Still on the road

 This has been sitting on the table taunting me since Christmas and I have been avoiding it because I am in a bit of a funk, but the deadline of showtime forced me to do something. a little on the burnt sienna on the road, a little yellow in the trees and some work on the clouds.  Trying to break up that big one near the horizon by segmenting it a little, and just fooling around with the blues.  That phthalo blue looks nice going down but once it dries it leaves a sooty residue that I can't do anything with.

December 30, 2023 — Elaine O.

Well, what with the holidays and all, I've finally returned to Monet's chickens. I'm intrigued enough by chickens to do this again, taking all the lessons I learned here. I think I need more "chicken sketching" before I'm confident enough to really get their shape and movement. Also, I tried some new texturing techniques on the ground and I both overdid it and stopped too soon. Next year!

Monet's Chickens    14" x 11"

Have a wonderful New Years Day and a wonderful new year. 

Yes, we have no bananas….

 In fact we have floating bananas in the quick sketch. I took a little more time with the second one.i like the bananas and the plate but not crazy about the shadows.I painted both from life. I’m just not getting the shadow thing tho. I guess I’m painting the edges of the shadow too hard, but shadows do have hard edges, don’t they?

Here’s another still life from life. I like the second one, but there’s not enough contrast between the shadow of the bowl and the plate. but the lime turned out well imo. Maybe I’ll do one more version of this on better paper. And that will be a wrap for 2023! Happy new year!

Alan Winter 1

 All right!  I added some darker values to the trees. I don’t know if it’s enough for you but I can add more. On Yupo. 8 1/2 by 11  

A little something for Christmas. I followed a YouTube lesson about negative painting. I’ll do better next year. Cold press 6 X 8.

I finished the Columbus Park lagoon sketch. It’s a little more subtle in real life. The camera really picked up the yellow-green. If you look close you can see Geoffrey Baer in the background. On hot press 5 X 10.

I was looking down my street towards Clark last night and I did this urban sketch of the Citgo gas station on the corner. I’m determined to do more cars. 

Looking at it further, I think I’ll try to make the sky darker and do some more work with the trees. On hot press 5 X 5. 

Goin down the road feeling bad.

 Was going down ok, but then I got like a random vertical line in the road in the lower left corner and I could not get it out.  Wet it, pulled it out.  Put more paint over it and it still shone through, more water, more paper towels, more paint, more water, etc.  Mostly got it out but too much shows through. Basically gave up on it and that freed me up to be very loose on the sky.  Too loose, because that lower cloud is way too thick.  While I'm in my orange, yellow green palette I can put stuff down and pick it up.  But blue does not pick up well and leaves that dirty blue residue.

Still I think it has some promise.  Well not this one, but I think I will start something from scratch and use what I have learned.

Kind of like this break.  Having to work on a true work of art every week was getting too stressful for me.  I need time to  experiment. 

Classmate Collection #6

 Lost the profile because of the stupid bricks. Resorted once again to my magic brush. And then white gouache.  Then to white acrylic. Finally the white gel pen came into play. Lesson learned…..when the face is small,  not really necessary (or possible in my case) to worry about the nuance of color on skin. Now looking at it here, it appears the table is floating. Maybe it is!!  You never know what will happen when Ken is painting. Happy New Year one and

all. 

on the road again

 To a corn field I believe, if it does not get crushed by what appears to be maybe a toe of the jolly green giant, but this painting is being quite the Chatty Kathy, so I don't anticipate any problems here.

Alan Fall15

 I think I’m finished with this view of the pods in Biloxi. I increased the value in parts of the foliage of the live oaks. 

Some more urban sketching of alleys. I call this one “Transformer Alley” because of all the transformers outside Illinois Masonic Hospital. This is a 5 X 5 on hot press in my sketchbook. I like how Waterlogue highlighted the turquoise and Cobalt Blues. 

One of the things I like about the accordion style sketchbook is the ability to paint on multiple pages. So this is 5 X 10. It’s a view of the Columbus Park lagoon that was on a PBS show. I just took a pic of the tv screen and am having to remember what it was. But I know what it is. 

Classmate Collection #5 and 6

 Overworked Sara. Fussed with it a little bit more.  Without Pat’s help and my magic brush it would have been a total loss. My eye needs more measurement training. 

Unfinished Ken. Committed to the 8x8 format, I’ll have to do something to finish the lower right area. 

December 16, 2023 — Elaine O.

It's the last session of the year, so I thought I'd take things easy. Here, then, are some chickens. They are French chickens...specifically from Monet's chicken coop in Giverny. This was originally intended as a rough practice sketch as I don't know much about chickens...except that they are delicious. I'm not finished yet, but there are enough things I like to make it worth continuing. 

Monet's Chickens    14" x 11"

Tune in again to see more. Meanwhile, have a wonderful holiday and best wishes for a magical new year.

2023 Class Photo

It's the end of the year and, as is our habit, we ended the year with good fellowship, good food (thanks, Greeta and Ken!) and our traditional end-of-year photo.

We wish all of you a wonderful holiday season and an even better new year!

Class Info for January 2024

Spring I    ADLTART 1003-3C (66787) Watercolor Painting, 9 - noon, 1/20/2024 - 3/2/2024

Spring II   ADLTART 1003-SD (66788) Watercolor Painting, 9 - noon, 3/16/2024 - 5/4/2024, off 3/30

 

 

A quick knock off

 After giving up on the blue mess that didn't leave me much time to get something ready to post so I asked the woman at the cash register of the pizzeria to pose against the landscape painted on the wall.  Maybe I should have tipped a little more to get a bigger smile.

Lion in Winter and Classmate Collection #4

 I gave Alan a little more hair. I’m generous that way.

I thought the Lion finished. Now on the photo, I see a few issues.  I’ve worked with gouache before but only to touch things up.  I actually had to create shapes with it on this one and it required me putting my brush right into the tube. Lion pic is 10-1/2 x 13-3/4  looks small in photo next to Alan and he’s only 8x8.

Alan Fall 14

 I sketched this looking out our classroom window on a cloudy day. I realized that I was afraid of the ink and determined to go further with it. It is, after all, a pen and ink drawing. So I spent more time drawing and less time painting. Still too concerned with painting within the lines and trying to paint cars. 

I decided to do an actual painting from my sketchbook and used my sketch from the farmer’s market in Beloit as the basis. I was surprised to find that I liked some things in my quick sketch more than my Yupo painting i.e. the radishes. The blotch on the girl’s black jacket is a reflection of light off the shiny fixative.

This is the “tea layer” of a painting based on my sketch of the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum in Biloxi. I liked the color values and the basic shape of the piece but hated how intrusive the trees and branches were. So I free painted this layer to put in the basic shapes and colors and now I have to define the shapes and deepen the color values. 

Quick sketch:

Ł

Formal painting:

December 9, 2023 — Elaine O.

Let's face it—we're in for a Paris series. So it's best to just sit back and ride it out. (Although, technically, this isn't Paris; it's Normandy.) This is a beautiful, compelling sculpture called Les Braves. It's a memorial marking the D-Day landing on Omaha Beach. I originally intended this as a study/test, but I'm surprisingly pleased with it—everything but the way the masking tape and fluid left the edges of the sculpture. And even then, I could salvage them. On the whole, this has the feel of my memory, so I'm happy.

Les Braves    13" x 10"

And now for the historical/factual comments, if you're still reading along. This is at the center of Omaha Beach, near the original memorial. It was installed for the 60th anniversary of D-Day and was originally meant to be temporary. But people liked it and it stayed. It has three groupings, each with a different theme and it looks different depending on where you stand.

If you want to see it without travelling to France, a twin was installed this year at the War Memorial in Grosse Pointe, Michigan. But if you do go to France, try to visit the Normandy beaches. Even if you don't know anyone who was there, it's a stirring and emotional experience.

Update….

 The plot thickens….

Classmate Collection #2 and 3

 

Tried to put shadow on Brian,s face and definition on his arm…may have gone too far. 

Rhapsody in blue

 Well not a rhapsody, more like the sound of the garbagemen in the early morning banging cans around.  But it's early yet.  I have three goals here, to experiment with all the blues on my palette, to use only dagger brushes, and to somehow pull it all together to make another masterpiece.  Goals one and two are coming along just swell, number three not so much.  We we will see what we will see.

Nothing to Write Home About….

 I wasn’t inspired to do anything to yesterday’s still life, but now I admit it looks a little unfinished…I was thinking about adding part of a hat in the lower left or something behind that glass…maybe the hand of fate at Pat suggested…I painted another “moody inside, riot of color outside “ scene…those blue chairs are kind of distracting…they could come down a few pegs…

Alan Fall 13

 I’m trying to find a way to greatly reduce the amount of watercolor paraphernalia that I drag around so I can “urban sketch” or paint “plein aire.”  So I’ve been watching a lot of YouTube videos by people who have done this. Here are a couple of examples of what I discovered that make it easier to paint outside or to join in urban sketching groups. I currently take photos and use those as reference but I am moving toward sketching and painting from real life. Here’s one:

And here’s another:

Included are: sketch pad, small watercolor palette, water brush, fine tipped ink pen, piece of paper towel, and a small flowcharting template. I might also carry a couple of watercolor brushes if I have a water source and some greyscale tombow markers.

So here’s some stuff.

I was going to paint first and draw second but I decided not to do that because I liked it the way it was. 

Here an abstract of an iris all done with the tools above. 

I’m going to revisit this market scene and try to make the shadow better ( but I’ve tried before). I might make a real painting of this after what I’ve learned from the sketch. 

This is a quick sketch of a place we used to go on the coast.  I thought it would be too complicated but the sketch taught me otherwise.  Like the beer bottle.

This is from a photo I took at the Ohr-O’Keefe Museum in Biloxi. I think this might make a good real painting (maybe on Yupo).

Here’s a beginning of a drawing that we should all be familiar with. We’ll see. 

December 2, 2023 — Elaine O.

Can you tell where this is? Yes, it's another of the France paintings I promised (threatened?) last week. This is the Eiffel Tower and other Paris landscape elements silhouetted against the sunset sky. I may do this again, but with a touch more color in the sky...or not. 

Eiffel Tower, Sunset    8" x 10"

And again, as promised, some links to the perfect stocking stuffer for artist friends you may know. Here's an enamel pin (shown on my paint bag for scale). It actually spins! You can quickly look up monochrome, complementary, triadic and analagous color schemes. It's petite (about 2"round) but useful. Here's the link for the pin. And here's the link to a keychain version, if you'd like that better. 

Ten Cat RIP

 The Ten Cat has gone commercial and now is after, well, younger folks.  Those beautiful windows fronting Ashland Avenue will no longer display my masterpieces.

Going through my archives I came across this photo from my first show there in 2005.  The woman in the back right is from a print class at Harold Washington.  Otherwise I am sure the rest of you will recognize yourselves.  

Alan Fall 12

 The first two are quick sketches taking the class suggestions into account. 

Added some branches. Still love the little tree on the left.

Lightened some values and reduced the darkness of many windows. 

Farmers market in Beloit. Had fun with the vegetables but disappointed with the woman in shadow. 

Back to Chicago alleys. I was standing on the top level of a parking structure when I saw these views and thought that we had not painted alleys from this perspective. 

Another view in a different direction. The first is the pen and ink drawing. Then I dropped in some color. 

This is for Ken. I’ve a friend in Tucson who has a garden. He sends me pictures of flowers but this time he sent me a photo of a leaf. Look familiar?