Day 5,6 and 7

Caught up again!!

I decided to do some small exercises today. These are the sort of studies I do in the first workshop I deliver to new groups, I talk about how I mix and choose colour, how I do little colour planets to  help me decide on my palette, then we go on to do some of these simple studies where they can have a go and practice what I am telling them about.

All these are done with no predrawing, I find some people are not happy without a drawing and that is fine, I'm there to encourage them to paint, so whatever they want to do is fine by me. I do think that painting without drawing is the ultimate (and certainly what I aspire to do though I draw if the image is tricky) and I do try and encourage all those who say they can't draw to try and learn how to draw for it's own sake but for it not to stop them painting. That's why I'm happy for people to get the image on the paper in whichever way suits them best and if they don't want to give no drawing a go that is also fine. 

The first image is just a simple pear.... everyone can have a go and as pears come in all colours they don't have to stick with the palette I have chosen, they can choose their own. The exercise is for them to mix paint on the paper and the brush, not in the palette

In the first place this is a less than a minute sketch then allowed to dry. I then went back in to strengthen the shadows around the top and base so not including drying time less than 3 minutes.

We then do a lemon where I show them a bit about how to lose edges and then how we can go in behind the subject (painting negatively) to bring out small areas of definition.

Again a really quick study... maybe about 4 minutes for this one!!

I then might paint one of my brushes, this is more about lost edges than colour mixing.... it is actually one of my mops and as I don't seem to be able to get on painting with them I use them as my subject instead. Just used indigo for this one... going in pale to start with then losing almost all  the edges. The brush can still be seen but my idea is always to almost ruin it at this stage then go back in with some definition. That way I can just define small areas and still get a feel for the brush without painting every single edge.

I can see from this that I have overworked it a touch but I think you get the idea!!

Will post again about the some of the other studies I do in this first workshop.

Leslie's Blog