Laughing Gulls in Watercolor

I'm sure I've mentioned before that my background in art is primarily abstract. It's also large! For many years my smallest paintings were 4'x6'. Most were 6'x8'. But it's been awhile since I've worked at that large size.

As I've investigated art based on birds, or earlier insects, it made more sense to start small. I was unfamiliar with both birds and insects. If I'd started working large I would have ended up with gross, untruthful, and dull generalizations. Working small has forced me to look more closely at both(the insects very closely since they were drawn under a microscope).

BUT, every once in while it can drive me nuts. I think the recent detailed watercolor pencil work pushed me to the brink. I needed the freedom of something less constricting. So today I went back to straight watercolor.



The sketch at top is a quick sketch, with a few color notes, that I did just for practice. The second version is on watercolor paper rather than sketch paper. The birds are Laughing Gulls, seen in April, 2009 just as they made their arrival in Cape May, NJ. Though they'll eventually be on every lamp post in the area, at this time they were in one of the ponds at 'The Meadows,' a great area owned by The Nature Conservancy.

I'm not big on scenic photos or paintings. But sunrise or sunset here always changes my mind. The light and color are just too beautiful.



In this case the sunset which is in back of me as I took the photo is reflected in the background of the painting, with some of it spilling out onto the gulls and water. It was a stunning sight and made the black and white of the Laughing Gulls particularly striking.

I'm stopping for today, before I do something I regret. Tomorrow I'll probably do at least some more work on it.

I should add that this still isn't a large painting. It's only 7"x10" like many of my recent paintings. It's more the free brushwork that has made it seem 'larger' to me. But it is time to start increasing the size of my watercolors. I do not yet approach them as canvases on which to orchestrate color, value, texture and light as I always did with abstract art. I'm very much missing that type of painting.

Waltzing Around Watercolor

I seem to go back and forth with watercolor between,one, being somewhat more expressive and less limited by what I actually see and, two, trying to be more accurate. As in all art the desire for accuracy can also lead to overcaution, tentativeness, etc. Today's watercolor of an Acadian Flycatcher that I saw and photographed in Shenandoah National Park a couple of weeks ago tends towards more accuracy and maybe more tentativeness.



That was not the problem a year ago when I photographed another Acadian Flycatcher in almost the exact same spot. He was so far away that the photo just showed the slightest hint of shape and posture. So with that photo I concentrated more on the overall composition of the pastel drawing. The Flycatcher was a very small part of the drawing though it still was the focus. (Someone might legitimately ask: well if it was in the same place why did you get such a better, more detailed photo this year? The answer is a new camera: Lumix Panasonic FZ28. It has an 18x optical zoom compared to 10x of my last Lumix. I'm not a camera person and don't have the time, money or inclination to carry a lot of camera gear. But these Lumix cameras with fairly high optical zooms with Leica lenses fit my purposes well. And..... are in my limited price range).

I'm not sure what stage I'm at with this new watercolor. I thought I might be done but after photographing it the watercolor does not seem finished. I did try to stay true to the beautifully gradated colors of the Flycatcher, though they are really a bit more olive than this shows at the moment. I'm afraid any more work on it may ruin it through overwork, which may have been a problem in the last couple of watercolors I did.

So as I'm say I'm 'waltzing around watercolor', waiting to see what I should do next. I'll probably know tomorrow or the next day after having let this sit for a bit.



The drawing above is a preliminary sketch for this watercolor. It's nothing special but I thought some readers might find it informative. In it I'm just trying to get a general sense of where I want the bird placed in the watercolor. It ended up being pretty close to this though I did move it up just a bit.

Solomon's Seal, Meadow Rue, Birdbath

Today, beautiful as it was, was a day for work. So after transplanting many tomato seedlings, then tilling six raised beds to get ready for planting, I felt I deserved an art break. Though just about everything in the yard calls out for being painted right now I decided to try the newly visible Solomon's Seal and Meadow Rue, along with the handmade birdbath that is next to them.

I'm always impressed by the beauty of the Solomon's Seal as their red stems break the soil. About the same time they come up a number of Thalictrum, or Meadow Rue, do as well. They inhabit a dark, shady part of our yard next to an ancient bird bath I made from poured concrete years ago.

This seemed like the perfect opportunity to work from life, not from a photo. I'm sure I could have gotten a really striking photo but I wanted to work directly. Unfortunately I chose to work in watercolor pencils and waterbrush. I'm still learning how to handle these and the results weren't that happy. Finally I brought the whole thing inside and went back to work with real watercolor and brushes.

The result is DARK. The scene itself was dark but I think that the first thing most people need to do with watercolor is decide where the light areas will be and be sure to keep them. I find this particularly hard to do with watercolor pencils. Though my guess is that I'd also have had trouble with plain watercolors if I'd used them because there wasn't much light, outside of part of the birdbath and some of the stones. So that's something I continue to need to work on: see the lights and darks, and make up some lights if I don't see them!

Obviously I could also use some work in learning to portray stones in watercolor. In the end I tried to use mainly dark colors to unite this small watercolor. I don't think it's all that successful but sometimes you just need to start working and make the best of the results. If you're not happy remember what you learned for the next one.

Either way, artistic success, failure, or somewhere in between, it was great to be able to be outside again, especially to start working from life outside.

Blizzard, Sausage, American Redstart

Like much of the Northeast we've been warned that we might have our first real snow of the winter. Actually it's not all that uncommon to get big snows in early March here in Philadelphia.

While waiting for it I decided to venture forth in watercolor once again, this time based on a photo I took of an American Redstart on nest in a Witch Hazel on Pocosin Fire Road in Shenandoah National Park. Anyone who knows redstarts will notice something odd. This looks like a male. This photo is old so I don't remember the details now. But I really can't find a way to turn it into a female. There is the yellow-orange on sides of tail but I believe male has that as well. And the upper body just seems too dark to possibly be attributed to shadows. So I think we have a male on nest.



OK, you might ask, but what about the sausage? Well I've decided to include five photos that show the work in progress. It also is not done but I've lost all natural light here so I'm stopping for today. Some of these versions aren't exactly attractive or very hopeful. It's the equivalent of watching sausage being made. Still I think some people, especially artists, might find it interesting. There are points here where it almost looks hopeless. But I think things did get better.



As anyone who reads this blog regularly knows I'd prefer not to work from photos. But there hasn't been much activity at our feeders and the weather isn't great for venturing outside to work. So I'm going through old photos looking for sujbect matter. This is very limiting, and often not too inspiring. On the other hand art is where you find it and sometimes you just have to make the best of what's available.

This is the last wersion for today. I'm not sure when I'll get back to it. But in this case I know that it's not done as it is. There's just no richness of color, and not much of tone. I hope that will appear in the next version.

Spring Will Out....

even if it is just a Palm Warbler in the Mud.

A quick watercolor based on a photo of a palm warbler seen at Oakdale Nature Preserve in Freeport, Illinois in April, 2008, in fairly wintry conditions.

We will forget about all I've said regarding values and tonal contrast for this one............... I remained somewhat true to the muddy conditions of the warbler's habitat. And though I thought of tonal variety as I worked it just seemed to disappear. I think the white paper, peeking through in places, counteracts the mud somewhat. I may do more work on this but most likely I'll just leave it as is. I fear more work will only make it darker and muddier.

The palm warbler truly is a sign of spring in our area though. Pine warblers are often earlier but less likely to be seen. But when you see the golden glow of the palm you know that spring is on its way!

Bewitching Secrets of Watercolor

The title is not mine, but a direct quote from "Watercolors of Winslow Homer: The Color of Light" by Martha Tedeschi, et al., from a show at the Art Institute of Chicago.

In my last post I mentioned 'reveling in materials' as a motivation of myself and I think of many artists. You can say all you want about artists thoughts and writings, even my own thoughts and writings, but often it comes down to something much more simple: a great enjoyment in experimenting with the materials of art. My guess is that the same can be said for music.

In any case I was struck by this quote when I neared the end of the book today:

One can find here a metaphor for Homer's sustained relationship with watercolor itself. It was in this medium that the artist had conveyed his most immediate expressions and experiences while also clearly reveling in the beautiful effects that it alone allowed him to pursue. Over three decades of focused work and travel he had discovered the bewitching secrets of watercolor's unique marriage of color, water and light.


Homer was the master of 'reveling in the beautiful effects' of watercolor while at the same time being true to light, water, subject. It would be hard to find a better example for someone who wants to work in watercolor.

Dowitchers and Kinglets

The beautiful watercolors of Lars Jonsson and an uncooperative Ruby-crowned Kinglet, both mentioned yesterday, conspired together to get me to start a new watercolor today. The kinglet made another brief appearance but did so while I was busy with something else so I couldn't draw him. Rather than sit staring out the window waiting for him or other birds to appear at the feeder so I could work from life I decided to go back to working from photos.

I looked again at the Jonsson book yesterday and I think that pushed me towards watercolor for my new work. They are inspirational! This is the same dowitcher that appears in an earlier post as a charcoal drawing. In that post I said that it also might appear in a watercolor so here's the fulfillment of that 6 month old prediction.

I'll probably do more work on this but I'm stopping for today.
For now it's just great to be working again.

Winslow Homer - Baaad Example!

There is no doubt in my mind at all about who my favorite watercolor artist is: Winslow Homer. I couldn't say this about drawing or painting but I can about watercolor. So I was very happy to get a new Homer book for Christmas: 'Watercolors By Winslow Homer: The Color of Light' from my old haunt of the 1960s and early 1970s, the Art Institute of Chicago. While working my way through it today as I stared at some tentatively finished paintings in my studio I came across examples of his scraping and blotting to alter previously applied pigment. This is something I can use I thought.

A while later I decided to remove the staples that attached my 'Greater Blackbacked Gulls' watercolor from its stretcher board.

But after I had taken off a couple of staples I remembered what I'd said in an earlier post about the painting: it was really lacking in tonal variety. I'd also just read about how important tonal clarity was to Homer. As I looked at the painting I thought: What a dud!

So I went back to work on it, using scraping, blotting, erasing into wet paper, and variations on these to try to bring more tonal variety and clarity to the painting. I think that the new version is an improvement.

When I labeled this post 'Winslow Homer - Baaad Example' I of course wasn't criticizing Homer. My point is that the good example of quality art can persuade you to alter your own work, perhaps destroying it in the process. But that's really my artistic background. You work and work and work at a painting until it seems finished. For some artists this will be primarily a 'visual' finish. For others some other category/value is applied to determine finish. There have been many times where I've ruined a work by going back into it, sometimes with an idea that was brighter in my mind than when put into practice. But generally speaking you become a better artist by setting higher standards for yourself and not always settling for your first attempt at something.

But watercolor, particularly if you're new to it like I am, presents a dilemma. It's so easy to ruin the freshness of a watercolor by overwork. On the other hand Homer is a great example of ambition in watercolor. He shows you that you can go back into a watercolor and try to improve it, knowing that you may in fact ruin it, but also showing many great examples of exactly the opposite result. What a great example he sets for all watercolor artists!