Creating Dragon’s Eye

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adam allingham, art help, artist, artwork, cracked glass and watercolor, creating art, creating Dragon's Eye, creative art, dragon, Dragon's Eye, experiments in art, fine art, how to paint in watercolor, imagination, Patricia Allingham Carlson, textures, watercolor, watercolor painting

I am reposting Dragon’s Eye for the New Year.

An accident in the studio- a piece of safety glass was cracked; it remained attached in a single piece. As we discussed its disposal, my husband thought to slide a piece of watercolor paper under it and drip liquid watercolor through the cracks… hmmm. We did it!

Well, I let it dry for a week, then slid the broken sheet of glass off and threw that out. A richly textured stained paper was left. It had texture on texture, really impressive! I scraped off as much splintered glass as I could, then studied the thing. I had no idea what to do with it and set it aside.

It remained so for 3 years. Every so often I would pull it out and look at it, but it remained silent, and waiting. Then I saw what it would be. The texture was very reptilian and I decided on a dragon. I researched close up photos of reptiles eyes. I drew in the eye of a dragon.

This became an obsessive piece for me; I bought a dragon wall gargoyle, I listened to music that pictured dragons for me, I painted and had much fun!

I started work with the eye itself. I used watercolor ink full strength to cover the eye area completely. I have always loved painting and drawing eyes of all kinds, and this part was a easy to complete.

Close up of the eye.

In order to include the proper dragon anatomy- my vision of it anyway, I added paper surrounds to complete the whole head as a sketch. Looked right to me-

Done- Dragon’s Eye

20 x 15 inches

watercolor

Relaxing against a warm mountainside; you suddenly turn as the Dragon’s eye opens!

The original is available, as is a print at http://fineartamerica.com/featured/dragons-eye-patricia-allingham-carlson.html

The music I listened to as I painted and dreamed was Demon outside: Run, battle., by Adam Allingham- a gifted music composer.

Check out Adam’s work and songs at https://www.facebook.com/pages/Adam-Allingham/174774089223111?id=174774089223111&sk=app_178091127385(soundcloud)

His facebook page at  https://www.facebook.com/pages/Adam-Allingham/174774089223111

Visit my facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Art-of-Patrcia-Allingham-Carlson/151439547637?ref=hl

Happiest New Year to all!

Art Experiments with Watercolor and Sand.

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Looking Up

Sometimes I am brimming with ideas for artworks I want to paint. Often I am not. In our busy lives we don’t even have the time to create, express the ideas swimming around in our heads when we have them; how frustrating to have the time to create and no ideas to work with!

On such days I just haul out a variety of materials and experiment.

On this day I decided to try sand, water and paint. I don’t know where that idea came from, but I enjoy creating new textures to paint on, and wondered what these materials could do.

 

 

 

 

 

Outside I dumped sand onto paper, wet it, drew in it with my finger, then dropped concentrated watercolor paint onto it. Then I let it dry, and brushed off the sand.

(By the way, I kept the colored sand for another future experiment!)

That was really fun!

 

Here is what one of the dried works looked like- truly unique textures had been created. but it didn’t bring any inspiration for what to paint it into. It sat for months in my studio. I would periodically turn it in different directions, waiting for it to “tell me” what it wanted to be. One day it did.

The face I saw in the unfinished work was in an odd pose, not one I would have chosen myself. It was hard to get it right and make it look attractive; the view up someone’s nose is tricky to pull off! But the textures there for a head dress and hair were intriguing and fun to work with.

I used white ink with a pen to do much of the detailing. It took another rest until I saw what was needed to complete the head dress and veiling, then it came together.

Looking up was completed. She looks hopeful; that is a good way to look and to feel.

I hope your holidays were warm and wonderful. Mine were.

And I wish you a happy and creative New Year to be- Looking up!

 

 

 

Creating Time

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Fairy Wood

I envy artists who have unlimited time to create. It seems my studio time shrinks with each passing week; I must forcefully neglect my self imposed to- do lists and chores in order to grab a bit of precious creating time. So that means the kitchen does not get cleaned, or the rug vacuumed, or I return the library books a day late and pay a fine. Sometimes I am so full of art, I just must do that. Oh well!

I have written before about the frustration of finally grabbing that studio time and finding yourself without any good art ideas. One of my fun activities on such a day involves setting up several prepared papers on boards, hauling out the paint, water and texturing plastics and papers and playing with art.

I wet the papers, dab and drip and spatter paint onto the surfaces, then press plastics, paper towels, leaves, whatever into the wet paint. Then I leave them to dry. At least I got to play with color and paint, try out some new texturing ideas, create something.

Next day the works will be dry, and I look at the papers from across the room, trying to see or imagine what I can turn them into. It would be pretty cool to snap my fingers and Shazam!  Fine art! No, I mean to paint into the forms or scenes that could be, develop them into something interesting.

I begin by taking the work I see promise in, and sketching in the scene. If the paint is dark I use a whiter conte crayon- or white pastel, which is easily erased.

Sometimes I can “see” a landscape, sometimes a person, animal, dreamscape… sometimes I must use one of my reference photos.

Here I saw a waterfall , rocks and trees, mist rising through a forest. I painted in the trees, defined the rocks for the fall to descend, used the textures as water and foliage.

Next I refined the details further, painting in darker ares, cracks in the rocks. At this point of painting, the hours fly by( the housework undone, lol) and my studio time is a joy.

And when it feels complete, I rise, stiff muscled, sometimes stretch and go outside to re-coop. Then I come back to the work and smile and feel great!

Then I start cooking dinner!

Does this routine sound like you, my artist friends?

I hope I have given you some ideas to try, I wish you lots of studio time this week, and much creative joy from it.

Do You Feel Like I Do?

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As I wrote in my blog last week exploring emotions through your art ca be helpful and even necessary.

As human beings we all feel emotions. These can be simple or quite complicated. Throughout time we have used many outlets to express these emotions, with the knowledge that we feel better after expression.
We laugh, we cry, we rage, we glow…

Creating art to “get it out” or explore our turbulent emotions can provide catharsis for you ; if you have painted it in a way that allows your feelings to reach and touch others, catharsis for them as well.

Yearning

Yearning for more than you can reach on your own, desiring with all your heart for assistance, your Higher Power, a fervent wish, a prayer for help for yourself, your friend, the world is a universal emotion. A chance pattern made by random on painted paper brought this supplicant to my painting; a human form stretching to the heavens was suggested by marks and I painted him in. To get his body correct I asked family members to pose for me, and took reference photos so they wouldn’t get tired from all that stretching. I first used diluted white tempera paint to block in his form, then added watercolor to detail.

Aspire

Aspire- I can do this. The feeling of self certainty necessary to do what you dream of, really, really need to do. Again, looking upward but this time also inward; you do have what it takes, but must draw hard and deep to pull it out to make it happen. To help yourself, your cause, achieve your dream. This painting was done with a fast gesture drawing in black crayon, then painted with watercolor.

Depression

I think most of us have felt despair, it is an unfortunate condition of living. Loss, fear, illness, worry, failure are sadly universal occurrences in life, and when we feel helpless to affect these conditions depression can be overwhelming. I painted this young man to express my own helplessness as I watched a friend deal with depression, to try paint out some of the pain. I involved him in the process by asking him to pose for me, sitting pressed up against a glass window to created pressure points I could paint. This was an experiment for me in textural painting, and it helped me to vent my own feelings. The friend did recover.

Compassion

Compassion is a beautiful and kind emotion we are gifted with. It causes us to act to help our fellow creatures on earth, to feel empathy for their suffering. It is an emotion that can create peace, provide comfort and love. For this painting I was intrigued by an expression on the model’s face, the angle of the head. As I began to paint though, the strength and longing in the face began to surface, the compassion in the eyes to emerge. The person began to feel angelic, full of empathy and kindness to me, and became a Guardian.

Hope

Hope is a paradox of a feeling; fragile as a flower, strong as a willow tree. As winds of change and chaos blow upon our lives, hope allows us to go on, to believe that better times are coming. I painted this, Colors of Hope, to show this feeling of ours. I started with a powdered pigment base ( see previous blog of mine, #16, Feb 20th ) then added watercolor paint to wrap the woman in a cloak of pattern and color, colors of hope to help her prayer.

Interesting to me as I write today, I examine my feelings as I painted each one of these works- I relive how I felt while painting them and feel what I felt. The people in them became very real to me as I worked, almost separate entities from me, my brushes and the paper they were on. Seems to me that I learned some things by creating them, felt what was needed to feel, and maybe, hopefully, showed them to viewers in a way they could feel and relate to in their own lives.

Emotions- the colors, patterns and tides within us all.

The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web.

Pablo Picasso

Next week- one more art and emotions entry.

 

Powdered Graphite and … Watercolor

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Reflections on Alone.
Reflections on Alone: Up before the dawn, the sky was black,streaming rain and mist, driving
tired, dark and cold .Only the bright lights from a convenience store showed the woman in the road, alone. Detached, separate and resigned.
12″ x 16″

So the vision was in my head, based on a surreal early morning experience while driving through a dark rainy early morning. My errand was stressful and I almost struck a woman who was walking near the middle of the street.

This experience was so disturbing that it needed an expression through art to release it. The next day I drove back to the spot and took several reference photos.

Looking at plain white paper can be inhibiting to the creative process. I have used many methods to mark up the paper, making it a flawed surface that seems to free me to paint more intuitively. Plain white paper can make me paint stiffly, afraid to wreck the clean austerity ; marked up paper invites me to play.

Adding a powdered graphite base to the paper can open up texture, depth and a while new approach to watercolor painting.

Starting with a sketch on watercolor paper, but you do not need any sketch; you may just rely on chance and patterns.

water, brush, container of powdered graphite. I think the graphite is used to stop squeaky doors.

I wet the paper with water anywhere I do not want the graphite to stick- that is where I want white paper. I get it real wet, not damp.

I sprinkle the graphite over the wet paper,

then take it right outside- messy part.
I have a container of water already out there. You could also use a hose. Don’t let it sit around long at this point or it won’t wash off right.
I pour the water over the paper, washing off the excess. How you pour it makes different patterns.

So this is the created underpainting.
Wherever the paper was wet you now see the white.
I find this an exciting way to start a painting, the intimidating blank paper is gone, you can now paint anything you want.

When the paper is dry I begin to paint in my idea with watercolor paint. I begin with the background, allowing the unique patterns formed by the graphite to guide my painting. The paint will show most brightly on the preserved white paper.

Reflections on Alone. Add to the image with a song by Adam Allingham, a talented composer friend click on the link:https://soundcloud.com/adam-allingham/rain-like-heartbreak

I often use my art as a catharsis for deeply felt events in my life. As you look back at your own created artwork, do you see the love, awe, pain, fear, and hope you have experienced? Is it hidden in symbolism or color use or spelled out as an illustration?

As I paint my feelings and events I process them, relive them and gain a deeper understanding of what they meant to me.

How about you?

Your comments are welcome- and I hope you have a happy day.

My services as an art teacher/adviser are available at this link:https://theartofpatriciaallinghamcarlson.wordpress.com/online-

art-teacher/

Art instruction tips and ideas, portfolio review, an on-line art instructor.

 

Recycling Art

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Pink- all I could first see of this left behind painting. My adult student Cindy had tried her hand at my “blur” approach, working wet on wet with watercolors and adding salt to the wet paint for texture. She saw no merit in the work for her, and invited me to create on it. Two points here-

First, the color… I have always disliked the color pink! This aversion goes back to my childhood. Upon discovering that a little girl was not allowed to marry her beloved and admired father, I decided to become a “tom boy” to be more like him. I Loved to dig in the dirt with him, play with caterpillars and find worms, and tagged along on his hikes outdoors, absorbing nature lure from the=is wise man. My Dad’s favorite color was blue- so guess what mine was? And all knew that pink was the opposite, and it was for Girls!

My dislike of pink stayed with me, as I grew up and learned about stereotyping of boys and girls, social pressures to conform to these stereotypes, and those who worked for equality between the sexes.

Now, for the reason to recycle a painting; I was a frugal artist! As I studied art at my university I had to be very careful with these expensive art materials. I learned to re- use squeezed out watercolor paints, paint on the back of old paintings, do all I could to get the most out of my supplies. Later I learned how to tear up old paintings for collages, and finally to re- paint over old watercolor paintings. A light and transparent image could easily be covered over with darker and more brilliant colors. A darker painting could be covered over with some gesso thinned with water or black ink. Textures could be pressed into wet paint creating random images. I fell in love with the textures and pictures that appeared by random, and found a whole new approach to painting through my frugality!

So one day as I was between paintings I took this pink and green painting and added more color to it after wetting it. Though I personally disliked the colors I thought why not- what do I have to lose?  I pressed the wet paint with plastic wrap to texture it.

To my eyes it was more interesting, but no composition suggested itself to me. So I wet it again and added some black ink in some areas. Again, I pressed plastic into the wet paint.

When dry it looked like this, and now I saw a landscape! I sketched the landscape in with white conte crayon; this allows me to see the lines on the dark areas, and to erase if it’s wrong. After the sketch I first began the development with white opaque ink.

White ink is a wonderful medium to work with in this type of approach; it can be applied opaque to cover or diluted with water to appear transparent. I marked in shoreline and trees where I saw them occurring, and added more color where needed.

The finished painting had color undertones that I would not have chosen myself. Through re-using another artist’s discarded work I created a watercolor where I discovered that I actually liked the color pink! Not that I would chose it for my clothing or home decorating,but it certainly is a lovely color in art and in nature! Pink seems to add the ethereal, the gentle edge of the rainbow I imagine to exist in Faerie-

I have continued to use the color pink since this painting, And I continue to recycle artwork!

Fairy Woods
watercolor on paper
11 x 14.5 inches
original available and print

Hope you get to have a creative day .