Texture Techniques

I would never say that art is on the back burner. My studio is too full of in-progress projects for that! But life interrupts art sometimes, and so lately I've been busy training for my annual triathlon, teaching a six year old to read (he's doing so well!),

planting flowers and veggies in our little garden, and enjoying having my husband home as he just finished having two weeks off work.

I've been thinking a lot about painting to please myself, and what I want to get out of my paintings. I love texture, and splashes of bright colour, like this:

That brilliant colour is Daniel Smith's Green Gold, and the sparkly texture in the flower is made by sprinkling salt into a wet wash of colour. This is a small piece of a painting of crocuses that I'm working on. I have so many paintings "in progress" right now. Often "in progress" is another word for stalled out, or given up, but I don't believe in painting pointlessly. I have learned to stop when I'm not sure what I'm doing, or when it doesn't feel inspired anymore. My painting style doesn't allow for drudge work.

I have two sessions left with my current watercolour class, and we are working on a painting of saskatoon berries. They all left last week all fired up with enthusiasm for the subject and how fun it is to paint. My demo piece is above, and the texture you see in the background is made by pressing cling wrap to a wet wash of colour and allowing it to dry. It's not a technique I use a lot, but it can be really cool if it's not overused. This painting will need to have some background layers to help the texture blend in before I call it finished. And as a demo piece, it may not progress any further out of class. I don't have many paintings turned out that first started as a result of a class demonstration, since I usually have to paint my demos tilted at an odd angle, or completely upside down. I'll get a photo taken and show you sometime.

Speaking of unfinished projects, my printmaking paints arrived yesterday and I'm excited about making time to take the seals off the bottles and give mono printing another go. There's a reason my studio gets so messy, so fast!