Art Every Day Month - November 7

Prompts and crossovers: Boy Scout Apple

Barbara Martin's Reptitude offers a creative nudge for writers in the form of a Daily Writer's Note. Today's prompt was to envision dessert and write about it.

Well, I'm not writing, I'm painting, but I could still envision dessert, a big juicy Boy Scout apple, cold out of the fridge and warming in the bright sunlight in my workroom window. And the crossover worked. I was able to "put that deliciousness on the page."

The only trouble was that I had to paint the apple before I could eat it! Enjoy!

Art Every Day Month - November 6

Layers: Transparent Washes

Today for my "Art Every Day for the Month of November" challenge I laid down two washes of transparent color – viridian and prussian blue – with deliberate and accidental movements of paint on the paper, and with varying degrees of wetness and dry brushing.

What did I get? Lovely delicate marbled effects, abrupt patterning, and a jewel-like quality in the depth of color. See-through textures, mottled tones, and an underpainting that dissolved as the next layer went over it.

I also got a sense that however controlled I might want to be in applying it, the paint will create its own random characteristics as it dries on the paper. I just need to wait to see what it will look like.

And I needed to remind myself not to judge whether or not I like the effect until the painting has finished itself.

Art Every Day Month - November 5

Layers: Optical Mixing

For today’s watercolor exploration, I chose three primary colors: magenta, permanent yellow and ultramarine blue.

By applying each layer of color after the previous layer was completely dry, I was able to preserve the opacity of the layers. As the colors dried, they pooled in distinct layers on the surface of the paper, and by various means, I could move them around or lift them off the paper entirely, giving a unique textured effect.

Besides giving texture, these colors provide an effect for the viewer called optical mixing. In optical mixing, the viewer’s eye gathers information about adjacent patches of separate colors, say magenta and ultramarine, and the viewer’s brain mixes the colors into a rich purple, which is what the viewer perceives.

The lessons here are 1) the waiting is as important as the painting, and 2) what you get isn’t always what you see.

Art Every Day Month - November 4

Backflow

Backflow in watercolor is the result of an intrusion from one area of wet paint into another.

Backflow could create an attractive marbled effect or it could spoil a painting.

Usually backflow comes as an accident – unwanted. However, if I interfere it’s not an accident any more, it is an experiment, and in today’s painting I deliberately set up the conditions for backflow to occur.

The extent of backflow is a function of how quick I am to intervene to prevent "ruin", or how long I am prepared to wait to see what develops. Today I waited. I had to let the entire backflow effect happen on its own.

Whether I accept the random results depends on how spontaneous or how controlling I want to be, with the painting or with myself.

Art Every Day Month - November 3

Ritual vs. Routine

The trick to staying with a routine is doing the thing regularly.

Doing the Art Every Day for the month of November project - or any other daily painting project - may be an artificial way to initiate a routine, but it works... as long as every day I do the painting (and the photography and blogging to get it online).

I hope for the time when my acceptance of this routine - taping one quarter sheet of watercolor paper to a board, getting the water and paintbrushes ready, selecting the colors, and taking a deep breath before I start - becomes a ritual for starting painting and not just a routine any more.

That's when I will have internalized the action of the daily painting and made it part of me, not simply added it to my daily list of activities.

Art Every Day Month – November 2

Art Every Day for the Month of November

Today’s challenges… keeping going. Letting the water and the paper and the pigment do what they will as they dry. And accepting the results as the watercolor does the work of painting all by itself.

All I do is initiate the process.

And I will use the results to prepare myself for tomorrow’s painting.

Art Every Day Month - November 1

Art Every Day for the Month of November

For the month of November, I am following the activity on
http://creativeeveryday.com/art-every-day-month
and challenging myself… not just to being creative every day, but to adding uncertainty and risk to what I am doing. On this project I’ve got no guarantees and I’ve got no safety net.

My ground-rules? Watercolor paints on ¼ sheet of watercolor paper. Every day for the next 30 days. Work through the fear. And accept the results. And turn the fear into anticipation and excitement for tomorrow’s painting.

For the blog, I will post a photo of the day's painting, and of a detail from the piece.

In my workroom, I will display the finished work.

I will accept what I find in the work. And build on it the next day. Every day for the next month.

It won’t be great art. It probably won’t even be good looking.

But it will be risk-taking, and it will be every day.

That’s my commitment for the month of November.