Category: Wet Paint Party

Day 2106 In Memoriam

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Of our dear friend and fabulous artist Rachel Miller who left this earth Sunday far too early. A sketch of her as our model at Dr Sketchys. Her she is as Marian the librarian. One of the founding members and first director of the Augusta Burlesque group Dirty South.

Rachel was a talented linguist with NSA fluently speaking multiple languages including French Libyan Somali and three others. Do you know to be an NSA linguist you have to be able to be fluent in a new language within six weeks! She was brilliant. She was retired Air Force, a gourmet cook and caterer, terrific watercolor artist, a twin, and above all beloved mother and wife. Those are just a few of her many talents.

She was a bright star in our lives and will be greatly missed by her legions of friends too. 

My fast take on Rachel as Marian the Librarian. Probably a five minute sketch.

And here we are jamming it up at one of the Doctor Sketchys. The lovely Ilaina short me and outrageously fun Rachel.

Her memorial is tomorrow at 6.

from her husband Frank.

A memorial stop-on-by, share-your-Rachel-moment service for my wife Rachel M Miller will be held Wednesday, 3 July, starting at 6PM. Because some friends are still flying in, it will probably go beyond 8PM. It will be held at River Place Condominiums in the clubhouse. This is where her sister Jessica Yu lives and where we’ve had some memorable parties. There is no dress code so come as you are. Some are bringing food, some their own liquor to toast her, others want to share some of her paintings, but I’m sure all have a story.

There are two guest-access parking levels at River Place Condos. There’s also some parking lots nearby open to the public after hours.

Her candle burned at both ends it will not last the night but ah my friends she cast a lovely light. – My rewrite of The Edna St Vincent Millay poem.

Margaret Xoxoxoxo

Day 1206 Wet Paint Party

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12×16″

Tonite Feb 24 at Sacred Heart. My sketch as well as 70 other pieces of art will be up at silent auction for adoption to decorate your walls with some fabulous art. There will be some wild fun entertainment engineered by Vintage Oolie. Always interesting. All money raised goes to the Augusta Arts Council.

I was trying to keep the sketch light and loose. I meant to take a photo of the ink drawing which was not exact just close. Loosening up as Bob Burridge would say. I was also trying to keep it transparent.

I really loathe painting trees with watercolor and it always seems to show. I had to work on them a lot to get them right. Multiple Layers.

SKY – blotted the washes as I laid them down to get cloud. Used cerulean blue and some verditer blue.

Building – quin coral quin gold with dioxzine purple and cobalt blue with some cerulean and quin burnt orange for the greys.

Trees – quin gold, Daniel Smith gold green, cobalt, ultramarine blue, dioxzine purple and mineral violet.

Come on out. Always a fun event.

Margaret xoxoxox

Day 988 Wow 13 more days

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Til the big 1000!! 

Since 13 is a mystics number surrounded by bad luck impending done a journal page on palm reading seems like an appropriate post.   The assignement this week was to completely cover a two page spread with masking tape. Then study a palm reading chart and react to that. I am not exactly a girl who believes in palm Reading so this was a little difficult for me. 

I pondered the assignment of reading your palms for 4-5 days. Then I did all these pages in less than an hour.  I was flipping thru the old Bazaar magazine looking for images to collage on another page and found the red headlines. I thought perfect. I glued them on. The grey was a scrap from ripping out collage items for the other page. Perfect color. 


I literally pulled a couple of pieces of somerset collage paper out of this heap and traced my hands and glued them down quickly.  Then I started scribbling with Prismacolor artstiks and gel pens. 

Next I stamped some old Teesha Moore stamps that I had for years and never used. I still had the third page blank. I lettered with the paint pen and drew some arrows. Then it popped into my head to do an X-ray hand for the scar page-write down all your scars-because some scars are visible but some you can only see in an X-ray. Still have to journal those. 

This is a WIP. It will change. I got some transparent purple ink to paint on it just not had time. And I have a list of things to still try out. Here are what I brain stormed. 

Yellow gold aura. Lightening bolts

Light green on x ray hand thalo blue thinned on background

Outline letters in yellow? 

Green glow 

Heart Malagra

Anyway time to get going. Busy day. 

Margaret xoxoxo

Day 984 Alex and Willie

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Every Sunday I watch CBS SUnday Morning. My fav bits on it are the partsabout  artists or singers people stuff. And this show is crammed with them. Alex was on this am talking about his 45 impersonations. Hard to resist sketching him. He morphed into 45. The mans definitely making me political!! 

The background was Quin gold but not enough contrast w the head. Like the orange one better. After all he is the Orange One”

Have always loved Willie and meant to just draw him. He just popped onto the page. What’s not to love about an 84 year old who says “we woke up and we are still not dead!”??

Think they are done. Maybe. Trying to resist the urge to scribble on them in the background with a soft dark pencils. So many quotable quotes from them both.  

Painted on 280# Arches Cold Press with Ted Nuttalls transparent palette plus cerulean, hematite and cheap Joes Andrews Turquoise. Pen pentel brush pen. 

Ttyl Going to try my hand at horses today. 

Margaret taking a walk in the park today too. 

Day 982 Dr Sketchys 2

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Love the Chinese dresses Foxy wore at Dr Sketchys Wednesday. Gorgeous fabrics and they fit her like a glove.  Classic Chinese dresses probably from her home in Taiwan. 

This is my favorite sketch I think though the next one is nice too. 

Both 11×14″ Super Aquabee tablet. Noodler Konrad WN colors in a whiskey painter box with a Cotman travel box full of Daniel Smith quinacridones. I used a gold Wink of Stella marker to sparkle these.  

This was a challenge to add origami elements. I have folded thousands of those cranes and a few of the frogs. As a kid I loved doing origami since the first kit I received for Christmas. I think she’s slightly out of proportion. Head to big. Legs a tad too short but I like her anyway. A lot to draw and paint in 20 minutes!!

Day 982 Last Nite!

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After several disastrous sketches I knew I could handle our beautiful Asian model when I did this watercolor in ten minutes or so. 

All sketches are 11×14 in a Super Aquabee tablet. Love that paper. Painted with my whisky painter box loaded with WN and Daniel  Smith Quin coral and an old Cotman palette loaded with every quinacridone I own plus thalo blue and green black and white gouache. Painted with a pentel waterbrush. 


These are all two minute sketches. Some of these will probably be altered. And most are pretty awful. As in EEEKKK I Don’t feel good and I can’t draw a thing tonite. This one was the worst. 


Better.  I decided to give up my go to Dr Sketchys pen the Pentel Brush pen and use a Noodler Konrad. Life improved.  I always think it’s interesting how a change of pen can improve your drawing skills when they aren’t going well. 

Next We had a challenge to turn her into a fox. Evidently her stage name is Foxy. As some of you know I like to draw chickens. Follow them around at Key West to draw them or sit and watch them and sketch them. Never thought chickens could be so much fun but they are. 

Really like the sketchiness of her body and legs in this one. 

Ttyl another busy day. Haircut picking up paintings and back to aiken for a reception for a friends show.  

Margaret xoxoxo

Day 980 A few of those 100 people 

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Painting the Farmhaus people 

And a few of my tv sketches. Really liking the background colors. A lot different than my usual cerulean. Sometimes it pays to get outta the box you are in. 

Painted with Ted Nuttalls transparent palette. 

Book club tonite. If you haven’t read When Breathe Becomes Air by Paul Kalanathi do. Don’t know when a book has made me cry more. So poignant. Wonderful book.

Book club tonite. Off I go. Xoxoxo Margaret.  

Day 979 -21 Days left

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Till 1000. The goal is nigh! 

Taking an online class in extreme journaling with Julianna Coles. All my questing for a book at goodwill, salvation army, thrift stores and in the garage where I found a forgotten stack of books I found the perfect book in my son’s recycle bin in Atlanta. It’s a heavy thick very slick Saks sales ad. Since it was trash I didn’t feel bad about altering it. It also had some nice photos of women in it. 

Despite babysitting the grandchildren single handedly, lecturing to middle schoolers about art quilts aka show n tell and driving about four hundred miles I bounced out of bed to start the monster mash process this morning. 


I worked on the cover since I did not like the big script Saks on the cover. 

Oddest thing happened when I opened a huge old Bartletts to cut out poetry. I don’t think I even turned a page. It opened to a page that held a poem about “locking all your heart aches inside” and “hide it in your trunk” “will hide all your failures””will rise to meet you yet” and of course I cut them out and glued them on.  


I don’t think it’s quite done the more I look at them. Bout maybe they are never done? They will tell me. Lots of fun.  Go sign up.  

 

The first double page spread. Thinking it’s still too busy. 

I painted stamped collages scribbled and painted and lettered and I could go on but it’s time for French. Acrylic paint caran dache neocolonial ii prismacolor paintstiks paint marker. 

The books about the size of a piece of printer paper. Can’t wait for the next chapter. 

Margaret xoxoxo #julianacoles 

Day 976 Time for some News

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Been obsesssed with the news as many other Americans have and I take notes and draw the talking heads. Monday I was almost late to class listening to Comey FBI director talk about their investigation into the Presidents claims against Obama which of course as most people knew even before the testimony were completely unfounded. 

His other bomb  shell  was that the FBI has been investigating the Trumps campaigned connections to the Russians since July.  And I am keeping track of what they are saying and how it’s interlocked. 


It’s just all to incredible. 

About the picture. I had a few problems with Comeys face. His eyes and mouth should be parallel. They weren’t. I fixed him by adding a dark left corner to his mouth which raised it slightly. 

The purple brown on his face is Daniel smiths piemonite. Love that color. Makes delicious darks combined with blues too. And stays transparent. 

I think I nailed Schiff. 

Most of the red is a grease pencil. SO much fun. Loved them. Got a box of 5-6different  colors on Amazon.  It’s like a crayon on steroids. 

Otherwise the colors are Ted Nuttalls transparent palette plus piemonite on their faces for shadows. 

Ttyl Margaret xoxoxo Where’s my Dick Blick 40% off coupon?? Heading that way today. Art store shopping!!  

Day 975 One more St Paddys Day

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Could not resist drawing this great pirate ship passed by loaded with people tossing beads to the crowds. So much to draw and so little time. I really like parts of this but the foreground people watching are all assorted sizes. The middle group too tall for the other two groups. 

And I completely forgot to draw the buildings in the background. OOPS!!! 

Oh well that’s the thing about live sketching. Some you win some you mess up. Lol. 

One more to go. The Whiskey Bar Lamy Safari. Lexington Grey ink in a Stillman and Birn Alpha. 

Colors used. Every green I own. Pants are all some combo of ultramarine blue and burnt umber. Sky peacock blue I think.  

Ttyl off to delve into Atlanta after talking to two groups is middle school art kids. One was awesome second one ready for lunch. Fun classes though the kids are so cute. Just hungry. 

Margaret xoxox