodically. It's like I'm almost on the verge of a breakthrough of some sort but it's really painful getting there since I'm trying to change or improve what I'm already doing.

So coming up this week- I am copying John Singer Sargent's style into one of my own paintings, all in the 3 hour class. I have my photo of venice ready to go and am excited at the prospect of having a deadline to get it done. I want my watercolors to be looser and look more painterly and I've got a couple of ideas to help me achieve this. I will post the result later this week so you can see the finished product. Hopefully I will make Sargent proud!

But enough about me...

I recently started a new watercolor class here in Atlanta and was given a new challenge this week: to reproduce a John Singer Sargent piece. His paintings are unbelievable and the subjects he chooses take you on a trip around the world. Check out his watercolor paintings here:
http://tiny.cc/pkR39 I think he might be my new favorite artist! Needless to say after 3 hours slaving away trying to reproduce his piece "Doorway to a Venetian Palace" http://tiny.cc/z6v5r
I am reminded of how much I still have to learn. The experience was blissful, however. Trying to recreate his bold brushstrokes was liberating. There's a pretty good bio of his life on Wikipedia if you are interested in learning mroe about him. He travelled the world, spoke 4 languages, and caused enough scandal to actually leave Paris and move to London. Good stuff.

Someone recently told me that a professional logs 10,000 hours of practice before they are considered a professional. I figure I'm good for about 1,000 so far at least for my 31.5 years! This week I've logged 5 hours drawing and painting so far and will get at least another 5 in this weekend hopefully. I'm seeing progress now which is all I ask for. My figure drawing class is turning out far better sketches than the ones I did in London 2 years ago. Who knows maybe I will even post some here... AND I have a new interest in portrait painting. But more on that later.

Imperial Palace Finished!

I've had all of these great pics from our trip to Japan last summer sitting in a file waiting to become paintings. Here is the first one of the Nijubashi Bridge at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo. I decided to do this one in pastel for a couple of reasons. 1) I thought the colors in the photograph were really rich and it would be easy to render in pastel. 2) It is a fairly small painting (maybe 7x10) and I thought it would look too busy in watercolor 3) My box of sennelier pastels still smiles at me everytime I walk in my art room and beckons me to play with them!

Something I recently observed working in pastels- my issues with the color green have disappeared! Obviously in pastel you are working with a limited palette since you only have so many sticks (my set has 80 half sticks) and mixing colors is difficult. The set I have is specifically for landscapes. When I first opened the box I noticed the most flourescent lime green pastel I have ever seen. I thought, "when in the world will I use this color?" But sure enough it has made it's way into every painting recently as the most brilliant highlight color for foliage.

Overall I like this painting. It's better than another one I did recently of a bridge. I was challenged to capture the atmsophere however. When I took the photo the air was dewy since it just finished raining and the colors in the photo have an almost smoky quality. Somehow mine turned out looking like it is a clear sunny day. Perhaps the colors are too warm. Any suggestions?