I picked these fleurs in my garden and set them up as a little still life today. It feels great to be painting again. I’m still quite busy and many things in life are up in the air… but painting helps keep my perspective and focus. I’m thankful for the things it brings into my life! Cheers!
Ron brought me these lovely spring-time tulips last week. They were all tightly closed at first and then one pink and white opened before all the others…
Here’s a photo of the tulips and my original rough sketch. It was fun to get back into the studio even if just for a few hours. I’ve missed it as life has been pretty busy lately. Happy Spring!
I noticed something funny after I finished painting yesterday… altho the text isn’t key to the painting, I was surprised to see “raisin” on my “spoonful of sugar”! Of course this would only happen in Canada where the same candy is labelled in both french and english. So today I put the grape/raisin candies together like good little Canadians and this little painting is the result. Hope you like it!
I’ve been playing hooky from my blog, and painting, since Monday. Some very pressing matters needed attending to… like selling my house and getting paperwork in order to buy a new one. In a few minutes I’m off to have another look at several houses we are in limbo on. More on that later.
This afternoon I treated myself to 2 hours of painting and spent some more time with my candy. I loved the purple of the grapes reflecting into the spoon. Cheers!
I bought these colorful little candies specially for painting. I love all the color and the little light bits reflecting off the wrappers. Just plain fun to paint! I’m watching what I eat these days and these little guys are *definitely* not on my diet. I think they’re just as much fun to look at anyway, right? Happy Sunday!
I’ve always loved oranges and blue. This little guy marries the two up. Sometimes the simplest things are so fun to paint. Happy weekend!
For some reason I really enjoy painting fruit. These little key limes are being minded by their sour old grauntie lemon and it’s time to head for bed. The littlest guy isn’t entirely sure he wants to go. Anybody want to vote on whether I should go check myself in to the nuthouse? Anybody? Private message me with your concerns ;-)
In my little front garden the chives and the Lady’s Mantle are blooming side by side – a wonderful confusion of red-violet and lime green. I selected a few of the stems – yes, I realize 5 chives would have been more “right”… but I felt a bit rebellious as I selected these and made four work [I think]. The squat little marquise shaped vase was a bit of a scary shape to paint. I just blocked out all “vase” thoughts and looked at the light and dark patterns. I did my best to capture the biggest ones and I think it’s working.
My daughter and son-in-law [Kim and Kyle] are off to the Calgary Stampede for the evening, leaving our grandson, Parker, with Grandma and Grandpa for the evening. This will be the first 24 hour + period of separation for mommy and Parker. Hope it goes well… have a great day all!
Much of my energy lately has been focused on preparing for other folks to see my house. Ugh! I bought some sunflowers at Costco last week in preparation for one of these showings. I just grabbed this little guy one evening and sketched him up quickly. He’s nice and bright and cheerful, just what I need around here! Cheers!
We spent Friday afternoon listening to Carol’s views about some of the art-related things like taking and editing photos of art, blogging about art, and marketing. Marketing is a fact of life for most artists – if you want to paint tomorrow, you’ve got to sell today. If not, you’re pretty soon going to run out of both money and storage. This definitely applies to me. So, I was keening interested in Friday’s “ways and means” discussion. Of course one of my key goals with marketing is not being eaten alive by it – I want to paint, not market. Lots to think about for sure.
That afternoon Carol talked about making it easy for folks to find you on the ‘net. She suggested that both first and last name should be consistently included in an artist’s web presence, thus you are reading this post from my new blog www.cheryquist.blogspot.com. This wasn’t something I considered In 2008 when I set my blog up as “cherylsdailyblog”. I’ve spent some time over the last week backing up my old blog, importing all previous entries, and setting up this new blog. What sounds like a formidable task was really incredibly simple!
And so concludes my monologue on this wonderful week. It’s been a trip down memory lane and a great refresher. I hope you’ve enjoyed it too. Cheers!
We were given no particular time constraint for this exercise but we had approximately 2.5 hours if my memory serves me correctly. I used pretty much all of that time. Allowing time for setting up the still life and drawing, I’m guessing I spent 1.5 hours painting. 90 minutes divided by 132 strokes crunches out to just over 40 seconds per stroke. Usually I paint very quickly so this was quite a different experience for me. I like this little painting. I think the deliberateness of the strokes made this set up doable for me. Highly polished subjects, like this spoon, are difficult to paint. Of course Carol was coming around regularly to keep me pointed in the right direction and Sharon gave me some valuable tips as well… It all helps.
I’ll wind up my summary of this workshop tomorrow… until then, ciao!
After working us hard for several days Carol sent us away to set up and paint a still life of our choice. And I’ve got this thing about a little blue medicine bottle that I picked up at an antique store in East Coulee. Since i also love citrus fruit and the reflections they make in my favorite bottle the photo on the left was my still life subject. On the right is my painting. Carol Marine had this suggestion as she made her rounds. In the case of glass like this painting the darks first isn’t necessarily the best way. She said “just block in that bottle plain blue for now and go back and add the low lights and then high lights. I actually like how the little painting turned out. Blue/yellow is one of my most loved color combinations and has been for my whole life. 
Enjoy!
As I mentioned last Monday, the first day of our workshop we began with introductions. What a talented bunch of ladies! I’ve added the bloggers among them to my list of “Blogs I Follow” on the right side of my blog… http://cherylsdailyblog.blogspot.com/
Here’s a photo of 4 apples Carol set up for her painting demo… and her complete painting. This took her about an hour, what with all our demanding questions [lol]. She’s fast and so fun to watch!
Carol had several teaching points Monday including:
Painting Exercise:
Value [light versus dark] is essential. Carol gave us 30 minutes to set up and paint a little still life that had a dark, medium and light monochromatic pattern. We used dominant, secondary, and “smidge” values. The dominant value in my still life set up [the cup below] was “mid” [takes over half the painting], my secondary value was “dark” [takes up most of the remaining area], and there was just a smidge of “light”. First I wrote down my pattern, then I painted the cup in a neutral color to match the pattern I had noted in my subject. Good exercise in SEEING.
I’ve just arrived home from a week long Carol Marine workshop and, although my lodgings were superb [ty Conrad & Teresa], I can truly say I am happy to be home, sweet home! I’ve neglected my blogging this week due to shortage of time & energy but I’ve painted lots, and I’ve learned even more!
Tomorrow I’ll begin a day by day recap of the workshop highlights with photos of my work, but today I want to share what happens at the end of Carol’s workshops. Over the course of the week, Carol painted five 6”x6” paintings during “demos”. These are made available to student to purchase for a modest price if you’re lucky. This morning we had a draw to see which students would be selecting a painting to buy, and in which order. My name was drawn second. I really wanted Carol’s painting of orange slices, a knife and a little bowl of mine [as yet unnamed]. But, another student’s name was drawn first and she selected this one. Later, she had a change of heart and we traded – thanks Margreet!
I love everything about this little painting – the oranges just glow against that blue background and the brush strokes are lively & free. I find Carol’s style engages me in a way that hyper-realism doesn’t. As a viewer, I have a role in this painting… a connection. My eye moves around in the painting noticing the colors and shapes, confirming the story. The connection is also stronger because I enjoyed watching her paint it! Throughout the week Carol came by to help me with my painting and every project she commented that the highlights needed to be smaller… I’ll remember that every time I look at this painting – the dark shape says “knife” with just those small lights on the handle!
Two very, very tired ladies today… and now to bed!
More practice in oil painting and I took up a Daily Paintworks Challenge on “balance”. Setting up this balancing act with a little striped box, a bottle of acrylic paint, and “tomorrow’s” blank canvas was just fun. It was ironic to paint the bottle of acrylic paint with my oils! We need hope in the future and signing this painting in the bottom right of the “tomorrow” canvas is symbolic for moving on with life and believing in the future. Big thoughts for a fun little painting. Have a great week!
I’m sure enjoying painting these little guys! I’m using baltic birch panels sealed with GAC100 and tinted with an orange/red. The warmth peeks through in places and unifies the whole. Enjoy!
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