Sunday, August 21, 2011
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Monday, August 15, 2011
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Friday, August 12, 2011
Tuesday, August 09, 2011
Ruwenzori
hatchuring, color. A nice map I used yesterday to double check the
elevation of Bottego, the north peak of Mt. Gessi in Uganda. Would
like to see (and paint) these mountains someday.
Sunday, August 07, 2011
Trevor Chamberlain
Chamberlain quotes a British art critique (unaccredited) writing that watercolor "requires the forward planning of a chess player, the concentration of a Zen master, and the dexterity of a brain surgeon."
Chamberlain is a painter I admire. In the next couple of weeks I'll be posting a quote from some of the watercolorists I look up to along with some samples of their work. I began this series of posts with a very similar quote and some samples from the website of Melbourne based Joseph Zbuvic last week. He's a great painter that holds his palette colors close to himself. I'm very curious what's on his palette....I've been watching one of his videos this week instead of painting. I'm amazed to watch the brush control these folks have. They can do so much with precision and exactitude. Not much is left to chance, whereas my best paintings are happy accidents.
Back to Chamberlain. Handprint has a great page on his approach, palette, biography and a few lovely samples that I will just link to here. He has a nice book in the Atelier Personal View series that is worth owning if like me you enjoy loose, expressive British watercolor.
Chamberlain is a painter I admire. In the next couple of weeks I'll be posting a quote from some of the watercolorists I look up to along with some samples of their work. I began this series of posts with a very similar quote and some samples from the website of Melbourne based Joseph Zbuvic last week. He's a great painter that holds his palette colors close to himself. I'm very curious what's on his palette....I've been watching one of his videos this week instead of painting. I'm amazed to watch the brush control these folks have. They can do so much with precision and exactitude. Not much is left to chance, whereas my best paintings are happy accidents.
Back to Chamberlain. Handprint has a great page on his approach, palette, biography and a few lovely samples that I will just link to here. He has a nice book in the Atelier Personal View series that is worth owning if like me you enjoy loose, expressive British watercolor.
Selkirks x3
Last weekend I prepped a sketch from a photo (above) I took in the Neptune Range of the Northern Selkirks in 2009. I thought it was a good sketch and probably the best I have done. I've tried painting Neptune probably a half dozen times now and I was excited to work from this sketch. I also decided I would take my time unlike how I normally paint which is fast and perhaps not as considered as it could be. The first couple of times I painted this scened I used masking to save some highlights and paint the sky, the results were ok and I decided I would go back to masking which I rarely use nowadays. I carefully masked out the mountain mass so that I could paint a nice wash for the sky. The masking turned out ok. Unfortunately Ihad sketched this on the first page of one of my new Saunders Waterford fat pads and I had never worked on this paper before. I used a heavy application of WN masking fluid and after putting down my sky and letting it dry I tried to remove the fluid. It turns out the 140pd paer is a bit fragile and the WN fluid is much tackier than the fludi I used in the past. SO... I ended up with no underdrawing and a ripped surface in one spot. I was quite sad as I loved this sketch. This was earlier this week and it's taken me several days to get over it and get on with the painting. I didn't even bother re-drawing it in the end, too worried it would not match the quality of the original...so a la prima I went...
The rsults are ok. If feels very much like a field sketch or a wrm up rather than the more finised painting I was hoping to achieve. I guess thats what these sketch pads are for and I should limit my use of masking fluid to heavier grade paper taht can handle it. Either way I've definitely notice that masking fluid will remove pencil lines regardless of the paper which is quite annoying. There is probably some logic in drawing details after masking and panting sky.
While this piece was drying today I got out some other sketch books and paper. In one I alid a very loose wash of Indigo and light red and practiced lifting with a new WN white taklon brush I go this week at a sale. I was happy with the results and decided to add some details from the Neptune image onto it.
On another sheet of Canson colored pasted paper I have I dug up some white gouache to experiment with snow painting for the first time. Again using Neptune as a model. I ended with white gouache on both paintings and I have to say I'm fairly happy with the results both feel like my style of painting and very different at the same time. I'm excited to experiment with this some more so for now the gouache is staying out.
Saturday, July 30, 2011
Joseph Zbukvic
An artist is a combination of the poet and the surgeon. - Joseph Zbukvic
This Yugoslavian born, Melbourne Australia based artist whose landscapes are delicate, while still remaining loose and showing off the best of the medium. He excels at capturing a wide range of values but my favourites seem to be middle valued paintings with subtle variations. Quite delicate and sublime. I've seen to of his videos and unfortunately the demonstrations mostly fell short of the mark. His one and only book "Mastering Atmosphere and Mood" has a number of good demonstrations that while staying rather vague are still good learning opportunities. Sadly the book is long out of print and only available as a download of dubious quality and legality. (I've added to this post to make it more obvious that the works below are those of Zbukvic and not mine, my apologies if in my brevity I misled anyone. 8/28/11)
This Yugoslavian born, Melbourne Australia based artist whose landscapes are delicate, while still remaining loose and showing off the best of the medium. He excels at capturing a wide range of values but my favourites seem to be middle valued paintings with subtle variations. Quite delicate and sublime. I've seen to of his videos and unfortunately the demonstrations mostly fell short of the mark. His one and only book "Mastering Atmosphere and Mood" has a number of good demonstrations that while staying rather vague are still good learning opportunities. Sadly the book is long out of print and only available as a download of dubious quality and legality. (I've added to this post to make it more obvious that the works below are those of Zbukvic and not mine, my apologies if in my brevity I misled anyone. 8/28/11)
Friday, July 29, 2011
Foot powered...on the Potomac Heritage Trail
So this blog is suppose to be about a few other things than watercolor painting so I thought I would write a small trip report of my hike/run on the Potomac Heritage Trail between Scott's Run and Roosevelt Island last week.
Anyone in DC knows we've had multiple triple digit temps and extreme humidity. Normally things I don't tolerate at all. For some reason my body is finally getting used to the heat and this summer I've been more tolerant than any other summer since moving south of the MD line. Anyways the reason I mention it is that Sunday was suppose to be a respite from the heat. I had planned on leaving early in the morning, but somehow early with Leila meant getting to the trailhead at 8 vs. 6. And it was hot and humid...so much for cooler temps.
I knew the Potomac Heritage Trail (PHT) trail somehow linked in to Scott's run but I had failed to bring either map or guidebook or read any recent trail description....yikes, talk about bad preparation (more to come on that topic) So I probably ran about a mile in Scott's run heading east and North towards the river hoping to run into it. BTW the maps at Scott's Run make no mention of the PHT so don't count on them being any help. My instincts proved correct and I did intersect the green blazed trail down by the overlook near the river. Once I got on it I mostly backtracked uphil and south towards some private pool club and a residential area. GAIA GPS on my iphone soon came in handy and showed me both the trail and the stretch of pavementt I would need to do to get to the real trailhead at the end of Live Oak Dr. right next to 495 here.
From this point is 10 miles to Roosevelt Island! If you start at Scott's run it's more than 10 miles so plan accordingly for water and stamina. The trail is in good condition but heavily blocked by thick layers upon layers of spiderweb. Between this trailhead and Turkey run I had to wave a branch in fron tof me to clear trail most of the way. It made for a slow 4 miles (1.5 hours). I passed someone's stashed water jug near some cliffs and thought what a good idea...although I assumed my 2 litres and planned 3 hour finishing time to be sufficient and left it alone...Not my water anyways. I was to think about that water quite a bit.
I don't want to detail the trail turn by turn but lets say that it is a good variety of terrain with great views on the Potomac.The stretches along GW Parkway are annoying but at least spiderweb free. From Turkey run onwards I made much better time but I ran out of water after 3 hours. My legs started cramping shortly after that and I got to Rosslyn in 4 hours, dehydrated, probably a bit heat struck and barely standing. Every piece of clothing soaked. I ran bare chested the last hour as my nipples were so chaffed from the wet top. I lost 5 pds in 4 hours.
I suggest waiting for cooler weather to repeat, to cache water and to have at least 2 liters when starting with another 1-2 liters available along the way. Its definitely a nice trail although I could do without the sandy stretches and the cobwebs.
Anyone in DC knows we've had multiple triple digit temps and extreme humidity. Normally things I don't tolerate at all. For some reason my body is finally getting used to the heat and this summer I've been more tolerant than any other summer since moving south of the MD line. Anyways the reason I mention it is that Sunday was suppose to be a respite from the heat. I had planned on leaving early in the morning, but somehow early with Leila meant getting to the trailhead at 8 vs. 6. And it was hot and humid...so much for cooler temps.
I knew the Potomac Heritage Trail (PHT) trail somehow linked in to Scott's run but I had failed to bring either map or guidebook or read any recent trail description....yikes, talk about bad preparation (more to come on that topic) So I probably ran about a mile in Scott's run heading east and North towards the river hoping to run into it. BTW the maps at Scott's Run make no mention of the PHT so don't count on them being any help. My instincts proved correct and I did intersect the green blazed trail down by the overlook near the river. Once I got on it I mostly backtracked uphil and south towards some private pool club and a residential area. GAIA GPS on my iphone soon came in handy and showed me both the trail and the stretch of pavementt I would need to do to get to the real trailhead at the end of Live Oak Dr. right next to 495 here.
From this point is 10 miles to Roosevelt Island! If you start at Scott's run it's more than 10 miles so plan accordingly for water and stamina. The trail is in good condition but heavily blocked by thick layers upon layers of spiderweb. Between this trailhead and Turkey run I had to wave a branch in fron tof me to clear trail most of the way. It made for a slow 4 miles (1.5 hours). I passed someone's stashed water jug near some cliffs and thought what a good idea...although I assumed my 2 litres and planned 3 hour finishing time to be sufficient and left it alone...Not my water anyways. I was to think about that water quite a bit.
I don't want to detail the trail turn by turn but lets say that it is a good variety of terrain with great views on the Potomac.The stretches along GW Parkway are annoying but at least spiderweb free. From Turkey run onwards I made much better time but I ran out of water after 3 hours. My legs started cramping shortly after that and I got to Rosslyn in 4 hours, dehydrated, probably a bit heat struck and barely standing. Every piece of clothing soaked. I ran bare chested the last hour as my nipples were so chaffed from the wet top. I lost 5 pds in 4 hours.
I suggest waiting for cooler weather to repeat, to cache water and to have at least 2 liters when starting with another 1-2 liters available along the way. Its definitely a nice trail although I could do without the sandy stretches and the cobwebs.
Friday Off
So that means painting between feedings, diaper changes, laundry and getting pho with Y and L....not my best work but still I got to paint today!
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Friday, July 15, 2011
Sierras
On strahmore with MG palette. Experimenting with WN Pyrelene as well.
A beautiful color. Trying to figure out what I can mix it with to get
nice cool greys.
Saturday, July 09, 2011
Saturday, July 02, 2011
First.
based on an image from Eric Valli's Dolpo book. MGraham palette and
cheap paper. Nothing fancy, it just feels good but selfish too to take
a few moments to try and calm down enough to put brush to paper and be
able to enjoy both the process and the results. I am a happy and lucky
man today.
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