Staying busy

Feeling a bit Surreal today, can you tell?

14 x 11 inches, Acrylic on panel, "Illusion"

Still working on completing my one hundred figure paintings, and just started the January 30 paintings in 30 days challenge.  This is day 4.

Also thought I would collage a photo together of the last bunch of figure paintings.

So I can safely say, I am staying busy this month :)

Mary

All about layers

"Indecision"  14 x 11 inches Acrylic on canvas

                                         

Finished today for day 28 of the 30 paintings in 30 days challenge.  

I started this yesterday and count that layer of the painting day 27, because it could have been a finished work at that point, but decided to do more. 

    

   I plan to do a small video of the process and the thought process soon and add to my YouTube channel.

   Day 26 is another painting that came together with layering...

"Dances with Light"  !4 x11 inches  Acrylic on canvas panel

                                         

   This painting branched off from this painting...

The painting need more, wasn't sure what for a while.  Finally I decided to let intuition take over.

Now it feels complete.

Mary

Painting from memory

Finished this 3rd week of 30 paintings in 30 days having some fun.  I have been painting a view I saw briefly while driving down a road.  One thing I learned from this is a memory is just an idea,  not a true reference.

Day 21....

6 x 6 on Ampersand panel

Day 20 and 19...

The 3 are available on my DPWs web site, pretty much just for the cost of the painting surface, thought it would be fun to just share the little experiments a t a fun price.

While I was having fun just had to do a little digital play also..

There is a web site called Collage.com that you can create collage collections from photos, another fun place to play:)

  Next week I plan to get a little more serious and finish each day some paintings that I have started.
I have a rule for myself, always have something in process, that way when I get up there is always something waiting for me to work on, it is a good way to keep painting everyday.
Mary

Preparing for Abstracts

"Secrets"  Mixed media 24 x 18  inches

 

 

"Rust and Steel" Mixed media

It often appears that an abstract art work is quick and spontaneous.  Sometimes abstracts do happen that way.  But often there is a lot of preparatory work going on behind the scene. 

For most of the abstracts I do in watercolor or acrylic I use some collage.  For collage I like to texture and design my papers.  This could involve textured artist tissue paper with gesso and paint, there times I use ink, and solvent on found papers, to get usual effects.

To apply my collage parts I use a mix of gloss and matte medium, fluid for thin papers, and gel for heavier ones.

The process of textured the papers to use take a few days and layering then into the work takes several days also, because it is best to layer thinly allowing each layer to dry before apply the next.  Any painting between layers and at the finish should completely day before finishing with varnish.

Yesterday I spent the whole day just making collage papers. Today I am sorting and figuring out which ones are best to use. Next will be laying them out on a gessoed panel and creating the basic design. That is the process I used in the paintings that I am sharing above.  

 

 

piles of ink textured paper getting sorted

close up of one paper

another example of paper

 Mary

Schiros_Art

Schiros Abstracts

Painting with Leftovers

Acrylic 10 by 8 inches, acrylic skin and paint knife

      

I Thought II             I thought I would share a neat way to use leftover acrylic paint.  Depending on what you use for a palette, often the dry paint film can be pulled off.  There are palettes of plastic that are made for just that, but plastic sheets used as drop clothes work well to.  I often cover the whole table I am working from with a plastic sheet then use the whole table as a palette.

Once there a     Once there are enough dry layers of acrylic you can catch an edge and peal it off.  Usually, the under layer is the most interesting.  You can then cut the piece of acrylic film, often called a skin, and glue it down to a painting surface with an acrylic gel medium, let it dry and paint over and around it to make a new and interesting piece of art.

A dry acrylic film ready for my next work

This is the underside, it is usually shinny, smooth and very interesting

Confessions of an art supply junkie

Pictures, Wolf; wax and silver point

Crow; wax and watercolor

Abstract; watercolor, ink and collage

Dragonfly; acrylic, litho pencil, and watercolor

There are two phases in the growth of art, learning and experimenting.

I am a firm believer that to make good art you need to know the basics.

A good painter needs to know how to draw. Value sketches, design plans are foundations to a good piece of art. Knowing color will develop richness and emotion to a painting.

Phase one you learn the rules, phase two you break the rules.

The art junkie habit grows with every new or different art supply I stumble across. The new material has properties that take some time to learn. That is simple enough but then I have to see what it does with other material I already have. Rules start getting broken experiments happen. Soon the conservative watercolorist is venturing into the scary new world of mixed media. I try to give the new addition a safe name, water-media, and that works for a while. Then the oils and waxes start sneaking in and I have to confess I am on my way to a life as a mixed media artist.

I hope my family and friends will forgive and that moments of pure watercolorist will still emerge. The adventurer in me is not going to stop, so here is to experimenting and breaking rules.

Some of my favorite places to learn and get supplies are on the net and locally.

Locally:

Boundless Arts, Grand Blanc, MI

FIA, Flint MI

On the net:

Wet Canvas

Robert Burridge