Category: color

Sunflowers from Underneath

Under the Sunflowers (c)2011Dora Sislian Themelis
12×16 Watercolor Lanaquarelle paper

Here’s a different view of  the sunflowers, from the underside. I thought this was a different angle with different color scheme. Not the typical full face of flowers. I like to shake things up with composition once in a while. Not really into the ordinary or the typical.

Whether this works or not doesn’t really matter. Remembering it’s the process that counts, I painted this with those words in mind.

Process, baby.

Yes, in between I had my distractions. Who doesn’t need a distraction now and then? I most certainly do. Otherwise I could head for the lounge chair in the garden and just gaze at the world. That would be nice, if I didn’t feel guilty to do that.

Painting is work. Lounging is not, unless I call that thinking. So I paint.

A Distraction for Friday

 A Distraction

Oh man, I had to get away from that last painting with something that didn’t need to make any sense!
I went out into the backyard garden with the watercolors determined to get away to a far away place. Planted out under the crabapple tree are these late blooming, salmon azaleas among other flowers and potted planters.

Twenty minutes was all I wanted and I did it. Done. I really didn’t care what I came away with as far as a finished product. Back in the saddle people! A little too washy in some spots, but who cares anyway? I mixed up some pleasing colors, threw them down on the paper with no objective other than the process of painting something, anything.

A little secret: on the other half of this paper was the dance party painting. It took all I had not to paint right over it. Would have been some kind of satisfying though.

Word for Wednesday is Wow

So, with the idea to tweak these photos from a lovely commenter from yesterday’s post, here they are.  This is the way the hydrangeas were meant to be seen!  And yes the word is WOW! 

I forgot all about the image adjusting program on the computer and was relying on the camera.  I guess I just felt like ranting.  Sometimes I think my monitor is not calibrated correctly and my photos might be too dark.  But hey, who cares?  Right now I am in heaven looking at the color of these petals!  Yes, sir.  This is how they’re supposed to look. 

Ideas are running through my head now.  Which to paint first?  Yippee!

Fun with Photos, Not

There he is again.  The yellow goldfinch that likes to come by my pink coneflowers, or echinacea, flew in yesterday afternoon to eat some seeds.  These birds are so skittish they won’t let me peek at them from my kitchen door.  I grabbed my camera soon as I saw this one and snapped this picture from the kitchen window, through the screen.  It’s the best I could do to capture the bird.  The Mr. gets so excited to hear these birds were here.  He raises finches and canaries, but this one is special.  What a beautiful color he is!
Yesterday I had to clip these huge hydrangea because some animal must have fallen on the branches and many were broken.  I gathered some and arranged then in a vase on my patio table.  They are stunning.  This morning as I was writing my Morning Pages, yes I’m still doing that, don’t ask anything else, I had the impulse to take a couple of photos to remember the deep blue color.  The edges of the petals were trimmed in a teal green and were very striking.
This photo looks nothing like the flowers!  I couldn’t get the camera to darken so the true blue could show.  Nope, nothing I do would allow me to capture the colors of these flowers.  Ok, whatever.  I tried every angle and the automatic camera kept lightening the picture.  Thanks alot.

This is not what the hydrangea look like at all.  I guess it’s going to be a fun day so far if this is how my morning started out.

Yarn to The Rescue

I was too tired to drag myself to Holy Week services last night. Trying to keep a meatless/dairyless fast is not easy.  Maybe vegans can do it, but that’s not my bunch.  This afternoon I’m definitely going.  The service today is Holy Unction and the worshippers are annointed with blessed oil for healing.  Two services are performed today and the afternoon is less hectic than the evening.  Ok, people bring their crying, screaming children in the afternoon, but I think I can block them out and be in my own zone for an hour or so.  And I could always use some healing.
It’s just impossible to do much art related endeavors while my mind is busy focusing on each coming day this week.  I’m not resisting just distracted, edgy, and tired.  The way I’ve been able to slow down the rushing moments and float away is by looking at yarn.  I ordered some really colorful yarn for something and time stops when I look at the color, feel the texture, and play with it on my needles.  Time stands still for that moment.  I know I could look at my paints and those colors, my new watercolor paper, but then I might find myself painting and losing valuable time being lost in that!  We’ll never eat dinner!
Yarn is available, within reach, and not too time consuming.  My stash sits in a big basket next to my little dream corner couch and I can take a few minutes out to get to it.  Isn’t the color of this yarn delicious?  It’s amazing in person too.  I had a certain thing in mind when I ordered it, but it’s not the right gauge.  There’s no way I’m returning it though.  I’ll do something else with it.  In the meantime, I ordered another few skeins of a different brand, a better gauge, with better maintenance and great color, online anyway.  Gotta have color!  It better be great color when I get it, too.  Otherwise I’ll have to order something else.  
So it’s Wednesday and the week is close to over.  It better be over soon or I’ll be up to my eyeballs in yarn.