Color

Color Studies


Color studies for a tomato.


Creating color studies has been long, boring, and tedious... then again mixing paint can be exciting.

It can also be terrifying when you realized you just wasted a large amount of expensive watercolor paint to end up with a color you don't want.  So make sure to put a swatch in your color studies swatch book, and note which colors, proportions, brands, etc.,


I remembered that I had fresh on the vine tomatoes in my kitchen...


In the end color mixing and creating all of those swatches has become well worth the effort.  The last time I did any serious color studies, that involved mixing my own paints, etc., was a good twenty plus years ago.

If you've never mixed colors before I highly recommend doing so, there are plenty of color mixing books available in the art book market to help get you started.

Color


I've finally hit that point, the one where I can no longer remember which colors are in my watercolor palettes so tonight I made a color map in a notebook for future reference.


I made maps for the first three palettes tonight, and as I was doing so I started wishing I had one of those huge palettes, the kind that holds 36+ pans. I have gobs of tubes of paint that are never used because there's no room in my current palettes for them to live.


My latest acquisition, a Pima watercolor palette.  The colors are numbered so it's hard telling what the actual colors are, am hoping I will find out someday what they are, I like them they're bright clear colors.

Junkin in June


More washi tape, from my favorite source Pixi's in Gilbert, IA. I have to admit that keeping a personal journal has become a lot more fun now that I've started incorporating all of those elements I've been collecting, but had no place in my regular artwork!  


Picked these up from one of the vendors at JB Knacker in Gilbert, IA this afternoon during their annual Junkin in June event!  


My watercolor issue resolved now that I've been reminded that I own sets of Caran D'Ache's Aquarelle watercolor crayons as I wasn't looking forward to replacing 20 year old dried up tubes of watercolor paints anytime soon!  Now that I'm using my aquarelle's again I can take my time and buy the colors I need preferably on sale as sets or as single tubes.

Studio Purge and Color Wheels



On Purging and Creating: I decided to take the month of June off from creating, etc., with the exception of the Art Walk here in Ames on June 6th, to focus on paring down my studio.  I've already started lining up local artists that are interested in my excess fabric, wool and silk fibers, oh and the yarn!  I have to say it's exciting, very exciting.

I had hit the wall and that wall was I cannot create anymore until I get rid of the excess in my studio it is weighing me down.  So out it goes so that I can move forward with my new Canyonland Series, and my collections for licensing.

Watercolor on Bristol board with Sumi Brush

On Color Wheels:  I love certain colors, and I tend to work ONLY with those colors in my work.  After twenty years of producing work I've decided that this is ok and these are my signature colors.  So I've been busy making color wheels in watercolor, acrylic paint, and with natural dyes, and how I achieved those colors so that they are repeatable.


On Planning:  Something I got from Lisa Call a couple of weeks ago that has lit a fire under my can is this:  "Planning is Defining the Dream!"  I started working on my business plan again, laying out the road map to where I want to go and have began planning how I want/hope to get there, and doing so has lit a new fire within me.

Fall Colours


September is drawing to an end, so thought I would post some fall colours!


Rust on hand dyed cotton fabric.
 
I do believe I dyed this with MX dyes back around 1994,  before I became allergic.  Anyway, I love the colors of this piece, as the leaves start to change I will take some photos, do some color studies and use some of this fabric as it's wanting to be stitched and oh so badly.

Beading Resumes


Was starting to make mistakes so decided to take the rest of the day off from writing and started beading instead.  Am working on the branch portion now, trying to integrate it as part of the whole piece.


More bead soups, this time greens, browns, and brownish purples so as to look like an actual branch in my crabapple tree.




Ok I know I've shown this last one before, multiple times actually, but I sooooooo love this color combination!  The only colors that make me even more happy are sage greens, purple sages, and golden greens.  It's hard to explain... except to tell you to go hang out on the open prairie in the fall.

Inset Panel for Window


Had to wait until the sun went down but here's the inset panel, I covered it in a natural cotton muslin on both sides.  I plan to paint some fabric tomorrow for the next inset panel that will be going into the dining room window.  After we finish that window we have one more window, an oval window, to work on and we are done.