Time out of the studio ... it's good and it's bad.

Wednesday I took a road trip to Raleigh with my dear friend, Sue. Left early, got home late. Never made it down the hall to the studio to work on the triptych I've started. Haven't even gotten the in-progress photos downloaded from the camera yet.

Thursday was spent in town running errands, doing the grocery shopping, and then being totally unproductive at home. Getting up at 5:30am Wednesday morning and not getting home 'til after 9:00pm, then the town excursion, sort of wore me out. No studio time. I just couldn't focus even though I wanted to.

Today is Domestic Goddess day because the husband is on his way home for the weekend. Took a nice walk down our road with my neighbor because I've been too inactive the past few months. My plan is to walk every day.

Now, the rest of my day will be a fun-filled hoorah of dusting, cleaning bathrooms, and pushing around the vacuum cleaner. woo.hoo. Got veggies and a large roast in the crock pot after my walk so I can feed the man when he gets here. I put in extra veggies because that's what I'll eat. I am so loving this new crock pot! Extra big. 7.5 qt. Love it. My old one, a small 4 qt. would hold the roast, but not so many veggies.

In all honesty, all I want to do is run back into the studio and not come out. I feel cranky and frustrated that the necessities of life are in my way. But, I do realize time out of the studio is really a good thing. I get so single-minded and caught up in my own little world. Not much else gets done, which isn't so good.

Guess I need to practice some balance with it. It's just a little difficult.

To suit that balance theme, let's post a nice picture to reflect the concept ...

Namaste, y'all ...

Crankin' 'em out and hangin' 'em up ...

Not sure what's going on, but I seem to be rollin' along rather quickly with the painting stuff. I'm not complaining.

Got the Poppies done last night. I like how they turned out. I like that I'm done and ready for the next victim, too. I've got months of not being able to get into the studio to make up for.

So here's the last half of the process and a grand finale ...


When I paused to take a lunch break I came back to the studio to find a seat thief ...

After relocating Zipper Doodle, I cranked up the colors on the poppies ...

Glazed some darks to start building the forms a little clearer ...

Painted in a watery line of black around the flowers and stems to separate them from the background a bit, as well as to highlight the petal edges. Lightened up the inside of the petals a touch to give more dimension. Decided it needed some gold to catch the light ...

Signed my name and it's done ... (fuzzy photo, not sure what happened.)

Grabbed the hammer and a picture hanging hook and put that thing up on the wall in the office area ...

Woo Hoo!

Namaste, y'all ...

Poppin' poppies and small spaces.

For the past couple of years the husband and I have been in a slow but steady process of home redecorating/remodeling. We haven't gotten wild and crazy, busting down walls or ripping out plumbing. We don't have big bucks to spend, nor do we have good amounts of time. The husband is a truck driver, so he's not home every day and weekends like most people. It all has to be done as we can, when we can ... hence the fact it's already been two years and we're still working on it!

Most of the areas we've worked on have lots of things to do to call them finished. Some places it's major stuff. New chest of drawers in the bedroom. New rug in both the living room and the dining room. Curtains, throw pillows, etc., etc., etc. After ten long years I'm finally gonna' get my living room furniture reupholstered!!! And, there are rooms we have yet to tackle. Kitchen untouched. Guest bath also untouched. Laundry room tagging at the end of the line.

One of the areas we have pretty much brought to completion is the foyer. When we bought our first computer we didn't have a good place to put it, or the God-awful monstrosity of a computer desk we purchased for it. (I give all the blame to the husband for picking that thing out.) Since we rarely use the front door the niche area in our foyer was wasted space, thus it became our 'home office' area. Honestly, I'm glad I don't have the before and after photos to show you. Just the after. I don't even like to think about the before. Suffice it to say, it was bad, and over the years it I developed a progressively stronger and stronger 'hate this space' feeling for it.

Now, we have this nice, functional, streamlined work space ...

Pretty impressive what you can do with some plywood, stain, and peel-n-stick floor tiles. The husband did a great job. Just one minor problem. You see that big ol' open wall above the computer monitor? Screaming for a piece of art. I love the new space, and enjoying working at the computer now, but it's a little bland. Needs color, a touch of personalization and some warmth. Good thing an artist lives in the house! Also going to reupholster that chair, but that's another story.

Well, I'm on it. Paint barely dry on the last work and I'm at it again!

Right after I finished the White Lotus I got started on a new painting for the office/foyer. My original intention was to do something like this ...

Came across this image on the internet. Unfortunately, I can't find out who the artist is to give credit where credit is due. What I will say is I love the softness and simplicity of it. I love the contrast of the vibrancy of  color with the subject matter. I also am completely enamored by the way the image travels across the canvases into a triptych.

When I sat in the chair and stared at the wall I wasn't thrilled with the way I thought a triptych would look between the shelves. Too linear. I got to thinkin' about some paintings my friend Kasey had done of poppies. Here's one I particularly admired ...

Poppies #4

I really liked them, had been inspired by them, and wanted them for my very own. Alas, that wasn't meant to be, but it didn't mean I, since I can paint, couldn't do some for myself! Ka-ching!

I think one of the things I love so much about Kasey's work is that her style is so different from my own. She has a freshness and spontaneity to her work. It's happy, full of color, texture and originality. Huge fan, I am.

Anyway, I copy-catted her poppy theme and began this ...

30" x 30" ... quick sketch of placement of poppies and some Golden Molding Medium for texture. Yeah, I know I said I wasn't going to go so big with my next piece of art but I couldn't help myself. I think the size will work very well on the office wall.

Base coat of black paint to create depth under the colors I will be adding ...

Glaze coat of chocolate brown to warm the black ...

Drew the poppies onto tracing paper, cut them out, decoupaged them onto the canvas for more texture ...

Smooshed more molding medium over the tracing paper, used a pallet knife to create a sort of ruffled edge to the petals, then used my finger to smooth the surface and give a bit of directional movement to the flower ...

Started glazing in browns and aquas ...

Building up the colors of the background and first coat of a deep orange glaze on the flowers ...

Still a lot of work to do, but it's getting there.

Namaste, y'all ...

White Lotus, Part II

(Technically, this was written on Friday night but I didn't want to double-post.)

After publishing Friday's post, White Lotus, Part I, things started rolling. I wasn't sure I was liking the amount of terra cotta in the upper portion above the flower. It seemed to dominate overmuch. I also felt I didn't have enough dark (purples and greens) in the lower half to give the work depth like a pond. I loved the burst of the aqua yet thought maybe it was a bit too large.

So, I propped the painting against the wall in the dining room where I intended to hang the finished piece. My dining room and living room are basically one large rectangular space, and the colors I'm using to decorate are incorporated into the art. I needed to see how well the wall color, a medium toned khaki, played together with what was happening in the painting. I knew the fairly neutral background would 'pop' the colors even more and I could better judge what I needed to do. I want color, but I also want an element of softness as well. The white of the lotus needed to 'glow' and make the flower the focal point, even when juxtaposed against the more vivid colors.

With the painting leaning against the wall I sat down at the table and stared at it for a long time. I compared it to the printed out version I was using as my reference and realized I was right about the dark half. The upper half needed a bit of a 'tone down', too. I took it back to the studio and got busy.

On the lower half I pulled more of the darks up closer to the reflected petals of the lotus, both reducing the area of the bright aqua and giving it another layer of shadows. I also blended in a small amount of a deep burgundy to 'dirty' the water. Ponds are murky.

I brushed a wash of a soft buttermilk white mixed in glaze medium over the upper part, and added some areas of the darks to give a bit more 'depth' to it as well. I used a rough brush to tamp and smudge some of the burgundy above the lotus to break up the intensity of the terra cotta. This also gave the painting a bit of visual 'texture' to counter balance the expanse of predominately smoothly blended colors.

I brushed a bright white on the lotus petals to play against the more creamy white they were painted with. I also brushed the white horizontally across the canvas with a small brush, then blended it with a clean fat brush to blur it, creating a soft illusion of ripples on the surface of the water.

I carted it back to the dining room, propped it against the wall, and stared at it again. Then I walked away and watched a show on Hulu.com for about forty-five minutes. Sometimes you just have to stop looking at something in order to see it again.

When I walked back over to study it some more I suddenly realized it was finished ...

I'm pleased with the end result. What a wonderful feeling. Particularly after taking so long to get the Angel done! This painting, even though it's large (24" x 48"), only took around a week to paint. I think I'm still surprised to be finished so quickly. I wasn't prepared for an, "Oh, well, I'm done." in a week. Yeah, good feeling.

Not sure what's next, but whatever it is, it starts tomorrow!

Namaste, y'all ...

White Lotus In Progress, Part I

Picking up where I left off, sort of.

Despite a few interruptions and detours with other things commanding my attention, I've been working on the lotus painting. I get back there in the studio, crank up the iPod, and moosh paint around on the canvas. Sometimes I think the process of paint mooshing is the best part. Blend a little here ... drop a little of this color there ... swish in a bit of that color ... mist it all with a spray bottle and moosh some more.

Can't help it. I love blending. My lovely and impressively artistic friend, Kasey, calls me the Goddess of Blend. I admit, I like to blend. And this particular painting is all about blending on the background. Happy camper, I am.

But for snorts and giggles, I thought I would post an update on my progress. It's often hard to show 'work in progress' because, as the artist, you know so much isn't done yet. Kind of like having your date show up early and you're caught in your ratty bathrobe, legs still unshaven, half your makeup on. Nope, not pretty.

While working on a piece of art things change, they develop, and sometimes, they disappear. As you can see from this canvas, the background is still evolving. And it may very well do that for awhile. It will be what it will be until I moosh the paint into something that pleases me and I don't want to moosh it anymore lest I muck it up. It's not really a process I can explain. I either know it's working and I like it, or it's not and I don't.

Then again, it may totally and utterly frustrate me. Not unknown to happen. I could easily end up painting over parts (or the entire thing) and try again. This seems to freak some people out. I've gotten the "Oh My God! You Didn't Just Paint Over That!!!" reaction from a few people over the years and I'm never sure what to say to them. Maybe what I had painted looked good to them, but it wasn't working for me and I wasn't going to keep paddling that canoe upstream. The creation of a painting should be enjoyable, not make you want to attack the canvas with a machete.

The beginning ...

Phase 2 ...

Phase 3 ...

Phase 4 ...

Phase 5 ...

Phase 6 ... lotus close up

Phase 7 ... where it's at right now. The weird, shinny spots are wet paint.

Namaste, y'all ...