WIP: moody sky

acrylic on board

m2: Laramie Peak

8 x 5"
oil pastel and acrylic on acrylic paper

This painting of Laramie Peak, WY started with a thumbnail sketch I drew from memory, from which I did three acrylic underpaintings.  This is the first finished painting, using the top underpainting from the WIP post.  When I paint from memory I don't look at photos.  For this painting, I just remembered the feeling of being there and I ended up capturing the features and colors of this landscape that I most identify with Wyoming.

Paintings like this remind me of why I started to draw and paint.  I knew this picture was done when I was compelled to stop painting and just look, feeling like I was there seeing the mountain.

color

I always wondered why artists talk so much about 'color'.  I used to think, what's the big deal?  Well, reproducing a color is really difficult it turns out. There are entire books on this topic... so here is a brief list of some things I've learned since paying attention to colors:

It's difficult to objectively see a color.
It's difficult to mix paints to reproduce colors.
It's almost impossible to reproduce colors with photography.
The same digital photograph of a color will look different on different screens.
The same digital photograph will print different colors on different printers.

What an impossible situation!  The above colors are all different photographs taken within 10 minutes of eachother of the exact same painted acrylic card (from my last post).  I got everything from grey to light blue, and the actual color was closest to the above middle shot, a dark blue.  That shot was produced by using the manual settings on my camera for the first time ever.  It was actually the first time in my life I had ever used the manual settings on any camera and I had no idea what I was doing.  Fun! - I'll be experimenting with my camera a lot more now.

WIP - Laramie Peak

I decided to play with my thumbnail sketch of Laramie Peak that I posted about last week.  I went to the art store to see about getting some paper more suitable for oil pastels and I ran into the artist who taught the drawing class Matthias and I did together last year.  One of the things I talked about was my desire to experiment with a non-white background for my pastel paintings.  She works at the art store and suggested that instead of buying colored paper, I get some acrylic paper and paint it before applying the oil pastel.

I liked the idea so I bought an A5 pad of acrylic paper.  It might be a bit small, but you've got to start somewhere!  I'm still experimenting a lot and one thing I wanted to look at is whether I like contrasting or complementary colors in the background.  Here are three underpaintings I did in acrylic which I plan to paint over with oil pastel:

art studio

After drooling over this art studio, I decided to appreciate my own pART time studio:

Lots of light comes in through a south facing window, and I'm faced with our piano and a few pieces of art Matthias and I have hanging on the walls.  Even though space is tight in our living/dining area, I really don't get that impression from this photo.  It's given me a new appreciation for the space I do have in our home!

thumbnail sketches

When I'm experimenting with colors and ideas, I find that if I do a full size picture I just end up taking a lot of time and ending up with something I didn't have in mind.  It seems like such a waste of my lovely pastels, too, which then blocks me from drawing anything.

So I've started making little thumbnail sketches to play around with different techniques, ideas and color schemes.  I can quickly see if a color combination works out, or if I like using a certain technique.  It also takes off the pressure of needing a 'great idea' for a composition.

oil pastel on paper, thumbnail sketches

I really enjoy this practice, and sometimes, I loosen up enough to create something I really like.  Here's a thumbnail sketch of Laramie Peak:

I like this sketch so much I think I'll develop this thumbnail sketch into a full sized picture.

i1: Three Fish

conte crayon on paper (A3)

I actually drew this upside down, but the fish looked better this way.  I was experimenting with texturing the background, and some stronger fluid strokes then evolved into these fish.