Spring 2011 Acrylic

I need to appolgize, I have noticed that there are rollover hyperlinks embedded in my blogs that I did not put there nor approve of but aparently, Blogger has started this as part of their allowing people to have free blogs. The orange colored double underlined hyperlinks are put in there by Blogger, not me....... Also, it is not allowing me to insert extra lines to create paragraphs so I will have to use ....... Acrylic Project - Week 1...... Because I usually have to do an orientation for the new students we didn't do much this past class, basically what I hope you will all do before next class is to have the reference photo and, if you need it, the drawing for the project, you can download it from the picture page and print it out........ The other thing you can do, if you want, is to tone your canvas. I honestly don't care what color you paint your canvas, you can leave it white if you want, you can do multi colors if you want, just have your canvas ready to start painting, this is going to be new for me as well and I hope it will be a lot of fun. I'm going to be working on a black canvas but it is not necessary you also work on black..... Also what you DO NOT need to do is draw your boat onto your canvas, we are not to that stage by a long shot and with what we are going to do, any drawing is going to be covered anyway so don't waste the effort...... See you Monday.

Spring 2011

Hi Everyone

I just posted the first picture we will be doing to the picture page. Please feel free to download and print out copies for class.

See you soon. - LP

Winter 2011 Acrylic Class

WINTER 2011 – ACRYLIC Demo – Clouds and figures.

Torrance class: We finished up the Poppy, the only thing I did different is I showed how if you need to gray a color – in this instance the blue/purple – you can use a thin mix of color called a glaze and paint over the color you want to mute. Since this was a blue/purple I needed a yellow/orange with a lot of water, remember it is just a glaze, I didn't have any extra color on my brush so that it didn't drip as I put it on and scrubbed it on the areas I wanted to put it. You need to wait until it dries before you know if it gave you the look you were going for, you may need to do it again be each layer should be a thin, transparent glaze, this is only to alter the color underneath.

Before I start the narration on clouds, I want to talk a bit about "getting in the mood" to paint. Painting should be almost meditative. If you are in "the zone" when you are painting you should be startled when you look up and see the time and realize an hour or two has passed. As I look around the class most of you look dismayed that only a few minutes have passed since you last looked at the clock. This is not the mind set you should be in when you are trying to create.

I have mentioned before the Betty Edward's book "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" it is a wonderful book for many reasons, the best being explaining to you how your mind works. The two side of your brain have different functions. The left side is concerned with Time, logic, math, language to name a few, the things you use in your everyday-get-through-life state of being. The right side of your brain of you brain is more concerned with spatial things, face recognition, esthetics, emotions sort of the background program that lets you walk through a room without watching every step – everything the left side is not. Together, they make up who we are and how we see the world around us.

One of the key things she talks about is how the left brain relates to the world. It has its own short hand for everything so that anything that looks like a chair no matter how ornate, it names it as a chair and moves on to the next thing, it is very impatient, it doesn't care. Your right side is the side that can tell the difference from a garage sale folding chair and a $1000 gilded antique, it does care.

There is another important fact she discovered and that is when ever you stopped learning art such as drawing, whether it was in grade school or college or whenever, that is where you start your journey again. This is a hard concept for adults, I think we assume that because we are adults that we have absorbed this knowledge or have access to it just by living and experiencing art. Well, I've flown on planes and watched countless movies and TV of pilots working all the controls, but I don't think you'd want me flying any plane you were on. You need to have not only the knowledge but also the skill and that comes through practice and patience.

Most of you are coming from this combination of being an adult and assuming you should be able to do this, plus, for a lot of you, you are in your instant gratification, left brain. Not a real good combination for learning. You will find you have trouble getting things to look like the pictures in your mind, they will tend to be more child-like (this would be more your left brain's shorthand version) or you get frustrated and start mixing mud. You need to slow down, picture the subject in your mind, sketch the subject either on your canvas or on paper and concentrate more on the process than the end result. You will hear that little voice in your head saying "Are we done yet?!" Ignore it and see how much detail you can see in your subject. Whether it is clouds, rocks or whatever, look for shapes, colors and patterns. You will start seeing things you never noticed before and the more you practice this, the easier shifting into that state of mind will become, you just need to ignore that voice when it switches to "This is stupid! Let's move on!"

I can't teach you this, I have tried. This is something you will need to find on your own before you will believe me, I know this from experience. The ironic thing about the left brain is it is also your own worst critic. It can see the picture you have in your mind and if what is on your canvas or paper doesn't match, it is quick to point out those "faults". Again, don't listen to it because it will drag you down until you finally give up which is what it wanted all along. Find something in your painting or drawing that you like and concentrate on the positive. I have had my "SHUT UP!" moment when I got so tired of the self criticism I about had myself in tears. It felt like I was being attacked by an internal pack of wolves and I didn't deserve it because I was still learning and art was a part of me I wasn't about ready to give up. It was my epiphany. From that point, my art took a dramatic turn and I've never looked back. Cut yourself some slack and enjoy the process, it will come with time, patience and practice.

::::She gets off her soapbox and puts it away::::

Clouds – Before you paint a cloud, go out and look at them or find pictures of different clouds. I take photos of interesting cloud patterns so I have a reference file with just clouds. See how they move across the sky, how the boil up and look like big soft pillows or wispy feathers. Have these images in your mind before you start to paint (see above). If you need to, you can take your charcoal and sketch in some basic shapes of clouds, have a plan before you start.

Clouds, like everything else needs to be under painted with a darker color, usually a soft gray for big fluffy clouds or a darker blue gray for stormy clouds. Remember that a gray color is a mix of complimentary colors such as blue and sienna (it is in the orange family), purple and yellow or red and green, I would like you to experiment with these mixes so you can see the differences.

I load my flat, bristle brush up with a good amount of color, then I start in the middle of the cloud area and with circular scrubbing motion, I start forming my cloud. As I get to the edges of my cloud I lighten the pressure on my brush so it is more a dry brush technique so the edges are soft and undefined. You can even take you finger and smudge the edge to soften it.

While you are applying the gray, don't be afraid to pick up other colors and add them to your clouds, add some red or orange and lightly mix into the gray or add white to soften the color. Be sure that you are using a circular motion if you are making big fluffy clouds so they look like they are boiling up.

When you are done with getting the shape of your cloud, let it dry before adding highlights.

It may take several layers of lighter colors to get the look you want with your clouds, each time you will use more white and less other colors (I usually mix in the same pile I used to make the clouds, I just add white). You will use the same circular motion but this should be more dry brush meaning your brush will have only a little paint on it and you will scrub it on lightly. Remember to leave pockets of your under painting showing through each time. You can even add some of those other colors like the reds or oranges during the highlight step especially if it is a sunrise or sunset.

The final thing you can do is to take your liner or a small round sable brush and mix your white with a tiny touch of yellow to tint it slightly and just on the top edge nearest where the sun should be you can add a "silver lining". This is not a solid line but "dashes and dots" to suggest that the sun is catching high spots and sparkling off the water vapor or ice crystals in the clouds. But this is only near the sun.

I think I am going to make a page for the figures so if you need to look at it they will be there anytime, I just need to create them in an orderly manner so I can get some good photos of them, I will post the page when I can get it done.

We are on our final week, I will show you how to finish a painting and we will have our critique.

Registration is now open at both Torrance and PVAC if you want to sign up for classes.

Keep painting.

Winter 2011 - Rocks

Winter 2011 Acrylic Class – Demo Rocks

Torrance class – we did the poppy very similar to what I did at PV the only difference is the background is darker and made to look more like out of focus foliage. We will finish it up next week.

All classes we only have 2 more weeks of class and classes will start up again at the end of the month. Registration is now open at Torrance and pending at PV if you want to get signed up for any classes it is best to do it ASAP especially at Torrance where they close under enrolled classes the week before classes start.

The thing to keep in mind about most rocks is they are rough plus they have chips, dents, ridges and cracks. They also are not a solid color. While these rocks look gray at first glance if you look closer you will see all kinds of color in them. There are blues and greens, purples and reds, yellow, orange and sienna are also there so get those colors in you under painting.

I started out just drawing a simple outline of the area where the rocks were going to be with my vine charcoal, I wasn't worried about individual rocks at this point. Under painting for rocks should be fun and relaxing because all you need to go is get the canvas covered in a medium dark color, what color doesn't really matter, the stroke doesn't matter, neatness doesn't matter - so be loose and free, you can even use a knife if you want to, just get the canvas covered. I was using my #12 bristle flat brush.

Once my rocks were under painted I let them dry before drawing in the individual rocks. While it is helpful to follow what is in a photo or in real life, it isn't necessary for it to be exact. No one is going to look at your painting and say "Shouldn't that rock be bigger?" or "What happened to the little rock that was supposed to be here?" IF they do, that's their problem not yours, you are the artist and have a license to do what ever you want on your canvas.

The rest of what we are going to do, for the most part, will be dry brush. I cannot overstate this enough because I as I walk around the class I still see people struggling with the concept. Dry brush means exactly that: The brush itself needs to be very dry so after you have cleaned or rinsed your brush take a paper towel and squeeze out as much water as you can, it should feel only slightly damp. When you load your brush you work the color into the bristles then either scrape the excess off on your palette and/or wipe it off slightly on your paper towel. There isn't a lot of paint on the outside of your brush at this point, this is good.

Next point that seems to be a problem is the amount of pressure you put on your brush. The goal is to be able to see what is under the paint you are applying so your pressure should be very light especially to start out with because there is usually more paint than you realize on your brush. As you use up what is on the outside of the brush, you can press a bit harder to get to the paint that is in the bristles but sneak up on it. There have been times where I have been holding the brush so lightly in my hand that I dropped it! It is important to learn this technique because it is how we blend our colors in acrylics. There is no point of doing an under painting if you are going to cover it all up with the next layer of paint, that under painting is important because it can help show texture and depth but if you cover it all up, you painting will look flat and uninteresting.

At this point the reference photo is your best teacher because it could take several layers of dry brush to get the rocks exactly as you want them, each layer building on the previous one. I will give you the basics of what I did but you will need to determine how you want your rocks to look. Study the photo before jumping in so you know where you are going.

My basic gray for the rocks was a bit different this time because I was using white (gesso), yellow and purple with a touch of blue. To that I picked up other colors as I went along because I could see greens and pinks, blues and oranges but my basic color was gray. Start our with a color that is a shade or two lighter that your under painting add more white if you want it lighter, more yellow, purple and blue to make it darker, be sure that you have a gray color not a purple color. Keep in mind that you don't want to jump right to the highlights you need at least one or two different values of color before you get to the highlights. I also switched to my #6 flat bristle brush.

On the shadowed sides of the rocks I added more blue or purple to my gray usually on my brush then blended on the canvas so I could see the color I added. However, I didn't use those colors exclusively in the shadows because I did pick up, greens, oranges and red as well. You should be using a scumbling stroke as you dry brush this will give you textures. If you want your color to be lighter add more white and less purple and blue. I just keep mixing in my original pile of color on my palette that way I know I'm getting the value I need.

When it comes down to the final highlights I used titanium white and a tiny touch of yellow to slightly tint the color and dry brushed this color in the light areas of the rocks: the tops and edges that might be catching light.

For the cast shadows I used my shadow color of blue, purple and a touch of sienna to make a dark color. I used this dark color to show the shadows cast by the rocks and the spaces between the rocks.

For the final highlights and shadow detail I switched to a #6 flat sable brush. This gave me a bit more control and allowed me to do some of the bigger detail, for smaller detail such as cracks in the rocks, I used my liner brush.

Next week I think we will learn how to add figures to our paintings and maybe some clouds, there won't be any reference photos though you might want to look for your own.