Fireplace Video
Happy New Year to all who read my blog! What a year 2010 was! As I reflect, in terms of my art, there were new beginnings, as traveled weekly to Woodstock, NY to the Woodstock School of Art, studying with Lois Woolley and HongNian Zhang, developing painting skills and my eye for detail and accuracy. How blessed I have been for this experience. I did well at the Spencer Fair as I competed in the arts and crafts exhibit, taking ribbons for everything I showed, including my homemade strawberry jam coming in third place! Then, I moved onto the Worcester Art Museum in the Fall, studying Photoshop with Christopher Whitehead and the Blogging with Andy and Veronica Fish. With all of their instructions, I am transforming my art even more. I created my wonderful horse picture, successfully taking the horse out of the barn and putting him a a beautiful pasture. I created this blog, which is only in the baby stages, I still need to expand on it to make it more interesting. From Christopher, I saw the speed drawing video of Nico DiMattia from Argentina, as he created a wonderful portrait using Photoshop, something which took hours reduced to 5 minutes! I follow his work on Facebook, and just last week I received a copy of his latest instructional book. My hope is to create a drawing using Photoshop using his steps. (I have included the websites of these wonderful artists, please take the time to check them out and see their beautiful work!) I also have met wonderful people along the way who were in my classes and hopefully have lasting friendships.
I hear the voices of all of my teachers in my head: Lois: regarding step 3 "Now you're in Wonderland, just paint, lay it on thick!", "I want you to paint 2 lemons on 9x12 canvas, and keep painting them over and over", regarding details in the painting, "what are we talking about here? We're not talking about this, so don't give so much detail over here, but over there". HongNian: "you have to know your up, your down, your left, your right" as his hand gestures the positions (it really took me awhile to understand that one!), then while pointing to our model who was posing as a chef at this cutting board table: "Look at this, it is love; your painting should show love.", then, "you should paint what you love"; also, "your painting should tell a story, you should think, what are you talking about"; "read books about other artists and see what they did in their life"; "draw every day, it doesn't matter what it is, there is no good or bad, just draw, it will help you see things better"; after Lois told me to paint lemons over and over, HongNian added, "until you get it right". (I really feel like Grasshopper, getting the wisest of instructions!) From Christopher, "make sure you make a duplicate of your original picture so you don't ruin it and lose it!", then all the myriad of demonstrations of all the tools that can be used to create, edit and alter pictures, it is phenomenal! From Andy Fish, "blog every day, read other people's blogs". Then I have the voice of my Bill Griffiths, my first teacher as an adult, as I timidly re-entered the art world taking a class in Water Color Painting at the WAM, "the Chinese say you will throw away your first 1000 paintings until you have painted one correctly", (that was scary!); "this is good, I want more" as I needed to keep adding layers and layers of color. (Please look again at the prize winning painting that got me the red ribbon at the Spencer Fair, I once had someone look at it closely and said, "oh, look how easy this is with just little dots of paint", to which I had to shake my head and explain, no, this was not easy at all and there was an incredible amount of paint to create the finished painting and to give the look that it has. (sigh, to those who do not understand!) Then, the most recent thought, not a voice, that is in my head, is I wrote to Nico in Facebook, thanking him for his book and that I would like to do the same picture he explained and send it to him, his response "that would be cool!! ;)" All wonderful encouragement to press on!!
So, having said all of that, 2011 is going to be a busy year for me and I am very excited. I have so many things to do daily: blog, draw, paint, read! This is all along with working a full time job, eating a healthy diet, exercising in some fashion, flossing, sleeping, meditating, making time for family and friends, leisure. This is where the re-invention comes in. This is a process of transformation for me and I am excited about my journey, and I am also excited to share this journey with you. I will also reflect about my journey that has brought me to this point. I will not say I have resolutions for the new year, because I don't, I just have visions and goals. May your journey for the new year be exciting as well!
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