Saturday, May 17, 2008

Little Houses

Worked on these houses, the road, the mountain and snow yesterday. I've put in and painted out the windows several times. The road color will not remain so bright.

I experimented with making the painting smaller than the canvas edge by placing masking tape on two sides. Of course in the end you'd have to remove the canvas from the stretchers and re-stretch it on the smaller sized frame.

I painted out the trees on the right and redid them. I prefer this color to the previous incarnation. I added snow. I like this pretty well except for the evergreen tree in the foreground. The color is still not right. I set this outside in the sun to dry and little black bugs got stuck on the paint.

I used some powdered pigment to make an oil paint glaze by mixing the pigment with linseed oil and damar varnish medium. Powdered pigment can be made into watercolor paint (add water and gum arabic), acrylic (add matte or gloss medium) or oil (add oil based medium.) I think that's pretty cool. See this previous post about Rousillon pigments.

I worked a bit more on this temple and added a top to it.

15 comments:

Andrea and Kim said...

Hi Suki!

It is lovely to see your works in progress...you are a beautiful artist to do that! The little houses are really great, and you have a nice perspective going there! If you found the right frame or had one made, you wouldn't have to re-stretch the canvas. It is an interesting idea. I know people do that with paper a lot, but the idea of doing it with canvas is also appealing.

LOL the bugs in your paint is kind of Pollock-esque, isn't it? Ah, why not? You know? I do like the new trees (liked the old ones too). You knew what you wanted there.

Now the temple...really wonderful! I love the bright, lovely colors. The paper is a perfect surface with some great mediums, too. Great work.

I also love the powdered pigments. What brand is that you are using? You can also get a nice effect if you sprinkle them...you kind of have to be cautious with the flying pigment...I wear a mask...and it sometimes likes to clump. I have found a double layer of cheesecloth works good, though.

Really nice work, Suki! You are always full of inspiration. Thank You.

Sara lechner said...

I like very much these paintings, suki, the colors and the simple form of the houses with their red, rust contrast. I also like the bright yellow of the road. It looks daring!
The combination of paint components is also interesting. They look really different than plain acrylics.
have a nice weekend!

sukipoet said...

Hey Kim. Thanks for looking at my paintings and all your kind words. The pigments are Rousillon. I did a post on them. sukipoet.blogspot.com/2007/12/just-wanted-to-paint.html.

Not sure if that will come thru. I only have earth tones. They came from France.

I picked the bugs out with tweezers.

Sara, thanks for stopping by. The road make me think of the song. "Follow the yellow brick road." I like the simple houses too. Snow is the hard thing to paint. Right now I'm thirsting to paint spring but I want to finish these paintings first.

sukipoet said...

Kim I added a link to a previous post mentioning the Rousillon pigments to the post above if you want to check it out. :)

Cris, Artist in Oregon said...

Great work here. I like how they are coming out. I told you that you didn't ruin your painting.
The green tree can be toned down some and it might make you feel better. Maybe add some yellow ocre to the green or gray it down some with the color compliment. Or add some of that color elsewheres. Lots of options..It isn't over till Suki says it is. :)
Thanks for sharing.

Cris, Artist in Oregon said...

Oh yes.. I forgot to mention the bottom work. Thats looking good too. Love the colors.

Anonymous said...

I love the temple! Thanks for stopping by my blog. I will be coming here often to check out your new work. :-).

Roxanne said...

I am no artist Suki, but I really do enjoy just watching the progressing in your work ...

Anonymous said...

Looks like you are still inspired from Røros :-)

sukipoet said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
~Babs said...

I am delighted by this painting!
The simplicity of the buildings, the bright color,,,oh, and I love the road,,,I also thought about 'yellow brick road', and smiled.

BTW: I think your windows look great,,,they're always hard for me,,,,well,,mostly I do abstract, but when I attempt windows, they're hard!

sukipoet said...

Hi Cris. Thanks for the suggestions re: working on the green. I keep forgetting i can tone things down and keep repainting the whole sheebang. I have to slow down a bit and wait when I don't like the way things turn out. I am almost done with two paintings though. This seems the hardest part. Just adding a dot or dab. Thanks for following along with me as i go through the process.

Anne, thanks for stopping by. the temple is fun to make and almost done. I am very very slow however so don't expect lots of new stuff every day as some folks have on their blogs.

Honor, both in artwork and in writing I think the process of creation is the most interesting thing. When the process is no longer interesting to me, then I put aside the piece or consider it done.

Britt-Arnhild, yes that town is very inspiring. I am so slow that I haven't worked on this painting for awhile so it might seem like I've dropped it but I havent.

Baabs, thanks for your kind words. Windows are hard and I keep wanting to put in more details yet really they need to be semi-abstracted and just indicated at least here I think.

marianne said...

I love how the paintings are coming along. Why are you making it smaller? Isn't it perfect the way it is?
I like both paintings, so nice to see them evolve.
The temple is from a fairy tale!

patti said...

The temple is gorgeous Suki and the colour in your painting of houses is so warm and beautiful.

I like the idea of pausing too. I started doing this in January after I read 'The Power of Now'. I begin at breakfast time and instead of tucking straight into my oatmeal, I pause and breathe. It's a good start to the day and a good habit to get into. We all go too fast to enjoy what's right in front of us.

sukipoet said...

Marianne, I probably will enlarge the painting again to the original size. I just wanted to try out that idea of making it smaller or larger at will within the frame of the stretchers of course. I read about that somewhere.
Thanks for your comments on the temple.

And you too Patti. I do think the houses pic is "warm", Maybe from a feeling of warmth by houses being so close together. That's great, the pause you take before eating. I think we esp eat too fast at least my born-with familily did.