Online wattercolor class

I hadn’t done much painting this year, since all the art classes had been canceled due to the pandemic.  No trips to John C. Campbell Folk School or weekend workshops at Spruill, or classes at OCAF or Lyndon House.   I really needed the push to paint that a class provides.  We meet once a week for four weeks online, and uploaded our finished work to a shared space were we could comment and discuss the paintings.  

The class focus was on using water to controlling how the paint moves on the paper.  We practiced adding very wet paint to dry and wet paper.  Adding dry paint to wet paper.  Using a dry brush to remove water and paint from the paper.

Then we painted a landscape from a photo.  I roughly sketched in the buildings and edges of the field.  I wet the sky and painted a morning sky with red and yellow.  I painted in the field where the light was reflecting off the wet grass.  I painted the buildings where the rising sun was casting long shadows.

I painted the dark tree line and used a dry brush to pick up pigment from the tree tops.  

I painted the grasses in the foreground, leaving  some areas white for the flowers.  Finally, I added more shadows.

Next we painted a white dogwood flower.  The only thing defining the white flower are the shadows.  They are soft, but need to be dark enough to give the petals shape.  

For the center we practiced negative painting.  Painting the dark spaces between the yellow pistils.  

Finally we used dark paint for the background letting the colors mix.  The darker the background the more the flower shows up.  Too dark or the wrong mix of colors creates a muddy background.

For the third painting we painted a humming bird.    These birds have distinctive color patterns and shape.  The position of the head, placement of the bill and eye all need to be correct.

The tips of the wings are indistinct and a trail follows the wings to suggest movement. The pose of the bird suggests reaching up, so I added an orange trumpet vine flower.

The background was painted wet on wet, allowing the colors to mix.  The darker shades around the flower and bird help define their shapes.

For my final painting I selected a photo of a pink azalea.  I used one red and one blue pigment for the flower.  

The lighter pink shades are made by mixing more water with the red paint.  

The shadows are made by mixing blue into the red paint. 

The background was painted wet on wet and has indistinct green leaves and additional pinkish flowers.