Friday, April 30, 2010

My First Mural

A few weeks ago I posted pictures of a mural I did as well as WIP photos of it. I mentioned a mural I did a few years ago (my first one) and I was asked to post pictures of it. Our garden was on a local garden tour and I painted the walls for that day. Most of the plants were new so they were pretty small and the mural showed all the way around this small patio. Here are some pictures. I know I took some pictures when I first finished it but I don't know where they are. Since I painted it, the plants have really grown so most of it isn't visible anymore. That's okay. Even though it took me about 40 hours to paint it, I'm ready for something a little different which is good because we need to get the house painted and I really wasn't looking forward to painting around the mural.

Please forgive the bad photo. This is one wall that I will do a new mural on after we re-paint the house because there is no planter directly in front of it. You can see plants in front of it here but there is a walkway between the wall and the planter. The wall always looked very stark to me and originally, this was the only wall I planned to paint. I was having so much fun with it that I decided to paint all of the walls.
Can you tell which of the plants are real and which are painted?
There are a bunch of different types of plants painted behind this schefflera. You can see a piece of a spiky looking plant if you look way off to the right side of the photo.
This is a part that I will probably paint around and then just touch up because I like the feel of the path leading into the distance. This part was really never finished. I planned to put some more distinct plants in the foreground and a multi-trunk birch in the corner and onto the side wall but I ran out of time and after the garden tour was over, I decided it was finished. Ha Ha.

Monday, April 26, 2010

Spring Flowers




This is not what I was planning to post today. I did finish another painting but I really don't like it. I don't like this one either but I like it better than the other one. That tells you how bad the other one is. I have a friend (you know who you are) that gets upset when I say negative things about a painting but I have to be honest. This is a pastel on Wallis paper that I did today after realizing I needed something to post. It was good practice at drawing a person.
The other painting that I finished but don't like is a silk painting that took me a long time to do but it just didn't turn out well. I like the main idea though so I'm going to do it over and make changes and I think I will like it then. Maybe I'll post the bad one if the re-do is good so you can see both and what changes I made.

Spring Flowers
Image Size 8" x 10"
Pastel

Monday, April 19, 2010

Waterlily II

I'm playing with charcoal and watercolor again. I also have some gouache on it. I threw a little bit of everything at this one. It sure is bright! I like the black contrasting with the bright colors. I think it has a happy feeling to it. Maybe that's because I was feeling happy while I painted it. It was very relaxing to throw paint on a wet piece of paper with the idea that it was going to be loose (for me) and have a carefree feeling. It was a good exercise in giving up control.

Waterlily
Image size 14" x 18"
Mixed Media
Unframed
$195.00

Monday, April 12, 2010

Canary Islands

I realize that this in not one of my best efforts but this is a small gouache study for the virtual paintout challenge. I'm a bit embarrassed to post this because it doesn't look like it took much time to do. Well, it didn't take much time. I did it yesterday and wasn't in the mood to paint. I tried a pastel first of a building in the Canary Islands that had succulents growing from the roof tiles. It was a very cool picture but my rendition of it looked very juvenile. That landed in the trash. I don't throw many painting attempts away so that should tell you how bad it was. I wasn't being lazy this week. I've been working on my big watercolor all week as you can see the WIP below.


I don't know if you can tell what this is or not. I started out by throwing some pale paint on it in an abstract shape. I knew I wanted to paint koi beneath it but that was as far as my planning stage went. I'm not sure what's going to happen with this painting. This is the only time I have tackled a watercolor painting without fully planning where it will go. Sometimes that plan changes as I paint but I have always known where I WANTED it to go. I have a lot of time into this painting so far and the thought that it may end up as a dud is not very motivating. However, I will plod along and see where it takes me. I know I need to darken my values on the stuff under whatever that is on top. Then I need to decide what that is on top. Is it reflections, or flotsam and jetsam, or just some abstract something? Any ideas?


Monday, April 5, 2010

Golden Beets

I went to the Farmer's Market last week and saw these beautiful beets. I had never heard of golden beets. I don't think I captured the color as much as I would have liked. The golds with the rose and other colors made them look almost iridescent. This is done in pastels on mat board coated with pumice gel. I wanted to try painting them in oils too but they had lost their freshness by the time I was ready to paint them again. I had taken pictures of them but they didn't look the same as in real life. I guess I'll hit the Farmer's Market again this week and try again.
I'm working on some large watercolors and I'm really excited about them. Watercolor really is my favorite medium. I may have one of them finished for next week.

Golden Beets
Image Size 10" x 14"
Pastels
Unframed
$140.00
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