My Tuesday night still-life group has made a change for the fall. We begin our weekly sessions by viewing select artwork from artists who paint in distinctive styles. Then, using a still life or photo, we attempt to evoke something of the artist while we paint for 90- minutes.
This evening, we painted under the influence of Georgia O’Keeffe, known for painting close-up views of simplified objects, often with bold colors. We each chose an object, such as this red rose, to focus closely on.
My Tuesday night still-life group has made a change for the fall. We begin our weekly sessions by viewing select artwork from artists who paint in distinctive styles. Then, using a still life or photo, we attempt to evoke something of the artist while we paint for 90- minutes.
This week, we considered Fairfield Potter’s interior scenes with figures, which often communicate a calm, friendly vibe through the use of warm colors and ordinary household items. The person who set up for tonight composed three photographs to work from that included her son, dog, and cat. For the background, I used my fireplace and its adjoining wall.
I started this sketch on the day of the solar eclipse last month. I noticed a watching woman with her head turned to the sky and her hands pressed over her heart and thought how it communicated the moment’s awe.
Initially, I put in a grey background similar to what we saw, but it did not communicate a reason for the woman’s reaction. Over the subsequent weeks, I slowly built a geometric butterfly-like background over the flat gouache with gouache, ink, color pencils, and markers. I like this better because it suggests why the woman is responding to the moment.
My Tuesday night still-life group has made a change for the fall. We begin our weekly sessions by viewing select artwork from artists who paint in distinctive styles. Then, using a still life or photo, we attempt to evoke something of the artist while we paint for 90- minutes.
This week, we considered Thiebaud’s Delta landscapes, which incorporate an aerial perspective showing geometric patterns, a patchwork of fields, and waterways that cut through the scene.
The longer you look at an artist’s work, the more you learn and refine your understanding of the artist’s goals. For instance, Thiebaud focused on a landscape without people or machines, yet, not knowing this, I placed a tractor in the center of my patchwork of fields and waterways.
Even in San Diego, we see fall color this time of year.
I painted several similar scenes last spring; only I used much more gouache. This one is on Shizen smooth watercolor paper. Although it is smoother than their rough paper, it still has enough texture to achieve translucent light in the part of the vase that has water. Something that pleases me about this sketch is the variety of levels of transparency.
I like this little value study more than the painting that goes with it.
Deliberate Sketching 