Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Finding your Voice in Watercolor

I love skies. I like to watch their ever changing splendor through my large living room windows. However, when it comes to painting them, I am terrible. In fact I am terrible at landscape painting altogether so I decided to take an online class.

I have to tell you it looks much easier than it actually is. I just can't seem to produce a proper looking sky using ultramarine blue and raw sienna so last night after another failure, I decided to take the reference photo and listen to my inner voice, use the colors that I like and see what happens. It couldn't be worse that the first trial. Even if it didn't look like the reference photo, it would at least be nice and vibrant so I went with the phtalo blue.


This is a paint in progress photo. The colors are altered by my ceiling light, but you can see my point.

And this is the final result. I'd like to hear your opinion. Which one do you prefer?

I haven't written this post to showcase my horrible landscapes. I wanted to share my experience and tell you to let go. Stop trying to be perfect, you will become better with practice. Instead, try finding your own voice. Experiment with the colors you like, don't think about not ruining it. We are not all meant to paint landscapes like Turner. By doing this you will set your mind free and you will find the joy of painting which will hopefully lead you into painting again tomorrow.

Another mistake I have been making is to paint too rarely not only from lack of time but also fro making things too complicated and expecting too much from my paintings. I am hoping to change this with my new mind set.

How about you? Please share your experience with your art, your frustrations and how you overcome them. Did you find your own voice or you are still on the look?


2 comments:

Catrick said...

Wonderful as usual...love the watercoloring. I still look at the sunflower and ladybug hanging on my wall and think of you.

Cathy

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