gouache – Page 30 – Ink, Yarn & Beer

WWM #17: Music

I am the least musical person in the world. I cannot carry a tune. Singing voice – well, let’s just say a bit – lots of bits – better is to be desired.

I can read music. I took piano lessons. When I practiced the piano, the dog would sit at the back door and whine to be let out. When my sister practiced, he would curl up in a ball under the piano bench – if he had been a cat, doubtless he would purr along.

However, despite my own inadequacies in the music department, I really like music. When I was a child, a family friend, Boris – who fled Tsarist Russia after the October Revolution (being a prince) – was a wonderful musician. He played the balalaika and sang melancholy Russian songs. A balalaika, a song bird. Here is to music in all its forms!

WWM #15: Monochromatic

Monochromatic – value studies – black, grey, white – something I never do. I promised myself I would weeks ago, before beginning any painting. As with most resolutions, it fell by the wayside. However, I think monochrome value studies in gouache could be really rewarding and worth doing – you can make corrections as you go along, put white on black if need be. Not so easy in watercolor, and pencil studies can get all fuzzy and blurred.

#WorldWatercolorMonth2019 is at its halfway point already! Summer is fleeing . . .

See you tomorrow!

WWM #13: Glassy

I am drawn to water – maybe because when I was young, there was always a lake or river nearby. As an adult, I live in a rather dry land where creeks are rare, but the vast Pacific is not far, with wetlands and marshes. Fresh water lakes, though, are what I really love – the ones where the sky passes by beneath your feet on the glassy calm of the water.

This is from a photograph of a lake somewhere in the world – from Pixabay – and the clouds in the foreground were crystal clear and smooth. I sort of messed that glassiness up, but came fairly close to what I was trying to express. Obviously, this is a rather lonely view, but what better place than to sit, enjoy the breeze , and perhaps listen to the babbling of water fowl and the hum of insects on a warm summer day?

World Watercolor Month 2019 – Days 7-12

World Watercolor Month 2019 continues, and amazingly, I have been able to keep up with the daily prompts, even with plumbers tearing out and fixing a leak, and just other life things that conspire to keep me from painting! Some paintings are quick and easy to do, but others may involve several hours, especially the ones in gouache. Some are easy to do in that ideas come to mind rather quickly, others more challenging. For instance, the 13th one is “Glassy” – glass? mirrors? reflections on glassy water? Those are the challenges – how to interpret the prompt. The interpretation can be literal or figurative.

Here are my interpretations for prompts 7 through 12.

WWM #7: Shiny Things – Reflections on the Ocean

WWM #8: Flying High – Migrating Monarchs

WWM #11: Simple Pleasure – The Natural World

WWM #12: Blossoming – Vine and Flower-Covered Buildings of Yore – All in Bloom!

Right now, most of my art supplies are hidden in shelves inside boxes! Funny how things just vanish. I am really frustrated in some ways, and rather amused in others. I still have to make a final choice in paint for the damaged wall, but that is easy enough. The real work is repairing the wall, putting in the drywall, mud, tape, sanding, taping, painting, painting, painting, moving back in . . . leaks are expensive, not just in money, but in time. Oh well!

WWM #11: Simple Pleasures

This one had me pondering . . . a good book, flowers, painting. In the end, I thought of what seems to give me the most pleasure. The natural world, flowers, plants – the world outside that is simply there. Sometimes we manipulate it, such as by planting flowers, and other times it is just being itself, chaotic nature.

Here, sunflowers. A family member was in Las Vegas when the earthquakes of July 4 and 5 hit the Los Angeles area. Her pool sloshed over, inundating her garden with salty, chlorinated water. She lost a lot of plants. I had sent her a picture of some sunflowers she had given me, soon to bloom, and that is when I found out she had lost her plants. My idea was to (maybe) paint some sunflowers for her, but unfortunately these did not turn out too well. Still, there was the idea and the pleasure of painting sunflowers . . .

Here, Joshua Trees. I really get a bang out of these crazy-looking plants, which are very limited in their topographical area for survival, and as the world warms (it really isn’t, per the government), these plants are becoming endangered. When the US government shut down, Joshua Tree National Monument (or Park?) was heavily vandalized. Many of these trees take centuries to get big – and then some fool decides they are fair game to destroy.

The natural world is one filled with simple pleasures for our delight. Some delight in destroying things of beauty, wrecking the work of time. To me, this is a really sad, pathetic statement about human beings, but then there are those who also work to save our natural world before it disappears. I am very grateful for these heroes who work to save the simple pleasures of the natural world.