Birthday Gift

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I had been looking forward to my birthday to claim this from my sweetheart. And now that he gave it to me I am just too happy! I received multiple things and this is the best - a colored pencil set all to myself!

I have done all the homework and ready to start my new project but I just want to make sure its perfect as I always imagined it to be. I can't really wait!

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Yellow Umbrella: Oil Painting

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I am delighted to have this painting realized(instead of saying finished)to the most of my efforts. As always I feel a mixed bag of emotions when a project is completed. Sense of accomplishment, conveyance of mood, and then emptiness for some unknown reasons. It happens pretty much every time. A void, a vacuum, something like that.

The journey of this project was full of surprises, encounters with nice people and an array of unexpected twists. The very idea of starting this project stemmed from my desire for originality, challenge and realism. So, I started looking for the appropriate subject and one day leafing through the pages of Portland I saw this picture that I would use as a reference.

Reference Photo

I guess it arrested me for it's uniqueness. It was all I was looking for. To paint a human in it's likeness sounded like a challenge for a novice like me. Plus it has color, mood, and sensitivity of a moment captured. So, I sought blessings of Tim Jewett to use his picture for my work and he gladly did.

Untitled
18 x 20
Oil on canvas

I was so excited to put my skills to work that first thing I did was to paint the woman. The rest of the work has been developed after and around her. It was not the most common thing to do, but I am glad I did that because once she came alive on the canvas, rest got painted all by itself.

Despite my efforts, I haven't found a suitable title for this work that took me nearly 2.5 months to finally get it off my canvas. Hope that changes soon. I borrowed the book from library and after multiple renewals, I had to return it back. I hoped to get it back in a few days but that never happened as the book got lost. It still is missing! Buying the book was prohibitively pricey. So, the project was forcibly suspended.

In August, I received an easel from hubby dear(xoxo - I heart you!) and I couldn't resist to work on it. It's around this time I had a light-bulb moment! I had taken a picture of the picture in the book and thought why not take a printout of that to see if that might work as a reference picture! I did and it did. I put up the canvas on easel and it was absolute fun to paint using this.

Once I developed this background after a couple of different combinations, inspiring from another picture of a rainy day I stopped on further build-up. I realized that has to be it.

I used only one brush for everything and seldom used any medium, just the paint. I think for the future projects I would need some more brushes but for now, this is just right. Before I end this post, I must mention that my work has been incomplete without art encounters with Steve Allrich and Lee Hammond via their books. They are very talented people.

Graphite Portrait in progress

Untitled
9" x 12"
Graphite on Bristol

I used a reference photo that was taken the day I had had my hair curled. It was a sunny afternoon and I wasn't too sure about this change.

In the portrait, I hoped to show the time of the day by light and dark areas. Also, there is an attempt to capture the conspicuous conscious smile. I have yet to sign and title this. Do you have any suggestion before I take this off of my workboard in a couple of days?

Break in Blogging

As most of you have noticed I am missing from the blogging scene for almost a month. There is a lot going on in real life that I am not able to justify the time set aside for this. All good though!

I hope to return in a short while and will post the finished and ongoing work. You all have fun and enjoy everything you love to do.

Charlize - Graphite Portrait

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"Charlize"
9.5 x 12
Graphite on newsprint





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Oranges - Graphite Pencil Sketch

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These are three stages of this sketch, made with graphite pencil #2B on newsprint. For a beginner, it's a great medium to practice with.


I loved using graphite because of two reasons: it's easily erasable and it's cheap.

I would like to use charcoal and graphite for future sketches but I'd prefer charcoal. We'll see. If you draw, what's your favorite?

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Indian Woman at Her Loom - Charcoal Sketch

Look closely. This picture had a unique quality - no real focal point for eye's movement. Viewer looks at the woman, the eye travels to the backdrop, rests on the fabric on the loom and gets back to the woman. Isn't that interesting. It was a small colored picture and I thought it would make a great subject for the following reasons:

One, the sunlit woman gives immense opportunity for my favorite light and shadow play. The background is so pitch dark that the picture exudes Sun's warmth.
Two, after the initial sketch, I realized there is no real backdrop in this frame and hence imagination got wings.
Three, I never drew a human in any of my recent works, so I guess that must have guided me to this.
Four, the folds of the fabric are very engaging. So, although there is no real silhouette of the woman and yet the folds convey the shape and the time of the day.

Indian Woman at Her Loom
9" x 12"
Charcoal pencil on paper

Supplies:
General brand HB pencils #2, #4, #6, and white
Canson brand Premium Cream Medium Tooth paper
Prismacolor brand fixative

Afterthoughts

I think it will take me a little while to really appreciate this one for couple or three reasons, as I move forward with charcoal sketches, my own bar is rising. Every piece has to be better than the previous one or atleast the same quality. In this case, I am not so sure what shall I compare this with. I cannot judge it against a landscape (duh!) or with anything I have done before.

I think this one has better sense of reproduction than many others I did. It is, however, the one in which I had hard time figuring out when to stop. I think that eventually happens when artist try to make arrangements.

What do you think?

World Drawing Day

This is what I am working on to celebrate World Drawing Day. I started this piece couple or three days back in a hope to finish it today.




It is of a Tangkhul (Indian) woman at her loom, beginning what will eventually become an exquisite garment.

It's taken from this book.

Dancing Dolls Red Sweater

I am so glad to finally have this post put together to publish!


This sweater was made only for its sentimental value. My mother made red crewneck pullover when I was younger. The sweater still fits me so I wear it occasionally. She gave me the leftover yarns last year. And I made this for my little angel. Her is more crayon-inspired, just so you know!

Now both of us can wear same colored sweaters made by our mothers. How cool is that!



Technical Details

This is a machine knit piece and the dolls pattern is taken from this with slight modifications. Sweater is my original design and the pattern is available for free to anyone who asks.

Golden Gate Bridge

I am thrilled to type this as my 99th post. For the special 100th I shall have something equally special. In the meantime, I finished another sketch. Here it is -

This is Point Isabel regional Shoreline, Richmond. A former railway trestle bridges the slough feeding Hoffman marsh (foreground), one of the best saltmarsh remnants on the Central Bay, that I reproduced from the book San Francisco Bay Portrait of an Estuary.


Golden Gate Bridge
9" x 12"
Charcoal pencil on paper

Supplies:
General brand HB pencils #2, #4, and #6
Canson brand Premium Cream Medium Tooth paper
Prismacolor brand fixative


Side by side comparison

It caught my eye for its subtlety. I had been meaning to draw golden gate bridge for some time. When I saw this picture I thought its perfect giving quite unique perspective of the bridge. I was intrigued enough to draw it.

I cropped the reference picture to fit it to a satisfactory level of composition. Making sure the foreground leads to the railway trestle bridge, the focal point, I tried to induce the depth. To accentuate the warmth of the morning sun, made the shadows pitch dark. The golden gate appears in the far off background. So it was necessary to have the feel of distance & three dimensionality. Barring some (in)conspicuous omissions overall essence of the picture is recreated.

It was a fun exercise. I, however, spent little more time than I should. But I think, with practice, I will improve on that. Considering it was my first in terms of reproduction of a charcoal sketch from a colored picture it definitely gave me a few ponderworthy moments. We live for that, don't we?

Last words

I have changed the clouds since the posting of this entry to just a slight hint and that gives a better outlook. I will post pics when I can and you can judge it yourself.

The Kentucky Mine - Charcoal Sketch

I recently had a chance to revisit my oldest hobby. To draw with pencil on paper. As a child, I would sketch on my notebooks using HB pencils. Over the years, like for most people, this hobby diminished or lets say gave way to other creative outlets. Coming back to pencil drawing seemed very natural to me especially because this time I was well equipped with the inspiration, information, and the tools. Steve Allrich mentioned in his book to practice the drawing on an everyday basis and I finally took the advice last week on.

I used the picture below as the reference photo for the desired sketch



It's been taken from this book. Here is my rough draft where you can see the basic composition is drawn, negative spaces are marked, object of focus is shaded and the background is laid. The tree in the foreground is sketched to a basic silhouette.


This is the final drawing that I think is complete.

The Kentucky Mine north of Sierra City
9" x 12"
Charcoal pencils on paper

Supplies:
General brand HB pencils #2, #4, and #6
Canson brand Premium Cream Medium Tooth paper
Prismacolor brand Fixative


Side by side comparison


Overall I am happy with the output. The composition is right, however, the sketch has varied from the original picture. The mine structure has shrunk considerably. The tree has further moved to the foreground with obvious shade. The dry grass under the tree pushes the mine back into the center. But the idea is, if you hide the photo, and look at the work alone, you can see the mood of very sunny and warm afternoon is well conveyed. And that's all matters.

This was an experiment to judge the contrasts of light and dark and I think, I got that right!

All for the love for drawing

I just finished a charcoal on paper sketch. And gosh am I happy with it! My very first charcoal FO that I copied from a black and white picture. I will post the pics soon. I am on a lookout for a good quality fixative that won't darken my stuff. If any of the readers of this post have any info, please pass it on.


Info for self

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Picture-Framing-Art-3673/2009/4/Framing-charcoal-sketches.htm

Love to knit in Public?

Well, what do you know -

http://www.wwkipday.com/

And I thought I was addicted until I met crazier than thou crowds who would spend ridiculous amount of time and money on knitting. It was about time when I took a step back and reassessed the priorities. Wham! And I know there are other things too.

But I am sure for many this is a great opportunity to show (off) and tell.

Stash, Spring II, New Stuff

I am glad to report that all my knitted projects are complete with entire bulky yarn stash used up right before Spring. I have some left overs (that green yarn)and some chenille that I am saving for something in future. All things are well packed and put away in a box. I have moved on with painting and may return back to some fiber arts in Fall.

The current project is Spring II which is nearly complete. So another FO for a busy mommy! Yay...

Now I am waiting for the right concept for the next painting - all fueled up with the recently gained knowledge. I know I want some landscape or something like that to paint where I can describe the clear contrasts of light and dark. But first, have to make sure I am super clear about the concept so that it may be conveyed lucidly.

“Enthusiasm is excitement with inspiration, motivation, and a pinch of creativity.” - Bo Bennett

Oil Painting for the Serious Beginner - Take II

I finished the book. It's more than what I expected. Well written, to-the-point, compact, and definitely not just for a beginner! It has everything a serious beginner would like to know. Aptly titled, it's a great resource for the novice and experienced alike.

I almost fell in love with this one and wasn't surprised when I received my own copy as a mother's day gift.

I will recommend this book to anyone who has interest and asks for a reference. I also have thanked the author for this one and yet to hear back from him. In the meantime, I am working on the advice I received in the book about practice, experimentation and the sincerity of effort.

"The happiest people don't necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the best of everything they have." --Ari Berstein

Stranger than Fiction

What was I thinking when I got this DVD to watch! That pretty much sums up the entire movie.

Movie begins with the narration of life of Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) an IRS employee in minute details, such as when he gets up, how he brushes his teeth etc etc. And you wait this to stop as the movie progresses, right? But no, it gets a weird turn. Harold starts to listen to everything. Wait, what?! Exactly! I wasn't sure what's happening, either.

Anyways, there is an author (Emma Thompson) who is writing a story that resembles in every detail to Harold's real life and she also happens to be the mystery narrator. How does she narrate it because she doesn't know him, not clear! But one thing is clear that she kills the main character in all her best-sellers.

With the help of a college professor, Jules Hilbert (Dustin Hoffman) Harold finds her and decides to meet her to request a change in the end. That seems hard for her to do as this is her masterpiece. Professor seconds her and suggests Harold to die rather than her changing the end of the story. Is this some kind of joke or what?

I shall rather stop here. You decide if you'd like to watch it! I wish I hadn't.

Oil Painting for the Serious Beginner

I had been thinking about taking some formal painting lessons lately. To warm up, I checked out a few painting books from the local library. They seemed well-written but could not hold my interest for long as they seem to cover a vast topic in just one book, an attempt that leaves many key issued unattended. Such as covering all media reflects author's wide knowledge-base but was of little practical use for me as I am seeking help in getting the fundamentals of oil painting in terms of the role of value and composition. I am a beginner who seem to have a grasp on drawing the correct proportions effortlessly. So, I read and returned a few without having much impact until I found this one by Steve Allrich.

It has pretty much everything I was looking for. And I am not even finished with the first chapter! I am sure this book would be an excellent resource for all my art-questions.

Here is his blog.

And here is the Artist's Statement from his blog.

Frida Kahlo Mexican Painter

I am stunned by the work of Frida everytime I look at it. She is one of the artists who is a genuine representative of painting. She is so honest with her work that it hurts. Had she been a writer her writing would make you rethink about the autobiographies that you've ever read. The heart-wrenching bare realities told with tearing truth would have made you shocked and sad at the same time. Such is her style. I have never seen an artist's work so flawless, intriguing and compelling as of her.

She was born and raised in Mexico and was way ahead of her times in everything she pursued. No wonder her work seem so contemporary that you'd wonder why she is placed in history! She mostly painted her own portraits and every single one has a story to tell.




Frida's Biography

Here is the biography of her which is not from this book but good to know just in case you'd like to know.
[Source: http://www.leninimports.com/frida_kahlo_bio.html]
Frida's life began and ended in Mexico City, in her home known as the Blue House. She gave her birthdate as July 7, 1910, but her birth certificate shows July 6, 1907. Frida claimed this so because she wanted the year of her birth to cooincide with the year of the outbreak of the Mexican revolution, because her life would begin with the birth of modern Mexico.

At age 6, Frida was stricken with polio, which caused her right leg to appear much thinner than the other. It was to remain that way permanently.

When Frida entered high school she was a tomboy full of mischief who became the ringleader of a rebellious group of mainly boys that continually caused trouble in the National Preparatory School. This group pulled many pranks, mainly on professors. It was also in the National Preparitory School that Frida first came in contact with her future husband, the famous Mexican muralist, Diego Rivera. He was commissioned to paint a mural in the school's auditorium.

On September 17, 1925, when she was 18, she was riding a bus in Mexico City when it was struck by a trolley car. A metal handrail pierced her abdomen, exiting through her vagina. Her spinal column was broken in three places. Her collarbone, some ribs, and her pelvis were broken, and her right leg was fractured in 11 places. Her foot was dislocated and crushed. No one thought she would live, much less walk again, but, after a month in the hospital, she went home. Encased for months in plaster body casts, Kahlo began to paint lying in bed with a special easel rigged up by her mother. With the help of a mirror, Kahlo began painting her trademark subject: herself. Of the 150 or so of her works that have survived, most are self-portraits. As she later said, "I paint myself because I am so often alone, because I am the subject I know best."

Although Frida's recovery was miraculous (she regained her ability to walk), she did have relapses of tremendous pain and fatigue all throughout her life, which caused her to be hospitalized for long periods of time, bedridden at times, and also caused her to undergo numerous operations. She once joked that she held the record for the most operations. Frida underwent about 30 in her lifetime. She also turned to alcohol, drugs, and cigarettes to ease the pain of her physical suffering.

Once she was out and about after her accident, a close friend introduced Frida to the artistic crowd of Mexico, which included Tina Modotti (well known photographer, actress, and communist) and Diego Rivera.

Diego and Frida were married on August 21,1929. Their marriage consisted of love, affairs with other people, creative bonding, hate, and a divorce in 1940 that lasted only for one year. Their marriage has been called the union between an elephant and a dove, because Diego was huge and very fat, and Frida was small (a little over 5 feet) and slender.

Despite Diego's affairs with other women (one was with Frida's sister), he helped in many ways. Kahlo shared Rivera's faith in communism and passionate interest in the indigenous cultures of Mexico. Rivera encouraged Kahlo in her work, extolling her as authentic, unspoiled and primitive, and stressing the Indian aspects of her heritage. During this period "Mexicanidad," the fervent embrace of pre-Hispanic Mexican history and culture, gave great currency to the notion of native roots. At the same time, being seen as a primitive provided an avenue for recognition for a few women artists. Kahlo, who had Indian blood on her mother’s side, was of Hungarian-Jewish descent on her father’s side. Although initially a self-taught painter, she was, through her relationship with Rivera, soon travelling in the most sophisticated artistic circles. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine that anyone who shared Rivera’s life could have remained artistically naive.

Presumably because it generated respect and imparted credibility in the art world, Kahlo encouraged the myth of her own primitiveness—in part by adopting traditional Mexican dress—and it stayed with her throughout her career.

During her lifetime, Kahlo did not enjoy the same level of recognition as the great artists of Mexican muralism, Rivera, Orozco, and Siqueiros. However, over the last two decades that has changed and today Kahlo’ s idiosyncratic, intensely autobiographical work is critically and monetarily as prized as that of her male peers, sometimes more so.

Her paintings, rooted in 19th-century Mexican portraiture, ingeniously incorporated elements of Mexican pop culture and pre-Columbian primitivism that, in the 1930s, had never been done before. Usually small, intimate paintings that contrasted with the grand mural tradition of her time, her work was often done on sheet metal rather than canvas, in the style of Mexican street artists who painted retablos, or small votive paintings that offer thanks to the Virgin Mary or a saint for a miraculous deliverance from misfortune.

Frida let out all of her emotions on a canvas. She painted her anger and hurt over her stormy marriage, the painful miscarriages, and the physical suffering she underwent because of the accident.

Kahlo who was so proud of her luxurious facial hair that she painted it right on to her self-portraits.

Frida, despite all of the hurt in her life, was an outgoing person whose vocabulary was filled with 4 letter words. She loved to drink tequila and sing off color songs to guests at the crazy parties she hosted. She loved telling dirty jokes and shocking everyone around her. Frida amazed people with her beauty and everywhere she went, people stopped in their tracks to stare in wonder.

Rivera, a dedicated Trotskyite, used his clout to petition the Mexican government to give Trotsky and his wife asylum after they were forced out of Norway. Rivera and Kahlo put up the Trotskys in Kahlo's family home. (She painted a self-portrait dedicated to him that now hangs in Washington's NMWA.)

After Trotsky was assassinated, however, Kahlo turned on her old lover with a vengeance, claiming in an interview that Trotsky was a coward and had stolen from her while he stayed in her house (which wasn't true). "He irritated me from the time that he arrived with his pretentiousness, his pedantry because he thought he was a big deal," she said. . Frida was later arrested for his murder, but was let go. Diego was also under suspicion for the murder, but he was let go as well. Several years after Trotsky's death, Diego and Frida enjoyed telling people that they invited him to Mexico just to get him killed, but no one knows if they were telling the truth or not. They were fantastic story tellers.

The fact is that Kahlo turned on Trotsky because she had become a devout Stalinist. Kahlo continued to worship Stalin even after it had become common knowledge that he was responsible for the deaths of millions of people, not to mention Trotsky himself. One of Kahlo's last paintings was called Stalin and I, and her diary is full of her adolescent scribblings ("Viva Stalin!") about Stalin and her desire to meet him.

All over the world, people loved Frida. When she went to France, she was wined and dined by Picasso, and appeared on the cover of the French Vogue. In America, people loved her beauty and her work. In Mexico, her homeland, she had many great admirers.

Frida only had one exhibition in Mexico and it was in the spring of 1953. Frida's health was very bad at this time and doctors told her not to attend. Minutes after guests were allowed into the gallery, sirens were heard outside. The crowd went crazy, for outside there was an ambulance accompanied by a motorcycle escort. Frida Kahlo was being carried from it into her exhibition on a hospital stretcher! The photographers and reporters were shocked. She was placed in her bed in the middle of the gallery. The mob of people went to greet her. Frida told jokes, entertained the crowd, sang, and drank the whole evening. The exhibition was an amazing success.

During the same year as her exhibition, Frida had to have her right leg amputated below the knee due to a gangrene infection. This caused her to become deeply depressed and suicidal.

She attempted suicide a couple of times. In 1954, suffering from pneumonia, Kahlo went to a Communist march to protest the U.S. subversion of the left-wing Guatemalan government. Four days later, she died in what may or may not have been a suicide. No official autopsy was done.

Her last words in her diary read "I hope the leaving is joyful and I hope never to return".

The Visitor Stats

I look at the closed poll of the visitors' stats in terms of their inclination towards arts and here are the results -

Painters 15%
Knitters 69%
Crafters 38%

It's not adding to a 100% because some people fall into more than one category. Interesting stats indeed. I am so glad I have some very talented people visiting my blog and making their presence felt by their kind comments and tips.

Painter's Block

I am not sure if something like this even exists but that's exactly what I am encountering for the Spring II.

Spring II started off without much in mind with a vine of green leaves. Then two pink flowers appeared from nowhere sometime later. And that's when the block resisted the progress.

I am not sure if I want to add more of the small pinks, or a round crimson red poppy or a few buds of sunflower. Or all of the above amid a cluster of cerulean, sap greenish leaves.