100 Paintings Challenge: On the Beach # 19

Quantity over Quality

Sounds odd doesn't it?! Quantity over quality………

The purpose for quantity over quality is because most of us strive to paint a quality painting each time we touch brush to paper. We sometimes get too caught up in the quality of our paintings and don't finish them for a myriad of reasons including "it's not good enough," "it doesn't look right," and "it looks nothing like I thought it would."

By focusing on quantity, we set aside the search for perfection and begin to paint for the practice of it, to learn what works, what doesn't and to keep going - no matter how good or how poorly a painting is turning out.

Giving/Receiving Encouragement

One of the things that can help us to grow quickly is encouraging comments - it keeps us motivated to continue painting. We are often “too close” to our own work and someone else, with more distance, can easily see areas to be improved.

Giving Encouragment:

• Be positive and upbeat!

• Use constructive criticism if you offer a critique.

• Be specific about what works well and why OR what does not work well and why.

• Re-read your comments BEFORE posting to make sure they say what you want them say!

• Be kind and courteous.

• Consider that you may not know what the artist’s “vision” is for a particular piece of artwork.

Receiving Encouragement:

• Try it on for size - if it fits, great. If not, disregard the comment(s).

• Take the comment in the spirit it was given - to be helpful.

• Do not fire off a comment in anger or hurt.

• Do not retaliate by being hurtful in your comments back to someone who has hurt you.

If you feel someone is being unfair on a repeated basis, contact me directly so that we can discuss it off-line.

PLEASE NOTE: As moderator of this blog, I reserved the right to delete any and all comments and/or posts offensive or harmful to other participants. This includes excessive negativity. I reserve the right to remove a participant from the blog if offensive behaviors persist after a written warning is issued. All decisions will be final and not open for discussion.

Monday, January 16, 2012

On the Beach # 19

I finally got to a town larger than Roseburg. We have about 20,000 people here and only a craft store. Grants Pass has over 33,000 and has a little art store .... so I got to browse through a very limited supply of new paper. I came home with three, a Moleskine watercolor sketchbook, some tinted paper, and Yupo.

I have seen some intreguing work painted on Yupo. It feels like very fine leather. Delicious! I tried it first. Oh my gosh! What strange paper. It isn't even paper. Further research tells me it synthetic and is advertised as washable watercolor paper. But I hadn't read that part. I just jumped right in. I wanted a lovely clear smooth sky. I laid the wash down and set the painting aside to dry. I tipped it at a slight angle to hopefully keep the more intense wash towards the top. When I looked again, all the paint had puddled in a line at the very top. Hummmmmm. Time to start over. Without even reading that it is washable I took it to the sink and rinsed it off. Clean!

What to do with this crazy paper? Some beach rocks in wet sand sounded like a good experiment. I even got out some ink which is supposed to be permanent. I swooshed and swirled and felt I had very little control over what I was doing. Once dry I went back and found I can very easily lift out highlights, and I worked on a few edges ... and ended up with dry ink on the palm of my hand when I just touched the darn stuff.

It will take a lovely clean line with an ink pen ... and I suppose acrylics will give interesting results, but it is so different from paper, I doubt I'll do much on it. Thank heavens I only bought two sheets.

I do have a purpose for some of this Yupo. I'm going to cut sheets the size of my various sketchbooks and slip them in underneath a page when I'm getting juicy in the sketchbook. The Yupo will keep the moisture from soaking through. ... so I'm glad I bought it.

4 comments:

liz Cutler said...: I have seen some beautiful pencil "paintings" on yupo, I was thinking of watersoluable graphite.
Or using it for monoprinting. Nice painting; January 16, 2012 at 8:14 PM
Claire M said...: I can really get the idea of wet sand from this painting. But, from your description of the 'paper', I think I'll stay away from it. Funny to read your adventures with it.; January 16, 2012 at 9:56 PM
Unknown said...: Makes me want to go out and try it, your adventures definitely peak my curiosity. Not sure I would like it either but synthetic paper sounds soo interesting. Thanks for sharing and boldly experimenting with papers. I am learning a lot through your process.; January 17, 2012 at 1:11 AM
Kelly said...: ...cool, Elva! This could be some sort of space image too! :-) Thanks for explaining Yupo paper. It's properties sound challenging and interesting...; January 18, 2012 at 8:33 AM

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Artistic Development

• This blog is dedicated to artistic improvement. It is a venue for the committed artist to receive ENCOURAGEMENT while taking on the 100 Painting Challenge.

• It is a place to discuss struggles with the challenge.

• It is a place to celebrate milestones, accomplishments and breakthroughs.

• It is a place to offer encouragement to others.

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• It is NOT a place to lurk. The expectation is that each artist will be posting at least 4 paintings a month, one per post.

• A painting may only be posted once.

• The painting should be posted on this blog and not direct participants to another link.

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• Up to two paintings may be posted by each artists for critiques and feedback each month.

About the Challenge

The 100 Paintings In a Year Challenge is intended for artists that are dedicated to the growth and development of their style as well as their artistic voice. The challenge also provides a means for overcoming areas in need of improvement.

The paintings should be a mix of small, medium and large pieces, some sketches, plein aire, and studio work; work from life as well as from photos. The variety is meant to push the artist out of any rut, to provide ample opportunity to create no matter what other time obligations are going on, and to challenge the artist if they do not create in one of these categories. The work can be done in any medium, but it is strongly advised that the artist consider choosing one medium in which to do the Challenge as this will help facilitate faster growth than trying to master multiple mediums.

DO NOT JUDGE the artwork! When a piece is complete, set it aside and move to the next piece of work. Learning to suspend judgement of our work is a major step forward in the development our skills.

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