Why not just paint?
Untitled teacup painting - in progress
Untitled teacup painting - in progress
Hi!
Sometimes I just feel like painting without having to think about the
process or about what I 'should' paint. Like anyone, I can get tired of
paying attention to the how, and just want to play with paint.
While there's some merit in open play, it rarely yields anything
noteworthy for me, and certainly nothing that I could hope to present
to a gallery (my big goal for this year). Perhaps one day I'll show you
the mess I made this last week when I took a break from the work of
painting and just played.
But today is about the work side of things.
After a whole month of painting miniatures and little else, it was a
bit daunting to start in on something bigger. Last week I showed you
the underpainting for the tall iron cobbler's shoe form. I discovered
that it was too big a jump and that I'll have to work my way back into
the larger stuff a little more gradually.
So I backed up a little and painted a couple of small works; "Brown
Feather Falling," which I showed you last week, and this one.
I had already decided to explore the teacups more. As I looked back
over all the images and interactions about teacups during the
challenge, I noticed that the colors within the aqua teacups
varied...quite a lot actually.
So before I rush headlong to paint a larger version of that cup, it's
time to study the colors and values a little.
Color study-aqua teacup
Color study-aqua teacup
Color/Value Study:
Aqua Teacup
If you look closely you can make out the notations I've written about
each major field of color.
I feel that I nailed the aqua, came close to the gold and the tea
colors, but missed the boat on the 'whites' in the porcelain.
Too blue.
They are actually much warmer than the colors I recorded, which I
adjusted for in the small painting.
Take a closer look at the color/value study and the image of the teacup
with the painting beside it.
Color study-aqua teacup
Figure 1: Color / value study
Untitled teacup painting - in progress
Figure 2: teacup + painting - in progress
Notice that the actual teacup (the model), appears more bluish in
Figure 1, and more toward green in Figure 2. This could be due to the
brightness level of the image. So I tried looking at it from different
angles and sure enough, it appears to change in real life.
So it really comes down to preference. Rather than trying to merely
record exactly what I see, I plan to allow my right brain more latitude
than my left when/if I do a larger version of my favorite teacup.
But in order to get to a place where I CAN just play....I had to put in
the work. And then the play will make sense.
Artmaking is only partly the hard-wiring you're born with. The rest is
like any other worthy endeavor; knowledge + skill + practice over time.
And like anything else, it can be learned if you're willing to work at
it.
I saved the best for last: This little gem is going to be the May
giveaway!
At 5"x5" it's slightly bigger than most of my giveaways, but, well,
it'll be my birthday / Mothers' Day gift to myself just to make someone
smile!
The crocuses are up here in Michigan the birds are busy in their nests.
Happy Easter!
Jan
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