Golden Days – Karen Winters Daily Painting
Golden Days – a highway near Lompoc – 12 x 16 oil on canvas
SOLD
This painting will be used in the movie “So We Bought a Zoo,” starring Scarlet Johansen and Matt Damon – Christmas 2011
Windswept – by Karen Winters
“Windswept” 18 x 24 oil on canvas
This new painting was finished just a few days ago, and will be in the show at Descanso Gardens, now just two days away. It’s my favorite painting, so far, for a few reasons. For one, it’s the largest oil painting I’ve attempted and probably represents the most dynamic design. The larger size meant using larger brushes and standing back farther. Although I did the block in part sitting down, all the finishing was done standing, which was a different experience for studio painting. I almost always stand when painting en plein air, but not in studio.
The best part was the inspiration for this piece. A month or so ago we visited our daughter in San Francisco where she was doing her summer internship between the two years of her MBA program. We went up to Mt. Tamalpais for the day and had great time wandering through a redwood grove. On the way back we got caught up in the traffic returning over the Golden Gate bridge, and our movement came to a standstill. When I’m a passenger in a car, I almost always have my camera at the ready, and this time, I happened to see a tree clinging to a cliffside we passed. The light was striking it in a particularly dramatic way and I was immediately started thinking of creative possibilities. (It was not a cloudy day – I made that part up.) So because we were frustrated and inconvenienced, this shot became a possibility. Speeding by at 60 mph, it wouldn’t have been.
This incident reminds me of the value of acceptance. Acceptance of things the way they are, rather than how we would like them to be. Possibilities are all around us if we are not fixated on achieving specific results.
For example, you run out of the color of paint you want as you are beginning a painting. Use a different color and see what happens. Water dribbles in the wrong place on your watercolor. Is it an error or a doorway to a new shape that you might not have tried? You leave your pencil sharpener at home and have to sharpen a tool with an exacto knife instead – creating a different sort of edge. I’ve heard stories of artists who suddenly develop an allergy to their medium of choice, and have to switch to another, leading to breakthroughs in their careers. These stories are abundant in art and other endeavors.
Have you had this happen to you? How did it change your art or, even more so, your life? How did acceptance of something unexpected or even unwelcome make a difference for you?
Red Tulip – Daily Painting – Karen Winters
Red Tulip 11 x 15 watercolor on paper (quarter sheet)
Here’s another new one for the show – a red and golden striped tulip from Descanso Gardens, catching the last rays of the day. And speaking of rays, I’m happy to report that our heat wave has broken. We had dinner on the patio last night and it was 68 degrees at 7:oo or so – what a change from just a week ago when it was close to 100 at that time. Very weird.
I spent today organizing my files to make prints and I was astounded to discover that I have more than 162 pieces in my catalog – and that’s just the ones that I have a positive feeling about. There must easily be three or four times that many. Today was the process-athon. Tomorrow begins the making print and framathon. Eventually comes the sleepathon.
At least (I think) I can take some comfort in the fact that I will never have this kind of intense startup again. There will be more paintings to paint and frame, but the learning the ropes part, the knowing where to go to get this or that supply – that should hopefully be a bit more predictable and relaxed.
Coneflowers
“Coneflowers” 9 x 12 watercolor on paper
Tonight was the meeting of our local art association, and we were privileged to see a demonstration by Fealing Lin, a remarkably gifted watercolorist who came to the US from Taipei as a dentist and reinvented herself as a fine artist. Her style is loose and free but it’s wonderful to see what she does with color. Unlike some watercolorists whose looseness seems mannered and almost formulaic, Fealing’s paintings are spontaneous and each presents a unique solution to a creative problem. She emphasized the importance of saving the lights and really pouring on the color, wet in wet.
I was so inspired by the demo she gave that I came home and painted this quick sketch of coneflowers, trying to get into that spirit of controlled spontaneity. Oh, yeah, and it was after dinner and a glass of cabernet. Hmmm. I think that helped.
If you’re in the Southern California area and would like a picture postcard invite to my show starting next week at Descanso, drop me a line at karen@karenwinters.com
Gloriosas in Excelsis
“Gloriosas in Excelsis” – 11 x 15 watercolor on paper
Not for sale. Prints available.
Gloriosa daisies (aka Rudbeckias) are among my favorite casual flowers. I love roses, of course, and alstroemerias, and lilacs, Shasta daisies, penstemons – ah, so many flowers so little time. But gloriosas are wonderful workhorses in a garden setting, as in this center planter at Descanso Gardens. They are long lasting either growing in the ground or cut, and if there isn’t too much cold weather they can even be cut back and coaxed to bloom a second year. Gloriosas are related to black eyed susans and coneflowers and they are outstanding in bouquets. I am still painting like crazy in advance of the show, even though I have more than enough paintings to choose from. But I know I won’t get a great deal of painting done during the month that I’m gallery-sitting, so I’m sort of putting a few in the bank ahead of time.
Hot hot hot
Hot Cannas – 11 x 15 watercolor on paper
SOLD
As I get ready for the show in a few weeks, I’ve been painting numerous large florals which I might offer for sale matted, but unframed. This is one of them, which I think fits the climate pretty well right now. We’re having an extreme heat wave in LA at the moment, with high temperatures from 109-110 where I am. It feels even hotter with the humidity being served. The air is chewy, sort of. If you go outside at midnight it’s still in the 90s – it’s that hot. In that spirit, I painted some cannas that thrive here as long as they’re planted in a wet soggy area. I grow mine in a bucket – literally with their soil underwater. They like it that way – they’re bog plants.
First Flush
“First Flush” 9 x 12 oil on canvas on board
SOLD
When spring comes to Descanso Gardens, the first flush of roses is a sight to behold. In fact, it’s pretty darn spectacular any time of year, even now when the hot summer colors radiate from every corner.
Yesterday I spent some time up at the gallery with fellow artists Belinda del Pesco, and Trish Kertes – two of the most gifted artists and nicest people you’d ever want to meet. They were so very helpful in teaching me the ropes of running the gallery when it’s our turn in a few weeks. Their expertise was so very welcome.
Prints coming soon
I’m making my master list of things to do to get ready, and among them is making prints available for sale as well as original works. So if you’ve been interested in getting prints of some of the things I’ve posted here, I will soon be offering those in a variety of sizes. More details on that as I get further along. At the moment I need to focus on the imminent deadline.
Castle Green – new show UPDATE
SOLD
Today I was delighted to get a notification that this will be one of 15 paintings accepted into the upcoming juried California Art Club group exhibition “California in Focus: Scenes of Pasadena and the San Gabriel Valley. Part 2”
The exhibition will be on view at Marston’s Restaurant in Pasadena … 151 E. Walnut Street … from November 27, 2007 – January 27, 2008. A reception will be held toward the end of the exhibition – the exact date and time to be determined. I’ll announce it on the blog as soon as I know.
Needless to say I am thrilled to be included in this beautiful CAC show, and to meeting my fellow exhibitors, but it just so happens that Marston’s is on the short list of our very favorite casual local restaurants. If you ever have a chance to dine there there you simply MUST try the Pasadena or Cordillera salad. Their cottage garden is a delight, too. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve photographed those blooms, and how it’s been an inspiration to my own cottage garden. I’m going to have to paint the Marston’s garden one of these days. If Descanso is my garden home, Marston’s is definitely my lunch home!
This was one of many painting projects that have been in the works these past weeks, and I am so very happy to be included.
Vineyard Sunset
Vineyard Sunset 14 x 18 – oil on canvas
This painting will be going into a show beginning on September 15 – my first group show at Descanso Gardens.
If you’ve been reading this blog for awhile, you know how much I love Descanso – in every season. It’s one of my very favorite places to paint. So being invited to participate in a group exhibition and sale there is something that makes me very happy. I will be exhibiting both watercolor and oil paintings in the Carriage House and will post more details here as the date approaches.
Now, about this painting. This was done from a photo reference, but the shot was quite different. For one thing, the sun was in a different position, the sky was blue and it was earlier in the day. The whole sunset look (and the color palette associated with it) came about at the underpainting stage.
What I learned from this: sometimes it’s wise not to begin a painting with fixed notions. Have a plan, yes, but be open to change if an idea strikes you that you like better than your plan. Then, be prepared to improvise. As soon as I made one major change from my photo reference, I put the photo aside and referred to it no more. At that point, every decision had to be made about the color of the imaginary scene, not the real one. What color would the hills be that time of day? How would light coming at a low angle look different than sunlight coming from above? How could I make the road more interesting than simple flat gravel? How would I add rocks and ruts with the right colors to make them look as though they belonged in the scene? What would clouds look like if I added them? All these thoughts began swirling in my head as I departed from reality.
Tomorrow I deliver my large somewhat surreal watercolor “My Offering – My Confession” to Brand Library for the hanging of the juried 36th annual Works on Paper show opening in early October. Times are hectic, but in a good creative way. I’m grateful for all these opportunities and really couldn’t ask for more.
Daisies and Crystal by Karen Winters
Daisies and Crystal 9 x 12 – watercolor
I’m working on a rather large watercolor for a special project, but in the meantime, to have something to post, I did this quick sketch of some flowers in one of my cut glass vases. As it turned out I became more interested in the facets of the cut glass than the flowers. This is 9 x 12, painted freehand with a #14 round brush and a 1″ flat, nothing smaller than that. I didn’t do any pencil underdrawing because I was using this as an exercise to draw with the brush and do some negative painting.
The grays and neutrals in this were composed of the primaries used in the flowers. In other words, palette mud.
But mud can be a very nice thing when it’s used to harmonize and serve as a background to brighter colors.
