"Watercolor from Start to Finish": I Am Teaching Watercolor at The Art League School!

Week 1: Introduction and Painting Donuts!
"Donut Bliss" (watercolor, 7" x 10")
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My dear friend Alice Kale, who teaches watercolor, has been pestering me to do the same for some time, and I finally surrendered to her persuasion. I took over another teacher's slot at The Art League School in Alexandria, VA. It is a six-week-long intensive introduction to watercolor, called "Watercolor from Start to Finish". An enthusiastic class of 18 has been meeting every Saturday from 9:30 to 12:30 for watercolor fun. At this point, we have just one more class to go. And what fun has it been!. This is indeed the beginning of a new chapter in my art career, as I will continue to teach as a regular staff at The Art League School from now on!

The first week I brought donuts to the class, since I thought their simple shapes and fun associations would encourage the beginners (minus two who are experienced watercolorists) to dive into watercolor without fear. And I was right. Some students ate donuts first and painted them from photos!

Week 2: Fruits and Vegetables
"Carrot Bunch" (watercolor, 9" x 12")

Drawing and painting from life is an invaluable training whether the subject is humble everyday things, or a figure. So carrying on the theme of still life of donuts of the first week, the students were asked to bring some fruits and vegetables of their choice for the second class. Several brought a bagful of produce; I love this class! Shapes got a little more complicated, but we are not so worried about drawing for now. (To those who want to improve their drawing skills, I recommend Bert Dodson's Keys to Drawing.) Instead we are focusing on the importance of values, edges and color temperatures in a painting.

Week 3: Landscapes
"Bixby Creek Bridge, Big Sur" (9" x 12")
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Week 4: More Landscapes
"Yaquina Head Lighthouse Sunset" (watercolor and gouache, 9" x 12")
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For the next two weeks, we painted landscapes. I did a demo of gradated/varigated washes and the students were let loose to work with the photos they brought, while getting accustomed to the watercolor terms such as washes, glazes, wet on wet/wet on dry, dry brush, etc. Landscape painting can get overwhelming with so many elements to deal with, so I emphasized that the class should look out for big shapes first. If one breaks down a picture into big shapes, there are usually only three to five. That's not so hard, is it? But landscapes often involve leaf/grass textures; boy, many went astray with them. It's been 23 years since I started painting watercolors and the memories of the excitement and frustrations are all coming back!

Week 5: Animals
"Emperor Penguin Love" (watercolor, 8" x 6")
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Changing gears, we painted animals this week. What fun it was! Several painted their dogs; many others painted colorful birds. It all comes down to this: paint what you know well and hold dear. And it showed. I am definitely keeping the subject of animals as part of my curriculum.

Week 6: Flowers
"Red, White and Blue" (watercolor, 7.5" x 10.5")
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One more week to go. Next week we will be painting flowers. We actually took a vote on this; between flowers, portraits, buildings, flowers won. But I let the class know they can paint whatever they choose for the final week. It's going to be fun and challenging no matter which!

Week 6: My awesome class intently painting flowers

"Enchanted Harbor" (oil on stretched canvas; 18" x 18") sold

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As my husband is from Minnesota and has lots of relatives there, we often visit Minnesota.  We spent a pleasant day in Grand Marais on Lake Superior in northern Minnesota during one of our visits a few years ago.  It is a picturesque artist community with two harbors and lighthouses.  The reference photo for the painting was backlit and pretty much black and white.  But I loved the composition and wanted to make a painting out of it.

I transformed a bleached-out, afternoon scene into a romantic twilight moment.  I went wild with dots in the water, sky and everywhere.  I hope you like my pointillist style as much as I do!

Collage of My February Paintiings

Collage of My February 2015 Paintings

Another month over, which means the time for another collage.  How do you like the collage of my February 2015 paintings?  My focus of this short month was cityscapes and landscapes.  Which painting is your favorite?

"Bodie Island Lighthouse, Outer Banks" (oil on linen; 12" x 12") sold

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Perhaps the best time to be on the Outer Banks, NC is winter when sunbathers are all gone.  Visit the Bodie Island Lighthouse at dusk.  The luminous peace soaks one's psyche.

"Kilauea Lighthouse on the Cliff" (oil on linen; 14" x 11") sold

 

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The reference photo for "Lighthouse on the Cliff," taken during the second visit

The second visit to Kilauea Lighthouse; Can you see the rainbow?

When I am at my home base, I choose a plein-air painting location from my previous experiences. There are several favorite places, to which I keep going back for better or worse. No big surprises. I know exactly what scenery will greet me when I get there.  However, I have never been to Kauai, so I didn't know what to expect. There has been hardly any snow in this exceptionally warm winter. Kauai was about 20, not 50, degrees warmer than northern Virginia, so the thrill in landing suddenly at a tropical island was somewhat diminished, temperature-wise. Still, the island was breathtakingly beautiful in any angle, altitude, and weather.

The first time when I saw Kilauea Lighthouse on North Shore, I wished I could paint the awe-inspiring sight then and there. But it was raining heavily (do you know that Kauai is one of the wettest places in the world?), which forced us to wait in the car for half an hour until the rain let up a little for picture taking. Later that day, we stopped by at the lighthouse for the second time. The rain had stopped and a rainbow was draped over in the sky! The lighthouse itself glowed as if it was spotlit magically. It was getting late, however. I vowed to return to paint it another day.

Red-footed boobies

On the third and final visit to the lighthouse and Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge on a windy, but sunny day, we saw red-footed boobies, Laysan Albatross and other birds, which nested at the Refuge cliffs. My heart swelled with an unusual, I-am-lord-of-the-world, kind of emotion, as I was standing high at the lookout, looking down at the soaring birds!

"Kilauea Lighthouse, Kauai" (opaque watercolor, 15" x 11")

Sketching the lighthouse

I found a relatively sheltered spot at the lookout and painted "Kilauea Lighthouse, Kauai" in opaque watercolor, clutching the paper in fear of losing it to the Pacific Ocean.  The lighthouse was painted in last over the blues of the ocean.  You can do that in opaque watercolor!  Of course, I wasn't "done" with this place.  "Lighthouse on the Cliff" was painted in the controlled environment of my studio, away from the ocean breeze, crashing waves, and swooshing birds.  One can't have everything, can she?



"Sunset Clouds" (oil on linen; 9" x 12") sold

"Sunset Clouds"
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"Lighthouse at Sunset" (oil; 9" x 12")
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It is a great idea to work in a series.  To get to the bottom of things, so to speak.  Sunset sky is one of my such on-going series.  I am perhaps inspired by my mentor, Sara Linda Poly.  She is my first oil painting teacher, whose luminous skyscapes never fail to take my breath away.  As a veteran plein air painter, she paints on location these "golden moments," which don't last very long.  Half an hour, tops, if you are lucky. 

Sara draws the landscape parts--trees and so on--on a toned ground first and waits for the sunset to work its glorious, spectacular magic.  It is, of course, hard to paint looking at the sun in rapidly fading light, and I don't know how she does it so well.  As a newbie to plein air painting, I prefer to paint these sunset scenes in my studio.  "Sunset Clouds" and "Lighthouse at Sunset" are my two latest attempts at sunset sky.  I am pleased with them, for now.

"Drum Point Lighthouse" (oil on linen, 10" x 8") sold

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Hi, I am back.  Having lived in this country for 27 years, last week I took a solemn oath to become a citizen.  The event called for a major celebration, so I took a weekend plein-air workshop with Bobbi Pratte in  Solomons Island, MD, about 90 minutes of driving from where I live.  This was my first out-of-town workshop.

The weather forecast was grim.  The teacher emailed us about the rain jacket, umbrella, duck tape, etc.  Why duck tape?  To strap the umbrella onto the easel since not everybody has a plein-air umbrella.  It rained all week, but the sky began to clear by Friday.  By Saturday it was the most glorious late spring weather one could hope for in the mid-Atlantic region!

We stayed at Comfort Inn that owns a marina and also happens to be right next door to the Calvert Marine Museum, home to the picturesque Drum Point Lighthouse.  My memory isn't what it used to be; Solomons Island sounds so exotic that I didn't know I've been to the place many years ago until I saw the famous lighthouse.  Many artists had painted this iconic regional landmark.  Now I got to try my hand.  For next few days, I will share more of my paintings from the workshop.  Stay tuned.