Painting Process Continued

 So I am close to done on this painting process.  I like to leave it sit for awhile and re-think things before finally signing it if I am finished.

This was almost finished but it seemed a little washed out to me. So I proceeded to paint the sky a much deeper blue around some clouds.  Things I am still considering - is that lake snow a tad too yellow and does the close by snow need some more work.  Sometimes I just need to ignore it totally for a week or two before I have fresh eyes and decide if it is okay.  Time will tell

Painting Process

How I sometime tackle a painting, some beginning steps.

First you must go on some kind of outing or adventure and snap a ton of pictures.  This was a super day we spent cross country skiing near Fernie, BC

Decide on a picture and do some ROUGH sketches to help determine what is relevant to paint

I like a vivid acrylic underpainting that will show here and there with some pops of colour later

 and warm up the painting a bit - especially in these snow scenes

I use some black gesso to establish some of the darkest dark areas - it will mostly get painted over.  You can't really see it but I did a transparent red earth glaze of oil paint over the large tree area to add warmth to the trees later too.  I begin laying in the sky first, then randomly start working all over.

This is as far as I got this week.  I will let the painting dry before I tackle the closer trees, as they have that red glaze I don't want mixing in and making muddy later.  

Now I hope that it will continue to work out and sometimes I lose courage and don't want to go farther cause I haven't done anything I do not like yet.  I always fear it could go south on me, but if I plan properly, mix my paints out first and not rush it, it tends to work okay!  I WILL post the results when it is finished. Fingers crossed.

 

Start to finish

A little blurb on the painting progression for 'The Royal', 20 x 20" oil on canvas.

My photo reference I took, with the hubster, child and dog baby in foreground.  I saturated the colours in my photo editing as much as possible

Toned the canvas with orange acrylic wash

Gridded the canvas and started my drawing (long process!)

Laid in the large areas of sky and mountains - boosted the size of the mountain

Changing a few things along the way - eventually I got rid of the high power lines and the mural as they were distracting my eye  too much

Nearing the finish.  In the completed version I got rid of most of the cars, the mura,l a few power poles, added some power lines where I liked them.

Completed Series

Well this is the second painting of the old blue truck, entitled 'Out to Pasture'.  I enjoyed trying to get the rust and I really liked the bright purple peeking through here and there.  I am attempting a quick dry in the sun, so that the painting will not be tacky on Saturday for the Strathearn Art Walk.  It is the second largest art fair in Edmonton, with tons of vendors, music, food trucks, etc.  Hoping the weather holds!

Recent process paintings

I am working on a few paintings inspired by my wandering this summer.  I loved this old truck, sitting out in a field that I have been driving past almost daily.  I finally stopped and took a pile of photos.  I did several sketches from my photos and decided on 2 ‘poses’ that I liked.  Then I gridded it up onto a 12 x 12 canvas and began the painting.  I have a second pose on the go as well, and will try to post it soon. The photos are out of order and not complete as I am posting with my iPad, which seems to be glitchy.  Check out my Instagram post @tessastanleyart to see the proper process.

Step1 get some ideas

After a small sketch - grid up and draw on canvas

Add caption

First Artist Demo

Yesterday was my first ever artist demo at The Fernie Arts Station. Being a beautiful Saturday afternoon I was not surprised that the audience was small, but that was probably a good thing as I wasn’t nervous and they were nice with no heckling!  I was surprised how quickly the 2 hours went by, initially thinking I would wrap it up early, but did not.

What worked well:
I did the demo in a similar fashion to the baking shows.  I had 3 canvases of the same size. One was just a gessoed and toned ‘blank’, the second had a completed under painting and the third was the fully finished version.

I started with my blank toned canvas and described how I prepped the canvas. Then I showed my sketchbook and talked about my drawings and studies for prepping and planning
I began the drawing on the canvas with diluted oils and got half way done, then asked if they had enough and wanted me to move on to painting.  UNANIMOUS yes.

  Hmmm... it was a good time to throw in a joke - why did Van Gogh become a painter? Because He didn’t have an ear for music. GROANS. Moving on.

Started the darks and shadows first with thinned oil paint.  Then mixed up sky colour, then lightest grass colour and covered the largest areas first. Then tackled the house and soon enough time was up.There were of course questions throughout which I hope I answered without babbling too much.  I think I would sometimes go off on tangents but hope they got their questions answered.  I showed the completed version earlier on in response to a question.

I think I would be good to go if I ever had to do another demo someday.  The pre-planned and finished painting steps worked well for me, as there were no surprises.  I do like to plan ahead!

All in all a positive experience for me, hope it was okay for the audience.  It would be worthwhile having someone video the talk so I could cringe and watch it all later to see what was working best. Many thanks to Jackie at the Arts Station and the women that attended!

Fernie Arts Station
 
Photo courtesy of Jackie from the Arts Station

Biking and blogging

Summer usually means a slow down in my art creation. I am off work and more time is spent ‘Momming’, visiting, gardening and holidaying.  This summer I have been able to do a lot more mountain biking, now that I am in actual mountains every day.  It’s been great for the cardio and the soul.  So of course that has led me to my recent bike painting theme.  Occasionally I will get on a tangent and paint several paintings on one idea ( see cheeky prime ministers https://tessastanley.blogspot.com/2017/04/oil-and-acrylic-dont-mix-you-hoser.html ) I know that many artist spend months or years on a theme, painting just trains or flowers or abstract fruits.  I find I need to switch fairly regularly to maintain my interest.  

 So this is a view from one of the bike trails last week. Fabulous! Below  are some of my bike paintings and progress paintings.

Solo Show - Fernie Arts Station

Well... it is one week away from my first solo art show at The Fernie Arts Station in beautiful Fernie, BC.  Thursday, June 27, 2019 from 7 until 9 pm is the opening.  The show runs until July 23rd, 2019.

I am fluctuating between excited and worried - primarily I wonder about everything I painted and how it will look - will people like it or not !! I have been in group shows, but those are always much less intimidating when you are with a crowd.

If you are driving through the Crowsnest Pass this summer stop in Fernie, BC and check it out.

Finished!

I had entered this into the Federation of Canadian Artists Postcard Competition a couple of weeks ago.  Was pleased to know that it was juried into the final judging - final winners are going to be chosen May 1st. Crossing fingers.

36x18" oil on canvas
Spring Thaw

Finally, I have completed my painting of Fernie, BC main street.  This has taken a lot of time and effort, but I am fairly pleased with the result.  It will be one of the pieces in my solo show at the Fernie Arts Station in July 2019.  Check it out in person then.

The Upside of Painting

My most recent effort is a largish painting of my favourite town, Fernie BC.  After some repeated attempts to paint in a more loose, impressionist fashion and having little success, I decided to try something challenging on the opposite end of the scale.  I have been plugging away at this for over a week now.  I was finding it difficult to paint the detail in the close up store windows, so I used the old trick of turning my picture and painting upside down so that I would just see shapes and paint what I saw not what I thought I was seeing. The upside of upside down painting is that it really helps!

Chugging Away

I am trying to paint almost daily right now, as my part-time teaching job is quiet until November.  Then it is almost back to full-time teaching and less time for painting.  I have put the finishing touches on the two paintings below.  The top, Bagel Shop, is part of my show in Fernie next year.  The bottom is one for my niece of her beloved cat.  Fun to mix it up a bit.

Bagel Shop - Oil on Canvas 12x12

Oil on Board - Myles

Exciting News!

I am really busy lately, it is 1:00 am and I am currently prepping for an outdoor art fair that happens tomorrow.  September has to be my most hectic time, but also very enjoyable.

Summer was really great, spent a LOT of time outdoors, hiking, biking, etc with family and friends.  Some close friends of mine reminded me of a painting I gave them a few years back that I had not signed.  As this painting was done while I was in a workshop with Brian Atyeo around 2011, I can't really say it was my work. Brian helped make it more interesting, slapped some bits of colour and shapes in there for me, so it is more collaboration than anything.

 Onto the exciting news.  I got a pleasant surprise last week when I found out I received the Harry Wohlfarth Award and had been nominated by one of my art instructors, Izabella Orzelski, for academic excellence.  Yeeha!  Then today I found out that my application to The Arts Station Gallery in Fernie had been accepted and I will have a solo show in July 2019! Better get painting!

Road Trip Inspiration

I had the opportunity to do a very short road trip with one of my sons, as he was off school this week.  We had 3 days and drove to Fernie, BC.  We snapped photos enroute - me for inspiration and painting material and my son, just because he is a talented, aspiring photographer.

Fernie, BC

I saw this fabulously coloured camper van in the parking lot in Black Diamond? I think it was.  I decided to do a warm up painting this morning with it.  It was a tad more technical than what I imagined - so I spent more time than I wanted to on it.  However I think it is worth saving to do a future painting from, with more thought about the background.