Day 1053 – Politics

June 8, 2017Leave a comment

Hard to avoid it today. It’s all over the tv the radio Facebook twitter. I don’t know about you but the last few days have been riveting. THIS IS WATERGATE!! 14×20 Mixed Media

Enough to get Rachel Maddow back from her sick bed where she had been for almost two weeks.

I got the brilliant idea to do this one on arches #140 cold press. BIG a mistake. Hard to write on with any ink pen or marker I had.

I finally picked up a Japanese brush pen I thought had permanent ink. I tested it on a scrap of paper. It didn’t run.

Fast forward to all the heavy lines in this sketch are done with that brush pen especially on Dan Coats.

When I started painting him he turned into a gray runny mess. This was supposed to be a watercolor. EEEKKKK.

I dug into my mixed media art supply grove. Caran d’ache Neocolor ii to the rescue. I started coloring. I lightened him up. The only person that didn’t have some runs was Comey. 😳

A lot of the letters ran. The names!! Eeeekkk. On this rough paper there was no clean edge. Tried a grease pencil which works great in my sketchbooks. NOPE TOO rough.

Got out a white gel pen on the letters. Better!! Got out a paint pen. Even better. More outlining with the Lamy Safari.

Done. Whew. Not what I had in mind BUT finally pleased with it.

Margaret planning another but it will be on hot press paper. Xoxoxo the news is calling.

Day 1051 Take a Hike Mr President #3

June 6, 2017Leave a comment

And what about where I live? Will the houses along the Savannah be in the Savannah?!

Will downtown Augusta be underwater?! And the island across from me already underwater sometimes. Will it be gone?!

Will the Savannah be 600 yards wide here instead of 300?!

I keep asking.

Nobody can answer me.

And you know 45 doesn’t care about our little spot of gorgeous earth.

Will

All

Be gone or

Bigger ?!

Or what?!

Ttyl Rachel Maddow is back tonite. I knew she wouldn’t be able to miss the recent NSA leak. Off to shower so I will be ready

Xoxoxox

Day 1046 – Let’s Make A French Omelette!

June 1, 2017Leave a comment

Ever since I read Julia Childs Mastering the Art of French Cooking as a child I have been in love with the notion of all things French and especially the quintessiantal French food – the omelette.

But I never could figure out how they made that neat rolled omelette.

Watching Jacques Pepins American Master show on PBS I thought YOUTUBE!!

Sure enough. There he was teaching how to cook an omelette.

Omelette Number 1 of course I had to draw it to commemorate the occasion.

First mistake I had been making was not using the right pan so I got it a big 10-12″ round edged skillet that was coated w the green coating that releases easily.

And I hadn’t been using the spatula to scrape around the edges as I cooked. Who knew?

And I stuffed mine. Trying to eat those greens and I had to have some Cheddar cheese.

The most delicious thing I have ever eaten. I swear. Not so pretty but amazing.

Omelette 2 Today.

Prettier shape but too brown.

Anyway colors used to paint it. Cad yellow light, cerulean, yellow ochre, green apatite and sap green for the plate, Ultramarine Blue and burnt umber for the shadow.

TIP: Splattered with palette mess left from painting. Has to be really soupy to splatter. Use more water than you think. And I just use a large paint brush in this case my 10 Da Vinci. I also painted this with the same paint brush.

Margaret xoxoxo

Day 1044 – That Dirty Dried out Palette

May 31, 2017Leave a comment

Now that I am home for a day or two I wanted to use my Ted Nuttall palette. This is actually Teds Palette.

All those lovely transparent colors.

And it helped with my procrastination mode getting started painting the Raisin and Harley painting

which is finally transferred to paper and ready to paint.

Of course my Palette has dried out and filthy. They always dry out!! It needed revival and cleaning. Another way to procrastinate!!! The spray bottle was not getting the job done. The colors were lumpy and nasty.

So how did I get it clean and get the paint smooth and ready to use!?

First I sprayed it and tried stirring each color with its own tooth pick. That did not do much for the lumps. I wanted to paint!!!

I got out my trusty old palette knife. It has a tiny blade on it compared to most so it fit perfectly in the wells of my porcelain palette.

I used a jillion Kleenex wiping wells out where there was just a dribble of old hard paint. NO LOTION On those Kleenex.

I started bending my antique palette knife in some of the paint. Oh NO!! I kept going. What palette knife is supposed to last forever!?

I decided to rearrange the colors. Here and there I had added colors I MUST have to the basic Nuttall Palette like Cerulean, Andrews Blue, Daniel Smith Piemonite and Green Apaptite.

The Kleenex and the palette knife left crusts of color in the corners.

Then I realized I could fill the wells with water and used an old brush to swirl out the bits left in corners. Hallelujah clean wells at last.

I used a sharpie to rewrite the colors on the edges of the wells and I even have a few leftover slots.

So it’s new clean and lovely at this point.

What I learned while cleaning my palette.

Wear rubber gloves while cleaning your palette unless you want to have colored fingernails. 😱
Those dollar store Kleenex with lotion have something wierd in them. They gave me a rash when I used them on my nose. 😱😱 Now gone. 🤗🤗🤗
Now I know why some people have stacks of these palettes. It might be easier to just buy a new palette than clean the old one out.

Margaret who has some painting to do. Xoxox and no more reasons to procrastinate because I even cleaned up the studio and moved to the summer one aka the kitchen table and island.

Oh wait I need to use the glass cleaner on the winter studio table. It’s looking hazy. Procrastinate procrastinate. I need some flowers to paint!!

🌼🌻🥀🌷🌷🌸🌺🌼🌻🥀🌹🌷🌸🌺

Day 1040 – Canyons – Blowing Rock!

May 27, 2017May 28, 20172 Comments

Mike and I had lunch at the Canyons in Blowing Rock because as she said the view of the mountains was spectacular from dining room. The food was delicious too and the service was great.

Spring green was the key color out the window covering the trees and the mountains.

Painted with Charles Reid palette leftovers. He only uses 12 colors. All Holbein. The greens are hookers and Oxide of chromium. He also likes cobalt violet. Uses all of those a lot on flowers.

I guess I need to do a sample of them so you can see the colors. Just normal old colors. No Quins though I added my favs Quin gold and burnt orange which I sub for ochre and burnt sienna at times.

I kept trying to get a pic of this interesting guy when he was sitting at the bar inside but he was back lit which does not work in a photo. Don’t u love all the trash can background?!

Funnny story. I went to the trash cans when we got in the car to throw some junk out that I pick up like a pack rat and guess who was there!? The guy. And a waitress who had been watching me draw she told him to pose for me because I was a really good artist. Lights not great but it might work. I have more of him not smiling. Do t like painting teeth showing.

Should have told him to take off his hat but that would have ruined his charm. I did get him to turn around but still no light.

The Mountains from the porch.

In the restaurant from our table. What a view. Love this place.

Ttyl Margaret xoxoxo

Day 1038 Drawing for days now.

May 25, 2017May 28, 20173 Comments

Finally getting the big painting of this ready.

As Charles Reid says “There are just some days I can’t draw.” And apparently this painting involved that for me.

The new painting has involved a lot tweaking. Harley is one big horse and he’s not in this painting. He’s too small.

I took a comparison pic of Raisin and Harley when I was in Bristol to see just how big he was. His head is about three times as long as Raisins plus his ears. In the first painting he was a little small. I think his head needed to be twice as big. 😳

I had already started drawing her on a whole sheet of watercolor last summer but there was no way I could stuff Harley onto that sheet of paper. Oops! I had ripped five previous inches off. Double oops.

So I traced her to transfer her to an elephant sheet(30×40″) of arches cold press. And drew one eye to low. Eeekkk. I couldn’t even trace!

I drew him and

Worked on him. Eyes too big. And her hands too small.

And tweaked him. Too narrow in this one. And what’s with that eye.

And I shaded it. And he’s too sleepy.

I drew more and I searched my fifty or so photos of Harley

and I cropped it

and lightroomed it for better contrast.

and printed out more of him.

And drew some more.

And this is Harley now. Time to transfer them to the elephant sheet I hope. Unless I walk by them on my circuit thru the house and think NO that’s not right. Sigh.

But there’s plenty of room for a bigger Harley now!!

Ttyl Margaret who needs a nap before she transfers this and paints. Xoxoxo😳🤗

Day 1035 Its about a dog!

May 22, 2017May 22, 2017Leave a comment

I took a great photo of my friend Raisins white English retriever Lucy lounging around on the window seat.

This is a small practice painting for bigger painting. Note to self LOOSE THOSE EDGES! It’s very hard to do a loose painting when it’s so small.

It all starts with a great photo of a gorgeous dog.

Click the link for a short video on how to draw your own dog.

Think I will draw Zoe. It’s been a while and she’s curled up ready to be drawn.

Colors used Winsor yellow, ds carmine, cobalt violet, mineral violet, oxide of chromium, viridian?, cerulean, ultramarine blue, burnt sienna, cad orange, cad red light or scarlet lake.

Ttyl Margaret who had to get walking again. Been on vacay TOO along now. Xoxox

Day 979 -21 Days left

March 27, 2017March 27, 2017Leave a comment

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 965 141 People in one Week

March 12, 2017March 12, 2017Leave a comment

Well I made it. Added another another 14 people yesterday when we were at the Standardbred Harness Races yesterday at McGhees Mile Track in Aiken. Starting from the last one draw to the first one drawn at the end of the post. I am going to paint some of these today I think since this is day 7.

Flipagram of the sketches.

All of them are drawn with my Lamy safari in Lexington Grey ink in my Stillman and Birn Alpha. Most were drawn from real life except the 20 or so talking heads.

In the window at the Mexican cafe on Laurens street in Aiken.

At the races. I was afraid to shop out my sketchbook after I did this because a certain bird was busy telling people what a great sketched I was.

Off MSNBC Friday nite. ditto that

Hanging the new Augusta State University logo sign at the Dental School Friday. These guys were working hard. Two guys only but they hardly stood still pushing and shoving the big scaffold that would take them to the top of the four story building.

More of the two guys. One worked continually nonstop the whole hour or so I was drawing. Pulling and pushin. And backing the truck up.

Contour drawings because they were moving fast. The angles they got on their bodies were as good as any dancer or yoga as they pushed and shoved the heavy scaffold.

In line waiting at chic fil a and the dental school check in.

Too right luck at chic Fil a and a guy waiting to see the dentist at the college.

A three generation family at chic Fil a

More tv talking heads.

My heroine Rachel Maddow. So brilliant.

Talking heads MSNBC especially like the Bernie Head.

Lawrence O’Donnell taking heads. Love him too.

Rachel Maddow and her talking heads

Panera sketches Tuesday

Panera Tuesday

Panera Tuesday the rest are at Panera Monday and a few more talking. Heads from MSNBC.

Heads on Morning Joe.

As I said will paint some of these. I love having my own coloring book. Total people. Depends on how you count them. 141 if I count all the contour drawings at the Dental College and in the crowd at the races.

Ttyl

Margaret who has to paint. Xoxoxo

Day 964 100 people in seven days Day SIX

March 11, 2017March 11, 2017Leave a comment

Time to finish up those 100 people. In the meantime there’s always the tv to draw from.

I am completely absorbed by the unfolding spy whodunnit on Eachel Maddow every nite on MSNBC. I even take notes and draw some of the talking heads or players in this dramatic story. Last nite it was General Flynn who was working for the Turkish government to the tune of $500000 while he was head of our National Security.

I don’t think Robert Ludlum or John Le Carre could make this stuff up. Just crazy stuff going on.

And yesterday ALL the holdover Obama attorneys were fired and told to clear out by close of business. Usually they stay to finish up their cases and then leave. Not this time. And Hannity a tv talking head seems to have precipitated it. Hmmm.