What Does it Take to create a good painting?


Some days it takes more than others!  Just thought I would share this pile of discards as these are what it took to paint the successful image.  Sometimes the paintings just flow off the brush, other days it is a struggle.  After not painting for some time I have to relearn!!  It is best to" keep your brush in the water"We always see artists successful paintings in the gallery, we don't see what it took to get them to that point. In the end I love this painting, so it was worth the effort to keep trying until I got what I wanted.

I just took a workshop with Bev Jozwiak at Kanuga Watermedia Workshops.  These are a few of the paintings I did there. Bev paints on hot press paper, which I had not really tried before.  Needless to say I learned a lot!  Using her techniques with thicker paint, darker paint, and the brushes she paints with helped with the learning curve!

Inspiration, then creation

Every time I walked past this room I was so interested in the sunlight and shadows created by the blinds.  Just looking at the photo doesn't convey that much interest or the feeling of warmth, but I really wanted to paint it.  So after considering how to paint it I tried two different techniques.  The first painting I did using tape batik, the second I painted on gesso applied to watercolor paper.  I wanted you to see this as so often I hear people lament that they don't travel, can't find anything to paint.  Truly ordinary objects, items that are around us all of the time can create beautiful paintings.