Category Archives: Learning

Gordon Shows Us How He Paints

Posted on February 26, 2019 by Sarah Sullivan

I admire the exuberance and humor in the paintings of a local artist, Gordon Bashant. He uses primary colors, black outlines, calligraphy, strong values, and halos. It gives his work a boisterous happy feeling that I would like my own … Continue reading →

Posted in Learning, Telling a Story | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Intuitive Painting

Posted on February 14, 2019 by Sarah Sullivan

I just finished a four-day workshop on intuitive painting with the Arizona artist, Stan Kurth. Above are three of my favorite paintings that I did during the workshop. We learned to develop paintings intuitively. Not from life, not from a … Continue reading →

Posted in Deliberate Practice | Tagged , , | 11 Comments

A Gardening Lesson

Posted on January 23, 2019 by Sarah Sullivan

I went to the cactus garden at Balboa Park expecting to paint cactus. Instead, I was taken by a school group learning about public gardens. I watched them awhile and liked the way the students leaned forward as they listened … Continue reading →

Posted in Landscape, Learning, People Learning, Telling a Story | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Inktense and Gouache

Posted on January 16, 2019 by Sarah Sullivan

I bought some Inktense pencils this morning and had to try them out. Inktense pencils combine qualities of traditional watercolor pencils and permanent markers. The pencil marks dissolve with water but once dry, the color is bright and durable. I … Continue reading →

Posted in Landscape, Learning, Uncategorized | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Quick Paintings and Quick Decisions

Posted on November 29, 2018 by Sarah Sullivan

I painted many 20-minutes sketches this morning of a model with the SDWS Thursday life group.  A twenty-minute sketch does not give a lot of time for planning, measuring, and color choice. You have to be fast and trust your … Continue reading →

Posted in Deliberate Practice, Uncategorized | Tagged , | 2 Comments

Frida Underwater

Posted on October 18, 2018 by Sarah Sullivan

This week the assignment in our illustration class was to show a character in an underwater environment, using black ink and traditional pens. I had trouble thinking of a character and began several sketches only to abandon them when I … Continue reading →

Posted in Deliberate Practice, Learning | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Do They Like My Work?

Posted on October 12, 2018 by Sarah Sullivan

I am taking a ten-week illustration course at a local university. Our first assignment was to select text from an unillustrated book and then to illustrate it using five types of pencil marks- hatching, crosshatching, scribbling, tick marks, and pressure … Continue reading →

Posted in Deliberate Practice, Telling a Story | Tagged | 6 Comments