April 13, 2013

Another day back painting—always a good time! First of all, you'd think the month we spent sketching at the conservatory would have done us some good. Not so, apparently. It has come to our attention that we have been showing one of our paintings upside down—and it's a lush tropical scene, no less—exactly what we've been seeing and drawing for the past month. How embarrassing! At any rate, we've corrected that here. You can't miss the painting; it's the top of our lineup and the beautiful vibrant colors are eye-catching. (To be perfectly honest, it would even look great upside down, but it looks much better this way!)

And here's more bad news—no movie! Either the camera wasn't turned on or we're all some kind of vampire painters.  There was absolutely nothing on the camera to download when we plugged it in. At any rate, you'll have to wait until next week to look around our circle

So look at the beautiful colors, ranging from the delicate irridescence of seashells and glass to bold, colorful trees and cities. Then keep going as we look at granulation medium and discuss brushes.

Medium of the day. We spent some time discussing another medium today—granulation medium. You'll see it in the fabric in the painting of the still life near the top. Allen's conclusion, along with others who tried it, was that the effect was a bit subtler than we'd like. It seems to get more granular when you're using a paint that's already prone to granulation on a paper surface that encourages granulation. But the rest of the time.....needs more experimentation.

Because we didn't have all that much to say about granulation medium (oddly enough, as it seemed we were in a very chatty mood today), we switched to brushes. It started when Ellen grabbed the wrong bag before leaving her house. Can't do much painting with workout weights, so she had to borrow supplies. She did an incredible job with the unfamiliar tools and, in the process, discovered a new favorite brush—the cats tongue. Interestingly enough, the brush was Ken's and it had been languishing in his brushholder. So we talked about oil vs. watercolor brushes, fan brushes, whip brushes, liners and cats tongues. We reminisced about people by their favorite brushes or ones they'd introduced us to. Keep coming back. This is something we may have to explore in greater detail.