The Secret Life of the Artist #15

The making of this year's Christmas card began with a photo from Facebook. A friend posted a picture of her husband standing next to the Christmas tree they cut down near their new home in Colorado. Editing him out (my apologies to Ken), I did a watercolor about 5 x 7". Scanning the painting we had photos made (sorry all you tech savvy people, but the computer is not something I understand well, I'm sure there are other ways to get this done). We bought card stock with envelopes the appropriate size and glued them down.

Meadow in Door County

Most of the time I was in Door County I spent with my dog and not painting. I was there to just be there, but did a few paintings. This one was done in the late afternoon one day when the sun was creating a kind of fairyland of light blue over the meadow through the woods. It was not easy to paint because it made things look flat. Successful or not, I enjoyed standing among the trees and looking out through then and did this 8" x 10".

Fastest gun at the easel

Last Saturday at the drawing class I did this charcoal drawing and a watercolor painting of the model. The remarkable thing about the drawing is that I did it in 5 minutes ---- portrait, hands and torso. Never done one that fast, although we always start out with a couple 5 minute poses. This was done on newsprint paper.

Watercolor portraits

When I am not painting with the Plein Air Painters of Chicago I go to my art guild's Saturday morning drawing class. After some 5 and 10 and 15 minute poses we finish with three 25 minute poses. That gives me enough time to do some watercolor portraits or figure studies. These were all done within the last several months. It's enough time to work if you can work fast, for there isn't enough time to really dry some areas, but if you plan ahead you can work in another area while the area you want to explore a bit more dries for more work.