Margaret xoxoxo
Irresistible
Category: Painting
Painting w Stan Miller
I will say that by taking his demo at Watercolor Live I have saved myself the trouble of taking a class from him in person which Mike had wanted to do before covid. Stan doesn’t want you to interpret the person but to paint an identical likeness. He’s very 123 so easy to follow but as my long time teacher Al Beyer said don’t worry abt the likeness unless they are paying you for it.
That said Stan has some absolutely gorgeous watercolors and rightly so he has made his living for forty years selling and teaching it.
TIP: I cut the Mr Clean Eraser up into smaller wedges so I don’t have to deal with the whole big eraser which is sponge sized.
Margaret in rainy SC xoxoxo
Oops dropped that ball
Forgot to post because my friend Mike and I wore ourselves out Wednesday virtually painting with each other. We did two of the sessions then collapsed for the rest of the week. Lol. We bees delicate.
Mike Hernandez did a great job. So succinct. His day job is as Art Director for Dreamworks. How cool a job is that? His style is reminiscent of what I call the golden age of cartoons back in the forties when Disney and others had fabulous artwork in their animations.
Margaret still tired xoxoxo
Hand is now cramping
Endless drawing. Third time. First trace was wrong second draw was lifted by masking. Spent three hours redrawing. Or was it four. 🙃🙃🙃😵💫
Now to figure out where to put the masking on the bottle. 😳😵💫

Jar masked. Kept dipping the brush in soapy water and drying it off. Also dumped the masking in the lid. Went much easier after I did that. I think asking the whole letter and lifting the mask to paint the dark will be easier than masking the highlight around each one. We shall see
Quitting for now. Need to work on the jar some more esp 1858 BUT my hands and shoulder are DONE.
Margaret xoxoxo where’s the chocolate?
Watercolor Live 2023 post hmm
Started working on Irena Romans class today.
The background is poured. A whole lot of options for messy Margaret to flood the world with blue. Eeek.
A whole Lot Of Masking. Ruined the old paint brush I was using. Oh well.
One pour down and two to go. So far so good. It’s a mix of inathradone blue ultramarine violet dioxizine purple and viridian.
Bytw I covered my chair seat which is cloth w plastic put on my old slippers and an apron wished I had a plastic one. 😳
Last pour and no catastrophes yet!! 🙃😂. Next up removing all that masking. Can’t see how this was better than a wash. Hmm
Be sure to check out Irenas site. Her paintings are phenomenal.
In the middle of all this I was making my friend Mikes Cream of chicken rice and mushroom soup. DH said it was the best soup ever. He even cleaned up the kitchen. Yeah. Margaret xoxoxox
Matthew Bird Still Life
Matthew Birds realistic still life. While I like the looks I am not fond of all the masking and layering. I kept making mistakes and having to start over. My fault not his of course.
Attempt #3 was best. I kept my lights on most of the apricots. The rock looks good. Background wash might need another layer. Last.
Three looks much better in person. I saved almost all the lights on the fruit but the iPhone flattened them out darn it.
Attempt number 2 screwed up the darks on the front of the stone. Painted it all alizarin. Oops off to a bad start from the first. Fabriano 300# cold press. Background washes hmm does it need more? I do like the bluey black.
Attempt #1 140 fluid cold press paper. Not great for lots of washes. What was I thinking using a 140 for all those layers of washes?! Will probably finish it sooner or later. Someone will want it.
Still think they need more background washes. Might just mix up some green alizarin and indigo and give them two layers but I do like the blue shining thru the back. Really pretty in person.
Best of all. Those Dynasty faux squirrel reservoir brushes. Have had them for a couple of years and never use them. They worked great for those endless lines on the bowl. I loaded the 12 once and did ALL THE LINES WITH IT and the hearts too. Who would have thought??
Margaret tahred from painting all day. Xoxoxoxo
Santorini
A fun paint with George Politis a lovely Greek guy who was such a helpful concerned teacher. He was worried I had a question about masking. And offered any help. I didn’t for him – it was for the teacher before him like why couldn’t you tell us we needed to mask BEFORE class. Not a lot to ask. He walked us thru this painting in a concise simple easy to understand manner with great results. I really enjoyed his class and would take from him again. He also has quite a few videos on YouTube though I have not had time to look.
Still slogging away at the blue black background washes. Tomorrow I am painting them no matter what else happens.
Margaret whose tahred xoxoxo
If at first u don’t succeed
Make another one and another one and oh wait make a third. Apricots in a bowl one day if one of them turns out.
First one I drew on 140. Since it gets a wash of Prussian blue then black I decided it would t work out well on 140. So I drew it again on 300# fabriano cold press.
By the way a layer of Prussian blue with a layer of black over it makes a delicious blue. And if that didn’t work you can alternate them til you get them really dark. Right now I have a light one and medium one and a dark one. All nice blues. Try it u might like it.
So now I have plenty to practice on. Surely one will turn out. We shall see.
Chicken pot pie
Hubster started saying the pie is burning. I told him can’t check it I am running a wash. It didn’t get too brown. Margaret with her feet up. Xoxoxox
Another watercolor
From watercolorlive2023
Then I went too far on the water but I can’t leave water just plain. I mean the only time the water here is flat is when there’s no current or no breeze. One or the other is always happening. Turned the wowed tree on the top left into a Christmas tree. That was fun.
I actually had the same one. Thanks dad. It was my fathers old one. I tend to the triangular springy small ones that look like cake knifes. Anyway I tried my old springy one to do the poles but didn’t work to well. Dug out dads during the break between classes. So much easier. Then I made a lot of lines w it. Did walkways gang ways porches. Over the top as usual.
Night night. Though I had. A nice long nap I need another one to get rid of this cold. Oh yes u have had quite the cold thru this whole crazy long days of painting. Xoxoxox @
Done done done
I added a lot of darks to it and used a gel pen to add more whites. Gotta love a gel pen. The quinacridones had smeared when I removed the masking fluid from the stamens. Tried gouache. Of course that didn’t work. So the white pentel gel pen came to the rescue.
Margaret tired once again. Good tired though. I have how many left to do??Xoxoxoxo
Margaret McCarthy Hunt Art 