Freehand painting my Flowers in Vase...

"Flowers in a Vase" 11 x 15. Watercolor. 2011

Today I wanted to try my new Kolinsky Sable Size 9 paintbrush and try to freehand paint flowers in a vase with no  preliminary drawing...I really like the results.

Amazon Explorers and the purple phalaenopsis orchid for Pam

I am inspired by Margaret Mee, one of the great British explorers and botanical illustrators of our time. She painted orchids and wildlife in the jungles of Brazil.  Her beautiful paintings thrill me which is why I bought her book and decided to see what it takes to paint an orchid in my own studio to give as a gift to my sister Pam. 

I started the project with my mechanical pencil, a pad of tracing paper and a live orchid. The preliminary line drawing is always the most time consuming part of the project.  You want to get the basic shape right at stage in order to finish the painting.   I left the orchid in my studio and went to bed. 

In the morning I came out to find all of the flower heads had dropped onto the table in the middle of the night! I thought how often did this sort of thing happen to explorer's in the jungles surrounded by mosquitoes and everything else to think about. All I had to do was I ran out and bought the replacement orchid, a purple Phalaenopsis to finish the project.

While debating whether to paint the orchid in watercolor, gouache, or acrylic paints I did color swatch comparisons. My sister Pam likes the more opaque bright colors, so I decided to make test swatches of all my colors of paints to see how they would look. I also was trying a new Canson 140 lb watercolor paper that someone gave me as a gift to see how I like it.  It is a smooth surface that works nice for all three medium, except the watercolor which tends to feel a little dreary compared to using the Arches.  The paper tended to make the watercolor grit more obvious, but worked nicely for the gouache and the acrylic.

The final image is framed and matted and up on the wall for the family to enjoy!

Sunshine On My Shoulder...

"Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy, sunshine in my eyes can make me cry, sunshine on the water looks so lovely, sunshine almost always makes me high." John Denver

Today I woke up feeling motivated to paint. After breakfast I took a trip to the art store to get 4 new tubes of watercolor paint, and to the farmers market for a bouquet of the most lovely sunflowers.  When I got back I plopped down in a bright sunny patch of grass, spread out my materials in the sun and started sketching.  After an hour this is what I had. A basic line drawing. I spent another several hours  painting each petal cadmium yellow, the sky a light lavender and the center shades of yellow ochres. By the time I was done, the sun decided to go away and I was left painting in the overcast fog again.  So with a wet paper in front of me and pale sunflowers sitting waiting to be finished, I decided I was done for the day.  Here is what it looks like.

Sunflowers.  7" x 9 3/4".  Watercolor.

Finding New Inspiration

Welcome to my blog!  After years of working as a teacher/naturalist in some form, I am determined to put all my energy into pursuing art full time!  In order for this to happen I am putting together a blog of the process as I figure out what it means to be an illustrator.  I hope to share in my newest passion for landscapes paintings of the California coast including several from Santa Cruz Island where I am an assistant kayak guide in the summer.  I hope to use this blog to push myself to doing a new piece of work everyday. Enjoy

This is the view looking east on Santa Cruz Island toward Anacapa Island.  8 1/2" x 11".  Watercolor.  I painted this on August 2, 2011 after spending the previous day kayaking.  This was my first attempt at using paynes gray gouache for the dark shadow of the islands.  Next time I want to try the watercolor paynes gray to see how it looks.

Santa Cruz Island looking towards Anacapa Island. 8 1/2" x 11".  Watercolor.