I thoroughly enjoyed having Thane's cousin, Bruce, and two of his sons here for a visit all this last week, but I have to admit it's good to have my house back to myself so I can get on with things that need to be got to. Happily, many of those things are fun!
One project I've been putting off involves playing with paint. I signed up a few weeks ago for an on-line acrylic painting class called Get Your Paint On - Beyond the Basics. It's taught by Lisa Congdon and Mati McDonough as a series of five lessons over five weeks. The class interacts, shares progress, and asks questions through a blog, Facebook, and Flickr. The first week my task was to gather inspiration for 2 - 3 large paintings. I already had a couple of ideas, so I mostly gathered pop art flower images to use as reference material. You can see the Pinterest board I created here. I just love all the bright colors and bold graphics.
This past week I was supposed to be putting the first undercoat of paint on my canvases. However, with a houseful of testosterone, I decided I'd just wait until life returned to normal, as normal as that is. Yesterday, I finally pulled my paints out and started playing.
One of the paintings I have planned will be of a fern frond - lots of greens layered on greens. I needed to know what sorts of greens I could create with the paint colors I have. Rowan, of course, had to play, too - here's our mess on the kitchen table (yes, I have a perfectly good studio - what's your point?).
I wised up eventually and made myself a cheat sheet of greens so that I could see what color combinatins would make which greens. Not only will this be a great memory aid for colors, but more importantly, it will tell me which combinations give me warm greens and cool greens. I'll need to use many of these in the fern painting, but the cools and warms will have their distinct locations.
Once I'd had enough of creating greens, I decided I'd probably better get some photos of ferns so that I'd have images to work with. Given that it's pouring rain today, I'm glad I got out yesterday with my camera. There were plenty of subjects to choose from - our yard's totally overgrown. (Bruce actually had the audacity to call our lawn a meadow. I mean, really.) I don't know if you've ever taken the time to look at fern fronds, but they really are quite beautiful. I won't bore you with all of my photos, but here's a couple for your inspiration. I find it fascinating the internal fractal design they have - each piece of the frond is a smaller replication of the larger whole.
Now comes the hard part: actually putting paint on canvas. That somehow seems such an irrevocable action. I shall be brave, however, and wield my paintbrush with impunity! Wish me luck.
