#156 and #157 7/24/19 Two More Landscapes - Rolled Hay Bales and the Bull

Tap, tap, tap, roll the brush, tap, tap, tap.  That's what I did with these two landscapes.  They were a few days in the making....one day to paint in the sky and some of the foreground.  Then let it dry a bit, then come back in for the tapping.  I like the tapping for tree leaves.  It takes a while, but I like the textured effect.  I think I'm going to use this to fix the penguin ground too, there's always time to fix an oil painting.  Thank you Yasser Fayad!  Another thing I did with the three landscapes is not use any green paint....only yellow, blue and brown.  I figured that it would look a bit more natural, as every time I put my brush into the palette I'd be picking up a slightly different color.

These are two scenes that I pass on my way to work....I stop every once in a while on my way home, if the weather is nice and take some pictures.  When the hay bales were made, I noticed them in the morning (no time to stop) and I hoped and prayed that they would still be there on my way home for a photo shoot.  Heck, they stayed there for weeks.  The bull had a buddy with him on my way to work one morning (again, no time to stop, I allow zero extra seconds for my ride to work, extra seconds would be lost sleep) but on the way home it was just this one guy.  He didn't look too thrilled that I was there at the fence taking pictures.  If he had charged, I likely would have had a heart attack!  But he calmed right down and went about his business of eating more grass....so I took lots of pictures.  I asked Joe to give me a critique on this new technique, and he looked at each of the 3 landscapes and said, "Derivative......Lame......Belongs in the trash!"  He then explained he was quoting a Spongebob episode.  Uggggh.  His only advice was that the driveway on the haybales painting looked off, like it was a random stripe on an otherwise nice picture of a farm.  Good eye, I fixed it.

I'll look at these again tomorrow and maybe fix more things.

#155 7/20/19 Wolfsville Landscape

I prepped 3 canvases for landscape paintings...thinking I'd get them done over the weekend.  The prepping happened ok.  And I decided I would paint the sky on all of them first, then the next day begin painting the landscapes.  That way the edges between the trees and the sky would look a bit better...that the edges of the tree could have bits of sky poking through the leaves.  Saturday came and I set to work on the first one, the view from the top of Woodland Way looking down the hill at the road that leads into Wolfsville.  This is a road I travel sometimes on my way to work, when I've a bit more time (it's a little longer, but just a lovely road to travel).  Somebody bought some land and built a big white house, which I assumed was going to look out of place among the farmland and old houses.  But it actually looks rather nice.  My painting of this view, not so nice however, it took forever and I wasn't happy with the results and never made it to the other two landscapes.

So on Sunday I spent a bit of time watching a you tube video of a man doing a beautiful landscape, the title was "tutorial for a simple landscape" (by Yasser Fayad).  The video was nearly 2 hours long, included no instruction, just music set to a sped-up video of him painting.  The camera was set directly above the painting and he kept his palette right next to it. He used a very limited palette, so it was nice to see him mix so many different colors from just 5 blobs of paint.  He painted, and repainted, and repainted, and repainted....the thing was very labor-intensive, with so many layers of color.  I counted, and he tapped his brush to the canvas 42,856,011 times before he called it quits. Tap, tap, tap, turn the brush, tap, tap, tap, redo a spot that already looked perfect to me, tap, tap, tap, turn the brush, tap, tap, tap, redo another spot that looked perfect.  Phew it was exhausting!  I didn't watch it from start to finish, I kind of jumped around.  The end result was gorgeous, and it was helpful to see the mishmash of initial colors slowly transform to recognizable objects through the sheer persistence of tapping.

I worked some more on my landscape that evening.  Then the next day as well.  I noticed on other landscape paintings that I like, there is something in the foreground, even when the main event is far off in the distance....so I added some black-eyed susans.  They weren't in the photograph, but they're blooming everywhere right now, especially roadsides.  Sometimes it takes a few days for me to notice what it is that is holding a painting back.  In this case, it was a few trees in the first tree-line that lacked the normal symmetry that nature usually provides....they looked juvenile and once I tap, tap, tapped them into a better shape I became happier with the landscape.  It's not near where it could be, but it was great experience, and I need to put the brush down on this one.

Grandson checking out Nanna's paintings, deciding between an apple and that cute clownfish

#153 and #154 7/18/19 A Single Strawberry and a Gin & Tonic

These are the balance of the 4 easel paintings: a single fresh strawberry, and the top view of a gin and tonic.  Both have very dark backgrounds.  The strawberry painting kind of makes me laugh (but not out loud), as the strawberry is being showcased way too seriously. I struggled a bit with the strawberry; halfway through Dave walked in and said, "Oh, that's nice."  And I snapped back, "It's terrible, it's pathetic, leave me be."  After I put down a few more layers of red, its three dimensional shape took hold and I was myself again.  The little leaves at the top, just like the leaves on top of the tangerines, don't look as curvy and rounded as I would like.  It's a deeply shadowed area, so I'm going to blame that.

The final easel painting is the lime slices floating in a glass of what I'm going to assume is a gin & tonic (because that's where I would put lime slices).  The effervescent bubbling going on in the photo was too much for my limited skill set.  They are just random dots in my painting.  I'm just happy there were no ice cubes to paint (phew, been there done that!)  I was nervous about differentiating the greenish-blue of the fluid, with the green of the lime rinds, with the green of the lime flesh.  It was getting late, I felt I should be going to bed, but I wanted to finish it....so I pushed myself.  I'm pleased with the way the lime slices stand out.  Sleep, who needs it?!

#151 & #152 7/17/19 Citrus Fruits

I've got 8 more tiny easel canvases burning a hole in my pocket, so I thought I would knock 4 of them out tonight....instead I got the 4 photos selected and cropped, printed, chalked, transferred and the backgrounds painted.  It was late so I called it a day.  But for today's date, I'm calling the first two....tomorrow I'll call the second two.

First two are the tangerines and the grapefruit.  The tangerine was inspired by a painting I saw on Daily Paintworks....the orange fruit, the green leaves and the dark background made for a very dramatic still life!  I found a picture on Pexels and away I went.  I decided the background color was better in the photo than in the idea I had in my head (which is the color "darkness").  The blue against the orange spoke to me.  Then there was the reflective surface they were sitting on, I loved that too.  The leaves were the most difficult, that is, to show how they bend and curve.  I don't think I really translated that well.  But overall, I'm satisfied with the painting.

The grapefruit painting involved a decision: keep it as a grapefruit....but what if it's really a blood orange...I could likely make it a regular orange if I wanted.  I decided to paint the flesh of the fruit pink, let the viewer make a choice as to whether it was a pink grapefruit or a blood orange.  For the color of the flesh I used Alizarin Crimson and white (in varying degrees).  So, note to self: if you need a deep pink, use Alizarin Crimson (I could have used this advice when painting the pink rose a few days ago, perhaps it wouldn't have turned out so pale).  Although the fruit flesh in the photo is still more intense than the Alizarin Crimson.  I think I'm perhaps too timid when it comes to extreme colors.

#150 7/16/19 1940 Chevy Truck For Sale

I liked the shape of the Michigan truck so much, I decided to try it again, but on a larger canvas.....we have advanced this subject matter to a 5x5 inch canvas!  Dave was with me when I was photographing these trucks.  He was my protector, in case the owner came out with a shotgun.  He would throw himself in front of me, I have no doubt.  He was holding the for sale sign that was propped in front of the truck while I took pictures, but fortunately I took a few with the for sale sign still in place.  That's what I painted tonight.  I think the sign is a key piece of the interest....$10K, 4000 miles, 1940, are you serious??? I wonder if it runs.  It must for $10K.  The phone number is good, in case you're looking for a 1940 Chevy truck!   The painting went smoothly, thank goodness.  I feel like I needed this. 

#149 7/16/19 Pear on an Easel

Another easel painting....thought I would go back to my roots....fruits.  When I posted a bunch of my "appealing" painting on the Daily Paint site - Oh!!! Speaking of!!!  The "Four Fat Apples" sold today from the site listings, woohoooo! 

Where was I?  Yes........posting, the "Pear Make-Over" stole my heart again, so I thought I'd give another pear a chance as an easel painting.  I wanted a darkish mishmash background.  It could probably be darker.  I eye-lined the pear after I painted it, kind of reverse of how I should have done it.  But I repainted the background and overlapped the eyeliner a bit, then I repainted the inside of the pear, and overlapped the eyeliner a bit.  I'm not a fan of the purple shadow, and will work on that next.

#148 7/15/19 Converse Shoes on the Easel

Let's see....I've painted blue converse sneakers on just about every type of canvas I have, except the 3 inch easel canvases.  So that's what I did tonight.  Another perspective of Faith's feet.  I thought maybe, given my extensive experience now with laces, that I'd breeze right through.  Yeah, that didn't happen.  But I still like the painting, even though it's a bit messy-looking.  Usually for these tiny 3 inch wrapped canvases I've been continuing to paint the picture around the edges of the canvas, but I decided that wouldn't work with the shoes.  So all 4 sides were painted gymnasium yellow, like the floor Faith is standing on.  But then, I decided, no the sides should be blue, like the shoes.  So that's were they're at now.