Sara is also painting skin in this family portrait. She reached the point where she felt she was beginning to overwork it....
...so she painted another portrait. We love the light and dark on this one, and especially the way the body edges roll into the darkness.
Then, Sara did two more small studies in which she boldly added saturated color to create form.
Again, she uses saturated colors to sculpt the form.
Finally, Sara decided to take a break and work on something she was less invested in than her lovely granddaughter. This is a rose from an Ansel Adams B&W print (yes, this was in one of the books Steve gifted us). Aren't the colors exquisite?
Elaine T. is also waiting for a grandbaby and is using her time to study loose painting and color—all the better to capture that soft, fresh baby skin. This abstract is quintessentially watercolor, with all the transparency, movement and color that a good watercolor needs.
From there, Elaine T. added texture with salt...
... before pulling a flower out of the loose background. We think Elaine T. is ready for the baby—and we're ready for new baby pictures! Let the countdown begin
Isa is also a proponent of loose watercolor. Here, she's added some final touches to her warm autumn pie-scape. Especially noteworthy are the composition and the finely etched elements like the leaf veins that really make this painting.
Look out the window for a snowy winter scene. We love the sophisticated way Isa separates the picture plane between indoors and out with color, value and temperature. It makes us feel glad to be inside, all warm and cozy.
And then, Isa began another painting. This, too, is a view from a window. You see the beginnings of a tree branch. The shiny bits are masking fluid, meant to reserve snow on the branches. Already, Isa's use of color lets us see the window frame and mullions in shadow, with the sun glinting on the varnished wood.
Ken's still working on his Day in the Life of Ken series. Part of his day was spent under this tree in the Ten Cat backyard. It's darker and more indicative of the twilight sky than this photo shows, but you can already see the light shining on the trunk and branches, picking them out against the evening sky. Oh, and don't say anything about Harry Potter, Goosebumps or Halloween. The day in the life was NOT Halloween.
Hard at work on her Snow series, Elaine O. realized how many different kinds of snow there are—from delicately falling snow to near whiteout snowfall, to freshly fallen snow, to slushy remnants. So, she's turning to the experts. She is copying old masterpieces to get a feel for how the greats handled snow. This painting is a copy from a painting by Pissaro—but Elaine O. hasn't gotten to the snow yet.
Here, on the other hand, the snow in New York has fallen and is being trampled by people, horses and carts. We like how Elaine O's colors contribute to the vintage feel and how the snow feels like city slush. This is a loose copy of a painting by Robert Henri.
Dana is painting a horse, too. But this one isn't trudging through a snowstorm. He's the star of this portrait. Look how proud and noble he looks. And don't hesitate to zoom in and see how technically perfect and detailed this painting is.
Susan is fine-tuning her painting from her Australia/New Zealand trip. Below, she's added to the background...
... and included more memories to the boomerangs symbolizing Australia.
Our newbies were in fine form, too. Emilia continues to play with color in this soft, watery plaid.
Her color wheel has the same fluid, watercolor feel...
... but her advanced color wheel experiments with more vivid hues.
Richard's plaid is also soft and playful.
He used the sidebars around his color wheel to experiment...
...and then did extracurricular experimentation at home, playing with brushmarks...
...before beginning his advanced colorwheel. These newbies are coming along quickly. Drop by next week for more.
And here's special treat for our viewers, thanks to Sara. She found a great resource featuring watercolors. It's a UK-based charity and they've created a free online database of documentary watercolors painted before photography became the way to document our world.
Here's a little explanation: https://hyperallergic.com/482738/the-watercolour-world-documents-the-planet-before-photography/
... and here's the site itself: www.watercolourworld.org. Be sure to grab a hot drink—you'll be glued to your screen.
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