"Cooley Lake House"
9" x 12"
watercolor on cold pressed paper
Did you ever have one of those times when everything just went right--things fell into place, your tools behaved as you wanted them to, and the colors of the world just sang to you?
That's how I felt when I did this painting--it just worked, for me.
The beautiful, honest old farm house with its broad, inviting porch is no longer there--it was on a new Missouri Department of Conservation acquisition, Cooley Lake Wildlife Area, and it was considered to be an "attractive nuisance," liable to be a danger or a target to vandals. I'm glad I painted it and its old barn before it was gone.
This is on an old oxbow of the Missouri River, before the channel moved, perhaps in the 1953 flood; what a view that would have been from the house! We've been there many times to watch the herons, ducks, and thousands of snow and Canada geese. It's much quieter now, as eutrophication has filled in the lakes until they're quite shallow, but it's still a great place to paint.
---------------
Mini-demo
While watercolor is still quite damp, you can use the handle of an aquarelle brush, a cut-up credit card, or your fingernail to push color out of the way to make lighter areas.Here you can also see a bit of spatter, some wet in wet work and even a tiny bit of salt to make the texture of the rough grasses whispering in the wind...A figure, carefully painted, suggests the quiet and isolation. I scratched a bit of detail in the upper edge of the grassy area, can you see it?Drybrush work with varied greens made good foliage; I connected the leaf masses with fine, dark lines to show the trunks and branches.
I updated this post, since I rediscovered a demo I did for it! People seem to enjoy them, so I added two new detail shots and put the demo below. It seemed especially appropriate since I'm in the middle of teaching my online class--on watercolor pencil.
I've done several workshops for the Nevada Watercolor Society, and a field trip into the desert with my sister and brother-in-law brought me to this beautiful redrock outcropping with the storm lowering over it near Mt. Charleston. The colors of the high desert landscape were intensified by the storm...rich blue shadows in the still-snowy mountains, the burnt sienna of the redrock, and the gray-green of sage and other desert plants. I love the scent of the desert, and the coming of rain intensified that too--fresh, spicy, wonderful.I wish I could share that with you as well...
This is an original work, using the versatility of watercolor pencils , done on cold pressed paper. It was a challenge, but all painting worth doing IS...
This was originally in my North Light book, Watercolor Pencil Magic--it's one of my favorites--so I put it on my new CD, Watercolor Pencil Workshop...it's part of Lesson 3.
---------------
MINI-DEMO
Here, you can see the progression from dry pencil on paper to the first washes--you can do the pencil work in the field and not worry about carrying water with you, if you like.They're lightweight and versatile...
The careful application of clear water softens and blends the pigment on the paper...I was careful not to blur the edges where colors touch,where I preferred a crisp edge. I let this dry before adding the foreground layers.
I DID want a soft edge to suggest clouds--you can see I kept the application of blue pencil much lighter in that area, then was careful to blend softly.
Scribbled marks worked well to suggest the desert scrub...dots here and there suggested smaller plants. They blended just enough...
"Window on the Past" 5" x 7" original watercolor, marble dust and polymer medium on archival cold-pressed paper matted
(Click on the image to see it larger...)
There is something both inviting and mysterious about a window, particularly one that has looked out upon the world for so long. This is an adobe window in the American Southwest, set into the thick walls that help keep the intense desert heat at bay.
I tried out some of the new texture mediums, and then decided it would be more challenging and interesting to invent my own--so I borrowed some marble dust from a friend who paints with pastels, and mixed it into matte polymer medium for a somewhat rough texture, then painted it onto the paper and allowed it to dry.
Rough strokes approximate the texture of my subject.
--------------
MINI-DEMO
The polymer medium sits on the paper surface, and allowed me to lift color with a damp brush, blotting away the loosened watercolor easily as you see here on the edges of the window frame.
I lifted more color to suggest the glass in the broken window, then used an Exacto knife to scratch the sharp edge of the glass, below--I was delighted with the way this helped suggest the dark mystery beyond.
Here, I chose granulating paint--Ultramarine Blue--which settled unevenly into the marble dust-created texture. When all was dry, I scraped paint away from the surface here and there to show the weathered quality of the old building and used a bit of spatter to further add the sense of great age.
It is a very atmospheric little piece!
----------------
Most of the paintings offered here are unframed, both to save on shipping charges and to allow you to suit your own taste and decor.
Doing so allows me to keep the prices down and puts original art in the hands of more people!
"Lara and the Yatates" 8" x 10" ink on Bristol vellum
Yatates are wonderful Japanese traveling paint kits--they have been in use for well over 400 years, and were part of a Samurai's basic equipment. Yatates come in many shapes and sizes--I have four in my collection, all thought to be Edo-era, 1603-1868. They are FUN to use in the field! Mine were all quite inexpensive, considering, and are made of brass and copper--virtually indestructible, though I DID panic when I left one of them in a restaurant in the next town! They had no idea what it was, but they kept it safe in the office till we could get back over and retrieve it.
There is ink-saturated cotton, silk or sponge in the bowl, and the hollow handle holds a brush for writing or drawing in the Sumi-e style.
Here's a photo of the same two yatates...lovely, aren't they?
----------------
MINI-DEMO detail from the ink painting above
It just seemed right somehow to use the Sumi-e brush and paint without preliminary drawing with pencil, as the Samurai might have done. I do find I tend to hold my breath a lot when I work that way, though!
Brushes of this sort often come to a lovely point so they are good for drawing, writing, or painting...I just paid close attention to shapes and relationships as I worked, using the tip of the brush for lines and details, and the body of it for Miss Lara and the soft gray shadows.
I diluted the ink with water for the halftone grays on the yatates, but left it full strength for our beautiful black cat, Lara. (She was named after the heroine in Dr. Zhivago, since she too was shot and thrown into a snowbank to die. My husband's daughter found her, rescued her and brought her back to health.)
--------------
Most of the paintings offered here are unmatted and unframed, both to save on shipping charges and to allow you to suit your own taste and decor.
Doing so allows me to keep the prices down and puts original art in the hands of more people!
Hi all...well, I'm amazed at your response already, so I thought I'd show you what I mean...I put it on this post http://cathyjohnsonart.blogspot.com/2009/06/waiting-for-first-snow.html, on the painting that sold already, but I had the detail shot of the upper right part of the painting...
This is what I had in mind, more or less. I hope the italic and ------- lines set it off a bit.
Hi all...I've been thinking I might try to include a mini-tip when I post a painting, just a bit telling how it came about, or what technique was used where. Would this be of interest to you?
Maybe I'll try to find a place to do a poll on Blogger, but meanwhile, please do leave a comment and tell me what you think!
Well, wow. I did this little painting for the current North Light book, the revision of Watercolor Tricks & Techniques that I've been working on for the past year. I plan to use it on a new CD of demos, when I get the chance, too--I shot step by step pictures of it all along the way.
It's been ages since I got anything up here--I've been so busy with the book and the online classes--and it's SOLD already! (Since it was bought by a friend for a gift, I'll keep the details private!)
Thank you! (Now I'll have to get MORE new things up! *G*)
"Cooley Lake House"
9" x 12"
watercolor on cold pressed paper
A figure, carefully painted, suggests the quiet and isolation. I scratched a bit of detail in the upper edge of the grassy area, can you see it?
Drybrush work with varied greens made good foliage; I connected the leaf masses with fine, dark lines to show the trunks and branches.
