Back to My Own Faces

After being inspired by the faces in "100 Girls on Cheap Paper," I'm back to making my own faces, inspired by run of the mill magazine photos. Here are a couple of my latest.

I think she has a pretty face. I definitely didn't concentrate on the hair! I like the shading on the neck and the cheeks.

She looks like she is her own person. Or else she has something to hide. I'm not sure which.

Face and a Body

After the last Friday Faces, I tried to make a body to go with the face. It's not so good, but that's because I did not use an inspiration picture. I should have grabbed a magazine ad to help me out. It's okay, but seems rather cartoon-like. I do like the feeling of movement I get from her hair.

What do you think of these faces so far? I'm certainly enjoying painting them and experimenting. I'm learning about the colors I like, the colors that can make various skin tones. I'm also learning how to put personality into the faces through different shapes of the eyebrows, lips, and where the eyes are looking. I'm also learning that a little bit of makeup does wonders for a face!

Face on a Canvas

As I practice making faces, I think about -- am I ready to make a full painting? What am I going to do with my new-found skill of painting faces? I got brave recently when I decided to make a face on a canvas. (I've been doing all my faces on 9" x 12" watercolor paper.) The occasion was a visit I was taking to see a dear friend who I had not seen for a few years. Her name is Kim. She's a vibrant, daring, accomplished woman. In fact, she now owns an artist co-op in Deland, Florida, called Funky Trunk Treasures. If you're ever in that neighborhood, you should check it out. Deland has a great downtown main street, filled with great shops and restaurants. Kim calls herself "Kim Possible," which is very appropriate, since she is the woman who makes things happen. Here is the painting that I did for her:

I just did a splotchy very colorful background. I didn't want to over-think it, since this was my first face on canvas. Kim is a redhead, but this doesn't look like her. It's inspired by her and her go-get-it-ness. She immediately displayed it in her shop, which was quite an honor, since it is filled with wonderful artwork.

More Inspiration

In my last Friday Faces, I showed you a couple I did based on drawings in the book 100 Girls on Cheap Paper by Tina Berning. Here are two others that are copied from her art. This is for my experimentation only and I will never sell or publish my versions of her drawings.

I chose this one because it was an incomplete head. Why not? An incomplete face makes you think.

This one had know discernible eyes, and I liked that it included some of her torso. I will have to branch out and do more than faces next time.

Paint -- It's Not Just for Faces

I've done an awful lot of Friday faces. I hope you've been enjoying them. I also paint canvases, so I thought I'd show you one of my newer ones.

A while back I took a painting course from Flora Bowley. Be sure and check out her website to see the her beautiful paintings. The course was actually online, and she made amazing video tutorials that we watched to learn her techniques. I'll never be her level, but she is certainly inspiring. She's also really giving in her instructions. Some artists may be afraid to give out their techniques. The reality is: No one can truly paint like her; and her style is always evolving. So if you're copying her, you'll always be a few steps behind.

Here is a photo of some of the detail. She paints layers and layers, and sometimes other shapes and colors peak through, and sometimes they don't. I think you can see through my layers here to see some things that didn't make the cut. I look at it that the under layers inspire the over layers.

Here's a detail at the top. I covered up so much of the under layers that it looks smooth and monochromatic up here. I'm not sure if I like that. Maybe one day I'll go back and add a little more pizzazz up there.

100 Girls

On my first Friday Faces post, back in January, I talked about painting 100 faces to practice, and see how good I'd get. I'm on about 20 now. Last Friday, I showed you a weird Face Fail. Now I'll show you some where I did use inspiration pictures to get going. In fact, I copied them just to try some new techniques. I'm not claiming the designs as my own, they are just for me for practice. I will give you the source, because it's a really cool book and you may want to get it. I picked it up on Amazon.

You can see what it's called: 100 Girls on Cheap Paper. Drawings by Tina Berning. This artist has made face after face and published them all together. Talk about awesome! And inspiring. I've done a few of her faces, and here's one:

I love how the rest of the scene isn't even drawn. It's just the face, no hair, no ears, no neck. I used just a couple of colors -- Payne's Grey and Titan Buff.

This next one is a slightly side view. See how much better I did than last week's Face Fail by using an inspiration picture? I also did a little bit of an ear, which I never do. Have you wondered why all my girls have long hair? Yep. No ears are necessary. This one even has a bit of a shoulder. I really should include those once in awhile.

Fail Face

O.K. Everyone will make a fail once in awhile. So what. I tried to do a side view without any instruction on how to do that. And here you have, the Face Fail.

Will I give up on trying to make a side view or tilted head? Of course not. The colors on this clash, the hairstyle is weird. Right, like those make a difference when it's just an awkward-looking face? Whatever. Will I try this again? Of course! But maybe I'll do a little research and find some steps on how to make a side view. Or use an inspiration photo (which I did not do here) from a magazine or book. Stay tuned!

Back to Your Roots

When you take an art class, as I did with Dina Wakley's face painting class, you are learning a technique. It has steps, and a certain order. As you experiment later on your own, you tweak the steps, and tweak again. Sometimes you tweak so much you get away from the original method. I like to go back to the original instructions, re-visit them a bit, to remind me of how it all began. Here's a face I did in her initial outlining method.

The background is a bit busy, and of course you can see so much of it when it's just an outline. I like this one. It's simple, proportional, and still has a bit of the personality that I'm seeing in my faces. This takes it back to the simplest of elements.

Happier Friday Faces

Now that you've seen a few Fridays' worth of faces, what do you think? I'm certainly trying different things. I've learned how to make them happier. They're not necessarily attractive, but I think they have personality. 

One other thing you may notice is that occasionally they seem to be wearing makeup. You may not think that's so odd, but for me, I just don't wear makeup that often. It's never been my thing. Look at this face, though. She seems to have a little bit of eye shadow, and she is certainly wearing lipstick. Maybe I'm living vicariously through these faces. I'm enjoying putting the makeup on the girls.

Not sure what that is above her head. I'm thinking I started another face, flipped the page around, and started again. Well, that's what experimenting is all about!

Different Skin Tones

In an effort to try out darker skin tones, I give you these faces.

All I can say is, ick. The ick color of her face above is accentuated by the weird background color as well. Oh well, I tried.

This one is a little better, but I don't know why her neck is colored so differently. I do like how I did the shading, though. The cheeks are a lighter color that the face. I like that rather than relying on shades of black to make shadow. I'm not sure if there are pupils in her eyes, but I do like the effect.

Faces Inspired by . . .

Have you been to outdoor shows where an artist is painting people's portraits? They are set up with an easel, their paints or pens, and someone sits in the chair across for them for a bit to have their portrait done. That artist is an amazing artist -- but he still needs something in front of him to inspire him and get him going. Try painting a face from memory. It's tough. It's hard to get the proportions right, the expression just so. But try it again with a picture in front of you, and it's so much easier. In my face painting practice, I've used magazine pictures (usually ads; invest in a Vogue or other fashion magazine, and you'll have tons to choose from), other artists' books or blogs, and of course, the new standby, Pinterest.

As I've said earlier, these paintings are not to be sold. They are practice. So if I am inspired by an artist, or I outright copy that artist's picture, it's just for me to practice. I am publicly putting my paintings on my blog, but I will tell you if I've copied another artist for practice. I don't think that artist will think for a minute that I am profiting from his or her work.

This first one came from an artist's website. She's wearing a big hat. I don't know, I think mine kind of looks like hair. I think it's very Bride of Frankenstein-like. I like this next one because it wasn't as detailed as the ones I've done, and it didn't rely on hair for beauty or interest. I think it's someone wearing a hoodie. This also was inspired by another artist.

Love that Hair

When you've given yourself a goal to paint 100 of anything, you have room to try crazy things. As I make my way through 100 faces, I get a little creative with hair color.

If Kelly Osborne can do lavender hair, then why not one of my girls? I like the background color with her hair too. Sometimes I'm just making a background to make a background, and it doesn't really go with the face. I like the tilt of her head here. Or maybe it's just the way the eyes are looking to the side. You can see that I'm experimenting with different eye colors too.

This one has quite a "hairdo" as they used to say. I think it gives her a lot of personality. I think she's a powerful corporate woman who gets things done. But oh my, what a neck. I should have given her some shoulders.

What are My Materials?

You've seen a few of my Friday Faces now, so I realized I should tell you what materials I am using.

I am using 140 lb. watercolor paper. Remember that I am making these faces to practice. They are not being shown or sold. I want a nice surface, but I don't want to spend a lot of money. I buy the paper at craft stores when it is on sale or I have a coupon. I prefer the paper in pads rather than in a spiral notebook, because I like to spread the pages out and work on a few at a time. I can paint the background of one, and while that is drying, I can make the background of another.

I'm using Golden acrylic paints, About 95% of the paint I use is Golden. Sometimes I've gotten others just because I want another color, such as a neon. I like the way the Golden paints cover and have some light to them when they dry. I use both fluid and thick paints, but mostly fluid for these faces. 

I use an old gift card to smear the paint around the page when I'm doing a background. Or not. Sometimes I use a paint brush or a sponge brush. I use acquarellable stabilo pencils to initially draw the face, as Dina uses in her class. These are grease-type pencils that can also write on photos or glass. They will smear with your finger or water, which is the point of using them here. They create a nice shadow effect on the lines.

When I don't want that smear, I experiment with other pencils. I like farb-riese color-giant by Lyra, and I like charcoal pencils.

Sometimes I use a spray bottle with water to create the backgrounds. Not that often with these, though, because then I have to wait for the paper to dry before I keep going. I don't like waiting. Usually I work on 3-5 faces at once, so when you can go from painting to painting, then you don't have to wait.

Start with a Background

In Dina Wakley's face painting class, she always starts with a painted background. She's painting right in an art journal, whereas I'm painting on watercolor paper. It doesn't matter. The background comes first.

We're using acrylic paints, and often she will just squeeze paint right onto the page, then scrape it around with an old gift card. Here are the next two faces I painted.

I've managed to put the smiles back on their faces. I think the angriness of my previous two had to do with their severe eyebrows. As you can see on this second one, the background is a bit busy and it matches her hair. That's not a good idea, but remember that all this is experimentation, and getting my experience as I creep toward that 100 face mark.

Each time I make a face, I try something new. A different shaped face, different expressions, different colors. Speaking of shape, my, look at the neck on that first one! Sometimes I'm just so focused on the face that I forget that there should be something below it.

And Then They Became Angry

After my initial success of my first two faces from Dina Wakley's class, I was so excited that I immediately came home to paint more. What also helped was Dina's comment about expecting your faces to be good on the first try. She says, make 100 faces, then you can judge your work. Before that, it's just practice. Well, I took that to heart. My son has spent hours drawing creatures over the years. As he's grown up, I've seen the creature become more elaborate and more distinct. That is a prime example of what practice can do. My daughter, who is 8 years younger, swears that she can't draw. I use her brother as an example of what you can do if you just keep trying. Since I'm talking about his drawings, I'll show you some here:

He's away at college now, but has left files of hundreds of drawings. In that respect, and because of Dina's encouragement, I have decided to make 100 faces. I don't know how long it will take, but I'm certainly enjoying doing it. Here you have my next attempts, the first ones at home without Dina's suggestions in my ear. In trying to convey a lively expression, I think they have come out a bit angry. What do you think?

They certainly show some character. I went a little weird on their plucked eyebrows. I do like the idea of trying unusual hair colors. That's kind of fun, and it's not a risk when it isn't me! Stay tuned each Friday while I post more of my "painted faces."

Garden Turmoil

Here in Florida, we're still in quite a rainy season. We usually refer to the "afternoon summer thunderstorms" when we're talking about the 30 minute intense showers that we get, followed by plenty of sunshine. As I see from my calendar we're in Autumn, and my daughter's soccer practices are still getting rained out, so I think we might want to adjust that name just a bit.

It's this time of year that my husband and I begin to plan our vegetable garden. You see, we grow our vegetables here in Florida from October until May. Last year we had a bumper crop of lettuce -- we couldn't eat enough to keep up with it. We ate the snap peas right off the vines, they were so good. We successfully grew corn for the first time, and will definitely plant more of that this year. The only vegetable that lasted through the summer is our green peppers. Those couple of plants are quite hardy, and survived the summer heat and bugs.

Now, however, with all the rain we've had, I feel we are in the midst of a garden turmoil. The grass is growing so fast, it's quite thick and long between mowings. Our flowering vine on the fence is going crazy, and I can't talk over it to my neighbors anymore. I must find a dry but not too hot weekend so I can tame that beast.

All of this talk leads me to the unveiling of a finished painting. I worked on this one for awhile, and even showed you some photos in process in a previous blog post. I've put the finishing touches on it, and it is now hanging in a place of honor in my home. What do you think of this Garden Turmoil?

 

Chemical Landscape

I'm really liking how this painting developed. This is another one that went through many configurations before the final piece. I'm going to enter this one in a Landscapes show in the next couple of weeks. You can see here how it evolved into a "Chemical Landscape."

Here's is where I started thinking of it as a landscape.

I got very dark here. You'll see in the next photo where I lightened it up.

I changed its orientation and like it much better this way. I added some radioactive flowers, chemical dust flying through the air, and there you have it.

A Gathering of Palates

Recently I had some paintings in a show at the Lighthouse ArtCenter in Tequesta, Florida. I don't think I've shown this one in my blog before, so I thought I'd share it now. This painting made me think of a dinner party, where you have a fine mix of foods and a fine mix of friends. I call this painting "A Gathering of Palates."

How Do You Wire a Painting?

I've wired many a painting, I've even done my own framing. I've never thought it was that difficult. Recently, I had to show someone else how to wire a painting. Have you ever felt that disconnect between what you're doing and what you're saying? This was one of those things that I found hard to describe. I was trying to explain over the phone how to wire a painting. That's kind of tricky. I decided I'd try to write out the steps so I wouldn't have trouble with the explanation again. I hereby give you my little tutorial, called "How to Wire a Painting."

First of all, let me explain that I was wiring a canvas. I prefer to paint on 1 1/2" or 2" deep gallery-wrapped canvases. That means, there are no staples on the sides. You could eventually frame the canvas, but it's not necessary because you have a smooth canvas look on the sides. This technique will still work for wooden framed canvases, though.

Here's the back of the painted canvas. You can see the staples on the back, but that doesn't matter.

 Let me mention one more thing about the back of the canvas. I've seen some paintings that have a lot of excess paint smeared on the back of the canvas. This is a natural occurence, especially if you paint on a flat surface, rather than up on an easel. If you tend to get a messy back for your canvas, you might want to put some blue painter's tape on the back before you begin. Let the tape take all the paint, and when it's done, peel the tape away. Think about it this way: Your hope is that someone will buy your painting, right? Once they own it, they WILL see the back of the canvas. You want to present a clean back as well as the front. Please don't create a beautiful painting, then let it have a messy looking back.

Now, onto the the wiring.

These are the tools you will need: with a cutting capability, pencil, ruler, an awl, hanging wire, eye hooks, and later, the hanging pieces for the wall. The best way I can describe an eye hook is it's about 1/2" long and it looks like a lollipop. It is threaded like a screw, and the "eye", or open part, is what the wire goes through.

The rule of thumb is that the wire should go down about 1/3 from the top. Dare I say it? Please look at the front of your painting and make sure you have it right side up. You can use a ruler to figure out the third distance, then mark your spot with a pencil. Notice on my canvas that I am marking the spot on the wood only. You don't want the eye hooks screwed into the wood and the folded over canvas, just the wood.

Use the awl to poke a hole in the wood for the eye hook. Usually the wood on canvases is soft enough to do it this way. If it is too hard, use a small drill bit to drill a hole.

Start to screw in the eye hook. Poke the end of the awl into the eye and spin it around until it is screwed in tightly. Put in the eye hook on the other side the same way.

Cut a length of hanging wire about 1 1/2 times the width of the painting. The needle nosed pliers you are using should have a cutting part. Squeezing the wire tightly will cut through the wire.

One note about hanging wire. It is designed for hanging various weights. If you're making lightweight paintings, a 10 pound wire should be sufficient. You'll find that different brands of wrapped canvases use heavier woods, so you may need a heavier wire even if the canvas is a small dimension. If your canvas is 36" wide or more, you may want to use a heavier wire as well.

Thread the wire through both eye hooks so that an equal amount of wire is left over on each side. Wrap the end around the eye hook, then pass it back through the hook. Use the pliers to pull it tight. Do this for the other eye hook. The excess wire should be wrapped around the hanging wire.

One other note about wire: Some people prefer coated wire because it doesn't fray. I don't because it is slippery and the excess wire slides around when you wrap  it. You can see that my wire is frayed here. I'll cut off the frayed portion before I am finished.





 I always pull my wire tight. Over time, the wire will get loose, so I want to start with a tight wire.

To hang your painting, check to make sure the hanger is rated to hold the weight of your painting. I use standard hanging hooks, which go into the wall with a little nail. Never put it in the wall in an existing hole -- there will be too much wiggle room and it may fall out. Always make a new hole.

One more thing: When giving up one of your paintings, either to hang in a gallery or show or when you sell it, make sure you put your name and the painting's title on the back. You can even tape your business card to the back. If it is important to note that this is an original, one-of-a-kind, you can note that too, or note if it is a numbered copy.

Hopefully, my instructions are sufficient. If you have any questions, drop me a comment here.

You've Come A Long Way, Baby

How does this painting

become this painting?

Lots of paint and layers, and more than a month of sitting on it. I started this painting near the tail end of the online class I was taking from Flora Bowley. I started a few paintings following her step-by-step instructions. That's an ironic undertaking, and I'll explain why.

Flora has written a new book titled Brave Intuitive Painting.  Her style is to get many layers of paint on the canvas, using fluid acrylics, sprayed water to let it flow, and many tools like sponge brushes, stampers, and her fingers. Eventually, she'll look at the painting and begin to see some shapes and designs emerge. It's what I've heard other artists call letting the painting tell you what it's going to be. Intuitively, you will know where to go next with the painting.

Now here comes the ironic part. When I take a class, even art classes, I always try to follow exactly what the instructor is saying. I do their steps as they are given to me. So really, there's nothing intuitive about that. You're just following directions. But I agree with that approach, especially when you are learning. I also preach that approach when I'm talking to others about cooking. I say, always follow the recipe exactly as it is stated the first time you make the recipe. After you've made it once, and tasted it, you can then modify the recipe any way you'd like. I feel that if you don't do it the written way once, you'll never know how it is "supposed" to be. The same is true with taking a painting class. Recognize that the instructor is an expert, and she's made hundreds of paintings using these techniques. If she says to put your cool colors together, then hey, give it a try. Surprise! She's right. You try to sneak in a warm color when your acrylics are still wet, and you'll be making yourself some mud.

This is another stage of my painting. At this point, I wasn't seeing anything yet. It looked disjointed, so I decided to add some sketchy lines that could unify all sections of the painting.

I then added a lot more color, so much so that it looked very busy. I don't have a photo of it at this stage. That's when I put it down for a month or so. During that time, I had finished Flora's class, and finished two of the main paintings I started for her class. Putting it away allowed me to come back to it and really allow the intuitive part to kick in. I was done with the class, and no longer following her procedures step by step. I was separated from the daily tasks and could now just use everything I had learned, plus, the feelings that came from inside of me.

I'll show you the final painting one more time. Look at the darker bits, like the bright blue and magenta, but look at how I unified the whole piece with the creamy yellow. I call this piece "Forest for the Trees." I thought of that name as I was thinking about how many layers are in here, and how many colors and objects are there that you can't fully see anymore.

This piece was acceped into the Lighthouse Art Center show called "Art of Association." It will be on display June 1.