Even Unwanted Kittens are Cute

Can You See Me? 10 x 10" Watercolor and Inktense Pencil on
Canvas by Tracy Feldman

Yesterday, I looked out my front door to see this cutie asleep in one of my hanging planters.  He's one of the new crop of feral kittens that have been born in our community this summer.  Like all of his brethren, he is adorable. But ... he's squishing the succulents I put in that hanging basket, and he's going to present another danger to the local birds and other fauna.  Even so, I couldn't resist photographing, sketching and then painting him.  

    Painting him also gave me a great excuse to play with the new Derwent Inktense Pencils my sister gave me.  Derwent describes these pencils by saying, "Pencil to ink in just one wash!".  I knew from my sister that the colors would get very intense when you put water on them, so I started with laying down a light watercolor wash and then added the pencils for intensity and precision.  Although they are in theory permanent after they dry, they're not really intended to be put on a primed canvas, so I wasn't sure how permanent they would be. Also, watercolors definitely are NOT permanent on canvas without being treated, so like with others of my watercolors on canvas, I gave this little painting a quick spray of a clear coat to protect it from water, wear, and the fading effects of sun.  I hope you like it as much as I did painting it.  I'm going to put it up for auction in my DailyPaintworks.com gallery.http://www.dailypaintworks.com/buy/auction/403123

Crown of Crocus -- Springtime in my Garden

Crown of Crocus - 10 x 10" Watercolor on Canvas board by Tracy Feldman

This little watercolor on canvas board is a celebration of spring --when it finally decided to grace my garden.

The fall before these lovely little flowers emerged from the winter soil, I had rearranged the planting bed they were in. Clearly, I hadn't realized that the crocus bulbs were under the rearranged rock border.  What a delightful surprise then when they pushed the rock aside just enough to emerge.

This image really appeals to my Reality With a Twist sensibilities. The oval rock reminds me of a stylized head, and the crocuses (and their vegetation)  look like a crown (and hair) gracing the rock.  As soon as I saw it, I knew I'd eventually paint it, and knew too what it would be called. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did painting it.  I'd love to know what you think.

Like with many of my small works, I'm making it available to buy at auction in my Daily Paintworks gallery.  And, as is typically the case, I'm going to start the bidding at much less than I'll charge at a show or on my website ($35). So, check it out.

Peaceful Day for Lucky & Techno Troubles for Tracy

Peaceful Day For Lucky - 11 x 14", Watercolor on Canvas by Tracy Feldman

I'm so glad that I'm I'm back to posting on my blog.  I have been working for months to change my art website: converting it from a pure gallery site to a sales and gallery one.  Boy, does that take more work and knowledge to do it well than I ever imagined.  Fortunately I had gotten some initial advice on doing it from Cory Huff of the Abundant Artist, and my graphic artist sister, Danni O'Brien has been working with me and holding my hand as I've faced various challenges.

As a newbie to website design, I assumed that getting on a hosting platform and buying the services of a website building program (I'm using iPage and Weebly) would allow me to get a great site up and running in no time. How wrong I was.  Perhaps I would have been correct if I only had a few pieces, or worked in a very limited range of standard painting sizes. But my sister helped me realize that without first figuring out a logical organizational structure for the site, the galleries, the pages, etc. would have resulted in my site being a confusing, hot mess to visit.  And that is a formula for scaring visitors off, not for converting visitors to buyers.  So, I've worked with her to better the techno aspects of doing things.  I also have had to write descriptions of paintings, and work on figuring out all of the techno details, hoops that one has to jump through before selling online is even possible. I've had to learn new terms and to think about how to get paid, and what to do about shipping works that can be very large.  Boy, that involved more techno details than I originally thought. And, when it is done and up, I'm going to have to get much better than I am at the techno details of art promotion. Thank God there are people out there to help, like Cory, and Danni, and my friends,  Deb Watson and Tony Crocamo, and all sorts of helpful web advice about doing that.  I'll keep you guys posted about where I am on this.

During the months I've been doing this work, I've actually  been painting quite a bit, but not even posting the small pieces on my Daily Paintworks website because I felt guilty taking time to do that when the website still wasn't done.  Recently, I've come to realize that was not a logical thing to do.  So, on April 19,  I decided I needed to start posting on my blog and putting my small works back up again on the Daily Paintworks site for auction. That will give folk, I figure, a chance to get my pieces for maybe less than they will pay when I finally post them in the Small Works Gallery of my website.  But, when I went to do that, I ran into techno problems because I had converted from a personal to business PayPal account (in order to do sales on my website).  That required me to reauthorize Daily Paintworks to register sales for me.  I worked with the folk at PayPal and David Marin at Daily Paintworks for over a week to solve the problem, and I discovered something important that I want to share here.  Pop-up windows may be a pain when unscrupulous sellers hijack your monitor.  However, they are key to enable if you want to take full take advantage of the features of sites you actually do want to deal with.  So, if you click on a button in a site and it doesn't seem to work, do this before calling the site's techno support.  Check the preferences in Safari (or whatever browser you use) and if pop-ups are blocked, authorize them and go back and check on the faulty-seeming button.  I humbly can share that that might save you lots of time I wasted for myself (and others) this week.

What about today's painting?   I started painting "Peaceful Day for Lucky" at my friend Deb Watson's house.  She's a wonderful watercolor artist.  I hadn't remembered to bring anything for reference material, and she suggested I search through some of her reference photos, and one of those images evolved into this work. I loved the peaceful feeling I got from the scene.  It reminded me of scenes I'd seen many times in the west of Ireland. but the contrast and coloring were too similar in the photo.  So, I simplified the composition and adjusted the lighting and coloring to make the horse stand out.  I am very happy with the result, and I hope you are too.  I'd love to hear what you think.

As usual, I'm going to put the piece in my Daily Paintworks Gallery, so if you're interested in it, check out the auction there. I'm starting it at $50, but if it's still around after the auction I'll raise the price to what I"d normally sell my small works for ($100+ -- the actual price will depend on the work's size, media, and whether it is framed or not).

Fun on the Water - second of the Great Lakes beach pictures

Fun on the Water - Door Co, Wisconsin - by Tracy Feldman
Watercolor and Ink on Canvasboard

Although we were largely on land ourselves when we visited the Door peninsula in Wisconsin, I was struck by how water-oriented it was.  Locals and visitors alike spent much of their leisure time on the water, swimming or in boats of all stripes.  The fascination with being on the water seemed to suck everyone in.  This playful figurative "abstract is my homage to that fact.

I hope you enjoy this piece.  Tell me what you think.  Once again, I'm auctioning it on my Daily Paintworks gallery. The bidding will start at $20, but if it doesn't sell at auction, I'll raise the price to my normal (much higher) price.

Travels through the Great Lakes States 1

Lighthouses, Water, and Sky -- Door County, Wisconsin  by Tracy Feldman
Watercolor and Ink on Canvasboard, 10" x 10"

We've been away from home, visiting family in Pittsburgh and the mid-west.  The next few days’ paintings, therefore, are part of my beach-inspired work.  This piece, Lighthouses, Water, and Sky was inspired by the trip we took with Arny's sister and brother-in-law to a place that Arny and Elaine had visited when they were kids.  It's the Door Peninsula, which sits between Lake Michigan and Green Bay (yes, the one that the football team is named after).

I loved the idea of visiting a place that Arny had such fond memories of.  Then we went there, and I found I loved it myself.  We stayed at a charming bed and breakfast, called The Garden Gate, in Sturgeon Bay, and each day, we'd go out to hike and explore what the county had to offer.  People who don't live near the Great Lakes would be surprised how much shipping travels through the lakes and how wild the water can get in bad weather -- particularly in the winter.  Thus, the shorelines of the Great Lakes -- including the ones of this lovely peninsula -- are dotted with many interesting lighthouses.

As part of my effort to move toward abstraction, I used four area lighthouses as design elements.  Between them, I celebrated the beautiful green and blue waters that typified of that area.  I love seeing the range of greens, turquoises, and blues of the water for itself, partially because as a young person, I assumed that only the sea around tropical islands could be so beautifully hued.

I hope you enjoy this piece.  Tell me what you think.  Once again, I'm auctioning it on my Daily Paintworks gallery. The bidding will start at $20, but if it doesn't sell at auction, I'll raise the price to my normal (much higher) price.

Daily Painting -- Hammers of the World, Unite!

Hammers of the World, Unite! 
Still Life, Watercolor on Canvas
12 x 12"

 I did this daily painting to enter into one Dailypaintworks.com painting challenges.   The challenge was called, "You Know the Drill". The tried was to create a still-life using things that you found in your shop. I loved that idea because in my family I am the handy one.  I shop in home improvement stores like some women shop for shoes, so I had lots of "subjects" from which to choose.   When I spotted these hammers, the image of them in an arch in the strong light on our wooden floors popped into my head because I knew how much deep shadows would add to the image.  I quickly realized that my normal 10 x 8" format would not do it for this topics, so I chose a square, 12 x 12" format.

When I did the sketch for the piece, and noticed how the cup hook looked like a sickle, the title for the piece also popped into my head: Hammers of the World, Unite!  It appeals to my "reality with a twist" sensibilities.

A number of artists wrote me with questions about the process of doing watercolor on canvas, and their questions prompted me to experiment with the way I approached this piece.  For instance, a couple of people asked how I prepared the canvas to work; others asked about how I handled glazing (painting in layers) since paint lifts so much more easily from the gessoed surface of canvas than it does from the more-absorbent watercolor paper.

My first experiment involved playing with how I prepared the painting surface.  I normally don't do anything, but this time I used a Kirkland wet wipe on part of the surface to see how that later affected how well the watercolor stayed on the surface.  I noticed that while the wipe was great for lifting the watercolor sketch lines, where I used it sometimes did seem cause my watercolors to have a harder time grabbing the surface than normal.  Thus, in the future, I won't be routinely wiping down the surface with a wet wipe before starting to paint.

Another experiment I did when working on this piece dealt with glazing (creating layers) on the painted surface.  For that, I went to one of my the watercolor instruction books, Building Brilliant Watercolors by Judy Treman.  Judy creates beautiful, dramatic watercolors in a somewhat unusual way: she created an underpainting in purples before adding local color to her pieces. While doing a value underpainting is a classic technique in oils, it is not standard in watercolors where people need to worry about their colors getting muddied if their under-colors lift when glazes of other colors are placed on top of them.  Treman's works, however, don't have the problem because purple tends to be so staining. Thus, the layers of purple underpainting tend to stay put as she glazes the final colors over her underpainting.  Treman's "trick" for doing this involves not only the use of staining purples, but assuring the underpainting is dry throughly before she begins her final glazes.  The neat thing about the color is that after the final colors are glazed over her purple under paintings, the purple "disappears" -- but the values established by the purples remain.

When I finished my research, and got down to painting, I started out by doing what she suggested.  I created pools of purples of varying intensities and temperatures each in their own bowl, then I used them to create an underpainting for this piece.  However, I adjusted how I applied the underpainting colors because I realized that I the color's normal staining properties wouldn't make them stick more to a gessoed surface.  Thus, I tried out something I suggested to one of the people who had written me in response to a piece I wrote for  Empty Easel.  This woman wanted to know how to create glazes/layers in a watercolor on canvas.  I suggested to her that dipping one's brush in a little matte acrylic glaze (along with the water and the paint) might both help the under-layers of color be less vulnerable to lifting when other colors were worked on top of them without also interfering with ability of the later glazes of watercolor to adhere to the canvas.  I told her I'd experiment to see what I discovered.  This piece is the result.  I used my various purples (with matte acrylic graze) to create an underpainting.  I then grazed, and lifted, and glazed again and again over the underpainting until I got the image I wanted.  The intensity of the underpainting was maintained, so I'd say this experiment was a success.

 I'm entering the piece in the Challenge today, and it will be available in my Dailypaintworks Gallery for auction.  I'm going to make the starting bid $35 (instead of my normal $25 or $15) because it's a larger piece. I'd love to hear your comments, questions, suggestions.

"Daily Painting" 5 -- Lovey Dovey

Lovey Dovey
Watercolor on Canvas
10 x 8"

As you can probably tell, I painted this little still-life from life on the run-up to Valentine's Day.  It contains the bag I used to give my husband his little Valentine's gift.  A heart shaped container that housed a previous year's gift and a wonderful, ceramic craftsman-style trivet given to us by friends one Christmas (I think because the think of us as love birds.) I placed them all on a tablecloth we have in our kitchen because the old-fashioned lightness of the design was consistent with this old-fashioned homage to V day.
Hope you enjoy.

Even though it's not Valentines anymore, I'm including it in the auction this week on my Gallery on the Daily PaintWorks Website.  Check out the Gallery, and bid on it if you want to.   I'd love to hear your feedback, and if you want, I can do a tutorial on using these watercolor crayons to create paintings.

The Advantages of Producing Large Watercolors on Canvas

Catching the Post-Season Sun -- watercolor on canvas, 28 x 40.5" 

A few days ago, I said that I'd give some examples of large works that could be produced using watercolor on canvas.

Although it is possible to produce large watercolors on paper, I've always found that there are a few problems that arise when working on too large a scale that have to do with the nature of paper itself.  First, paper of any kind is relatively soft, so if you reach over it when working, you run the risk of marring the it in a way that isn't easy to take back.  For instance, if you push down too hard when you are drawing, lifting color, or erasing, from then on, you have created a spot that will grab on to more pigment than the flat areas (because water flows to the lowest point) -- whether you want that effect or not.  And, since you tend to need to work essentially flat  when doing any kind of wash or wet-in-wet work in watercolor (unless you are really fond of the drips of Jackson Pollock) it's hard for someone of my height (5'5+") to NOT lean over a piece that is that large while painting.

Comrades in Fishing -- watercolor on canvas, 32.5 x 42.5"

Another advantage of using canvas as a painting surface for a large watercolor is how much easier it is to frame the finished pieces.  Watercolor paper is absorbent, soft, and thin and the paper tends to bleach in the sun.  Thus regular watercolors need to be framed under glass or "acrylic glass" to protect the paper from harm, and the paint from water and sun.  You also have figure out some way to keep the paper away from the "glass", as well as to provide a subsurface (like foam board of some sort) to fit under your watercolor paper.  All of those things add significant cost and weight to the final piece.

The Gourmet Capital of Ireland -- watercolor on canvas, 24 x 36" 

     However, when you paint on a properly-prepared surface (with acrylic gesso, not oil-based gesso) and then later coat the finished piece with a clear acrylic spray, framing becomes much easier.   You can present your watercolor as you would an oil painting: as is or with a frame (as I've done with both Catching the Post-Season Sun and The Gourmet Capital of Ireland) or unframed with a prepared edge (as I did with Comrades in Fishing.)

In the next week, I'll update my website with more information about these pieces for those who are interested in finding out more about them.   If you have any questions or comments about this blog, or the pieces, I'll be happy to hear from you.

#2 Daily Painting: Evie ... now Evelyn, etc.

Evie ... now Evelyn -- 8 x 10" watercolor on canvas

This is my second daily painting.  It's also an 8 x 10" watercolor on canvas, and is called Evie ... now Evelyn.

Although  I now normally paint oils, I'm starting out doing watercolors for my daily paintings because I exclusively painted in watercolor for years, and I miss the vibrancy that medium offers as the surface shines through the layers of largely transparent colors.  I'm doing the watercolors on canvas, because painting on primed canvas offers a number of benefits over painting on paper.   For instance,  the steadiness of the substrate (canvas vs. paper), they don't have to be framed under glass to be protected from moisture and wear. Also, since my watercolors on canvas are coated with clear, gloss, acrylic spray -- which has UV-protective characteristics -- the image isn't as prone the fade as old-style watercolors when displayed in a sunny place.  That said, I still feel it still is probably a good idea to not hang one of these paintings in a place where they will be in direct afternoon sun for long periods of time.

For the 17 plus years, I  exclusively on watercolor, however, I only painted on paper, because no one believed it was impossible to paint on canvas.  Then, Frederix developed an archival "watercolor canvas," and artists starting experimenting with it.  I learned about the technique while checking out my local art association's (the Lancaster County Association of Art) class catalog, and I jumped at the opportunity to learn the technique.  It was taught by a great teacher, named  Karen Frattali.  I so loved doing it that I quickly produced a number of really interesting large works in it.  However, my exploration of watercolor on canvas was interrupted last year for a silly-seeming reason. We spent the academic year in Ireland (my husband was on sabbatical there),  I couldn't find the clear coat acrylic paint I needed at my local DIY store.  Thus, I decided to go back to painting exclusively in oils until I got home.  I'm so grateful that someone encouraged me to do this daily painting project for myself, because it's so much easier to experiment when working on small pieces.

The topic of today's painting is dear to my heart.  She's my niece by marriage.  The image is from a photo her parents took around 30 years ago when they were on sabbatical in France.  When they sent the photo to us, we immediately framed it - but unfortunately directly under glass.  I so loved the image that we periodically would take it out and display it again for a while (despite the fact that she hadn't looked that way in years.)  A few years ago we got some great old photos of my husbands family, so  I decided to take out that picture, but re-frame it to go with the other photos we got. To my horror, moisture had welded the photo to the glass, so removing it to re-frame it was no longer possible.  My niece, who  now has two little girls of her own, saw it and  asked me to send her a copy of it, but because I couldn't remove it from the frame, I had to tell her "no," and  I felt bad.  Thus, it is not surprising that when  I decided to do this daily painting project, one of the first images I wanted to paint was this one.  I call it Evie ... now Evelyn because at around the time this picture was taken, my niece decided that she was too big a girl to go by the name of Evie, but that name still holds a place in my heart since that's what we called her when I first met and came love her.

If people are interested, tell me and I'll post some of the large watercolors on canvas I've done so you can get a better idea of what big works in this media can look like.  Also, I'm thinking of doing painting tutorial(s)/tip(s) on watercolor on canvas -- comments/questions?

Day 1 of Tracy's Daily Painting Project

Welsh Landscape 1 -- watercolor on canvas 10 x 8" (20.3 x 25cm)

Before I started doing this painting project, I reviewed lots of other artist's work to get a better idea of where I wanted to go with this, and how I wanted to handle things.  I saw a lot of great work, and realized,  when looking at different people's sites, I came to understand

that there are many ways to do daily painting "right." 

For instance, some painters truly clearly felt compelled to produce a painting each day. Others were comfortable, instead to commit to creating a fixed number of paintings a week.  Some restricted themselves to working only from life. Others also looked to  photo reference and/or their own imaginations for inspiration.  Some marketed their work on one source, and other's took a broader marketing approach.  Some limited themselves to 30 minutes or less to paint: , others didn't.

No matter what their commitments about how they would work, the daily painters had something really important that united them:  a belief that submitting themselves to the discipline of producing work so consistently over a long period of time would help them grow as artists.  

Craig Nelson, the author of one of my favorite painting boos,  60 Minutes To Better Painting, called doing this giving yourself "brush mileage."  Like Nelson encouraged his readers to do, daily painters see these little daily paintings as serving a purpose different from their larger, finished work.  The process used to produce them is at least as important as the look of the finished works themselves.  I love that idea.

I look forward to using this year to increase my observational, painting, and composition skills as each painting increases my own personal brush mileage.  However, I'm following the folk who produce 3 to  (ideally) 5 new paintings a week.  I'm not committing myself to a set time to do the work because I accept that working quickly is a skill that I'm still in the process of learning. I am, however, going to restrict the size of these pieces I produce.  The works I create must be able to fit in one of the USPS priority mail boxes.  Doing that will make shipping more affordable for buyers and myself.  Thus, none of the pieces will be larger 12 x 14" (30 x 35 cm), and most will be smaller.   For instance, today piece is 8 x 10.  Finally,  I'm planning to produce work in a variety of media because that is something I've always loved to do, and I've been restricting almost exclusively to oil painting in the last year.

Although I really like the idea of working from life,  I'm going to be one of those folk who uses a variety of inspirations for my paintings.  I'm doing this because I have all types of photo references, etc. that I've gathered over the years that I would have loved to tackle.  Now, I have an excuse to do that, and I'm thrilled.  That being said, I'm going to do at least one painting a week from life also because since I normally do paint from photo references, I know can use practice working from life.

Today's painting, Welsh Landscape 1, is based on a watercolor sketch I did years ago when we first visited Wales.  Wales holds a special place in my heart because an English travel agent tried to discourage my husband and me from visiting there -- dismissing the Welsh as unfriendly and strange. As Americans, my husband and I decided that we wanted to make up our own minds, and we are so glad that we did.  We found the people to be warm and friendly, and much of the landscape beautiful and dramatic.  For that reason, my earlier sketch held a special place in my heart.  However, I had just starting to paint, so the materials I used weren't as archival as I use now, and I'm thrilled by the opportunity to revisit the topic.  I'll probably revisit again later in the year as my skills doing fast, small works grows.

I'd love your feedback on this piece and on the way I've decided to approach my own daily painting project.