Artichoke Study

"Artichoke Study"

Image size 6" diameter

Acrylic

I love these round, handmade watercolor papers.  I attached a piece of rice paper using matte medium to it to give an interesting texture and seal the paper.  I painted it using thinned acrylics.

For the past 12 years, I've posted a painting each week and I've decided that I'm taking a break.  The original reason I started doing it was to make myself paint more often.  Lately, finishing a painting each week has become more of a chore than a joy.  I would rather be working on projects at my house than having a deadline for a painting right now.  I haven't really been happy with most of my paintings lately so I've decided to paint when I'm inspired and not have any deadlines.  I guess I'm getting lazy as I'm getting older.....

Falling Blues

"Falling Blues"

Image size 13" x 19"

Acrylic

I found this wonderful handmade paper that has a very textured surface in my pile of watercolor paper.  It didn't have any sizing in it so I sealed it with Matte Medium before painting.  I think you can see the texture of the paper in this photo.  The paints found their own direction to move on the paper and because I sealed the paper, I was able to get some good darks.

Fiery Sunset

"Fiery Sunset"

Image size 9" x 12"

Encaustic

I was playing around with encaustics again this week.  I'm not a fan of orange, but with the purple/pink mixed in I think it gives a nice effect.

Sky High Palm

"Sky High Palm"

Image size 22" x 22"

Watercolor

First, let me say that the border on this is not crooked as it shows in this photo.  The paper is warped and I couldn't get a good picture of it.  I'll flatten it tomorrow and post a new photo.

This is a poured painting that was a problem from the beginning.  I used a piece of 300# paper which, in hindsight, wasn't a good choice.  Too much of the paint is absorbed into the paper which makes it harder to get darker values.  On top of that, this paper has lost its sizing which was not immediately noticeable, but that made it even harder to get the darker values.  My final layer was the border and I got that dark value by using paint that was not diluted very much at all.  

It really doesn't even look very much like a poured painting to me so it was a lot of wasted extra effort.  Oh well, I'll try again with a different paper and see what happens.

Water

"Water"

Image size 3.75" x 6.5"

Encaustic, watercolor and alcohol inks

I had this small piece of paper that was cut from a finished watercolor painting.  I loved the colors in it and couldn't bring myself to throw it away so I covered it with encaustic clear medium, added alcohol inks, and more wax.   It was a good experiment.