2011 Pearls art show

This is me last night at the 2011 Pearls Before Swine Art Show here in Elgin with my painting "Just Happened." I created this one with an intuitive underpainting first, adding an image of columbines after it had dried, by painting in and around the shapes. "Summer Breeze," above, is one of my intuitive paintings which I let evolve spontaneously without preplanning a subject. Both paintings were fun to create. Summer Breeze received a People's Choice award during the reception!

There was a big festive crowd and lots of beautiful art, including youth art, in an old historic building on Main Street. And a silent auction with great participation from area businesses, with proceeds sponsoring a youth art scholarship. I am impressed with the vibrancy and support of the community and the leadership of the Elgin Art Association in making this event a success. Come if you can to the art show, which is up through Saturday, October 22 for the Elgin Hogeye Festival http://www.elgintx.com/hogeye.asp. For those of you who don't live in Texas, thanks for enjoying our fun through my blog!

"Watercolor, Free and Easy"

My brother asked me to lead an art activity at a surprise birthday party for a very special lady, his girlfriend, Sandy. She is not only his special lady, but one of my biggest art enthusiasts. How could I say no? After a trial run with a smaller group of friends, then an inspired day of analyzing my own painting process and simplifying and outlining the steps involved, I came up with an easy step-by-step process. With the key steps painted and described on an illustration board, I led the group through creating their own painting of vases with light shining through. The first step involved making a wet-on-wet underpainting. Then when the underpainting was dry, the image of vases was added by transferring a tracing onto the underpainting using graphite paper. And finally, the space around the vases was painted a darker color, causing the lighter colors to appear to shine through the vases. Voila! We had quite a few masterpieces and lots of laughter and fun, not to mention, wine, food, and birthday festivities interspersed in between!

Video from Spring Show

The reception for the Waterloo Watercolor Group 2011 Spring Show, "Printemps," was well attended and showcased alot of beautiful art work. Hope you enjoy this video clip from that afternoon. My new daughter-in-law, Beth, is interviewing me and my son Jared about how this painting, Purple Mist, was created. I do enjoy the spontaneity and mystery of wet-on-wet painting!

CD Cover Art

At the Pearls Before Swine Art Show in Elgin last October, a musician friend happened to notice my painting, Piscene Fantasy (see my October 25 posting.) She was recording a new album, to be entitled Piscean Dreams, and asked to use my painting for the CD cover! After returning from a tour of Italy last month, she treated me to lunch and shared her wonderful music with me. I'm finding that it's fun to share and collaborate with other artists! You can hear previews of the songs on her website, www.janegillman.com. Enjoy!

Printemps Invitation-Corrected Dates

I saw many of the paintings submitted for this show, and they were fantastic! I am honored to be a part of the Waterloo Watercolor Group and to have the opportunity to exhibit a painting downtown. Treat yourself to a leisurely viewing sometime between May 2 and June 26, and come if you can to the reception from 2 - 4 pm on May 8.


Directions to the Corridor of Art are a little tricky: You must enter the parking garage from Guadalupe at 8th, where the Chase drive through bank is on your left. Go up the ramp, just before the light. Park at any level, then take the elevator down to LL. Parking for the reception is free. Hope to see you there!

Less is more!

I learned a lot about exciting wet-on-wet techniques at a one day workshop this week taught by master artist, Rae Andrews. She emphasized leaving plenty of the white of the paper to create breathing space and sparkle in your painting. To start, we wet the paper, but only in parts. We then flicked paint onto the paper, staying mostly in the wet parts so the paint could spread and mingle. When our underpaintings dried, we looked through our photos and imaginations to decide on an image to paint. I used tracing paper to draw the flower I selected and then moved it around a bit on my painting to see how and where it would create a pleasing composition. Using a combination of positive painting (painting the object itself) and negative painting (painting around the object to create the shape of the object), I wove my image into the underpainting. When I photographed my painting, I got some shadows over the white parts, but I hope you can get the idea of "less is more!"

No rules painting

My daughter brought her new acrylic paints to our little cabin at Bastrop State Park where we were having a girl's weekend. Set up on the picnic table outside our cabin in the piney woods, our attempts to create with this unfamiliar medium resulted in lots of laughter, wind blown paper and paints, and these colorful pictures. It ranged from hilarious to contemplative, and even inspired some of the group to do some painting at home. It reminded me that it is great to create together with others, where there are no rules for what and how to create, only that you have fun. And that we did. Thanks everybody!

Purple Mist

I have been having a fun time experimenting with wet-on-wet painting. It is exciting because you never know quite what you will get. This one, "Purple Mist, " was inspired by some flowers and surrounding color and light I photographed at the Dallas Arboretum a couple of years ago. I love to try to capture feeling and atmosphere in a loose painting style.

Just this morning I received notification that this painting has been selected to be in the 2011 Waterloo Watercolor Group Spring Show, which starts May 1 in Austin. More info about the show will be forthcoming!

Wet paint on wet paper

Sunday morning I was reading in one of my art books, but noticed I was distracted by a sensation of heaviness, or sadness of some sort, inside my body. I had the urge to paint my feeling, one color and brushstroke at a time, without analyzing or pre-planning anything. I took a piece of watercolor paper and wetted it entirely, let the water settle into the paper a bit, and just started painting. It started out as a boiling pot of wet-on-wet color at the bottom. I added color by brushstrokes directly to the paper and also by flicking a brush loaded with paint to create splatter onto the paper. I also added a little salt at the bottom, which sucks up the watercolor and creates the effect of light spots. The process of painting was playful and fun, and before I knew it the heavy sensation inside me was gone. I love the way watercolor merges in unforseen ways on wet paper. When I looked at it, it appeared like a flower emerging and reaching for the sky. It feels like "Morning Joy," so that's what I named it. What does it feel like to you?

A Fractured Look

It is always refreshing to try something different, and this one was fun to do. If you look closely at this painting, you can see the insertion of geometric shapes onto the flower design. The idea was to change color between shapes to create the impression of a somewhat "fractured" look. I like this painting the way it is, but I may decide to make the color distinctions even greater. I'll keep you updated if it gets a facelift!