Laguna Beach Encaustic

Laguna Beach Encaustic

Image Size 5" x 7"

Encaustic

Well, I completely forgot that today is Monday until 7:20 PM.  That's how crazy things have been around here.  Fortunately, I had painted this one last week so I'm not missing my self imposed Monday deadline although I'm probably posting it too late for those of you that subscribe to my e-mail delivery to get it today so it will come on Tuesday to you - but it was finished today.  : )

Not that any of you probably care about it but I would have been really mad at myself if I had the painting finished and just forgot to post it.  After all, I've been posting a painting a week since 2008 and haven't missed a week, no matter what's going on in my life, so I don't want to miss one now!

I admit, it's not much of a painting, but it's done and as with all of my paintings, it was a learning experience.  I've done this scene so many times but never in encaustic so it was fun to see how different this looks from the other mediums that I've used in the past.

Peter's Canyon Encaustic

Peter's Canyon Encaustic

Image Size 7" x 5"

Encaustic

I combined encaustic with a little oil paint for this painting.  I have a lot to learn about this medium but am enjoying my experimentation with it.  I'm not crazy about the shape of this tree so I will probably try to change that tomorrow but for now, it's finished.  

I'm having problems with getting little pin holes in the wax.  Even if I get rid of them when I fuse the first layer, they seem to appear as I add and fuse more wax.  If anyone out there knows what is causing this, I would love to learn from you.  I am using encaustic gesso to prime my boards.  Maybe that is too porous and is causing the problem.  I think I will try an encaustic with no gesso and see what happens.

Pear Family

Pear Family

Image Size 12" x 6"

Watercolor

I painted this on a saturated piece of paper.  It's fun to try to control the combination of water to paint when painting this way.  It's important to add less water and more paint as the paper begins to dry.  I put the paper on a piece of plexiglass while I was painting so the paper stayed super wet for a long time.  It's a challenge to keep adding paint without getting blooms from having too much water in the brush.  I've got a long way to go before I'll feel like I'm in control when painting this way.

When I wet this paper, I could tell that the sizing was gone.  The paper becomes translucent when wet if there is no sizing.  I didn't care about the lack of sizing because when the paper is saturated, it doesn't seem to matter if it's gone.  I like the fuzzy, ethereal look that this painting has because of the combination of wet paper and lack of sizing.

Little Plumeria Study

Little Plumeria Study

Image Size 3.5" x 6"

Watercolor on TerraSkin

It seems like forever since I've painted with watercolor and I've really missed it.  This is a small study on TerraSkin, which I haven't used for a long time either.  I had forgotten how much fun this surface is to paint of and definitely need to use TerraSkin more often.  It's challenging to layer color without lifting the under layers but that is part of the fun!

Encaustic Magnolia

Encaustic Magnolia

Image Size 5" x 7"

Encaustic

I painted this from a photo of the magnolia tree in our yard.  It was a close-up of one of the upper branches and it was vertical like this.  As I look at this finished painting, I think it would have looked more natural if I had placed the branch at a bit of an angle.  Also, the branch for the bud became much thicker as I was fusing.  It's just a small study so I'm using this as a learning experience.  As always, encaustic is a lot of fun and a great challenge.

Koi Pond

Koi Pond

Image size 11" x 14"

Oil

I started this a couple of months ago and finished it this week.  I really love painting koi.  I think this is the first time I've painted them in oil.  I'm getting more comfortable painting with oils although I still love painting in watercolor better.

Lake Powell in Oil

Lake Powell in Oil

Image Size 12" x 12"

Oil

Here's another Lake Powell painting.  I just can't seem to stop painting this beautiful spot.  This one's in oil on a gallery wrapped canvas with the sides painted so no frame is necessary.  I really like that look.

Tornado Warning

Tornado Warning

Image Size 8" x 8"

Encaustic

        Being a California native and never having been anywhere near a tornado, I have no idea what the sky would look like before one hits.  Of course, I'm pretty sure the sky isn't this colorful but that's artistic license for you.   

Encaustics need to be applied to a surface that is porous.  I have a lot of 8" x 8" bisque tiles (unglazed) that I thought would be perfect as a support because they are certainly porous.  It was weird to work on this surface because for some reason, the wax in the middle would not move when heated and only the wax on the outside edges maintained its thickness.  The wax in the middle seemed to sink completely into the tile which is why it refused to move.  I continued to add a lot of wax and finally got it to do what I wanted.  I may try working on these tiles again (because I have so many) now that I know that working on them is a bit different.  I really like the end result and that's what's important, right?

Eze

Eze

Image Size 10" x 14"

Watercolor

Eze is a medieval town in France that just oozes charm.  It sits high on a cliff and overlooks the Mediterranean sea.  The oldest building there was built in the 1300s.  The narrow walkways between the buildings wind through the small town and up to a cactus/succulent garden that has a great panoramic view of the tile rooftops and distant sea.

This was a study that I started many years ago for a larger painting. I don't typically do studies before painting a large painting so this was unusual.  The large painting has been done for a long time but I never finished this study.  As I'm cleaning up and trying to become organized, I decided that I had to either finish this or throw it away.  Of course, you know that I have a very hard time throwing things away so I finished it.  It's not a masterpiece but it's done and that's good enough for me for this one.

Dreamscape

Dreamscape

Image Size 14" x 11"

Encaustic

One of the things that I love about painting with wax is the dreamy feeling that can be achieved by melting the pigments.  This started out as an abstract but as I worked on it, I began to see a hill with trees on a foggy morning.  I am really happy this one!

White encaustic pigment is one of my favorite colors to work with because it is totally opaque and tends to break apart in a unique way when heated.  I think you can probably see the difference in the white around the edges (the white of the ground support) and the white in the middle of the painting which is the white encaustic.