"Light As A Feather"

(SOLD......8" x 8"....on 300 lb CP Fabriano....Presented on a 2" depth cradled board)

"The spirit is quiet and as light as a feather." To hear the spirit of God within us, it is quite necessary to be quiet. The Spirit does not speak where there is loudness and chaos, but in a still, quiet voice. It is another way of looking at the verse from Psalms....."Be still and know that I am God."

You probably noticed that I took three days off from blogging. There were other more pressing issues to deal with and I really do need to sleep....so there you have it!

This is the second in my trilogy with the feather. These are (8" x 8"'s) and will be displayed together in a fall exhibit called "Poetic Collections". What I am noticing is that the more I paint the same image, the more abstract it becomes. So if you want to learn more about how to abstract an image, this is a good way.

I have begun both pieces the same way with a very wet surface....getting rid of excess water with a sponge....and then dropping in some pale yellow with a mop brush. All the other colors were glazed on dry paper and losing most of the edges with a brush dipped in water and dragged over a sponge cloth to get rid of the excess....and then touching the edge of the color just glazed. The paper, of course, was thoroughly dry before adding a new glaze.

The dark stripe shapes in the feather were painted rather dark and solid and then allowed to dry. I then got a water brush and brushed over those stripes and into the neighboring shapes to deepen the value and soften the edges of the stripes. It can look contrived and rather stark to paint dark shapes with  hard edges around the perimeter. The problem can also be resolved by paying attention to the color and value immediately surrounding the dark shape.

Another tip is to test your values on a scrap piece of watercolor paper before applying it to your piece. It is very difficult to judge the darkness and lightness of watercolor when mixing it on the palette. And there you have it...just a few more things to think about.

Please contact me personally to inquire about this piece.

"Layer on Layer"

(unavailable.....4" x 6".....on 300 lb. CP)

"Growth is layer on layer." In an instantaneous world...no one likes to realize that growth in any area happens layer by layer. There are so many nuances to everything that it is impossible to learn all of them at once. But oh the joy, when things do come together in a pleasing way.

This small piece represents me practicing my techniques again. And literally, the glazing technique in watercolor is layer on layer. Just to recap...the layers must be dried after each one. That's the most important thing to remember.

I did begin by sponging both sides of this 300 lb. CP (Arches) with water. That thoroughly wets the paper and removes the sizing. I then painted three horizontal lines across the wet paper with neutral tint and a tiny bit of Cobalt Violet (Turner Brand). This may not seem to be an important layer, but creates foundational values that can be seen through the transparent layers. It is best at this point to go talk a walk, throw some laundry in the washer, or make the beds, etc. and let the water and pigment do what they're going to do. If you use your hair dryer too quickly, the effect will be ruined.  Come back to the piece after about 15 or 20 min. and then finish drying with a hair dryer.

My only reference here was a plant in my studio. And I simply took the shapes of the leaves as my jumping off point and changed the colors to lighter values. After painting each leaf on dry paper and losing the edge with plain water on one side, but not with every leaf, I dried it with a hair dryer. It doesn't take long for the pigment to do what it's going to do when glazing on dry paper.

You can see that I kept the colors light and overlapped them to create an abstract contemporary look. I also used a mechanical pencil (without the lead exposed) to make lines and write in a few of the leaves while they were wet. There happen to be (11) leaf layers in this piece.

Finally, I wrote the quote in pencil running up the side vertically. This is an important technique to get under your belt if you like contemporary watercolor.   And there you have it...just a few more things to think about.