As I mentioned yesterday, I finished up Shari Blaukopf’s short course on painting spring flowers in watercolor. From crocus, we moved onto hyacinths, and today we have a field – or certainly a large patch – of tulips.
Shari’s tulips are more rounded at the tops, as are your standard tulip. Me, in my messiness and lack of attention to shapes, created ones which have more ragged tops, more open in bloom, and any other excuse you can think of for not adhering to recognizably-shaped tulips!
With that out of the way, this painting was a conclusion to all three studies. Out of all of them, for me the crocus was the biggest challenge simply as I am not familiar with them in reality – only pictures. The hyacinth was difficult because the flowers are small, 6-pointed, and blur into one another. Working with them as color masses, light to dark, with an occasional recognizable flower made for success in painting a complex subject. These tulips, while not especially tulippy, were my favorite to paint.
If you enjoy watercolor, I recommend Shari’s short courses – as I have before. They are reasonably priced, some are better than others, but in each one there is a clear subject and a clear goal. She has put together some “series” of online classes, too, which cover related topics. Many classes have a section for the student to upload their studies, and Shari is very good about getting back, even if it may be a few weeks later because she is away teaching in-person workshops.
The solstice is not yet here, so it is still technically Spring! I thought this was an important fact since I am showing off the hyacinth study from Shari Blaukopf’s online course of flowers in the spring. I already did the crocus – the flower I have never seen – and today I present you with the second study, hyacinths.
Whether or not these really look like hyacinths may be up to you. Shari is not a botanical watercolorist, and neither am I. I really like the intensity of her colors and the way she handles paint and subject matter. Add to that, she is a really good teacher and I have enjoyed all her online courses.
Overall, I am pleased with this study, but I will say the bottom, in the pot and the dirt, I need to fix that, but will later. Time to have a snack and kick back after this. I was focused and now I need to unfocus.
I feel like a school kid – classes are taking up so much of my life! It is keeping me off the streets, so I am sure a few people are glad to know that! The classes are a series with Ian Roberts (online), Andy Evansen (online), handsewing 18th stays with Burnley & Trowbridge (far behind!), and a local class in oils / acrylics with a good teacher. Housework is falling by the wayside!
The above is a watercolor exercise from Evansen’s class. It’s a year-long course in watercolor, and the content needs me, the student, to work hard at the lessons. We began with skies – I am pretty comfortable with those. This module works with values, and I think I did a pretty good job with it.
What I found especially interesting was the beginning of the value study. Unlike Roberts who puts in all values in a pencil sketch, Evansen puts the middle value only as the first step. The white areas are bright spots and the sky, but the middle values are all created as one big shape. That was quite interesting, and not the usual route one takes with value studies.
Pencil drawing with middle value only added as a shape.
I messed up a bit, but it did lay out a map that was more clear to me than also including the darks. Once I got the idea in my head, the next step was to lay in soft colors on paper that was wetted on both front and back with a natural sponge. I used 9×12 140# CP Kilimanjaro paper here.
After doing the middle value shape, both as a prelim and then on the final painting, you are supposed to go back and add the dark areas to the prelim. I didn’t get there – I was too involved in the final product!
Light areas filled in on dampened paper. Includes the sky, white areas for buildings, and field and trees.
Doing the light areas on dampened paper allows the colors to bleed a bit, and create soft edges.
Thicker paint added once the light areas have been worked.
The next step was to work left to right so that the shape created for middle values in the preliminary study could be made on the painting. The idea is to work in one movement – left to right since I am right handed, but right to left if you are left handed. The idea is to create a bead of color that varies as you paint in a continuous design.
To me, this was really a dark based on the reference photo, but that is life! As I did this, I worked around the buildings and structures, as well as roads. The thicker paint and dryer paper allowed this to happen to create hard edges. I was happy with how easy it was to do!
Almost done!
This was perhaps the 3rd stage in my painting. I added furrows to the field and details to the structures. I scraped in tree branches and such with my finger nail only to realize I keep them trimmed too short to be of any use there!
After all the layers were dried, I did the heavier dry brush as well as glazes over the field and hills to create areas of warmth or coolness. I also did it on some of the structures to keep them from dominating .
Some thoughts . . .
It is really a lot of work to do these classes. My whole purpose is to stop my old ways of approaching painting and create some kind of shift so that I can become a better painter in my opinion. Also, I need to stay busy. I have felt like I have been floundering a bit, so an area of focus was important, especially in an arena I wanted to learn. I am still adjusting to all this, but in the big picture, I am happy I made the commitments.
A Study from Lena Rivo’s “Color Mastery” Class – Value Exercise
Awhile back I enrolled in an online class offered by a gouache artist, Lena Rivo, whose work I admire. The class is called “Color Mastery Essntials” and I have found it to be such a pleasure.
I have been painting with gouache since around 2019, and the first task was to get comfortable with the medium, learning its quirks. Every medium needs a level of study that comes simply through experience, and then, once experience is gained, refinement of that experience. Lena Rivo can be found on YouTube, painting in oils, acrylics, and gouache. Her style is simple, her colors are very clean and vibrant. Because mud is my middle name, I thought her class would be worth a try.
Was it? Most definitely. I have gone through nearly all the modules, and am doing them another time. This one is what caught my attention today – value. I really don’t see value but with the exercises in her class, values are becoming more and more visible. The above exercise was about values. The light colors of the fish contrast sharply with one another, some being darker and others being lighter than the water. Besides value, the question is what temperature do you see within the values? Warm? Cold? I never really thought about things this way.
If you want to see Lena Rivo’s work on YouTube, click here, and for her website, click here. There are free downloads about how to improve your art and an excellent guide for painting with gouache. A gallery of her work is eye candy, filled with beautiful colors. Flowers, people. landscapes, the sea and more are all represented here. You can also find links to her courses.
I won’t go into too many details of the class I enrolled in, as it is her class, but I will say I do recommend it. It is clear and logical, moving from simple to more complex. Topics covered include how to keep your colors vibrant, even in shadows, how to evaluate light and dark, and steps to take to evaluate what you see to create your own, original painting.
In all honesty, I tend to be skeptical about online learning, mostly because live online learning can be very poorly done. The same with a class that is prepared and self-paced by the student. Lena Rivo’s class is not dull, it is interesting, and full of important details that don’t overwhelm. Each lesson builds on the previous, and repeating modules effects learning more with each round.
I plan on continuing to repeat what I’ve already covered because I am seeing it again, with new and more experienced eyes.
Ink, Yarn & Beer 