365 Days of Art – Day 29

Posted on January 29, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….making up for my non-painting days

Carla Sonheim’s post the other day had us use the scraping method to make a random blob shape onto watercolour paper and then look for shapes or designs to bring out with marker. This was a lot of fun.

For some reason I saw birds and cats. I hate drawing cats, only because I don’t think I’m very good at it, so I did the two birds first. In the first blob I saw an eagle with a fish in his mouth and the second one was a random mythical bird with an angry look. Then I tackled the cat drawings. One is of a cat sleeping and the other is a cat from the back side.

365 Days of Art – Days 27 and 28

Posted on January 29, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….finishing with my renovation and painting beets

One of the things that I needed to do was finish putting together my set of drawers for all my art papers and art pads, palettes, plexiglass pieces, paper trimmers, assorted papers and magazines for collage and the 101 bits and pieces of stuff that I have collected over the years for my art. So one of my art days was taken up with assembling the drawers and organizing my materials.

Once that was done I was able to sit down and paint another pattern from Lisa Congdon’s class over at Creative Bug. This one is a pattern of beets. On the weekend I finally purchased a set of gouache paints. They’re a little more opaque than watercolours. These patterns aren’t as easy as Lisa makes them look. I definitely need more practice.

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365 Days of Art – Photo Study #2

Posted on January 27, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..Day 26

After taking numerous photos of Lucy, the Bassett hound, my granddaughter wanted me to take some photos of her. Funny how the dog was easier to photograph. Winnie makes a lot of sudden moves whereas the dog was happy to just sleep on the couch. Nonetheless it was fun taking shots from different angles and Winnie loved looking at the photos.

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365 Days of Art – A Photo Study

Posted on January 26, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..day 25

In Carla Sonheim’s year-long on-line class the prompt today was to take 11 photos of the same object. My granddaughter and I decided to should use Lucy, their basset hound, as my subject. This is a slight departure from the drawings and paintings that I do but I do consider photography an art form as well.

365 Days of Art – Day 24

Posted on January 25, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..spent most of the day on the road and in Collingwood

My husband had a meeting with clients in Collingwood today so I decided to accompany him on the trip. While he was with his clients I spent time walking up and down the Main Street of Collingwood, taking photographs and checking out some of the stores. After awhile I stepped into a lovely little coffee shop and treated myself to a flat white. I had to ask what it was and it sounded interesting so I ordered it. Delicious!

I brought my sketch book with me and some markers. It was the perfect place to practise my one-liners. Carla Sonheim wanted us to make several one-liners of birds, cats, potted plants or flowers, shoes and houses. For those of you unfamiliar with one-liners, you literally draw an object without taking the pen off the paper until you’ve finished the drawing. It should be loose and free flowing. They’re fun to do but sometimes a bit frustrating. My favourite are the flowers and houses. Here are a few pages that I worked on in the cafe.

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365 Days of Art – Geometric Doodle

Posted on January 24, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….day 24

I went back to Creative Bug and decided to attempt another pattern done in watercolour. This one was pretty open ended. Lisa Congdon encouraged us to try and not copy her piece but come up with our own colours and shapes. I think I’d like to try this with acrylics next time or maybe even do one in collage.

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365 Days of Art – “I’m a Circle”

Posted on January 24, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..day 23

In Carla Sonheim’s on-line class today the prompt was ‘I’m a circle’. She provided a link that showed the origins of the yellow smiley face. If you’re interested go here.

I decided to continue practising painting free hand with watercolour and of course I chose the circle. I purposely overlapped the circles to see how the watercolours would react and then I drew in the smiley faces in-between the circles.

365 Days of Art – Painting Without Brushes

Posted on January 22, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..Days 20 and 21

In Carla Sonheim’s on-line class we were instructed to create a still life using a scraping technique using an old credit card. Any left over paint on the card could be scraped off onto another piece of paper that could be used in future projects.

I loved this process. My brush pens didn’t give me the desired effect that Carla was looking for so I used the credit card to make all my marks. Jill Kuhn also used bubble wrap to stamp on some colour and I really liked that so I tried that as well. The flowers go off the page in this piece so the vase and the pear are the focal points of this still life. I know that I’m going to experiment with this technique some more. It’s very addictive. I even really like the art paper I created from the left over paint.

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365 Days of Art – Day 19

Posted on January 20, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..I’m truly caught up

Today I spent time developing a piece of art around the theme “Target Animals”, except that I opted not to make an animal. Instead I made a completely abstract piece. You might see an animal or some kind of character in my design but that was not intentional. This assignment is part of Carla Sonheim’s year-long on-line art class.

I used marker and acrylic paint on 185 lb. acrylic paper by Canson. It is 9 x 12 inches in size. The background is actually a lot whiter. I really need to take photos of my art in natural daylight.

365 Days of Art – A Study in Patience

Posted on January 18, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….on day 17 I finally attempted the exercise that Carla Sonheim assigned last week

When I saw this assignment, called Target: Animals I was immediately reminded of Norval Morrisseau, an indigenous painter from Canada. When I was teaching I introduced this wonderful painter’s work to my students and we painted our own favourite animals in a similar style which we called X-ray paintings.

The assignment involves producing circles and painting target rings inside each with different colours of acrylic paint. This is where the patience comes in because each colour has to dry before you start the next. I was fine at the beginning but as the circles got smaller and I finished sooner I barely waited long enough before I added the next colour. I think it’s somewhat evident in some of my circles.

Where do I go from here? I’ve been debating with myself as to whether I follow the assignment exactly as taught or if I put my own spin on it. I think I will do the latter because the animals that I’ve seen produced look too much like Morrisseau’s work. They’re lovely but I need to try and be more original.

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