Collage of September Daily Paintings

Collage of September 2015

30 Paintings in 30 Days (Not in order)

Not in order and not always with the right proportions, but better than last year's collage. Some of my subjects last year weren't recognizable.

I had to delete everything and start over on this one to get everything this well, but it's a big improvement. 

I plan to keep on with daily art and may post again later today with a new daily painting. But I wanted to post this just to share in the glow of completion. This year I did it. This year there are actually 30 paintings for 30 days.

From now on I'm keeping that 48 hour rule too - if I make it up the day after, it still counts. Some days get worse than others and that's a fact I have to live with. But I can still count a gesture sketch of a familiar subject and nothing about size, the idea is more to say hello to my art at least daily.

Purr at you! Ari Cat sheds his Cat Hairs of Inspiration in your direction!

Pacific Wave

Pacific Wave

5" x 7"

Rembrandt pastels on Uart 600 sanded pastel paper

Photo reference by kathymackay2 on WetCanvas.com

Painting the ocean has been on my Artist's Bucket List for all my life. I loved the sea from as long as I can remember. As a toddler I had a book about a hermit crab that fascinated me, had both beach and undersea illustrations that were absolutely wonderful - good illustrations, not just cartoons.

So I took a piece of Uart and decided to use my field pastels, 60 Rembrandt half sticks. I worked from the Weekend Drawing Event challenge where kathymackay2 posted a bunch of photo references last Friday on the last day of the current challenge... and I changed the weather. The photo reference was taken on a gray overcast day, the sea was very blue-gray and the wave was not quite as shapely, but from previous paintings and studies I understood its anatomy. I changed the weather to reflect what might have been a warmer climate or just a warmer season, moved the foam, gave it color and sparkle and light... and it just blew all my previous seascapes right out of the water.

I wasn't even thinking verbally while I painted it. I spent about 20 minutes and did not hesitate. I think I'm finally ready to try painting the sea from plein air. I understand the waves well enough they don't have to hold still, just repeat. This rocks. Today is a personal triumph.

A Page of Little Ari Drawings

Technically this isn't a painting - it's a 9" x 12" page of life drawings of my cat Ari. It's a serious project. I used an archival Pitt Artist Pen, black brush tip for its expressive line, on 100% rag watercolor paper. Every one of these little drawings is from life. The dates come in two clumps, back in November when I first started the project and then picked it up again late in April when I realized my winter slump had lasted that long.

This piece was difficult not because I don't have a lot of practice drawing my cat, but because I had so many little drawings of him and was determined to give the page a decent layout. The more of them I finished, the tougher it was to use the remaining space well, have everything leading in toward the others with a good eye path, create a good page as a whole instead of "cool little life studies."

I love my cat. I could and do draw him endlessly. I also don't mind having a lot of bad sketches of him crop up in my sketchbook. I lighten up when I do these gestures and don't worry so much about whether each of them is a good drawing or even an accurate likeness. This project, I wanted to do my best on them.

It's part of an art trade with Charlotte Herczfeld, my pastel teacher, a Swedish Colourist who heads up the Pastel Guild of Europe. She taught me how to handle color, how to handle pastels and depth and distance. She freed me from literal adherence to the photo and from sticking to local color instead of what I see. She also taught me how to create any hue I want with optical mixing and use a limited palette in pastels.

I've got several other artworks in the package. I'm nowhere near her level of skill, honored she liked so many of my works though. I'll be packing them all up this week to ship to Sweden and then wait for a wonderful, glorious package containing a painting that went right to my heart. I need to order a good frame for hers too, need to set aside that budget and not unpack it until I have a frame big enough - though I have mat board and can cut the mat for the painting myself just as I did last time.

I'm so thrilled about this and honored. I'm also vastly relieved that A Page of Little Ari turned out so well! I can't believe I managed, with all that care and patience waiting for good days and of course waiting for the cat to hold still in good poses, to fill the page just right. He is a great beauty of course, there was no question of the model's competence in this piece.

A long project completed just right! Nothing compares to that feeling!