Painting as Meditation

I'm getting ready to move, and my house has been full of craziness. To rest my brain from this stress, I've been burying myself in painting.

I'm still painting some bluebonnets. So let me clear the air about a myth...There is a myth that it is illegal to pick bluebonnets, but it is just a myth. Don't believe me, see here. DPS says it is legal, as long as you don't pick so many that it is defacing public property and that you don't trespass onto private property. So, I consider my 4 bluebonnets okay. (P.S. They last a long time. 1 week later, and they are still happy in the pot. They just slowly leach the blue out. Now they are a pale sky blue.)

They look quite dark for bluebonnets, but I painted these from real life, and when I squint down, these are the colors I see. (The picture washes out the lighter portions too much for good balance.)

Also, I worked on a large size ocean abstract that is very calming for me to paint. And I started some more ballerinas. (These are unfinished, but you get the idea.)

This last one is the one I am most proud of how it came out. Painted it from a picture on the Internet, but modified it a bit. (I prefer not facing people, so I keep a look out for backs of people.)

Light in the Dark--Value

This week, I worked on a portrait of my son. I took the reference photo with my iPhone, but it took it when it was dark with just the table lamp shining on his face. It obscured most of his face and left fun shadows to play with.

I've really got to do my research on taking better photos of art! But anyway, this piece is a good example of value changes and contrast creating excitement.

Part of me really wanted to define more facial features on the left, but it was so dark that they weren't really apparent. I think it gives it some appearance of mystery.

Now, a problem I did run across is that I worked with a lot of glazes. I also didn't use white in the darker areas of the painting. This meant that most of the colors were very transparent, leaving the work streaker than I wanted. To correct this, I spent some time an arms length away using a long brush to add touches of thick, opaque color. I even had to borrow some better art supplies from my teacher because my student-grade (I'm only buying professional grade as I run out) burnt sienna and burnt umber were too transparent.