Bay Watch

Here's my painting for Karin Jurick's current challenge on differentstrokesfromdifferentfolks.blogspot.com. My first attempt was more literal to the reference photo. It was ok, but not too interesting. So I decided to start again with a little different perspective on the scene and zoomed in on the female figure and put her on alert at the beach. Whether she's a life guard or just a mom watching out for the kids, I don't know. Technically, I still need to do some work. Ithink it could use more contrast and depth of colors, so I might come back and make her bathing suit a deeper color and also make her head a little bigger. After putting it down for a day or two, I can see where it can be improved, but over all I really like the composition and it gives the painting a little more of a story.

Blast from the Past - more collages

After the Sushi challenge, I thought I'd show you a couple of the challenges we had in our class. The red one is composed of torn paper, candy wrappers, packing cloth and pen. The green one is wrapping paper, a watercolor scrap, wall paper and magnolia leaves. When you just have a little time and want to play see what you can come up with.

DSFDF SUSHI

Here's my take on Karin Jurick's challange of sushi rolls on her blog, differentstrokesfromdifferentfolks.blogspot.com. Instead of paint, I chose collage, incorporating a soy label, origami paper and my watercolor paintings of the sushi and soy puddle. I couldn't see a good composition in the original photo, so by using collage I could add a lot of other elements and play with their placement until I was happy with it. It passes the "twirly test" as an old art teacher used to say. It really works well no matter which end is at the top.I had a lot of fun doing this. Also as a side note, there is a really cool book called "A Year in Japan" by Kate T. Williamson which is beautifully illustrated that also inspired the feel of my piece. Check it out on Amazon, and preview a few pages.

OH, Yeah....and abstracts, too

Look for future paintings based on these ariels. I love the shape and line. And after seeing Karin Jurick's choice of wigs in windows for her last challenge, we saw these manniquins in a window!! It was a store selling retail display racks, hangers and manniquins... Looks like a pretty good price for a new body! Too funny!

BACK AND READY TO WORK

After a 4 week vacation to New Zealand and Australia I'm back with 4000 pictures as reference material! It was an awesome trip and puts me back in the mood to paint some landscapes and incredible skies. Here's a few New Zealand shots. I was also inspired to do some abstracts after viewing and learning about Aboriginal art. (I see dots in my future). It's incredible how the work has proliferated since the introduction of canvas and acrylic paints since the 1970's. There are some very traditional works which relate tribe stories, and then lots of abstracts that have departed from the story telling. They were pretty amazing. We also visited the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney and well as the art museum of Christchurch which was pretty cool too. I went knowing nothing about artists of the area, but there is a lot of European influence there, obviously, since it is part of the Commonwealth. So as soon as I'm over jetlag and get settled back in (and laundry done) it's paint to paper!!