Sometimes I like to paint...and sometimes I like to turn my paintings into digital art. That's how I was feeling today as I was going through some photos of my artwork. This one is classic Michael Jackson.
Smooth Criminal is one of my all time favorite MJ songs. MJ has appeared in several artworks I've created over the years. It's fun to revisit past works and see what I can do to make them new and unique. I really love how this one turned out.
MJ Forever!
Here is another negative painting I finished last weekend in watercolors. This was actually the first one I did. I wanted to keep it very simple and mostly monochromatic.
I've been trying to get back into a watercolor groove since I'm returning to teaching High School Art this year and I'll be doing watercolors in my painting classes. I found some great watercolor artists on Instagram to follow, and several of them do this technique called Negative Painting. I'd never tried it before so I thought I'd give it a whirl.
These are my Moody Blue Trees I did last weekend. I really like this technique. You paint the lightest values first, and then add subsequent layers getting darker each time. For a landscape scene like this, it would actually be lighter in the distance. But sometimes in art you just have to break the rules. I enjoyed painting in a new way. I hope my students will enjoy it too. I think it will be a good way for them to understand negative space and value--and painting a monochromatic scene. I think I'll be using this technique in the future too.
I was finally able to get in the studio to finish my latest flower painting. Since I'm working on a move from teaching elementary art & technology to High School Art, I've been rather busy working on plans for that. So it was nice to take some studio days to just paint!
Ok, so I may be just a wee bit obsessed with all things Scotland. It's my dream to go to Scotland one day. And I absolutely adore Highland Cows, also known as Highland Coos. So, I decided that it was high time I painted one.
I recently had my 5th and 6th grade students create self portraits. But not realistic self portraits...no, they created self portraits in the style of Tim Burton. I had not done any kind of portraits with them before and I wasn't really sure what to expect. We did some practice drawings first, to learn about proper facial proportions. I wanted to give them a chance to learn the basics and feel successful before starting on the actual project.
The goal of the final project was to imagine what they would like like if they became a Tim Burton character. They could only use black and white colored pencils to create their projects; they also had to use correct facial proportions, and some shading here and there. They really blew me away with the self portraits they created. I hung up every one of them in the hall so that the whole school could enjoy them. We got so many compliments on them! So, I thought I'd share a few of my favorites with you. And I enjoyed this project so much that I created my own self-portrait too.
My Self Portrait
Student Work
I have an amazingly creative granddaughter. She is my favorite partner in art and all things crafty. She even has her own art table in my studio so that she can create whenever she's at my house. Awhile back, she asked me to create a drawing for her of Steph Curry. My response: "Who is Steph Curry?" The look on her face was priceless as she said, "Seriously, grandma?" Then she proceeded to school me on all things Steph Curry and convinced me to create this drawing for her. I was having blog issues, so I never posted it.
I tend to be drawn to trees quite often in my artwork. I've painted and drawn trees many times over the years, and when possible, I like to have my students create trees too. There are just so many things you can do creatively with a tree. This one went into my art journal recently.
Recently I added some spreads to one of my art journals and forgot to share them. This first one is just cute, fat little bird.
