Alan Spring 2

 The first 3 are 30 minute cobbled still lifes. This is where you just sit in a room and pick 3 to 5 objects and just imagine a still life then draw it and paint it. It was recommended that I use water soluble pens. I’ve been using a Tombow lately but it puts down lines that are too thick for my liking with this exercise. I used it quite a bit in my last building paintings. So I used a Universal One and a Snowman. The Snowman has a thicker line. These are painted in my 5 X 7 sketchbooks on 140# coldpress.

Here I’m sitting in the kitchen using a Snowman pen  

Sitting in the living room using a Universal One. 

Objects from the dining room. 

We have a friend in Mississippi who is a potter.  He took a picture of his kiln when he was firing pottery and I thought it would make a good subject for a Yupo painting. I have a 9 X 12 tablet of synthetic paper that’s not yupo but acts like Yupo and is cheaper. It’s harder to take it all the way back to pure white which makes it hard to get what I wanted but I thought it was interesting. 

To the woods

 That stripey thing from last week has become a forest

This is a 9x12 tree.  Put in a stripey background and then went over it with a wet brush.  It was like painting white on dark paper.

 This is a 5x7.  I filled the background with indigo and perylene maroon and let it sit overnight so that not all of it came up leaving a ghostly pattern.  Once I had the tree in I put some dark green over the background to give it more contrast.  

Watercolor surgery….

 In both paintings, she’s getting a little facial surgery. I’m ok with his face finally,but his arm llooks slightly diseased. I’m trying to get the effect of dappled sunlight in the bottom one, but it’s very hard with skin. The top one still has a ways to go but it might be a closer resemblance than last week’s….whoknows….

Edith

 

From a black and white photo in Grinnell. College magazine   The college has dedicated a new building in her honor.  She is the first African American to attend Grinnell and at 110 years old she was able to attend the dedication.  Edith Renfrow Smith is a retired CPS teacher  She lives in Chicago  

In the garden

 Maybe a little too much, but I've never been a Miesian.

 These are all 5x7 inspired by some trees in the Lurie gardens (can't you tell?)  Went in first with viridian and rose to get a blackish background.  Then put indigo on top because it wasn't dark enough and vermillion. burnt sienna, and then that imperious lady, perylene maroon, to make complementaries to moody indigo,.  Then covered the whole mess gently with water and pressed gently down with a Viva paper towel, and this is what I got.  Seems too good to waste on a bunch of trees, but we will see.

SS A Quiet Date 03.22.25

 Since last year, my husband and I go on a monthly mani and pedi procedure at our Andersonville nail salon. The mid month date is a healthy appointment to maintain my partner's lower extremities as a requirement of his diabetic type 2 status. I painted this to reflect on a lifestyle of 2 retired senior immigrants, which I never dreamed of doing when I was just a teenager in warm Philippines. The impact of our photo on my fellow instagram circle was positive: " a bonding moment", for most of the comments. The shirts and hairstyles of our 2 nail technicians are just a byproduct of my traveling imagination! Happy Painting to All!

March 22, 2025 — Elaine O.

It was a day for celebrating—Ken's birthday (thanks for the delicious cookies!) and Sara's new grandbaby—not to mention finishing a painting and a pad of paper. I like the ceramic pitcher and feel as if I've (finally) gotten the sense of the dragonfruit, so I can move on to other produce with my head held high. There's a lot to like about still life painting, isn't there?

11" x 14"

Alan Spring 1

 I’ve been working on some different techniques for the examination of the 1400 block of Belle Plaine. I finished the Yupo version and sprayed it with high gloss fixative. I quite liked the result. The little burst of flame is just a reflection of the lamp.

I took an 8 X 12 canvas board that I treated with gesso. Then I did some drawing with a Tombow pen. With the Tombow, the ink diffused when touched by water. I was trying to go for a little darker time of day. I also added some texture by adding some touches of acrylic paint to give it a rough look and added some relief to some of the limestone details. You can really see it with an enlarged view. I finished it with a high gloss fixative because, like Yupo, the paint is still just floating on the surface. 

I’m going to try some “cobbled” still lifes. This is where you sit down and pick some items that you can see in the room and imagine a still life in your mind. I planned on using several different types of ink pens from highly diffusing to low. I just did a quick sketch of  the building image I’ve been working on using a Universal One ink pen which diffuses when hit with water but leaves a pretty solid line as well. 

It’s just a little sketch in my sketchbook but leads me into the cobbled still  lifes that should be fun. 

Meet Claire Diane!

 Say hello to Claire! She made her due date, arriving at 11:30pm on St. Patrick’s Day. Mom and baby doing fine, dad and grandparents are exhausted, and sisters are over the moon!

The Three Amigos

 Okay the first one is just one amigo, he just happened to get there first.  The first two are 5x7 and the second two are 9x12.  None of them are officially done.  I love the image and these colors and there may be several more.

The Project That Never Happens

 

A small attempt to paint our front entrance on Khadi paper. Lots of dappled sunlight. A larger version always in the to do pile…..somehow too daunting to ever actually get done. 

Pitchers and pictures of Quinn…

 I added some dubious elements to the top one. I’m not sure it’s finished but I’m finished with it. The bottom one I’m just going to leave alone for a while.

Again, not sure Quinn with flowers is done.Her hands could use a little  love. It’s an odd pose. Her head looks either too big or maybe she looks too old still. The bottom one is a redo of an early painting. Itsstillawork in progress….after looking at Elaine’s work I’m thinking that I need to go in with more paint and less water early on. This whole layering thing just always looks pale. Interesting that my non human paintings get plenty of color but my humans always seem about to fade away….

March 15, 2025 — Elaine O.

This is the last page of a watercolor pad! Which usually means I'm so happy to reach this milestone and so excited to move on that I go in all devil-may-care. Sometimes the result is carefree and good; sometimes it's slapdash and bad. Here I revisited the dragonfruit and added some challenging surfaces. We'll see how I feel when I'm finished, but I think I like this (after some initial doubts),

11" x 14"

Ukrainian Birds

 

All on one strip of Khadi handmade Indian paper. Doesn’t the last one seem to be thinking….”now they’re saying we started the war😔.

Good morning Sunshine

I did a 5x7 of this flower in about an hour and it had a pleasing sway,  This is a 9x12 and it took me about ten hours.  There is more here but not sure if it is better.

The 5x7

 

Alan Winter 12

 I finished this view down my block. Spent a lot of time and wondered why I painted it. It’s only 8 X 10 and maybe there’s too much stuff in to small a space. There are things I like about it but I didn’t like the overall look. I don’t like photo realism.  Just print the photo. This  ceased to be fun the more detail I poured into it.

So I painted what I liked on a 12 X 14 sheet of Yupo. Painted a few details but went for basic shapes and colors and liked it a lot.

I saw this view one morning at dawn. So, I might try another one using a Notan filter. 

March 8, 2025 — Elaine O.

It's been a relatively slow week...in terms of painting, that is. I've just managed to finish this scene from a courtyard in Paris.

12" x 9"

Next week, I'm looking forward to starting the last page of a pad of paper as I work my way through my watercolor paper stash.

Cough, cough, cough…

 A day at the Art institute gave me a week’s worth of coughing on the couch! I had to send my girls home early, cancel brunch plans, and just lie around and cough…the place was packed and I’m sure I caught it in the Thorne Rooms which has terrible ventilation…

So these two little sketches are all I’ve done all week. I have a beautiful amaryllis in bloom and I couldn’t let it go unrecorded….

Alan Winter 11

 Had a strange little week painting. It started out with a couple of sketches of things around Truman. Even though they were sketches, I put more effort into them than I usually do and was reminded by Elaine’s rough orange and blue paintings that the energy is important as opposed to painting inside the lines. Anyway……here’s a couple that I saw walking around the campus. 

This is 5 X 10 on a hot press sketchbook of the Wilson el stop taken from the parking lot.

Here’s another looking out from the parking lot that is 5 X 5 on the same sketchbook. 

This piece is on a canvas board primed with gesso. It’s 8 X 10. Looking east from my house. There’s a lot of work to do but I got the initial washes in and the general shapes together. Darker values with shading and foliage to be added. Now I just need to have fun. Also I love the texture of this surface. 

Goofy stuff.

 Added a bit of olive green to this since class.  Just think of it as a Cornell Box of various brushstrokes.

And these are the steps I took to get there.

And this is the tree you saw in class

And this is the tree now.

Not that crazy about these two masterpieces, but I learned a lot and I had a lot of fun.  Both are 3x5 yupos.