Decorative Nest - workshop. Day 18

Decorative Nest

15x11" gouache on paper

NFS

Day 2

Susan Hanssen 

Workshop.

Goal

 Paint something in a way we would 

never paint it. Reach outside our 

comfort zone.

Susan's example was an abstracted chicken 

with a blue top-not instead of red! 

If you think of the very organic way I 

painted the nest and feather just a 

couple of days ago then you know

how much I pushed myself out 

of my comfort zone with this one.

Polka dotted eggs and bright colored 

branches/twigs - plus a border!!!

Step one was to mark up the paper 

in a random way with dark watercolor.

Those marks can be clearly seen behind the nest.

2. Draw the subject with watercolor crayon..

3. use transparent washes.

4. Finish with gouache. 

5.Touch up with watercolor crayons.

The border happened quite naturally

to stop the very bright nest from

appearing to float.

Decorative art can be fun and relaxing

and I quite enjoyed painting this. 

Here is a wonderful sheep Susan did.

The patterns are painted the same

 as from the collage study..

See more listed under sheep on her website

HERE

I was asked why I was taking a watercolor 

workshop from two artists who work

so differently to me. 

Simply this... when the opportunity comes 

along to have the opportunity to learn from two

artists of Nancy Frost Began

and Susan Hanssen's

incredible talent and teaching skills...

any artist should jump at the chance.

17 of us are very glad we did!

It was AMAZING! It was BRILLIANT!

I am exhausted.

Feather - Water-Media Workshop. Day 16

Feather and Nest
17"x13" water- media on paper
NFS

Artist Note

Another creative day.

I had a blast.

So many amazing artists are in the group 

 I can't help but be inspired 

by what they do, but the ooh and ahh moments
happened when
Nancy Frost Begin
worked on a painting to demo the
way we would be working.
I could have sat and watched her paint
all day long.
No such luck...She was very aware of
wanting her students to have time to paint.

This was another method where we painted 

on top of an old painting. No coating of acrylic
matt medium this time.
(I goofed and called it varnish yesterday.)
With this one

 white tempera paint was applied 

over the painting in different ways

and left to dry. Next, black (permanent) ink

was put on rather intuitively. 

Special instructions were given

 on the next step

of hosing the tempera off.

We did that yesterday.
See below

The resulting imagery

"spoke to me" and I saw 

the direction I wanted to go.
The underlying marks
provide some wonderful natural effects
one cannot create any other way.
I really like this painting.

What a creative and stimulating

two days they have been.
Thank you, Brilliant Nancy!

The next two days are with

Susan Hanssen.

She is fabulous painter.
I am looking forward to another
completely different approach.

See her work HERE

Spider Mum - Watercolor Workshop. Day 15

Spider Mum

13x17in 

mixed water-media on rag paper.

Different for me I know.

This is a workshop painting and is still 

not finished. I may have to do some tweaking 

after I have time to look at it.

Artist Note.

It was an exciting and very busy day.

The instructors are

two award winning sisters

who have a mission to free

artists from the constrains of 

the traditional, and introduce

new methods to achieve 

creative fulfillment.

Their motto is 

COURAGE LOOKS GOOD!

Today, the first of two days out of four,

were with

Nancy Frost Begin

(Click her link at bottom)

The painting above was worked on top 

of an old painting which we had varnished.

I went freely into it with

great inspiration after watching Nancy's 

amazing demo using gouache.

She applied it in a certain way and then

 moved some around with various tools

allowing random areas of the original

painting to show through. 

This created beautiful abstract areas. 

My flower would look dorky on a regular

background, but I feel this method

provided some oomph!

Tomorrow we try another exciting method

involving tempera paint and permanent black ink.

Check out Nancy's amazing work 

Nancy Frost Begin