Raidance - 30/30 Challenge 2016

Radiance, Watercolor on Arches #140 Cold Press Paper, 9"h x 12"w, 2016 #14

Sold!

It Takes Two to Tango - Day Twenty-Nine of the 30/30 Challenge

It Takes Two to Tango, 

Watercolor on Arches #140 Cold Press Paper, 11"h x 7"w, 2015 #31

Master Study, Not for Sale

Day Twenty-Nine of the challenge -- never thought I would make the whole challenge again! Yay! It is almost the end!!! This painting is a study of master watercolor artist Jan Kunz, whose work I have admired since I took up watercolor a few years ago. The clean, colorful washes that radiates with light just grabs my heart the first time I saw one of her books. Since I haven't painted many still life setups, I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to experiment with different texture -- glass, silver, wood, etc., before to attempt assembly a grand still life and paint it. So this is my practice for capturing the texture of clear, thick glass. It combines something that I am familiar with and feel comfortable painting -- rose, with something I am feeling a little bit timid about -- glass. I had a lot of fun doing it, and painted it over a few days of this month, whenever the day's painting did not take up too much time and leaves a few hours to spend on other projects. I have discovered that painting glass is not unlike assembling a big piece of puzzle -- I have lost numerous times over the different patterns of reflection and refraction painting the ball jar, and it is just one simple little jar! Clearly I needed more practice on this subject, but it was so much fun. The next step is to assemble a still life of my own similar to this setup and see if I could carried out what I have learned doing this master study into my own painting. Can't wait to do that!

Pink Ladies in Progress, and Thoughts on How to Use Reference Materials

Pink Ladies, Watercolor on Arches #140 Cold Press Paper, 8"h x 8"w, WIP 2

I am trying to ignore the fact that I have not posted here (or on my facebook page, or on my Daily Paintworks gallery... =_=b.....) I used to beat myself up for these artistic "dormancy" periods, and feel like I am being lazy and irresponsible to not turn up one painting after another, or worse still -- not even working on any paintings for an extended period of time. When I am in school doing oil paintings, I feel at least there is a reason (or excuse to forgive myself?...) that I am not producing more watercolor paintings, since I am learning something new and not turning out finished products that can be shown to the world (without shame...) is allowed; but doing the breaks between semesters, I often go through these extensive periods feeling so guilty that I am not working more on my watercolor painting, or painting bigger, more substantial works that I've promised myself so many times I would do...

But, guilt aside, I do start to realize (after fighting with myself so many times) that these dormant periods are essential to my growth as an artist. I almost always come out of them learning something new, and paint a little differently. So, this time I am trying to not feel too guilty about it when it happened, and embrace the time I feel needed to study other artists' wonderful works (both on the amazing web and in museums), watch tutorial videos, read instructional books, and most important of all, think about my own approach to each potential projects that comes my way, trying very hard to analyze what is missing in my paintings at this stage of my artistic development.

Gradually it becomes more and more clear: I am too much of a slave of beautiful reference photos -- for the colors used, for the shapes presented, for the myriad amount of information presented in the photograph. The more time I spent setting up a still life/floral, or walk around trying to find that "perfect view" to take my reference photos, and the more photos I take "just in case" none of the ones I took previously turn out to be just "right", the more I seem to be unwilling to let go of it during my painting process. But can one really learn to run without finally casting away the walking stick that he/she has held on so tight for dear life?... Especially as an artist working in the realistic tradition, how much should one be bound by the information (shapes, colors, values, edges, etc.) provided in the reference material and how much artistic liberty can (or should) one take?

Obviously every artist (even the most photo-realistic painters) takes some liberty editing their reference material to create their art -- without this editing painting simply becomes a mechanical "pixel-by-pixel" copying of the reference photo, and cease to become a window into the artist's soul, therefore cannot hold its own. However, not all alterations from a reference material automatically improves the art piece -- nature often provides us with much more interesting shapes and subtle value shifts, for example, than most of us could come up with if we are given a blank piece of paper and no reference to work from. The hardest thing is how to make all the editing actually add onto, instead of detract from, the final resulted artwork. It's a true test of the aesthetic taste as well as technical skill of the artist, and it's scary as hell.

But maybe, it is time for me to start...

Morning Light II -- Continue with the 30 Paintings in 30 Days Challenge...

Morning Light II, Watercolor on Ampersand Aquabord, 6"h x 6"w, 2014 #18

Bid in My DPW Auction ( Starting Bid $75)

Another of my early entries for Leslie Saeta's "30 Paintings in 30 Days" Challenge for this September... I named it "Morning Light II" since I have finished "Morning Light I" a bit earlier -- the first one of my 6" x 6" rose series on Ampersand Aquabord, but haven't got a chance to share it here with you guys yet... (Promise I will do so in the next few days -- I am gradually catching up with my long-lagged-behind blog posts! But since I haven't posted the entire summer, there is so much catching up to do... :-P)

I have really struggled through this one to get the soft transitions in the background where colors are rich, saturated or dark - which according to my opinion is the hardest thing to do on Aquabord. I think it may still benefit from a few changes here and there to model the volume and turn of each petal, but for now I am stopping, as I have worked on it for two days continuously, and losing insight on the subtleties. The great thing about this challenge -- putting a time limit on each project and force me to work more directly, boldly and fearlessly -- also makes it hard for me to do the last 10% of work that I consider makes the difference between a good piece and a mediocre one -- there is no chance to put a piece away and come back to it with a fresh eye with such a tight time frame for completion... Nevertheless, I think I may come back to this one in a few days to do some fine tweaking... :-)

Despite of all its difficulties, I still think my adventures into Ampersand Aquabord is well worth its while, because it is something "new" and "foreign" to me. Personally, I believe that it is very hard for someone who has painted for a while to avoid getting into an "inertia" of painting simply be deliberately trying to change his or her technique, and one surefire way to push yourself out of such painting rut is to try a new subject, or try a new surface. Different painting surfaces have different absorbency for water, different drying time and subtle variation in the same stage of the drying cycle, different surface texture, different resistance to paint application (which determines how easily the same stroke will spread or different surfaces with approximately the same wetness). Hence, painting on an unfamiliar surface would force you to open your eyes, and really observe the behavior the paint you put down on paper again, instead of just blindly going from one painting stage to the next. All of these afore-mentioned characteristics also determines the different visual effect one is able to achieve on various painting surfaces -- on a smooth, non-absorbent surface like hot-press paper or Aquabord, one can utilize the drying edge of a stroke that is laid down and different "water-mark"s to suggest shapes (wet-on-dry); on a very absorbent surface, it is hard (and often not necessary) to maintain the edge of one individual brush-stroke, yet one can rely on the movement of color laid-down across a large area of wet or moist paper to achieve interesting edge effects and soft shapes (wet-in-wet). The final visual effect is often drastically different, creating different signature styles. 

Of course, it is not impossible to use one technique to imitate the other by softening edges with clear water, or wet small areas when painting wet-in-wet to simulate brush strokes, and create similar looks on different painting surfaces using very different techniques -- which is another great exercise. It has taught me that no matter what road is taken, a painting is ultimately judged not first by the techniques used, but by the final visual effects one is able to achieve. A good painting is first and foremost about "what" is being painted, then by "how" it's painted. Technique is an important means to the end, but for me not by itself an end. The image in one's vision and how it is translated onto the painted surface is the uttermost important thing. 

Enough rambling for now! I should really get back to my watercolor table... In the mean time, if you have an image of a beautiful landscape, or a flower you like, or anything you might want to see painted, please email them to me at arena.shawn@gmail.com. I will paint them and post them here. From every 10 paintings I make from them, there would be a random drawing, and the lucky winner get to take a original back home for free! Interested? Then send me your photo!

You can now buy high quality Giclee prints of many of my sold paintings, both on paper and canvas, as well as some note cards with my paintings here:

My Big Pink Rose Painting -- and the 30 Paintings in 30 Days Challenge

Beauty Queen II, Watercolor on Arches #140 Cold Press Paper, 19"h x 14"w, 2014 #14

Bid in My DPW Auction ( Starting Bid $550)

I have been absent again from this blog for three months! I cannot believe it... It seems like everytime I say in my blogpost that I will post more often, something just happens to make it difficult to keep that promise... I am back now, from a difficult trip back China, my home country, for the funeral of a dear elder family member. Times like this make me think about my own mortality, and I am having some concerns regarding my own health following a recent body checkup, but most important of all, it makes me rethink what I want to do with everyday of my life.

I've always been slightly intimidated by the thought of painting larger, and thought "I could do it when I have more time" or "I could do it after I gain a little more experience with watercolor". But I realized this is not going to happen as long as I keep on putting it off -- so after careful consideration, I've set the goal for myself to paint at least one painting larger than quarter sheet per month in the next 12 month, and try to do at least three paintings larger than half sheet among those. I'll revisit this goal in a year, and see how I have stood up to this self-challenge.

So this is my first attempt -- a rose the size of almost a half-sheet. I have done it in a smaller scale - 7"h x 5"w, a size that I am much more comfortable with. I felt less intimidated by this subject since I've already worked out some of the problems in composition and execution in the small painting, but as I was proceeding with the larger version, I started to appreciate it unique challenges coming with the scale. For starters I found my arms don't stretch to the far side of the painting when I sit, and I often have to paint the top side upside down to solve this problem... And it is not even really large for those of you (you know who I am talking about! ;-) that routinely work on full-size and above sheets of paper... (What do you guys do when you work on a larger size? Please share your tips with me!)

So this is my humble beginning of yet another chapter of my watercolor journey -- it's been almost three years since I started sharing it with you, my friends, and I've loved every minute of it. Flipping back to the first few entries of this blog, I can see how far I have come and I know it is impossible with the encouragement from all of you. Thank you, my friends, at down times it is your kind, gentle nudge that has kept me going on this winding road.

Oh! I almost forgot to mention that I have again signed up for Leslie Saeta's "30 Paintings in 30 Days" Challenge for this September! The challenge has started when I was still in China, where I have no access to blogger or facebook due to government restrictions on internet there, so I have a few of those piled up, uploaded onto my Daily Paintworks Gallery Page but not here. I will gradually share them here with you in the next few days. It's unlikely I am going to make the 30 paintings quota this time due to my travels, but I will paint everyday nonetheless. Happy painting my friends!

In the mean time, if you have an image of a beautiful landscape, or a flower you like, or anything you might want to see painted, please email them to me at arena.shawn@gmail.com. I will paint them and post them here. From every 10 paintings I make from them, there would be a random drawing, and the lucky winner get to take a original back home for free! Interested? Then send me your photo!

You can now buy high quality Giclee prints of many of my sold paintings, both on paper and canvas, as well as some note cards with my paintings here:

A Still Life Study, A Small Landscape, I Am Hanging on There...

It Takes Two to Tango,  
Watercolor on Saunders Waterford #140 Cold Press Paper, 7"h x 10"w, WIP 2

With a dear family member falling ill of cardiac issues and later myself getting sick with flu when in hospital taking care of him (thank you all who have sent me kind words and prayers!), I guess I have fallen off the bandwagon of "30 Paintings in 30 Days" challenge this time. I have decided not to beat myself up for it, and just try again next time in September when Leslie is hosting this challenge again. In the mean time, I found out that floral/still life painting actually suited the fragmented schedule I have in between hospital visits and bed rests better than landscapes, so to get back into the groove and also actually learn how to paint glass, I have resumed this study from master artist Jan Kunz's tutorial. Unlike most of my floral work, the two roses here are mostly done wet on dry, so that I could practice softening edges with a damp brush, while in the mean time try to make good shapes with each brush stroke. It's amazing how time consuming all the small shapes of the flower petals and especially on the ball jar are -- I have an increasing appreciation of the amazing work you do, Carrie!

Frosty Morning,  Watercolor on Arches #140 Cold Press Paper, 7"h x 10"w, WIP 1

When I actually have some chunks of time at hand, I worked on several more small landscapes. Most of them still have not taken shape yet, so I've only included one here. It started as a "Sky" painting in the challenge, and from that palette of Cobalt Blue, Turquoise and purple grey mixed with transparent primary colors, I decide to portray early snow in the mountain highlands, with lake water in the foreground, and some small shrubs still exhibiting fall colors reflecting in it. The focus here is to try to evoke the feeling of chilly late autumn morning air in the highlands. We'll see how it goes! :-) 

In the mean time, if you have an image of a beautiful landscape, or a flower you like, or anything you might want to see painted, please email them to me at arena.shawn@gmail.com. I will paint them and post them here. From every 10 paintings I make from them, there would be a random drawing, and the lucky winner get to take a original back home for free! Interested? Then send me your photo!

You can now buy high quality Giclee prints of many of my sold paintings, both on paper and canvas, as well as some note cards with my paintings here:

Sun Dance (Take Two) Heading for the Filoli Exhibition!

Sun Dance II, Watercolor on Arches #140 Cold Press paper, 12"h x 12"w, 2013 #51

Bid at My DPW Auction (Starting Bid $195) 

So -- here is my main piece for the exhibition at Filoli Garden - "Nature’s Many Splendors: Farms, Gardens and Woodlands". I just took it down there today to be hung, and saw many splendid artwork by other artists in the show -- if you are in the bay area, this show is definitely worth going to! Lots of gorgeous floral, lovely landscape, and amazing photographs. As of "Sun Dance", I've painted it at a smaller size, and sold it during last year's Filoli show when I was still working on it as an on-site demo. I really love the different problems presented by this project, such as creating glowing shadow on a yellow flower -- yellow itself is too light for any shadow area, so the shadows on a yellow flower is never actually "yellow"; yet this flower is largely in shadow, so to maintain the impression of it being an "yellow" flower in this case is especially difficult. Also, I was practicing wet-on-dry thin glazes of limited color palette this year, and thought this could be an interesting one using such method. So I gave it a second take, and was quite happy with the results: I feel this time the yellow glaze applied in very thin coats really retained the color variation of the underpainting without deadening it, and the flower center painted wet in wet to made it appear much less rigid compared to last time. I would like to practice more mainly yellow paintings to try out a couple of other methods, such as one without purple underpainting, to compare the results. But for now, I will switch to some slightly less difficult projects for the next couple of days...

You can now buy high quality Giclee prints of many of my sold paintings, both on paper and canvas, as well as some note cards with my paintings here:

A Look Back at Year 2012...

As the clock ticking close to midnight, I am turning my eyes to the year passed and all that has happened in my art journey along the way. As I mentioned in my last blog post, it has been an amazing ride, thanks to all of you, my dear friends and collectors! When I set off at the beginning of the year, I did set some modest goals for myself: creating some artwork every week, posting them online for sale, documenting the process in this blog, and trying to enter some juried shows. In the end, I have accomplished so much more, -- something that would not be possible without your kind encouragements and support along the way!

In this year, I have managed to finish a total of 54 paintings -- including studies and plein air work. This may be a modest number for many, but to me it is a real accomplishment, as I am a very slow painter and the work I have managed to actually finish in all the years before do not even add up to this number. I would definitely like to do at least as much in the coming year, but I will leave goal-setting to my post tomorrow. ;-) Now is the time to enjoy the bubbly drinks and pat myself on the back! 

I've managed to overcome my fear of losing control of what happened on paper and tackled some unfamiliar surfaces, the most difficult of which being Ampersand Aquabord, and with the kind encouragements of Kara and Crystal, got some success in the end. I would love to keep at this effort in the coming year -- and maybe try some portraits on it too!

This year I have also tried a few different sales venues -- both online and offline, some more successful than others. I've set up my Daily Paintworks Gallery, where I auction off my smaller original works; I've stocked my Etsy Shop, where I sell both originals and Giclee prints, as well as products such as calendars and note cards; I've uploaded my work to the print-on-demand site, Fine Art America, so that anyone can purchase Giclee prints of my paintings to the size and surface they desire, as well as my works as note cards. I've kept up on this blog (although updating regularly did remain a challenge when school work got busy) and maintained regular update of my facebook page, through both of which I have met many wonderful friends! I've attempted my hands at three local art fairs and managed to break even at all of them, and received several leads which resulted in sales afterwards from these events. I've also become a member of the wonderful Main Gallery in Redwood City -- the amazing talent and creativity of the artists I've met there made me very proud to be one of them!

I've tried my hands on a couple of local, regional and national juried shows this year, and was fortunate enough to be juried in 20 of them, getting a couple of awards and selling some of my larger works through these shows. I am extremely honored to enlist among the wonderful artists -- many of whom are my teachers through their books and instructional dvds -- in these shows, and consider the juries decisions a gentle nudge of encouragement for an artist at her starting point like me. For all the ones that I did not get in, I can only say I will definitely try harder the coming year!

What I did not manage to do, in the year past, is to keep a sketchbook and draw freehand everyday, to go outdoors more often and do more plein air studies, and to keep finishing two small paintings a week. With four days a week in the Golden Gate Atelier learning classical drawing methods, it has proven quite a challenge to keep at these goals. But I will not give them up in the new year, -- I've just signed up for an impossible crazy task today, which I will reveal in tomorrow's post. So stay tuned...

Ok, before I bore you with more self-bragging, I just want to share with you my seven favorite paintings that I have created this year. Some of them are award winners and already happily settled in their new homes, others I love not because of the final results, but also the challenges I have taken and difficulties overcome during their creation...

High Summer Dreams II, Watercolor on Arches 140# Cold Press Paper, 10"h x 14"w, Sold

This one has won me a gold medal in Stockton Art League's National Juried Show at Haggin Musuem -- the first red-carpet moment in my art career! 

April's Passing,  Watercolor on Ampersand Aquaboard, 6"h x 6"w

Available through Randy Higbee Gallery ($300 with Frame)

My first successful attempt on Aquabord after much suffering. I feel that after this one, I started to have some understanding of how this difficult surface works, and I was also able to let go of a bit of control to accept what's happening on paper (or, in this case, on board ;-)

Petal Light #2,  Watercolor on Arches 140# Cold Press Paper, 7"h x 10"w

Available through Daily Paintworks Online Gallery ($125 with Mat)

I feel that I have truly captured the warmth and vivacity in this bird without fiddling too much. Love the wet-in-wet process from start to finish...

Beauty Queen, Watercolor on Arches 140# Cold Press Paper, 7"h x 5"w, Sold

I tried out the multi-colored glazing method of the amazing Jeannie Vodden and combined it with my own wet-in-wet approach in the background. I was very worried the flower and the background would look like completely separate entities, but somehow the painting feels coherent as a whole when finished. Yay! Sometimes risk-taking does pay off...

Edge of Summer, Watercolor on Arches 140# Cold Press Paper, 5"h x 7"w, Sold

I tried to paint from a black-and-white photo and just imagine the colors of this one, and lovedswhat became of it. An attempt to correct my tendency to paint colors too literally from reference materials and see them only as a starting point. 

Petal Light #1,  Watercolor on Arches 140# Cold Press Paper, 10"h x 8"w

Available through Daily Paintworks Online Gallery ($150 with Mat)

Starting from an under-exposed, uninspiring reference photo of large area of dead dark shadow shapes on the leaves, I let the wet-in-wet process lead me and created interesting dark shapes. I felt a real sense of freedom after pulling this one off!

Winter Light, Watercolor on Arches 140# Rough Paper, 5"h x 7"w, Sold

The first landscape painting I am proud of -- I feel this one did capture more with less. 

Thanks again my friends -- as I have mentioned, I could not have done this without your support! Happy New Year Everyone!!!

You can purchase my 2013 wall and desk calendars here:

To Show, or Not to Show: That is the Question (My Grappling with Juried Shows...)

... Last night, as the clock on my computer screen ticked closer to 11:50 pm, I was frantically trying to finish, resize and upload my images to OnlineJuriedShows.com for entering Randy Higbee Gallery's 2012 6 Inches Squared Show. And tonight, I opened my emails -- and happily found out "April's Passing" and "Island Beauty - White Plumeria" are accepted. I've just learned several days before that "Peppermint Rose" was also accepted into Debra Huse Gallery's Holiday Treasure Salon 2012. So, it looks like I will have a bunch of small paintings shipped down southern California for the holidays...

April's Passing,  Watercolor on Ampersand Aquaboard, 6"h x 6"w, 2012 #52

Accepted into Randy Higbee Gallery's 2012 6 Inches Squared Show

Bid in my DPW Auction (Starting Bid $95)

With all these great news, I do not want to sound ungrateful. But after the initial ecstasy faded, the practical side of me cannot help but wondering -- should I really be working against the clock to enter so many juried shows?

Asking a full-time artist who is trying to make a living making and selling their art, you are likely going to get a very passionate answer about this question -- and ask a hundred, it's likely you'll get fifty yes and fifty no, with very good reason on both sides. I've had quite good luck with juried shows this year, getting into many and sold quite a few works with much higher price tags than selling online (mostly because juried shows often requires a minimum size of 10" x 14", much larger than what I usually sell online, and these larger pieces are also framed). However, doing the hard math often suggests such sales are not necessarily economically viable, contrary to my initial belief: take "Peppermint Rose" as example, its label price in the Holiday Treasure Show is $400. If it is sold, Debra Huse gallery takes 50% (which I think they fully deserve for spending time, efforts and money putting on such a great show and doing all the marketing for it, not to mention the huge gallery space a show like this will need also costs money), so what I will get is only $200. Now if we calculate the framing cost (I used a $50 frame from Randy Higbee frames shop for this one, since they have great quality frames, and they also do all the fitting for the paintings juried into the Holiday Treasure Show for free), entry fee ($45 for three images), shipping ($15 each way), handling fee (a very reasonable $10), packing material -- you can see the profit quick go down the drain on my side. So, is it truly worthwhile to spending that much time photographing, uploading, submitting my artwork, and packing/shipping it hundreds of miles away to exhibit in these juried shows? Is there any real benefit for me as an artist to sell my artwork this way versus simply selling by myself online, or in local galleries?...

Island Beauty - White Plumeria,  

Watercolor on Fabriano Artistico 140# Cold Press Paper, 6"h x 6"w, 2012 #12

Accepted into Randy Higbee Gallery's 2012 6 Inches Squared Show

Sold!

After almost a year's exploration, experimentation and contemplation, I think the answer to that question is more likely "yes", but the reason does not lie in the economic side. In stead, I think it maybe worthwhile to enter juried shows for the following two benefits:

-- Exposure. Juried shows in different regions of the country may expose your work to local buyers, who may not have a chance to see your work otherwise. Often it is not practical or even possible for an artist, especially artists who are just starting their career to have representations in galleries across the country, therefore, juried shows can bring your work in front of potential customers in the regions far from your normal reach. Juried shows also often showcase larger-sized works whose scale is hard to fully comprehend until the viewer is standing in front of it, instead of looking at it on a computer screen. Some work are definitely more powerful and awe-inspiring when viewed in person. I think this is why my larger work are often sold in juried shows instead of online. 

Peppermint Rose, 

Watercolor on Fabriano Artistico 140# Cold Press Paper, 8"h x 8"w, 2012 #36

Accepted into Debra Huse Gallery's Holiday Treasure Salon 2012

Sold!

-- Recognition. For artists who are just starting their career, getting into juried shows, and getting awards may open a few doors leading to wonderful opportunities. Art magazines, art book editors and curators may see your work and approach you for potential possibilities of writing an article about you, using your work in one of their art books, or even suggesting a future show opportunity. Art communities may see your work and invite you to give a demo, teaching a class or even a workshop. Adding national juried show acceptances and awards to one's resume also definitely make that road to gallery, artist-in-residence or grant application a bit easier. What's more, it is a demonstration that you are continuously making an effort presenting your work as a professional artist, which serves as a strong evidence in case you file your tax return as a professional artist, but cannot generate profit three out of five consecutive years. (Often, tax agents are quite flexible regarding applying this standard to artists, as long as you demonstrate the "continuous effort" toward becoming more professional and making steady progresses.)

Crimsonscape - Red Poinsettia, 

Watercolor on Arches 140# Cold Press Paper, 6"h x 6"w, WIP 2

Of course, one can also add that simply putting one's work "out there" to compare with all the wonderful professional artwork submitted to a juried show can serve as a measure of one's current level and progress through time. However, I would definitely caution taking this measure too serious, as more often than not, acceptance or rejection in a juried show with only one juror reflects more on the juror's taste and preference than the absolute quality of the artworks entered, and it can (surprisingly) be quite subjective. Therefore, whenever I am accepted into a show I really like, I would always caution myself that this by no means is a certificate that I have "made it" and better than all the artists that did not get in. Instead, it more likely just means that I am lucky enough that my artistic expression happens to fit in the vision of this particular juror...

To show, or not to show, that seems to be the eternal question for an artist struggling to establish his/her artistic career. To answer it, one really has to reach deep down, and ask oneself -- what is the purpose and driving factor for me to enter this show? What are the biggest benefits? What are the draw-backs? How much time and money am I likely to spend for it? Can I afford such time and monitory expenses? What can I get in return? Who is likely going to see this show? And are these people who I would like to show my work to at this stage of my career?... It is not an easy answer, and only you -- the artist can answer it for yourself...

The "Love" Part of a Perfect Love/Hate Relationship: Me and Aquabord

I Admit at times this all look like slow motion (to all the incredible fast painters out there who makes me feel like a snail...), but, a love relationship just cannot be rushed, especially when it's facing some significant difficulties... Ok, ok, before your thoughts go astray, I am actually talking about this new surface I have been continuously trying (and tucking away out of frustration) for about a year -- the Ampersand Aquabord. And I think I am finally making real progress in understanding how it works...

You see, the problem of painting on Aquabord mostly come from the fact that it seems to have a will of its own -- washes laid down on it does not seem to go to places you want them to go, smooth washes are next to impossible for large areas, surface dries in a heartbeat and wet-in-wet applications almost always fail -- despite all of which, once you have tried it, it's hard to put down: colors do not sink into the surface and the brilliance of hue you can achieve on this surface is almost unsurpassed as far as watercolors go. Just like a perfect lover, it's wild, hard to tame, but your heart always goes back to it after every painful fight and every separation.

Remembering June,  Watercolor on Ampersand Aquaboard, 6"h x 6"w, WIP 2

Like any other love affairs, it only start to become better and the two parties involved have "broken in" with each other. After much trial and frustration, the beauty of handling quality of this difficult surface start to reveal itself little by little:

-- Glazes of color merge seamlessly without revealing where the rewetting starts and where it ends. On paper, when applying a glaze to an area, despite out best effort to fade color back to clear water on the edge of shapes that requires a soft transition, often than not a "watermark" show up at the edge of the area that has been wet if the glaze is applied on areas that already have heavy pigment applications on them. This is because water would almost always loosen the pigment lying underneath and redeposit them on the edge of the wet area, no matter how light your touch is. I've tried soft squirrel hair brush, it helps but still does not totally eliminate the problem. On this surface, though, the surface texture of clay seem to break the obvious "ring" appearance of the rewetted areas, and glazes merge without a trace into existing color passages if you apply them lightly and avoid to disturb the existing pigments too much.

April's Passing,  Watercolor on Ampersand Aquaboard, 6"h x 6"w, WIP 2

-- Delicate layering of colors truly "GLOWS" on this surface. If I apply washes that are so faint only a trace of color can be detected when applied directly on white paper, the color seem to stand out with more integrity and shows up more. So, if you are patient, the colors on this surface can almost be infinitely modified by applying a very thin, watery glaze over any existing passages, like the shadow areas on the petal in the details shown below -- the Cobalt Blue glaze I applied would totally disappear had I try to do this glaze on paper, but here, a very lovely subtle purple tinge shows clearly on the glazed areas.

-- Lifting from very dark to near white can be easily done with a synthetic brush, while lifting from pale passages would result a pearl-like glowing stain that hints the original color. The lovely surface texture also gets emphasized and adds surface interest with these near-white liftings and thin glazes, as shown in the lifted white shapes in the detail below.

Details of April's Passing,  Watercolor on Ampersand Aquaboard, 6"h x 6"w, WIP 2

-- Very interesting diffused edges where a dark area meets a light area can be achieved by laying the dark pigment thickly (almost like cream or paste consistency), then immediately teasing out the edge with a wet (not just damp) brush. I used a small (size 4) brush with synthetic hair to do this, laying water droplets next to juicy dark passages, then push and pull color with the brush and water on surface, lifting if necessary, to create all the interesting shadow shapes on the leaves shown in the detail below. Since lifting back from near black to near white is not hard on this surface, once I let go of the fear and allow water to push and pull pigments with its own will to areas I have not expected, some very interesting edge effects and texture appears miraculously...

Details of April's Passing,  Watercolor on Ampersand Aquaboard, 6"h x 6"w, WIP 2

In the end, what did I learn from this very difficult yet extremely rewarding relationship? I discovered that once you stop the dire effort of trying to control every aspect of it -- making every shape, every edge, every color passage to go exactly as you imagined -- and let go a little bit to observe what happens on surface as you lay down the colors, half in panic (always), half in expectation, beautiful surprises lies in every corner. A partner with character may be hard to handle, but never will there be a dull moment or boredom in the relationship that comes along...

Throw in a Little Play Time... (Have You Played Today?)

At times we can all be so busy -- busy producing work to enter competitions, to send to galleries, to list online for sale. It may seem that we are under constant stress to create, create, create more artwork! We feel the need to update our blogs often -- if not with a finished painting each day, at least some great progress shots (that actually shows progress)! At times we wish that the first reference photo we lay our eyes on or the first still-life setup we place on the table would just make a brilliant composition, that every brush-stroke we put down on paper or canvas would work magnificently toward the beautiful vision we had for the piece in our mind, that we could speed up this whole process of drawing, painting, sculpting into a linear progression along a single line aimed straight at a splendid finish ---

... And if it doesn't, if there are much time spend agonizing setting up a still life, cropping  a reference photo, if there are many passages scraped, scratched, lifted out, washed off, and repainted, if for a little while we seem to have lost in the process and not sure where the piece is going, we feel anxious and sometimes even guilty that we are not "productive" enough --

Fire Dance,  Watercolor on Fabriano Artistico #140 Cold Press Paper, 6"h x 6"w, WIP 1

... But, are we really?...

-- What if you allow yourself some time every week to just play with that set up process, substituting familiar and tried items with ones that just does not seem to work, and find out why? What if you try to center the entire composition around that problematic object, using other items with complimentary or analogues colors and patterns, contrasting or similar textures, and try to design shapes that make the problematic object the center piece? What if you try a totally different point of view -- such as setting up the still life above the eye line to emphasize the majestic quality of ordinary, day-to-day objects?...

-- What if you spend a day to just look through the lens of your camera, pointing it at random angles and shooting found objects that you may never intentionally try to take a reference photo of? What if you crop these photos dramatically, using super close-ups to look at only the surface texture, or very small details instead of the entire object? Instead of cropping yet a other head-and-shoulder shot for portrait, what if you cropped off the head and focus on hands, feet, chest with shirts and legs with torn jeans?...

April's Promise,  Watercolor on Fabriano Artistico #140 Cold Press Paper, 6"h x 6"w, WIP 1

-- What if instead of going straightly at that beautiful wash, that light underpainting, that carefully drawn details that you know would lead to a successfully painting in your typical style, give up your normal procedure, and try something new, something different, something that may be way outside your comfort zone? What if instead of painting light to dark, general shapes to details in watercolor, you put in bold darks and wash light colors over them, and let the darks bleed out? (No panicking please!!!) What if you just take out the work (or its photograph, in most cases) of an artist you admire and never has a chance to study with, and imagine how he or she achieved a particular passage in the painting, and try out that method? What if you just try a new type of material, a new surface, a new painting tool and try to redo a painting that you have done and liked, or for that matter, something that you have tried to do and never worked out?...

-- What if you take the photograph, and turn it into black-and-white, instead of painting true to the color of the photo, just choose a color scheme from a painting by another artist that you feel greatly inspiring, and try to design your painting using that particular color scheme? What if you try a limited palette of only primary colors, only warm and cool earth colors? If you are used to painting with a limited palette, what if you try three new colors and add them to this new painting to just see how they work with your old palette, and how they work (or does not work) with each other?...

Waiting for Spring,  

Watercolor on Fabriano Artistico #140 Cold Press Paper, 10"h x 7"w, WIP 1

Guaranteed, most of these "experiments", or as I would like to call them, "play time" products may never turn out to be master pieces -- they may never be finished, but I believe they are just as important as the beautiful finished pieces we enter shows, win prizes, sell across the ocean or to the next door neighbors, and post on our blogs, facebook pages and websites to gain all the "wow"s an "ah"s. Because it is for us, for the artist within, for the growth of our paintings and ourselves, and for the wonder of the activity we call "creating" that lured us in the constant ecstasy and agony of being an artist --

... So, maybe today, among all the "serious" work we do daily as artists, we can throw in a little, just a little... "Play Time"?...

(I would love to see your experiments and excursions -- post a comment or a link to your adventure and the fabulous -- they by definition all are -- results of it here, I will share it on my facebook page!)