Day 1028 More Flowers

May 16, 2017Leave a comment

My best of the three attempts I made painting this bouquet. I thought painting white flowers was hard till I did this one. Those yellow flowers were a pain.

Funny story. When I showed it to Joe Miller aka Cheap Joe he quipped if I asked Charles Reid to sign it I would have TWO charles Reid flower paintings.

So I did. Darn he didn’t do it. 🤗He did laff when I told him Joe told me to do it.

I do have this very tiny Charles Reid sketch in my class notes where he explained to me how he would paint the yellow flowers.

Unpacking almost done. Now I have to go to the grocery store for something healthy to eat. All I have in the house is a couple of apples and I want to paint them BEFORE i eat them.

And I want to paint this great Mother’s Day bouquet before it does so off I go.

I did collage the cover of my notebooks from Charles and Peggi Habets class. It’s a Strathmore Mixed Media 500 sketchbook which has such a dull brown cover.

Ttyl xoxox Margaret glad she’s more unpacked than packed.

Day 1024 Some Charles R class!

May 12, 2017Leave a comment

Mari Mac aka Mari McMillan all the way from Hawaii! But used to live in Aiken SC.

Christine and Brenda. This is our fourth class together. We are the see you in May in Boone at Cheap Joes girls. I think there were seven people we have had class with every year the first week in May – Fealin Lin Ted Nuttalls and now Charles Reid.

Off to paint. Let’s see if we can get this one done today. 22×30! What was I thinking painting that big?! Too late now. No going back.

Margaret sitting on top of a mountain in Tennessee wondering what adventure we will have today. Xoxoxo

Day 2016 How many flowers

May 4, 2017Leave a comment

Was thinking I would NEVER paint another flower when I did this one yesterday. I guess til you get it right. Painting like crazy!!! This one was wrong … well at least the flowers. Had no clue how to paint yellow flowers.

This is what I was looking at!

So I moved things around and tried again. Charles pronounced this one a great success. Thinking it needs some more splatters and where’s the chickens eye. Great paint brush apple tubes and teapot. I can nail that fruit. Why did I think I wanted to paint that yellow bouquet.

Enough for tonite. Worn out so BED time.

Ttyl Margaret having too much fun in Boone. Xoxox

Day 2014 I am HERE!!

May 2, 20175 Comments

In Boone NC at Cheap Joes. Hanging out with Charles Reid and his adorable wife Judy. And Joe Miller aka Cheap Joe is here too. Such great people. And my friend Mike and her husband Alan.

In the class of 18 we have had the first of May class with at least the same 7 or 8 people now for three years so we are all getting to be friends. Several of them were in my class in Charlotte too – a small world of watercolor painters.

So what did we paint today?! FLOWERS AND more FLOWERS.

This is Charles’ painting from today. He takes a break every 20 minutes. It took him maybe two hours to paint this. Down by 11:30. Sigh. One day.

This is what he was painting. Judy said they had large decoy collections at their house in Nova Scotia. No surprise there. He always paints his decoys.

His paint box. This box costs about $500. He finally bought it because he was going thru $80 Holbein palettes like mine every two years. This one will last him forever.

Ok so what did I paint today?! This is it. Well one of them. Half sheet of Fabriano 300# cold press. My almost Charles Reid!!

Ttyl. Time for bed. All this painting is exhausting. Margaret xoxoxo

Day 1011 Some Grafitti aka Extreme Journaling

April 28, 20177 Comments

Well let’s hope I don’t accidentally delete this post this time. ROUND TWO!!

This is the assignment for week five of the Juliana Coles The Book of the Night class. Based on the Persephone Demeter Greek Myth. As usual first we journaled. Then I painted it out.

And I painted collaged and stamped it.

I added some red paint wiping it off and some purple on the spring side.

Added the white lettering with caran dache neocolor ii and scribbled on it some of the neocolors.

I also used my new favorite toy a 6B lead that I bought at Cityart last Thursday for $1.29. They have a storefront and gallery in the Vista.

The lettering on the leaves was done with the lead. I also enhanced the skulls in Hades on the bottom right with the caran dache neocolor iis. They didn’t show enough

Then I added some more red to the wrap on the girl on the left. I was hoping it would add to the flames of hades. Not sure it did But it’s done for now.

Ttyl. packing one more day til I leave for Charles Reid class. Margaret xoxoxox

Day 1007 All About the Raisin or is it Horses!?

April 24, 2017Leave a comment

If this painting of Raisin looks familiar it is. I started her last summer. I had also started a large watercolor earlier of the same photo when Al coopted it for an acrylic for school. He didn’t like the other photo I suggested.

Then she hung around the Aiken art studio waiting to have a few problems resolved like the upper corner and th iPhone.

Before you think I am obsessing over my friend Raisin the third photo is a study for the large full sheet watercolor and I really want to finish it after spending all day sketching it.

I decided to add the horse her Freisian Harley when I was taking Peggi Habits class in Charlotte and make the painting the Raisin story. She loves to ride and she loves her Freisian Harley.

I am meeting Harley soon but used a photo of a Freisian I took at the flat track races last month. Friesians are all big black and just gorgeous. Fairy tale horses with big curly manes and tails.

Here’s what it looked like before the gesso!!

I gessoed out the whole upper left -the picture frame and the iPhone that was in her hand in the original photo.

Then Al dissed the horse idea. WHAT?!! Too late. The gesso had done its work.

The photo from our Knoxville painting trip.

Here’s the watercolor study. The Freisian is too small. Bigger next time. It’s about 10×15″ Why do big?

I swore I would never do another tiny horse after doing this one last month. He may look great but he took HOURS ago do. Way too long for an 8×10″ painting.

What u say next time?! Still have that big watercolor to do. I only spent most of a day drawing it. And I AM going to paint it. Third times the charm right?!

Margaret whose hungry and going to eat.

Ttyl xoxoxo

Day 1006 The ArtistaVista!!

April 23, 2017April 26, 2017Leave a comment

The Vista is an artist area down near the old rehabbed train station on Gervais in Columbia SC. Thursday – Friday they had an art crawl and studio open house on Thursday in the galleries including a shuttle bus for those not up to walking.

All the galleries we visited. We walked FOUR miles that evening.

Red Wimmer One of Those Days Mixed Media $2300

Ginny Bojanowski asked if anyone wanted to go to the vista tonite at luck Thursday something I have had on my bucket list for five years so I said YES despite teaching my first watercolor class the next day.

Two hours later we were off! We started at City Art on Lincoln which has a wide assortment of eclectic art for sale and Also a terrific art supply store and also online seller.

Red Wimmer Sideways Glance Mixed Media $600

Loved these!!

I had to talk to City Art owner Randy who Charles Reid recommends for art supplies for his classes. I told Randy I would tell Charles hi for him next week in Boone. It always makes them both light up when I tell one or the other he said hi! CHarles does not do any technology. Since he’s a little deaf I doubt he deals with the phone either.

I didn’t take a lot of photos as we hit every gallery.

This one gives me food for thought at that price. Have to talk to Randy about my sketches!!

Risk into Buckhead Bruce Nehsmith Graphite and Carbon on paper $1000

Tiger Woods and baseball players. Interesting combo.

Loved these mixed media sketches.

Obviously Alex enjoys altering his drawings as much as I do!!

Huge and a good price for frames large art.

Alex Powers

Multiple baseball images and all were great like this one.

More of his work. Always hard to take pics thru that plastic.

These are all at Cityart.

We walked across the street to If Gallery. Smaller but another great eclectic assortment of art. My two favs were Laura Spong and Leo Twiggs both whom I have long admired.

Laura has supported herself and her children since her divorce in the 60s by painting. She was a housewife with no means of support when she started. Now her paintings sell for thousands.

Leo Twiggs was an art prof at SC State and a batik artists. Gorgeous work both of them.

On to the next gallery tomorrow – the Vista Studios.

Ttyl Margaret packing for Boone so I don’t schlepp everything I own.

Day 999 One more day.

April 16, 2017April 16, 2017Leave a comment

Happy Easter everyone. Raisin Carter. The chief instigator of all her friends showing up at Peggis class aka Leader of the Pack. I had fun stamping her name. I think she was a little tired from all the fun we had in Charlotte. We wore her out!!

Julie whose taking Charles Reid’s class in May at Cheap Joes with me. Wish I had taken a photo of her interesting basketball player that she was working on.

The ink sketches. Sometimes you should just leave them ink. I wasn’t using my normal skin tones of Quin coral and Quin gold. I used Quin rose and yellow ochre. So the paintings are a little dark.

They were painted with Quin rose, yellow ochre, ultramarine blue, mineral violet, and pyrrole red. Oh and sepia for a dark brown.

Ink pen Lamy Safari filled with Carbon Platinum Black ink in a strathmore mixed media 500 journal. Love their crispy paper. Just wish they would lie flat like the Stillman and Birns do.

Happy Easter. Margaret hanging out with the grandkids who are on sugar overload xoxox

Day 994 – Peggy Habet’s class

April 11, 2017April 12, 2017Leave a comment

I drew Peggy several times during class. This was the last time and looks the most like her. Fourth time the charm. She was hard to draw with a long thin nose and a tiny face.

The nose kept overpowering her tiny face when I drew her. This was the first try. And then I painted her too dark so I scrubbed her a little to lighten her up. I did have fun stamping her name and embellishing the page with a watercolor pencil.

Go round three. Nose still too big. Eeekkk. The hair is a combo of thalo and sepia.

Number four. TOO Dark!!!’ What the heck.

Better. But the face was too wide and not oval enough. I could make it narrower by adding hair.

I painted on my class sketches most of the day. Guess it’s time to do those color studies.

Margaret xoxoxo whose having a painting day.

Day 988 Wow 13 more days

April 6, 2017April 7, 2017Leave a comment

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