Painting without drawing

 

These were painted from life without drawing. The geranium was outlined in ink after finishing. This was fun——very meditative. 

Elaine O. — May 28, 2022

I found this sheet of watercolor paper hanging around. I did a rough sketch but never started to paint. It's a southern coastal scene with Spanish moss dripping from the oaks--a subject I never quite captured to my satisfaction. And there's some masking fluid on the paper from months ago. It's been on the paper so long it may not even come off, or it may leave a bad stain if it does. So, with all the potential landmines, I decided to just go all in and throw it away if it fails.

9" x 12"

 This is just a start, but so far, I think I like it!

End of May

 I did a little work on the martini. Just a quick sketch. I’ll be looking at “how to draw ovals” on YouTube in the near future. 

Here’s a great summer treat.

Ingredients:

• Gin – 2 oz
• Simple syrup – 1 oz ( I used blue agave)
• Freshly squeezed lemon juice – 1 oz
• Soda water 
• Lemon slice and maraschino cherry to serve

Method:

1. Throw 4 ice cubes into a cocktail shaker and pour in the gin, simple syrup, and lemon juice. 
2. Give everything a good shake until it’s super cold. 
3. Fill a highball glass with ice and pour in the cocktail mixture. 
4. Top up with soda water before garnishing with the lemon slice and maraschino cherry.

Here it is sitting in our backyard. 

I’ve always liked this picture of irises on my lakeshore in Michigan. This is a really quick painting on Yupo that I’m having a lot of fun with because I got to use several different techniques so far. It might be done. 

Hopefully we’ll see you next session. 

Face time…..

 I’m doing more gardening than painting these days since after gardening, I’m too tired to do any painting! However a couple of rainy cold days gave me plenty of time to pick upon my Quinn portrait project.

To review, here’s my sketch and the first portrait I painted

Here’s the 2nd portrait I painted.

It’s a little closer in feeling to the sketch, but it still didn’t capture what I liked about the photo. So I decided since I loved the photo so much, I would just print it out and trace it for the next painting. I feel like that’s cheating, but I did it anyways….

I’m not finished, in fact I posted this because I really like where it’s going, but I fear I’m about to ruin it…even tho I’m cheating, I’m realizing that when I do my own drawings I need to break them down more into value patterns before I paint. And I just need to practice drawing more!

See you all next Saturday I hope!

 

Tiger, Tiger

This is the tiger I did when I was doing big cats.  My plan right now is to do a series of paintings based on cropping this image.

This is a cropping of from the top of that painting, mainly from his butt,  I love where his stripes met along his spine, like birds of prey one on top of each other.  

 

Alan in May

 A little plein aire I did of my new view of Harwood Lake from my patio without the giant Hickory that fell into the lake. Hardly any drawing.

Another little sketch of a flowering plant that I loosely dropped paint onto paper and then did a contour drawing to give it structure. 

Another quick sketch of a dirty martini at the lake.  It continues to amaze me that I can’t draw a straight martini glass.  I’d spend more time but it will always be crooked and that will drive me crazy  

I’m going to start a series of Michigan landscapes that remind me of my youth.  This is Lake Michigan from the park across from my grampa’s  house.  And I thought that I would crop it to make it better.

More paint

 

When I was painting the latest alley I began by trailing paint brushes of indigo and sepia across a very wet paper to outline the general shapes of the alley floor and the buildings on either side of it.  After maybe two sittings for this I had this and I just loved it, it just seemed so open and full of possibilities.  I wanted to bring that to the finished product, but it didn't work.  I had to impose the buildings and the alley, reality on it, and all that possibility was lost.

Now that I have all my sixteen paintings ready to hang at the Ten Cat this Friday I had a little painting time on my hands and no idea where to go next, so I began with this one.  

I wet the whole paper down and trailed sepia over it, let that dry for a day and wet it again and trailed indigo over it, then the same with burnt sienna.  Then some hooker's green and perylene maroon and at this point the paper was plain wore out, lumpy and uneven and sometimes it would take paint and sometimes it would not.  What the hell, I spread gum arabic all over it and that seemed to make it better, and it seems like now it has reached a point where nothing stains, which is something I like.  I have gone over and over it adding burnt yellow, leaf green, and quinacridone rose, just following the lights and darks and shapes. not thinking ahead and not thinking twice.  Sometimes it is so wet and dark I can't even tell how the paint is going down, working with muscle memory.

I just wanted to see what would happen.  And here it is:

Elaine O. — May 14, 2022

It's finished! You know how I've mentioned sometimes being reluctant to remove the mask at the end, afraid I'll ruin things? Here's my dilemma, illustrated. This is the "finished work" just before I removed the masking fluid....

9" x 12"        Finished, except for mask removal

...and after. Quite a different vibe, isn't it?

9" x 12"        Finished painting

Actually, since the intention was always to include the white drawing lines, I can't really describe the removal as a dilemma. It's more like a surprise.

I'm planning to do this again, but larger and with more careful perspective.

Just the paint

 See this is all about the paint because there isn't anything else.  Wet the whole paper and sloshed sepia around it.  After it had dried a day I wet it again and sloshed around indigo.  Let that dry and then sloshed around some burnt sienna.  No master plan just working on the spur of the moment.  I like it so far but then again it looks like a dirty floor.

Putting Sweetie to nap

 Kind of an odd painting, a lot of texture but not much change in colors.  I think it has a sleepy ambiance.

And just in time to put in my show.  Hanging it on June 1 and taking it down July 1, opening will be Wednesday June 15 fivish.  Abd it may be the last because The Ten Cat is going on the block.

You can get a preview here: http://www.bckat.us/KenSchadt/2022show/index.htm

Another birthday card, a bag of fruit, and a mystery location

 Holly dancing after recovering from a serious illness last summer. 

Lifted from a watercolor FB site to see if I could do it. Too “masky”. My teen grandson asked “what’s cellophane.”

Who knows where this is?

Elaine O. — May 7, 2022

Still slowly working on my view of downtown Chicago, as seen from my brother Bob's window. Can you imagine waking up to this view every day?

9" x 12"

Alan’s getting ready to make Lemondrop Martinis

 First I changed my floral arrangement by going deeper into the shadows and taking some  color out of the tulips.

I have a lot of lemons so I’m  going to make a lot of lemon drop martinis. 

And I have a fancier shaker as well. 

Lemons are fun to paint. 

Sara’s Back….

 Great trip to California, saw lots of family, big trees in Sequoia, weird  rock formations in Death Valley & lots of crazy people in Las Vegas, along with a couple of amazing Cirque shows…But it was nice to be back for the last class of the spring session! We really have an amazing thing going on. Even though there were only 4 of us in class today (plus Pat),  it was so cool to see everyone’s work and to just paint together.  Not everyone has a community like this…we’re lucky.

So here’s my pencil sketch of Quinnie that I did before I left. I really like it.

Then today in class I did this watercolor. It’s amazing the difference in expression & I think it’s all because of the eyes…and maybe the mouth. I’m going to do another watercolor. I have better idea of the color palette I want to use. Just for reference here’s the photo I’m working from, but honestly it’s the sweetest pic of any child EVER!,,,

The drawing is a lot closer in expression than the painting…

Bye Spring & Rain by Ss

 My latest painting is a tribute to a grand lady with exquisite cheekbones, kind eyes, patient temperament, warm smile, smart mind and a generous heart. She was the daughter of a fisherman/ hometown midwife & a housewife with 10 children in an island usually visited by typhoons. She created a loving home with my father in a city by Subic

Bay near Manila. She wanted to be a nurse but she became a dressmaker, as the second bread earner in my family. Her nurturing instincts, with my father's support, enabled her to unofficially adopt numerous relatives who lived with us in their time of need. There were lots of mouths to feed, but, amazingly, no one went to  sleep, hungry! She arrived in Chicago after the death of my father in 1982. For 21 years of her stay with us in Andersonville, Nanay (mother in Tagalog dialect) cooked with passion, went to mass daily, shopped for favorite seafood, joined senior citizens activities & played actively in our nightly board games. She confided in me once, that never in her dreams while growing up in her original island home, that she would enjoy her senior years, as an American citizen in Chicago. My own family, right now, are enjoying the love & hospitality of my grateful relatives in the world: in North America, in Australia, in Asia & in Faroe Islands! Love pays with Love! In this May 7, 2022 report, I included my 2 recent portraits of my doctor & Judge Jackson enhanced by newly painted backgrounds! See you next month!

Done fooling around

 Well I am done fooling around with this one,  

And this is the photo I am going to use for my next painting and a 9x12 sketch I made in class yesterday.