Yellow Rose sketch
Sketchbook Rose – 7 x 10
While I work on some larger projects to prepare some paintings for shows, here’s a page from a Canson Montval sketchbook with a full blown Descanso rose. I didn’t spend a lot of time working on the subtle turn of each petal and leaf – I just wanted to get the colors of the late afternoon light falling on the blossom and leaves.
In retrospect, I see that I need to push back some of the petals so the bloom doesn’t look quite so separate from the background (even though it did look crisp with hard edges in real life.) I could use some complements to glaze over and do that, but I think I’d just risk overworking it too much. I’ve made a mental note of what I need to do, so this sketch has served its purpose. I used a lot of new gamboge, bright red, prussian blue and mauve for this one, and too many other colors to recall. Look for this in a larger version, coming soon.
Art thought of the day from Frank La Lumia, plein air painter, as interviewed by Molly Siple in American Artist:
The way you see things must be different from the way the average person sees the world. It’s important to be able to mentally break down nature into patters of color and value relationships. Until you can think abstractly, you will be at the mercy of leaves, branches and other details of nature.”
Yup, that’s the rub … where is the sweet spot that’s right for me between abstraction and realism? This is my koan of the moment. If you’re a painter, it yours, too?
Abstract sycamore
This was an exercise in abstracting natural forms in my watercolor class. Our teacher, who paints marvelously, is encouraging us to think more in terms of abstraction and symbol rather than literally painting what we see in front of us. I ‘get it’ and am doing the exercises and such, but there’s still a part of me that wants a tree to look like a tree with all the leafy bits (although not TOO fussy.) I’m guessing that my style will even out somewhere between the two, under the influence of my own predilections, likes and dislikes and gentle influence of other teachers yet to come. I love the California school painters with their abstraction and wild colors, but I also love Sargent and his beautiful loose renderings that simultaneously reveal and suggest. And I adore the crisp geometric patterns of Dong Kingman and the sweeping emotional scenes of Emil Kosa and the controlled wildness of Charles Reid. All of them – they all touch my heart, much as I like early music like that of Talis as well as jazz (but only if it swings.) Must we fit in only one mold?
Synchronistically, I opened a random art magazine to a random page and came up with an interview with Tony Pro an oil painter. Pro relates how he had the opportunity to meet Richard Schmid (author of Alla Prima and many other outstanding books.) Pro says that Schmid was kind but honest in reviewing his work, and advised him to be true to himself and not to copy others. Pro concluded with what what is today’s art advice: “Don’t paint like someone else to impress someone – work only to impress yourself.”
Geometric trees may be sophisticated, but for now they just don’t swing. Maybe they will some day – I’ll have to wait and see.
California Byway
California Byway – 7″ x 5″ – watercolor
A peaceful country road in the Ojai area, a little northwest of Los Angeles.
There are still agrarian areas, even in Southern California, where the landscape still looks much as it did a hundred years ago (as long as you don’t notice the late model SUVs zipping by.)
When we take road trips we seek out these out of the way places off the beaten path where the late afternoon sun reminds us that it really is a golden state.
Art advice from watercolorist Rex Brandt:
“I advocate the study of other artists’ ways and indeed, I am suspicious of the student or teacher who professes neither knowledge nor concern about the ways of the masters of his field.”
High Desert Ravine
“High Desert Ravine” – watercolor – 8″ x 10″ – available
A roadside stop on the way to Idyllwild provided the inspiration for this watercolor sketch. Sagebrush, crumbing granite and the scruffy native bushes gave me an interesting variety of textures and colors to work with.
Good advice from David Millard on painting:
“Be a doer … don’t just talk about it. Talent is what your mother talks about. Work is what gets you around the bases and score!”
Two koi
Two Koi – 8″ x 8″ watercolor on Stonehenge paper
Two little Descanso koi, looking for some fish chow. Look out for the racoons!
At Mulberry Pond at Descanso Gardens, they have created some ledges and shelves out of rock for the koi to hide under. I heard from one of the volunteers that the racoons will actually wade in the water to fish. But apparently they won’t swim into deep areas. Racoons, herons and egrets are a problem for pond owners who treasure their living jewels. To the predators it’s just an easy meal.
California Home 1 – Daily Painting
California Home 1 – 15″ x 11″ watercolor on paper
SOLD
Can you tell I’m in the middle of a very experimental try-anything phase? Well, I am. I absolutely love the California school paintings of the 30s through 50s, as I’ve mentioned here before, so today I thought I’d try something in that style.
Last year, on a trip to Capistrano, I took this picture of a bougainvillea vine climbing over a wall onto what seemed to be a carport or something undefined. I liked the vine but I wanted it to be part of a larger scene – not just a big pink sprawling mass. I might still paint it again in oil or pastel, but that’s another story.
So, today, while letting the Alverno villa color study percolate in the back of my head, I took out my sketchbook and explored some other ways the vine could be part of an imaginary scene. I invented a cottage for the vine to crawl on, and made the fence lower so it could be seen.
This was one of several value sketches I did, mapping out different shapes that I thought might work.
I scanned that drawing and brought it into Photoshop CS, where I experimented with different colors in different layers. To make the fuchsia-red flowers pop I looked for a complement for the cottage roof – a blue-green. I picked analogous colors for the other trees and shrubs in the scene.
When I got it roughly sketched on the paper, I discovered that I had too much room to the right with nothing going on, so I drew in an old clothesline and tucked it behind a hedge because I didn’t want the fence to run full wide right off the page. And … I liked the allusion to an time before labor-saving devices, and the sun and breeze that it implies. I suspect that there are a couple of little kids playing with a floppy-eared dog in that back yard. Don’t you think? That shrubby background became a place to insert a couple of squabbling birds – geese or ducks, your guess.
So there’s the evolution of a California dream from a long-gone era and I hope you found the journey to its completion interesting. I’ll be putting this in my ebay store, tomorrow probably.
Flintridge Cottage
“Flintridge Cottage” – watercolor – 5.3″ x 7″
Every year our town has a spring garden tour of some of the nicest homes. I often take a camera along to get ideas for landscaping. And occasionally these gardens end up in my paintings, too. This ivy covered cottage is on the route of one of our daily walks. With manicured box hedges, rose bushes and perennial flowers, it looks like something out of a fairy tale.
Palos Verdes Ride –
Palos Verdes Ride – 13.75 x 9″ – watercolor on paper
$100 Purchase from the artist
A few weeks ago, when we went down to Wayfarer’s Chapel for our anniversary, we drove through the Palos Verdes peninsula and I took a few pictures from the car along the way. One of them featured some large eucalyptuses, which I can never pass up the chance to paint. Unfortunately, this area is “no parking” due to extreme landslide danger, so I was not able to get out and sketch. But that’s why I always carry a camera with me. When I got home and took a look at my picture, I saw that there were some riders emerging from the grove. I hadn’t noticed them at all during the drive-by.
If you live in the area , I think we just approaching Portugeuse Bend, coming up from San Pedro. (Googlemap link below.)
Magnolia Glow – Daily Painting
Magnolia Glow – 7 x 11″ watercolor. SOLD.
Although this painting is sold see more of my floral and botanical paintings here
Every year I wait for the magnolias to come into bloom at Descanso. The tulips burst open at the same time, which seems fitting. The downy buds thrust up, covered with a soft casing that seems like velvet or suede. Eventually it begins to show color. This is usually about the time that a rainstorm threatens to spoil the blooms. But, with luck, the tight buds will make it through the showers, to open fully on a warm day. From this tight urn-shaped form they will expand gracefully, the petals laying back in ecstasy. The colors are more subtle in the shade, but I like them best in early morning or very late afternoon, when a slanting ray causes the white of the petals to glow with a hot inner fire.
In this case, the flower was painted first, in general terms. Then the background was added to gauge the contrast. Finally, I went back and added the final color accents to the bloom. I rather like the trapped negative space between the stem and the leaf – it reminds me of certain art nouveau motifs.
Full Blown – Daily Painting
“Full Blown” 7″ x 11″ – watercolor on 140# paper
Available
It’s not too late for the camellia show at Descanso Gardens, if you’ve been putting it off. There are still plenty of big blossoms in every range of white red and pink, and the azaleas at their feet are dazzling as well. And the tulips are up!
I was a painting fool this weekend. The more I painted the more I wanted to paint. I had some red paint left over from the tomatoes, and rather than see it go to waste I looked around through my recent flower files and found this camellia blossom, caught in the brilliant late afternoon sunlight. I can still imagine it hanging on the tree, moving slightly in the breeze.
I think I could paint something different from Descanso Gardens every day and not ever get bored. Do you have a place you feel that way about? Whether it’s a park or a garden or a part of the city that you call your artistic “home?”
