Rob’s Waterco☺ler

Came home from work and needed to at least finish the rough of this 14×17 drawing.  Now it can sit a few days until I figure out what to do with it next, or be done with it.

Thought I would drop a quick post in to show what I am currently working on.  This is a 10×14 watercolor inspired from a larger, and incomplete, oil painting I have been working on for some time.  I really have not had much inspiration to work on the unfinished oils this summer.  Saving them for the winter when I am stuck inside is usually best.  Still this painting of a boy fishing on a river bank is inspiring and I did a quick sketch here.  The drawing was done in a hotel while on vacation over the Labor Day weekend, and I am almost finished dropping in the majority of the color.  Now I will let it sit for a few days and make adjustments, as needed.

Of note, is the colors I used.  Besides the standard 6 primaries (3 warms and 3 cools) I also used Burnt Sienna, Naples Yellow (a favorite) and English Red.  I usually don’t like to use the English Red, except on trees because it is very opaque, almost chalk like.   I think it helped bring out some dimension and contrast in the painting though.

Rob

Last night I worked through some of the watercolor portrait of Gina.  It is 11×14 on WN hot pressed 140lbs paper. 

I masked off some areas of the hair where the sun is and also started adding some tonal highlights and darks.  Before I started the painting I used my drafting eraser dust bag to remove all the excess graphite I had put down for a value drawing.  I selected Burnt Sienna, Naples Yellow and Genuine Rose for the skin tones. The eyes (iris) are Winsor Violet and Cadmium Orange.  The hair is Ultramarine Blue and Cadmium Red, and a bit of Sepia.  the background is Cadmium Yellow Light and Genuine Rose.  The shirt is French Ultramarine Blue.  That’s it for colors.

Now the process of building up layers of watercolor on top of each other has begun.  Each layer adds depth and more contrast.  I am about half way done.

I started on a 10 x 14 watercolor of Gina tonight.  I got as far a getting a good reference drawing down on the hot pressed (smooth) watercolor paper.  It gives me a real good idea of the values and lets me make sure I have all the proportions correct before I put paint down.  After I sleep on it for awhile I will fix anything and then start painting

When she (Gina) see’s this she will kill me ’cause I do not think she is too keen on being painted, but oh well, I like working on attractive subjects

The picture is from the Middleburg Virginia trip the other weekend by the way.

Rob

The Clifton Art Show was last weekend (which pretty much got rained out) and I had very busy week full of getting used to my new 40 mile commute to work.  I must confess that I have not done a lot of artwork in the last 5 or so days.  Last night I jotted this 16×20 drawing down on 140lbs CP Arches and started adding some color (not shown).  Tonight I may work on it a little more and post a shot tomorrow.  This was drawn from a reference photo taken by Gina at a craft fair a few months back.  She watched the nice lady in the wheel chair get parked next to the unsuspecting little girl in the stroller and snapped the picture.  My intent is to make this look very Norman Rockwell -ish, only abit looser.  Should be pretty cool.

This Saturday I am going to the Aldie Virgina Mill (or there-abouts) with the NOVAL group of en plein air painters.  Should be fun.  I am taking the twins to thier first official paint-out with other artists so wish me luck!

Rob

The morning was beautiful and the it rained with damaging thunderstorms in the afternoon, however, the show went on.  Paint! Manassas 2008 succeeded in drawing 18 local artists to create and display over 50 pieces of fine art which depicted Old Town Manassas and the historic Manassas Civil War Battlefield Grounds.  Numerous pieces of original artwork were sold to local business owners and citizens at the show.  The remainder are on display at the following Old Town businesses through June 2008:

ArtBeat Gallery
Ashby Jewelry
City Square Cafe
Creative Brush Studio
Fulton Bank
Manassas Museum
Opera House Gourmet
Prospero’s Books
The Things I Love

Click the above picture to visit the gallery of Paint! Manassas 2008 show pictures.

The week ended with a nice paint out with fellow MAG artist, Selina at the Manassas Battlefield on Thursday.  The above sketch is a tree/fence drawing I did and will likely develop into a painting at some point.

Below are my seven entries for Paint! Manassas 2008!  One is already sold!  Well see how I do tommorrow…

Today was a perfect day to hike on the Manassas Battlefield with Gina and the kids.  We saw turtles, deer, birds, minnows, crayfish and a brown beaver looking creature.  I brought a sketchbook, but did not do any drawing.  We did eat lunch on top of a glorious hill in an open field which overlooks some historic sites and buildings.  I was inspired to break out some older reference photos and sketched up this quick squirrel tonight using graphite and watercolor.  Below are some battlefield pictures.

Rob 

I started this 16 x 20 watercolor of the Old Town Manassas Train Station as a simple line drawing yesterday and last night started a loose and wet painting.  Tonight I have washed in the rest of the color and will let it dry before I decide where to go with it.  My initial thoughts are it needs contrast and some hard lines so I might use an 8B pencil or ink.

Rob

It rained today.  I started off with Selina, from the Manassas Art Guild, in Clifton Virginia and I fully intended to finish my Old Clifton General Store painting.  Did I mention that it rained today?  No sooner did I get my french easel set up and it started again

As a back up plan we went to Old Town Manassas and painted en plein air under the old train station.  I did a very wet-in-wet impressionist painting of Fosters Grille and other stores across the tracks.  I will let is dry for a few days then go back into it with an 8B pencil to really bring out some hard lines.

Selina went to work drawing some sketches of the Candy Factory.  Both of us are gearing up for the official kick off of Paint! Manassas 2008 on Saturday

 Rob