‘Vibrant Acrylics’ Fourth Exercise - a Rose

The fourth exercise 'Paint a flower in fifty brushstrokes' from ‘Vibrant Acrylics’ was completed back at the beginning of September because, as usual, I was impatient.

To do all the exercises in order I’ve repeated the rose painting; this time using bigger brushes and canvas. For some reason, painting shapes isn’t easy for me, especially getting the right perspective.  The second painting looked worse than the first; so I decided to paint over it for a third try.

It took many attempts to get a good photo of the third painting because the texture from the previous one shows through. After looking at them, it seems I may have put too much deep violet in all three. I'll keep trying this exercise until I’m happy with the results... but don't worry I won't bore you with them:))

'3xWeekly' - Paintings of a Brown Cocker Spaniel

For the longest time I couldn’t decide on a subject or medium for my '3xWeekly'. Because the results of my previously painted acrylic dogs weren’t great, I was discouraged and thought they wouldn’t be a suitable subject. In Carol’s book ‘Daily Painting’ there was a painting of a dog by Kimberley Santini that I absolutely loved. On Kimberley’s blog it was clear that when she started, in 2006, her dogs didn’t look as good as they do today. So, if Kimberly could improve...I could too.

Being eager to begin, I did four paintings of my friend's Brown Cocker Spaniel this week. After the first painting I decided to put the background colour down first, then draw the image, then paint in the eyes, nose and mid-tones. Finally, layer the dark and lights of the hairs. Some people say it’s best to do the eyes last; but the painting looks too scary. I did four of the same image trying different techniques and colours. 

Before ‘3xWeekly’ I would never have just stopped painting and would have obsessed over each painting until I got discouraged and gave up. Knowing that I would paint another day, it was easier not to get bogged down by the results and just enjoy the painting and learning process.

Drawing & Painting Class – Portrait w/ Joel (Red, Yellow, Blue & White Paint)

Last term in my acrylic painting class we did a glazing with black and white prints of people. I chose to do Robert Deniro, so for this assignment, I chose the same image. What a nightmare... it was difficult to draw him because his face was at an angle.

Using red, yellow & blue acrylic paint we made a grey wash for the background. Then with willow charcoal we drew the image, it didn’t come out perfect because only 30 minutes was allotted for drawing. Next we began to block colours in for the face. It would have come out better if there was more time, but the class is only 2 ½ hours so what you see is what you get.

I wanted to try and do another portrait in oil because Joel said it’s easier to blend since the paints don’t dry so quickly. I bought a cheap set of oil paints and some ‘Winsor & Newton Sansodor’ from WH Smith and started another Deniro at home. The oil painting was proving just as difficult and I’m too embarrassed to show a pic of it…sorry.

Drawing & Painting Class – Tone and Edges w/ Joel

In Joel’s next drawing & painting class we worked on tone and mark making techniques. Starting with the same exercise from last trimester's class, we then chose a type of mark and used it to draw a rose from a photo. The decision on the mark type was made before we were told what we were drawing. Of course, I chose a difficult circular motion... as you can imagine my drawing didn’t go well. 

Didn’t finish the rose but instead started to draw the bust of a woman… this portraiture stuff might be for me. Creativity can be fickle, a few weeks of torture and then voila.

In the following class we were to concentrate on edges. Joel likes to paint people so there were mainly street scenes in his photographs. I really liked my choice and later found out that Joel painted the same photo in colour.   Don’t know if it’s the charcoal and erasing technique or the subject matter, but I loved this exercise.

It would be ironic if I wind up drawing people as an artist; when taking photographs, I’m always waiting for folks to move out of the way.

Cloud & Tree Lessons on YouTube

There are many cloud painting exercises on YouTube and this one by Rick Nagualero was very comprehensive. Free Acrylic Painting Lesson In Real Time - Painting Simple Clouds  My painting didn’t come out that well, so believe it or not... I painted over it. It’s not like me but I’ve got to change my thinking; if it’s not good enough to sign it needs to be recycled.

Fear not, because with another YouTube video, another painting emerges. ‘How To Paint Trees Full Slow Video "Apple Barrel" Acrylics Canvas Lesson Art Class' by Ben Saber made painting look easy, and it was... for the most part. It’s not perfect but my husband likes it.

Watching the long version of a video can be tedious, but if you listen to the artists talk as they paint, you can pick up various little tips and tricks.

Acrylic Painting Class – Final Project with Joel

We had three weeks for the final project and could choose any subject to paint. A cool picture of my dog Linus as a puppy was my choice. I wanted to use the colour mixing and glazing that we learned in previous lessons. Three weeks was not enough time; even after bringing mine home to work on, it was never completed. This was partially due to my unwillingness to make the painting worse in order to make it better and partly because I just wasn’t sure what it needed. Someday I hope to come back to it. If anyone has any constructive suggestions I'm open to them. The dog doesn't pop like it should and the background may be too busy.

While painting this photo I was inspired to try a pallet knife version and be bolder and more abstract. I didn't restrict myself to mixing the paint and didn't put in a background. This painting took a lot less time and in my humble opinion, came out better than the final project.

I brought it into class for Joel to look at and he liked it too.

B&Q Paints

B&Q had a clearance sale on house paints and they were really bright colours. It was a no brainer, the bargain shopper in me bought 5 colours: blue, green, red, yellow and black  Maybe not the wildest of colours but with them I created two really cool paintings using techniques learned from Art Fusion.

 

For more ideas I searched abstracts on Google images and found some interesting art. This time regular artist acrylics were used because the B&Q ones were too close to the original. By changing the colours, shape and adding paint splashes, I created my own artwork. It’s nice to view other paintings to get ideas provided you don’t create an exact replica.

I have included the inspirational painting; couldn’t find the link to the photo but found Victor Tilson the artist @ www.saatchiart.com. That's something to remember, keep the link to images you download.