THIS WEEK IN THE ART CAVE

 I've been enjoying making some art with Andrea Chebeleu's Watch.Learn.Play.

They meet every Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning.

Every month is a different palette and a different technique.

December is Vermillion, Hansa Yellow Deep and Phthalo Blue (GS) with a focus on drawing.

I've been enjoying it completely.

SWATCHING PAINT

 I set about swatching all of my Acrylic paints.  I wanted to know what I have and what I don't have for some upcoming projects.  I've always swatched my watercolors, but not the acrylics until now.

In the process I saw these chips setting out waiting to dry and thought they would make a great palette - for a quilt maybe?  Yes.

I don't know why it's sideways, I've changed it but it likes to be this way.

I've been joining Watch.Learn.Play and painting with them lately.  Today I painted some flowers. I had gathered some ferns on the morning walk and used them to transfer paint to the background to make the fern image.

We are using a palette of Cobalt Blue, Naples Yellow and Burnt Sienna.  That's what I used for this painting. It's a bit on the dark, muted side.  Which I like, but, I wanted a bit more of a brighter green and added a touch of Lemon Yellow to get it.

Oh, if you noticed the bottom of the painting didn't conform to that palette - I started with a canvas that had been primed with a light blue.  Then I over painted it with some Quinacridone Gold (my fav).  For some reason it decided to separate and not cover completely.  Which turned out pretty cool - so I left it.

MAKING ART

 I've joined an online community, Watch.Learn.Play, organized by Andrea Chebeleu.  We meet regularly on zoom and paint, draw, collage and play.

Today, we painted big and made marks.

MAKING MUSHROOMS

I'm participating in this year's Fodder Challenge - a month of artists showing us different projects.

This first one, presented yesterday, uses powdered pigments.  I'd never heard of them and now am enamored of them.  They were great fun to use and I can see how they can add something wonderful to future projects.

 

VALENTINE'S DAY FLOWERS

 Here's my portrait of the flowers my sweetie gave me for Valentine's Day this year.

It's been a while since I've painted.  I need more practice.  

WONKY WEDNESDAY

I started out quilting on NYC, doing straight lines with a ruler.  But, I started making stupid mistakes after about an hour, so I quit before I it got really bad.

I went back to painting the Little Houses.  

 

LITTLE HOUSES

 I saw the free patterns and directions for making these little houses in Quilt Mania.  

I got some of them sewed together and today I put some chalk paint on them.  

They still need a lot of details.

BIRTHDAY FLOWERS

 Darrell got me a nice bouquet of flowers for my birthday yesterday.  I found a canvas, dusted it off and rounded up my acrylics and brushes.  And painted.

VALENTINE'S DAY FLOWERS

Flowers from my sweetie for Valentine's Day.

 

WATERCOLOR APPLES

I signed up for an online workshop with Jane LaFazio.  This week's assignment was to sketch and paint some fruit from life.

I was amazed how drawing that little line around the apples turned a boring painting into a more interesting one.  (Jane's suggestion)

STILL LIFE - B

 Here's day two, letter B Still Life in oil:

I had wrapped the hard board in that blue and white paisley fabric.  As I was painting along, I figured I'd just leave it exposed. 

PAINTING ROCKS

 Hailey is staying with us this week.

We painted some rocks today.

MOVING THINGS AROUND

First thing this morning I started looking for a new iron, since mine died yesterday.  Can't do much sewing without an iron.  I thought about getting a 'tank' type iron - but they are expensive and I decided against it mainly because of the way my ironing board is set up.  I don't know where I would put the tank and have it be accessible yet out of my way.

So, when I found the professional Rowenta model I settle on I found the best price on Amazon.  I ordered it and was surprised to see that it would be delivered today, before 6pm, still free shipping.  Amazing.  [And it was.]

In the meantime, I cut out pieces and put them on the wall.  At the end of the morning, I wasn't really happy with it and spent some time moving a few groups around.

I was amazed when I downloaded these pictures of the quilt and the flowers - the colors are very similar.  Hmmm.

I took a picture of the Coneflowers so I could paint them into my journal.  It was hard to get the deep red/orange of the flowers right on this paper.  But I like it.

MONDAY WATERCOLOR

Our Watercolor Class has been moved to Mondays for the next several weeks.  Our instructor, Jenna Roby took this photo of downtown Seattle which we used as a reference for this week's class.

TUESDAY WATERCOLOR

VALENTINE'S FLOWERS

STARTING THE FLOWERS

Here is the beginning of my Valentine Flowers painting.

FRIDAY ACRYLIC

Now for something completely different...

First we did an underpainting - making marks.

Then we negative painted something that was supposed to look like the underside of a palm tree.

TUESDAY WATERCOLOR

BENTLEY PORTRAIT