He's finished

I worked as much as possible over the last three days on my new painting, Camouflage Casanova.  I really like him.  The water was a challenge to say the least, I hope that I did well.  I wonder what I will think in five years when I look at this painting again. 

Camouflage Casanova

I'm working on a new watercolor.  It's pushing me in ways that I really like.  I get nervous while I paint him and my heart pounds because this is new to me.  It's sort of like falling in love.....

I sketched him in graphite before getting started laying in his gorgeous plumage.

I stopped here because the kids were getting home from school, and I had a birthday dinner to prepare.  One of my son's turned 6 yesterday!  We had Homemade Macaroni and Cheese, a Moroccan Roast Chicken, and some Lemony Green Beans and Turnips.  Then, we ate the birthday cake, which I made yesterday, a Lemon Buttermilk Cake with Lemon Mascarpone Filling.  It was Delicious!

After we got the munchkins to bed, and I watched some brain rot TV, I sat down to paint again and pushed on to this point.  I like the way his beak looks, and I delivered his soul right before bed by finishing out his eye and adding the pupil.    I really like how he's coming along.  I'll add more later after I dance with him some more.

New Year

We had fun last night.  It got a little crazy, well, for us anyways. 

I woke up this morning far from the top of my game, yearning for coffee and glad that I don't generally drink very much.

I decided that it would be nice to pay homage to the mighty coffee bean, and started looking for reference material to work off of.  Started on a composition
 sketch for it, and this was the result:


I guess it will just have to remain a creative seed that has
yet to properly germinate.

I touched up The Flower Peddler, I like to leave my watercolors attached to the board for a few days because I inevitably see areas that can be further refined or elements that need "backed up" in the painting.

It might be time for another seascape, or time to try my hand with wildlife.  Sometimes the images flow from the brush, pencil or charcoal with peace and ease.  Other days, like today, it's a struggle to have a light touch.

I still feel like a rank amateur and am surprised by compliments that I receive on my paintings and drawings.  I do it because it comes from a place deep in my belly, an ache that wells up and eats at me until I quiet it down by losing myself in the solitude of creation.  I can't help but create.  It is my nature.

I wonder how I managed for ten years to do no art except for the rare sketch on some of the kids paper or a pallid and insipid Crayola watercolor that wrinkled the printer paper in a most unattractive way.  I think I must have used cooking as my creative outlet.  Now though, that I have a nice area set aside for me to use for art, new Escoda Kolinsky brushes, beautiful M. Graham pigments, a new desk etc. and so on, cooking feels like a chore! 

On that note, here is "The Flower Peddler"