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thereaderstea · 3 years ago

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I am back! I’ve been having a tough time to be honest and I was wondering if you have any fic recs that deal with mental health/illnesses? Just need fics that let me know I’m not alone here:( - ☂️

welcome back and merry meet, ☂️ carissima! i'm so happy to see you again! i'm sorry to hear you've been having a tough time; i want you to know my inbox and dms are always open if you ever need a listening ear 💜 also, here’s a mental health resource list.

mental health and mental illness are my favorite topics! so i have a lot of them in my library. i have also started reading on and navigating ao3, so i included a couple of fics from there. i included just the mental health warnings for each fic, but please check the fic's warnings before reading as most (if not all) of these fics are heavy and the multi-chaptered fics indicates what each chapter includes.

general warning: these fics (under the cut) may contain topics of mental health, mental illness, physical illness, death, grief/mourning, suicidality, panic attacks, abuse, and more.

BTS Mental Health Fic Recs

lost, then found by @magicalcrwn ➵ksj x reader | angst, fluff, hurt/comfort | oneshot | 2.2k ➵mental health warnings: talks of loneliness, existential crisis, implied suicidal thoughts

“When it comes, the two hands overlap / Then the whole world holds its breath for a moment / Zero o’clock“

Life is hard, sometimes you just gotta take a step back and breathe.

Stay by @sahmfanficbts ➵jjk x reader | hurt/comfort | established relationship au | oneshot | 2.9k ➵mental health warnings: depression, recovery, mentions of suicide

“Till death do us part” Your husband JK will do everything in his power to help you see how much he needs you to stay.

Candle by @tae-cup | The Reader's Tea ➵myg x reader | angst, fluff | oneshot | 4.3k ➵mental health warnings: depressing thoughts, thoughts of suicide, recovery.

You met him at the lowest point in your life. He was your candle, your light, and he helped you fly to the clouds.

nightlight by @minniepetals ➵ot7 x reader | angst, fluff, hurt/comfort | mafia au | oneshot | 7.7k ➵mental health warnings: mentions of abuse, mentions of death, reader has insomnia, nightmares.

things have never been easy for you but you never expected it’d be them that would make things easier.

heartbeat by minniepetals ➵ot7 x reader | angst, fluff, hurt/comfort | hybrid au | oneshot | 9.7k ➵mental health warnings: mentions of abuse, anxiety, nightmares.

running away from your master is never easy so you deem yourself this will be the last time if you are fatefully brought back to his hold again. so what happens when you stumble upon seven men who says they won’t bring you back? what happens when they promise you their love and care instead?

comforting arms by minniepetals ➵ot7 x reader | fluff, hurt/comfort | established relationship au | drabble | 1.2k ➵mental health warnings: stress, sadness/feeling down.

they come home to find you silently crying to yourself.

What Money Can Buy by @jeonstudios ➵jjk x reader | angst, fluff | oneshot | 17.8k ➵mental health warnings: reader has depression, loneliness, mentions of death.

in need of money, jeongguk signs up as a sugar baby, assuming he’ll be paid for sex by some old kinky woman. he never expected to meet someone like you. what were you doing on that site, and why would you have to pay for company?

A Place Called Home by @agustdakasuga | The Reader's Tea ➵➵ot7 x reader | fluff, angst, hurt/comfort | hybrid au | series | 88.3k ➵arctic fox!seokjin, panther!yoongi, golden retriever!hoseok, wolf!namjoon, calico cat!jimin, tiger!taehyung, rabbit!jungkook, vet!mc, human!mc ➵mental health warnings: ksj has anxiety, ksj was non-verbal, pjm has PTSD and anxiety, recovery, mentions of abuse, mentions of death, injuries, fighting rings.

Having saved your own injured hybrid, you were determined to try and help any other hybrid that crossed your path who needed saving. But being a vet in a small hospital wasn’t enough for you. You wanted to do more, you wanted to make a difference. You wanted to give them a home.

Fix You by @casuallyimagining ➵myg x reader | fluff, angst, slow burn hurt/comfort | hybrid au | series | ongoing ➵mental health warnings: discussion of physical abuse, emotional abuse, discussion of sexual abuse, discussion of self-harm

When you take in a stray cat, you have no idea he’s secretly a hybrid trying to escape his past. Can you help him heal?

Filtering Light by @sybilwriting ➵jjk x pjm x reader | fluff, angst | hybrid au | series | ongoing ➵bunny!reader, human!jimin, human!jungkook, ft. human!seokjin, human!yoongi, golden retriever!hoseok, tiger!taehyung ➵mental health warnings: mentions of past abuse, allusions of sexual assault, recovery, reader has anxiety and PTSD, panic attacks.

the reader is a bunny hybrid with a past that has left her traumatized and struggling to heal. some things can be helped with therapy, but some things can only be fixed through realizing you’re not all of the things that hurt you—you are, in fact, just loved.

Before I Leave You by @hollyhomburg ➵ot7 x reader | fluff, angst, slow burn, hurt/comfort | omegaverse, mafia au | series | ongoing ➵omega!reader, omega!seokjin, omega!jungkook, beta!yoongi, alpha!hoseok, alpha!namjoon, alpha!jimin, alpha!taehyung ➵mental health warnings: emotional and physical abuse, forced mating marks, graphic murder scenes, negative self-talk, self-esteem issues, non-verbal characters, abandonment, PTSD, hurt/comfort, agoraphobia, implied/referenced self-harm, suicidal thoughts and brief desperate suicide attempt, gender dysphoria, internalized transphobia, internalized misogyny, unintended outings, epilepsy.

Someone always has to leave first; They just didn’t expect Yoongi to come back with a new omega (who’s clearly been through some shit).

Don’t Worry Love by hollyhomburg ➵jhs x reader, pjm x reader | angst, hurt/comfort | duology | 4.5k ➵mental health warnings: mc has anorexia/eating disorder, anxiety, fainting.

You thought you had your bad habit under control- but when you wake up in a hospital room your boyfriend: Jung Hoseok confronts you- rightfully angry that you nearly starved yourself to death.

Part 1: Don’t Worry Love | Part 2: Just For You

Open Up Baby (Just Let Me In) by hollyhomburg ➵jhs x reader | fluff, hurt/comfort | established relationship au | oneshot | 2.1k ➵mental health warnings: depictions of mental illness, mc has PTSD, night terrors, anxiety attacks, flashbacks, implied abuse.

Hoseok knows that opening up is hard, and that healing is harder. But can see you struggling- but he’s torn, he can’t let you drown under the weight of whatever this is. He just wants to help you. He just wants to know.

Eyes On Me by hollyhomburg ➵knj x reader | fluff, hurt/comfort | established relationship au | oneshot | 4.3k ➵mental health warnings: knj has anxiety and panic attacks.

Kim Namjoon knows how bad his anxiety can get, but when he starts having panic attacks you decide to step in: lakeside hijinks ensue.

Sweet Like Honey (Break Like Glass) by hollyhomburg ➵kth x reader | fluff, angst | established relationship au | oneshot | 6.7k ➵mental health warnings: mentions of body dysmorphia, self-esteem issues, dysphoria, internalized self-hate, references to eating disorder.

Taehyung knows there’s something wrong with his girlfriend; the way she can’t look at herself in the mirror sometimes or the countless other bad days. He makes it his mission to make her feel as beautiful as possible.

eternal sunshine by sunlightvmin (ao3) ➵knj x jjk | angst, domestic fluff, hurt/comfort | android au | oneshot | 13k ➵mental health warnings: epidemic, death, suicide attempt, depression, anxiety disorder, grief/mourning, recovery, philosophical/existential talks, morality. ➵make sure you read/scroll all the way to the bottom because i almost didn’t and nearly lost my heart.

When half of the world dies, Namjoon forgets what it is like to live.

Android JK-0901 helps him learn how to, again.

Calcu-LATER by tae-cup ➵kth x reader, pjm x reader | fluff, angst, humor | college au | series | ongoing ➵ mental health warnings: slight internalized homophobia, anxiety attack, implied disorder.

Math never fails you. The numbers might not always make sense, but you know there must be a solution. Everything fits together like a perfect puzzle, like your tidy life and solitary living…until Kim Taehyung spills paint all over your notebook. He, quite literally, trips into your life.

Ch 1. Gouache on Calculator’s by Kim Taehyung | The Reader’s Tea Ch 2. Social Events? I Think Not | The Reader’s Tea Ch 3. Valentine’s Day | The Reader’s Tea Ch 4. Colossians 3:9 | The Reader’s Tea

it's hard to keep the colors inside the lines by orphan_account (ao3) ➵pjm x knj | college au, cafe au | duology | 38k ➵mental health warnings: pjm has insomnia, implied eating disorder, anxiety, panic attacks, mention of suicide. ➵i actually just started reading this the other day and haven’t been able to finish it yet but i love it so far! knj is an adorable, lanky barista who rambles and pjm is, in the author’s words, “a soft anxious cupcake.”

Park Jimin’s just trying to get through life without collapsing of sleep deprivation. Good thing Kim Namjoon works at a sleep clinic.

If I Only Get A Year With You by hollyhomburg ➵ksj x reader | angst, domestic fluff, hurt/comfort | oneshot | 2.1k ➵mental health warnings: mentions of death and self-harm, grief.

When both of your significant others die in the same car crash there is no one else you can turn to besides your longtime friend, Kim Seokjin. You both run away to grieve, but what you find in your sadness is more than you could have ever hoped for.

If someone could see what you could, they’d pass out. But you don't blame them. Who would ever expect for a ghost, a priestess and a grim reaper to be together - much less be rescuing others.

Stay by @deepdarkdelights | The Reader’s Tea ➵pjm x reader (first person pov) | angst | oneshot | 1.8k ➵mental health warnings: topics of death and dying. quote from stay:

“The world was one that had been plunged into darkness, devoid of the sky, devoid of the ground, and devoid of life. It was just the dark mist overhead and me. [...]

Was I even alive, had I ever been born? What is this strange but familiar place?”

here you go, mea ☂️ carissima! i hope you enjoy these stories, and remember that i’m here if you need an ear 💜 i wish you a well journey through your tough times.

sweet water and light laughter till next we meet,

your fellow reading monster, tor-mon 🖤

#bts mental health fic recs #☂️ anon #a reader's recs #a fellow reading monster #bts fanfics #bts fanfic #fanfic rec #bts fanfic rec #bts angst #bts fluff #assistant: castor

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meruz · 4 years ago

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Hey I can't find this in your FAQ so sorry if it's been asked before! Your traditional art is so stunning and vibrant, would you happen to have any brand recommendations for people trying to get into painting? Maybe specific gouche paint, brushes, papers etc. Thank you so much and have a nice day!

no one has ever asked me this before because this is like the first time ive started putting traditional art on my blog! LOL umm to be honest I’m very far from pro on this front, most of my knowledge comes from a handful of classes I didn’t pay a lot of attention to and lots of youtube videos but here’s my recommendations:

Paint

A lot of my paints are winsor newton designer’s gouache because this is what my teachers made me buy when I was a freshman at art school LOL. it’s definitely kind of pricey, I think it’s like $10.99 for a tube which I was NOT a fan of as a college student and is still not my favorite thing now. But they’re overall worth the price if you really want solid, high quality opaque paints. Though I’ve heard their student grade winton paints are decent as well?

I’ve heard less good things about brands like reeves and artist loft... but I think turner is alright? m.graham is supposedly great.

I also bought a set of holbein acryla gouache when it was discounted on amazon a while ago and have found it very solid. One thing you have to know about acryla gouache is that it uses a binder more like acrylic paint (hence the name acryla). Paints are made out of pigment + binder and most gouache is essentially watercolor but with extra pigment/chalk to make it opaque - the binder is water soluble so these paints can be reactivated with water. Acryla gouache is NOT water soluble when dry and it dries pretty fast so it’s overall less flexible. But other than that you can pretty much treat it like any other gouache and I find they keep a little better too, less likely to get gunky or stiff.

All paint brands have a handful of starter packs which are slightly discounted but if you want to build your own starting palette I’d say get a warm and cool tint of all the primaries, get a lot of white (working with gouache somehow involves a lot of mixing with white lol), and get a brown, maybe like burnt sienna or raw umber for underpaintings. No need to get a black, mixing darks builds character, looks better, and having one out of the tube can become a crutch. If you find a white watercolor paint tube that’s cheaper you can buy that instead of a gouache white. Again, they have pretty much the same make-up. And white paints are generally opaque enough that the composition between gouache/watercolor shouldn’t matter too much.

I’ve never used a block tray of gouache. Like those paints that come in little blocks in a tray? I know there's a bunch out there but I’ve never used them and I don’t know anyone else who does so I have no opinion on them.

Brushes

I’ve been kind of exploring this myself. I recently bought a cheap set of flat brushes off amazon LOL and I like them a lot?

Theyre probably not The Best or anything but I found flat brushes suit gouache plein air painting really well because its suits the kind of color blocking shapes I want to make. Also these had the right handle length to fit in my painting bag. That’s like the main reason I chose them tbh.

Honestly a lot of my art supplies philosophy is “give it a whirl with whatever you have lying around and when it feels like you're missing something specific keep an eye out for when that stuff goes on sale”

Paper

GOTTA BE HONEST I’m using cheapo paper. Because I’m making these paintings half for study and half to give my parents something to hang in the living room.

You can actually see some of them curling in on themselves here lol. If you’ve seen the sketchbook I’m holding in any of my pics of paintings it’s one of the canson mixed media books.

and its FINE... I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it lol.. I like that the texture is very fine but it doesn’t hold a lot of water and definitely distorts. Also I keep ripping off the surface with painters tape but that might just be on me. Oh buy artist tape. Just because its so satisfying to have clean edges.

I’m using painters tape instead of artist tape because I found it in the basement but if youre buying supplies buy artist tape because it’ll be kinder to your paper.

SPEAKING OF PAPER.

I guess anything heavyweight for watercolor/mixed media will be fine? some people like a lot of texture but if you’re painting small you might want to avoid it and pick hot press over cold press. Honestly I feel like a lot of this is going to depend on what your specific needs are.. how big do you want the paper to be.. do you want a sketchbook or would you rather carry around loose paper... etc. Maybe go to an art store and touch all their paper. I feel like its easier to understand sizes and texture when you’re seeing it physically.

When I go on a trip, I normally bring a softcover heavyweight stillman & birn sketchbook because I tend to obliterate metal spiral books in my bag LOL. Also I don’t rip any pages out of my travel sketchbooks so I don’t need perforation or anything. Also they go on sale a lot in the art store I go to haha. I havent used gouache extensively in it but it takes inkwash/maker pretty well.

On the higher end, I personally haven’t used it that much but my friends who do traditional illustration professionally swear by arches watercolor paper. It comes in lots of different sizes.

Whatever you use, if you really want it to lie flat you’re gonna want to soak and stretch it on a board but I don’t bother with that because I am lazy.

Palette

You didn’t ask about palette but I’m taking the opportunity to be a shill because I personally use a sta-wet palette and I LOVE it.

One of the biggest frustrations about gouache for me was how quickly it dries after it leaves the tube. And even if you can reawaken it with water its not quite the same? and consistency is SO important when it comes to applying gouache so I don’t want to be over-watering my paint.. ugh. Anyways, I don’t have to worry about that with the sta-wet palette and really its been a game changer for me. sta-wet is a brand name but there are a bunch of other wet palettes not by masterson that I’m sure are just as good. I mean, it’s just a box with a sponge basically, that can’t be hard to replicate.

The only thing - and I personally have not had this issue but I have friends who have - is that if you leave it wet for too long it could grow mold? or a mouldy smell? Just wash your palette with soap and don’t leave it for weeks on end and it should be fine.

If you’re not feeling a palette that’s always moist, the best palette I used in school was a simple glass palette. you can buy one I guess but it’s so easy to DIY, I think the way we did it in school is getting a piece of glass and mdf from the hardware store cut the same size and then duct taped them together on the sides so it wouldn’t be sharp.

costs like nothing.

what else...get a palette knife if you like to mix paints? and like to save paints... mixing with the brush means you lose paint in your brush in the mixing process so a knife is a good way to maximize that process. I don’t use it much but sometime if I have to mix a lot of one color I’ll pull it out of my bag.

I don’t know anything about easels, I sit on the dirty ground like a gremlin when I paint.

Ok yeah that’s all the supplies tips I have. hope some of it was helpful! always try to save money with art supplies, I think. Especially if you’re just starting out - it’s less stressful to use cheap supplies too lol. Good luck! Happy painting!

#Anonymous #traditional art #gouache #one day ill work out a proper way to tag this

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aaailieee · 5 years ago

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♥*♡∞.｡ NaruHina Quarantine Starter Pack!! ｡.∞♡*♥

I’m probably going to annoy you all lots with my quarantine drawings! Sorryyy. But I figured I’d try to make the best out of this situation and give you guys cute drawings here and there to accompany you in this conflicated situation we’re all living. Hope my drawings can lighten up your days just enough to make the out-of-the-ordinary situation less anxiety-enducing ♡´･ᴗ･`♡ ｡.｡:∞♡*♥

Here is a bunch of my headcanons for their starterpacks !! :

→ Hinata :

Cinnamon rolls: Hinata is fond of cinnammon rolls, so it makes much sense that it is her go-to quarantine snack.

Sketchbook: Hinata likes to doodle all type of stuffs in her sketchbook. But what she likes to doodle the most his the plants in the apartment she shares with Naruto. They lighten up the rooms and make them more “alive”, that’s why she likes having them around. Naruto doesn’t mind them, he actually likes them a whole lot. She also enjoys painting with gouache and watercolors in her sketchbook, and sometimes, Naruto likes to join her and engage in drawing or painting. He says he is too chaotic to be doing art, but Hinata finds his art very expressive and vibrant. Painting together is always very fun.

Knitting material: Hinata picked up knitting as a way to relax herself. She was going through a very stressful situation when she started it as a hobby : Kurenai suggested knitting as a way to calm down. And damn did it work. She now enjoys the feeling of soft fabrics in her hands, and while it takes a whole lot of time to see the final result, she isn’t the type of person that researches instant gratification. Naruto is like this.

Typewriter: Hinata unearthed this aged gem of a typewriter in the abysses of a flea market she and Naruto attended. Bunches of old toys, antiques and used CDs encircled them, but under the thousand folds of dreary stuff, Hinata encountered this light turquoise typewriter. It was love at first sight. Of course she had to buy it. The paint layers are cracked in the corners, seeming to imitate an aligator’s skin. Yet, there is a charm to it that Hinata cannot describe. It now lays on her desk, martyr of the strong sunlight. She types cute letters to her friends or writes poems on it, and it’s very relaxing. Naruto just watches her type lyrical stuff on this recylced paper of her, hair ignited by the sun passing via the transparent window. Writing is fun and relaxing, but watching Hinata write as love songs from the 60s play through her phone’s speakers is just heavenly.

→ Naruto :

Instant Ramen: Are we really surprised? Of course Naruto’s quarantine snack is instant ramen! It is never too much ramen for Naruto, and certainly not when in quarantine. Now he has an excuse to eat all the ramen cups carefully organized under the kitchen’s sink. But of course since he now has to spend every day at home, he varies the tastes and the level of spiciness. Hinata once in a while gives in the tentation and eats a couple of cups with him, but it easily goes overboard. They end up on the floor with stuffed bellies, cups scattered around their feets.

Comic Books: Naruto enjoys reading the weekly shonen jump, but now that he can’t go out and buy the new copy in the local store, he revisits all his old comic books. Huge stacks are hidden under his bed, in some transparent organization boxes Hinata buyed him to tidy up the shared room a bit. Nostalgia fills his being like a instant drug shot everytime he runs his finger through the aged, yellowish paper. Him and Hinata, every now and then, make mint tea and sit next to each other, engulfed in her soft lavender blanket, reading those comics.

GameBoy: After rereading his old comics, Naruto just has to play the old Nintendo cartridges that painted his childhood in wild colors. The fun and vibrant games make time fly so fast he often finds himself playing at 3am on the shared bed, Hinata’s sleeping form tucked under the blanket. Of course, the following morning, he wakes up with dark moons ornamenting his sky blue eyes, but damn, he doesn’t regret playing for seven hours straight.

Board Games: Oh gosh, board games! Of course board games would be on Naruto’s quarantine starter pack! These things make time a whole joke. Hinata is actually very competitive when facing Naruto, so when these two face each other it’s life or death - well, for Naruto. Hinata doesn’t mind losing, but Naruto can’t bear seeing every single one of his Monopoly spots being taken by Hinata. It’s fun, but one might argue that Naruto’s competitive energy can be too excessive sometimes, so much so that it’s unhealthy.

Stay safe everyone ♥

#naruto #naruto fanart #naruhina #naruhina fanart #hinata #my art #naruto x hinata #quarantine #naruto shippuden

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peace-coast-island · 4 years ago

Text

Diary of a Junebug

Making music with bebop gyroids

Musical gyroids galore! Kelly, Ned, Gutsy, Livvy, and Lulu are here with us to enjoy the sunny weather and make some fun musical instruments. The gyroids were designed by Daisy Jane and Kelly with some input from Ned and Goldie - and they look (and sound) so awesome!

It's been so bright and sunny these past couple of days, it feels kinda unusual. Looks like the sunshine's come out early this year! No shorts yet, but we've pulled out the sunglasses, where I finally get to use my new shades Daisy Jane got for me. Pretty and functional is how I like it - though I'm pretty sure that Daisy Jane spent quite a bit on these sunglasses - not that I'm complaining as they're really good at what they're supposed to do. I feel so cool and badass wearing them!

With Livvy home for spring break, she and Gutsy figured, what better place to spend a short vacation than at a camp? Gutsy always wanted to drop by to visit us since we came to Charm Villa to see her a while back. And of course, she had to bring little Lulu along to explore the great outdoors with her. Good thing they chose to come during a campsite event! What better way to be introduced to the camp than a gyroid adventure?

Since the Coloratura Jazz Band Festival last year Kelly and Daisy Jane began working on gyroid designs inspired by the festival. Kelly really has a way with instrument designs, coming up with interesting ideas like an electric cello in the shape of a treble clef or a harpsichord that looks like one of those cool antique desks. That's why gyroid events are so much fun - you can craft so many creative things with them!

Joining Kelly is her best friend Ned, her partner in crime. They've been friends since high school, often attracting trouble although things end up working out in the end. Coincidentally, Kelly's mom is a private investigator and a few years back she worked with Gutsy on a case involving a farm at Cedar Pickett. Kelly and Ned got involved and wound up riding horses along the infamously dangerous canyon trail to catch a criminal. They all remembered each other after all these years as it was an interesting case. It's fascinating how small the world can be sometimes!

Ned, according to Kelly, is a world class baker when it comes to pies. She wasn't exaggerating. He and his dads run a bakery/nightclub called Dub Step Pie Club. Despite the name, it actually looks like a pretty cool place. I should drop by there the next time I visit the island.

At first glance, Kelly and Ned seem like an unlikely duo. In a way, they kinda remind me of Daisy Jane and Almie - the bubbly outgoing one paired with the introverted quiet one. Kelly's the one dragging Ned into her schemes, usually involving her mom's cases. Ned has an unusual connection with the dead, so every once in a while he and Kelly end up with a murder mystery or a ghost with unfinished business. They have a fun dynamic, those two.

In between gyroid hunting sessions, we hung out at the main campsite and did a little baking. Ned taught us how to make pumpkin brownie pecan pie, a specialty at the Dub Step Pie Club. That, along with the cubeyberry pie he brought from home, were some of the best pies I've ever had! Tomorrow we're gonna make peach lolliberry pie, another favorite at the club.

Lulu's so cute when it comes to finding gyroids! Seeing her get excited and waddling around while carrying a gyroid - which looks huge in her little arms - my heart just can't take it! She's also become quite a chatterbox - I love hearing her point out things at the camp and getting excited about everything. Lulu's definitely the type of kid who's not afraid to take a tumble and get her hands dirty. It's so cool to see more of her personality come out, especially now that she's talking. If Lulu keeps this up, I'm pretty sure Kelly's gonna straight up die of cuteness before the end of this event.

Livvy has been enjoying the great outdoors, especially after a stressful couple of weeks at school. She's a business major with a minor in humanities - the latter which kinda happened and she decided to go along with it because, why not? It's more work, but she's not complaining too much because she enjoys the classes. Since going off to college, Livvy started a study/productivity vlog called coffeelivvy, where she posts about study tips as well aesthetic and practical notes. I enjoy watching her videos while journaling, especially her plan with me bullet journal videos.

Gutsy's been busy with Lulu and the cafe. She's into making bread these days so later this week we're gonna make baguettes, which sounds fun! I'll admit, the process of making bread - as in with yeast and proofing and such - sounds kinda intimidating, but with a pro like Gutsy, the process seems less daunting. Since working at the cafe, Gutsy found out that she has a knack for baking as well as making latte art. So along with some decadent pies, we also got to enjoy lattes with the pretty milk foam designs - a winning combo that's perfect for a camping event!

Kelly's on spring break too, a well deserved vacation after a busy semester. She reminds me of Alex and Claire, being the kind of person who does a lot of extracurriculars and manages to be on top of everything academically. Along with being in the Coloratura Jazz Band, Kelly's also a volunteer of the Asian Pride Film Festival, a video editor for Leicester Academy Theater, an RA, and captain of the badminton team. She also plans to take summer classes and go to Amsterdam for the the fall term, graduating in the winter.

Ned, of course, is managing the bakery of Dub Step Pie Club while juggling classes at Seashore Path. After taking a year off due to burnout, he returned for the spring semester, changing his major from English to business marketing. So far Ned finds his second go of college much less stressful than when he first enrolled, which is great to hear. I hope things turn out better for him this time around.

While collecting gyroids at Lost Lure Creek, we ended up taking a detour through the acorn trail. It's one of many places I haven't got to exploring yet so it was the perfect opportunity to finally check it out. Kelly took a bunch of pics of the trees with its warm autumnal colors. This area of the woods looks like it's fall all year round and it looks so pretty! And of course, the trees are full of cute little acorns that we had to take back to the camp.

Later on, while crafting gyroid furniture, we painted the acorns. It's been a long while since I've painted so naturally I was a little rusty at first. The idea for a painting session came about when Kelly mentioned that she and a friend led a Bob Ross style painting event at their dorm building that everyone enjoyed. Peaches and Lolly just bought some new paints so it was the perfect opportunity to try them out. I think my favorite is the acrylic gouache - something about painting with them is so satisfying to me.

Then we hung out at the beach, collecting shells, sea glass, and gyroids. Although it's bright and sunny out, it's not warm enough to go swimming yet. It was nice sitting out there under the warm sun, just hanging out with friends. We also did some fishing, catching some tuna that we later made into poke bowls for dinner. And for dessert, we had cubeyberry pie paired with a bottle of peach wine, courtesy of Gulliver.

Before heading back to the main camp, we dropped by the hangout sites to collect more gyroids before calling it a day. Lulu enjoyed helping out campers by bringing them fruit. I love seeing her chatter away to the campers and talking about fruit. Gutsy says that Lulu isn't afraid of strangers, which we clearly saw as she approached everyone she met. She's a little handful, keeping Gutsy and Livvy on their toes! I swear, you blink for less than a second and next thing you know, Lulu's run clear across the camp and trying to climb a tree or get into the water.

At some point, we got into an impromptu musical session starting with Kelly on the drums. Then Ned joined in with maracas, Livvy and Friga on guitar, Benedict on double bass, Soleil on keyboards, me on the toy piano, and Gutsy and Daisy Jane on percussion. Lulu was so cute dancing along to the music! I think we made a pretty good band - it sure helped passed the time while waiting for the gyroid stuff to be built!

Today we crafted the harpsichord, a galaxy themed dulcimer/synth, and a star shaped hybrid of a ukulele and violin. Like I said earlier, the designs of these instruments are amazing! Plus, they sound fantastic! We had so much fun making music - I can't wait to build more stuff and create even more music!

#animal crossing #animal crossing pocket camp #Diary of a Junebug #headcanon ramble

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mysticsparklewings · 5 years ago

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The Realm of Gouache

I did it! I finally got that gouache set I'd been eyeing down the way my cats watch their food containers! The gouache I'm referring to is this Miya/Himi Gouache set of 18 for anyone who's curious. It seems to have sort of taken the art community corner of Youtube by storm lately, and that combined with the way the set is designed, I've been really wanting to try gouache lately anyway, and it's pretty reasonably priced at around $20, depending on where you get it, it seemed like a good place to start with the medium. Gouache, to those that might not know, is a cousin to watercolor. (Well, traditional gouache is, anyway. There's also acrylic gouache, which is a closer cousin to acrylic paint, but that's a discussion for another day; I'm focusing on the typical kind of gouache here) It's made with the same binding agent--water-soluble gum arabic--but usually it's processed differently. Most companies use more pigment (the substance that gives any paint its color) and larger particles of it in their gouache compared to what you would find in watercolor, and there's usually some additional chalk-like additive to make the paint more opaque than watercolor. You'll sometimes even see gouache referred to as "opaque watercolor." For the same reasons, gouache is usually more expensive than watercolor or acrylics and while with a little patience you can make it into cakes/pans, it normally works much better fresh from the tube, and so it's much more often sold in tubes. What does all that mean, though? Well, gouache paint is more opaque and less transparent than watercolors without much water, giving it the color and covering power one might expect more from acrylic paints. But you can reactivate gouache with water, so you can also water it down and use it more like watercolors if you want to, and when you start layering it you can reactivate the layers underneath to aid with blending, which in my opinion is a trait that reminds me a little of how oil paints are praised for their slow-drying, "superior" blending capabilities. Based on that, personally, I continue to be surprised how little-known and how much of a niche painting option gouache seems to be. The only real "culprit" to me for why that is is the usually higher price tag, but even then...I don't know, it still doesn't make sense to me. The qualities it has that put it somewhere between acrylics and watercolors just make it seem like a really good beginner's choice to me, since you can learn some techniques for both and then if you branch out to one of the other two, it might make the transition easier. But I digress; we can debate on the finer points of gouache's place in the art world some other time. This was my first time using gouache at all, so I can't really give a proper review on this specific set of gouache (as I have nothing else to compare it to and I have no experience with the medium; it just wouldn't be fair), but I can give my thoughts on working with gouache in general and give a first-timer's perspective on it. Although I do have to say I found it interesting that there is pigment information available for the set online, even though the actual set doesn't have the pigment information or color names printed anywhere. (At least not in English.) Most lower/student-grade art supplies don't list that information anywhere. This specific set of gouache also stands out because the gouache isn't in tubes, but rather in little 30ml. cups that look like tiny jello or pudding containers. These cups all have their own slot in a very sturdy plastic case with a lid that snaps shut on both sides and a mixing plate that fits inside the lid. And I cannot stress enough that when this thing is listed as being about 2.5 lbs, they're not kidding! I was surprised by how heavy it actually was when it came in the mail, and after taking all the gouache cups out so I could peel off the little foil seals (most of which did try to take some paint with them, but I saved them short-term to try and make use of as much of it as possible before chucking them in the trash), I can confirm that most of the weight is coming from the paint itself. And it's really nice actually since most paint sets that come with a lot of individual containers of colors (usually tubes), the standard size is anywhere between 5 and 22 ml. By comparison, 30ml. seems pretty generous. The color choices in the set are pretty interesting, but also pretty well-rounded for a smaller, possibly more beginner-oriented set. You get both a warm and cool of the primaries (red, yellow, blue), a black, two whites (which we're going to talk about more in a moment), some earth tones in the form of a darker brown, a rust color, and an ochre color, and some "convenience" colors including a purple, magenta/hot pink/rose color, a teal, and some greens. Now about those whites... I'll try and spare you the nitty-gritty details of pigments and their uses, but in general most well-versed paint companies have more than one type of white paint on offer, and not all white paints and/or pigments are equal. Usually, you'll find a "Titanium White" and some other variation of White, possibly a "Zinc" or "Chinese" white. Normally, Titanium White is a specific pigment that's different from the other whites, but that same pigment can be processed differently in order to look and function more like the other white pigments (and other white pigments don't always have to be listed if they've been added to it). This matters because "Titanium White" is the most common type of white, and it's meant to be used primarily as white by itself because of its specific traits. The other whites are usually more transparent and work better for mixing with other colors. This is most likely why this set and others you'll find come with two whites; in this case, one specifically labeled as "Titanium White" and the other as just "White." One so you have a white color, and one for mixing. (Don't you just love how amazingly confusing pigment information can make things! ) This is fine and actually preferable to me, as it keeps you from using twice as much of just one white, so hopefully, you won't go through it quite so fast. The only problem I have with this is that I feel like my two whites might've gotten switched at some point since so far my "Titanium White" seems to act more like a white for mixing, and my "White" seems to act more like a traditional Titanium White. I did take all of the paint cups out at one point so I could open them and put them back in the palette/container, but I tried to make specifically sure I didn't get any of the colors mixed up. Still, accidents happen, and it could be they were switched before my set even arrived to me, if they are indeed switched. I intend to do some more testing to try and make sure if that's what happened or if it's some kind of user-error in using them. Anyway. After I did my swatching and a tiny bit of extra swatching/playing to get a taste of how the gouache worked beyond what my research beforehand had told me, it was time to play with it in a more proper art setting. I had a piece of Canson XL watercolor paper leftover from another project that I sliced in half to make it a more manageable size, and I used a circular cardstock insert that I saved from a roll of tape to give me a nice large circle to work with. I figured a planet out in space would provide a good opportunity to play with gouache's more watercolor-like properties and it's more opaque unique properties. And plus a cursory Pinterest search told me that when you're making fictional planets there's not much in the way of right or wrong, which was comforting since I barely knew what I was doing. So I masked off the circle and started out with a couple of coats of the beautiful Prussian Blue from the set (seriously, I don't know why but I was really enamored with this color) and varying amounts of water to do the sky. I had already found out that while you technically can use gouache without water, it feels a lot better to me if you add just a little to make it flow and spread more readily, and this was no different. I'm just not an expert yet at getting just enough to smooth it out without also thinning out the color. Still, I actually really like this stroked look for this piece, which is why I didn't try harder to layer it up to make it more solid. And I wish I could describe my process for the planet itself just as concisely, but I really just started going in with the colors I liked the most from the set--Ultramarine, Violet, Rose, Jade Green--and layering up thinner washes of color a little at a time in lines and curves to try and get a visual texture that makes sense for a planet. The most issues I had here were really my fault and not the paints', as I was trying to any color mixing pretty straight-on the paper and I had a tendency to put some color down and try a little too hard to blend it out, to the point it was just kinda mixed into what was already there. And I will note here that it seemed like the less watered-down the gouache was, the more quickly it dried. and the more water was added to it, it dried very noticeably more slowly. Now to be fair, that's usually how paint works anyway, but it just felt a lot more noticeable here for some reason. It could've been the paper, or the paint, or just me, or a combination of all of those things. I'm not sure. At that point it was getting late, I was getting tired, and I felt like the painting could probably benefit from being left to dry overnight before I played with it anymore. The next day I came back to it, starting with some spots of white since one of my whites did have a tiny circle in it where some of the binder had separated from the paint and it was bothering my brain to leave it unmixed, which naturally ended up in me having some white paint loaded on to my brush to use. I don't count that against the paint though since even some professional quality paints can settle out from the binder, especially if it's been sitting unused for a while. Usually, you just have to mix it back in and it's fine. The white was a wee bit too intense just sitting on top, so then I went back it with a little here and a little there of the colors I'd been using before and tried to fade out a bit of a curve shadow with the Prussian Blue. I even went as far as to try using a different, flat, brush and blending it a little bit differently, which created this effect that kind of reminds me of a waterfall in some areas. Then was that was dry, I decided that the planet itself was pretty much done. Which meant there was one more thing I needed to try... I masked off the circle again and went back to the "titanium white" and a little water, and starting tapping my brush against another brush to make splatter-stars. I was actually kind of surprised by how well this worked since I usually use my white ink, which seems to spend all of its usable splatters a lot faster than the gouache did. (For instance, I could usually get about 3 taps out of the ink before I'd have to dip back into it; the gouache I was able to get about 5+ good taps per dip.) And fortunately getting the water-to-gouache balance wasn't as hard as I thought it would be for effective splattering, and I managed to not get too much any one time so I didn't have any notable spots or problems from that. I did, of course, go back and add a few extra star details with my white gel pens, but that's standard practice even when I use the white ink. It may not be the most complex or thorough usage of the gouache, but for a first attempt, I felt pretty content with how it came out and to what ends I'd explored the properties of the gouache. That said, anyone who knows me knows I already have plans bubbling for some more involved tests/projects involving the gouache. Some of which I even decided on before the gouache got here in the mail. But either way, so far I really like the gouache and I'm looking forward to playing with it more and really seeing what it can do. Thanks to watercolors and alcohol markers, I've gotten pretty used to working from light to dark, but it is really nice to be able to add light back in a lot more easily if you need to. And I really love that the gouache reactivates the way that it does; Usually, I can get my watercolors to reactivate but I have to be exceedingly careful to keep from getting back runs or waterlines. I didn't seem to have that problem here at all, so I'm hoping this means I'll have an easier time trying to blend certain things when using gouache as opposed to watercolor going forward. Time will tell, I suppose. Now if you'll excuse me, Inktober is upon us and I have work to do! ____ Artwork © me, MysticSparkleWings ____ Where to find me & my artwork: My Website | Commission Info + Prices | Ko-Fi | dA Print Shop | RedBubble | Twitter | Tumblr | Instagram

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rowanwhittington · 4 years ago

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VIS3003 Evaluation

For the final module I wanted to push myself and utilise everything I have learnt over the year. I had to set my own brief, something which I have done before but not as formally or as well thought through as this. I knew I wanted to do my work from a feminist perspective, however I felt this was too broad of a topic and could easily become overwhelming. Instead I introduced one of my other interests, cults, and combined the two ideas into the title ‘The Exploitation of Female Sexuality in Cults and Religion.’ Once I began, I realised I wanted my work to be for the women that I am looking at as a way of bringing awareness to an often overlooked subject. With this in mind, I also wanted it to be for women in general who have ever felt objectified, particularly realising this after being catcalled myself. Overall, my work is always in some way for myself - everything I make I try to put myself fully into and relate in any way possible.

I had to do a huge amount of research for this module online as it isn’t something I could experience first hand. I looked on websites like Tate and MOMA to find an array of artists who have explored similar themes to my work, along with watching documentaries to get true accounts from these women. I learnt so much from this research process which pushed my desire to make artwork and show the disgusting abuse of power from men in cults and religion.

As a way of symbolising power dynamics and female sexualisation, I focused on the clothing of various cults, presenting this through a paper doll design with a faceless mannequin base. This was the introduction of the idea of these women being a unified anonymous female figure controlled by men. After reading about ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’, along with watching the first season, I began to focus this view on clothing more to how it can be used to restrain and control women. I constructed a corset out of cardboard to physically feel this restriction and see how material can affect the shape of a garment. The corset reminded me of Shibari rope, which I used to show restraint and control through uncomfortable ties on the body. This was a crucial point in my project as it became the focus of my work and a metaphor for sexual abuse. To accentuate the rope, I developed a bulbous, soft form reminiscent of a female body to be tied up. The bodies almost look pregnant, a nod to the idea of women in cults being there only for reproduction, often losing ownership of their child and having the idea of motherhood completely destroyed. I think this I an uncomfortable topic to see, although it was important to me to feature it.

My greatest inspiration was Louise Bourgeois, whose work I previously looked at in the Bioart module and was fascinated by. I love how varied her work is and how closely I connect to her creative process. I was captivated by the gouache paintings and sculptures she did of entangled nude female bodies. Everything about these worked with the message I was trying to convey, so I looked closely at her work when developing the shapes of my soft sculptures. I also was inspired by Allen Jones and how the female body can literally be objectified through sculpture. Although my work isn’t greatly linked to his, he was an important artist to look at in terms of the context behind my work.

I continued to refine my sculptures by changing something about each figure - they all have varying materials, colours, limb lengths etc. It was important to me that each one was unique to show an individual identity whilst being anonymous, so this way of working was both practical and met my aims. I used white and beige spandex as it puckered well around the rope, visually showing restraint. I hand stitched every doll, giving them an almost childlike quality, linking back to the original idea of paper dolls.

I think I was successful in refining my work by selecting the strongest elements and reworking them to get a polished but also experimental result. The idea of using dolls in my work came from one of the first pieces I made, showing a continuation of my ideas throughout the project. The final photos of the exhibition set up are some of my favourite pieces I’ve created throughout the year as I believe it to be thought provoking and a successful portrayal of my module brief.

I would have liked to have done more experimentation early on in the module, however due to the lockdown and working from home I really struggled to stay focused and motivated. To overcome this in future, I aim to find a way of working that is less stress inducing whilst still providing creative outcomes.

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emilyloudwellmultiverse · 4 years ago

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Multiverse evaluation

There have been many challenges I've had to face in this project. This being the shortest project I've had to do (three weeks) I have struggled to produce outcomes that I'm happy with. In addition, it has been a challenge getting used to working from home without having an actual place to be. Usually the thing that would motivate me to get up and go to college was the fact I had an environment full of supportive people to go to. Now I get out of bed and walk 3 steps to my desk to be greeted with support through my laptop, it's not quite the same. On the contrary, I have been receiving all the help and advice I need through emails, information put onto google classroom and weekly online meetings. This has definitely helped me feel less stressed and much less alone. Even with these challenges I feel I can be proud of what I've achieved and the way I have worked off site considering the circumstances.

The theme of this project is multiverse. It's a MARS project so I had to make sure I was thinking about including math, art, religion and science into my work.

I began my project by focusing on researching my chosen words, as well as zines. I later moved on to researching artists and their processes that I hoped to use in my outcomes, for example Tony Orrico (a human spirograph artist), Kelsey Hammerton ( a pointillism artist) and Nick Taylor (a zine designer). Due to working offsite I have had to adapt what processes I can do at home without the proper equipment, so I went back through previous project sketchbooks and picked out a few techniques I enjoyed doing. These techniques included pointillism, two handed drawing, ink blotting and spirographs. After doing the research I needed I began planning and completing my outcomes. As a result of limited time I feel the outcomes I have produced aren't up to the standard of work I am capable of producing, and I had some very different initial ideas on where I wanted these outcomes to go. That being said I enjoyed using all the processes I had researched, plus I bought some snazzy new gouache paints!

The materials I used for this project were pretty simple as I didn't have access to college equipment. I decided early on in the project that I wanted to do this zine all hand based to give myself a short break from working digitally. I mainly used gouache paints, and I especially enjoyed using them to do my ink blot pieces. The particular reason they worked so well was because of their watercolour like personality, I could change the opacity of different colours to let other colours show through. An example of this is on the “space” pages, I chose to make the yellow opaque to allow the blues and pinks to come out from underneath. Alongside these paints I used uni-ball eye (black) and uni-ball signo (white) gel pens to outline and draw designs. I used the black pen for my pointillism pieces because it has a good ink flow and makes nice dots.

To make my zine I used good quality sketchbook paper and folded it in a common zine way. I made two of these and stuck them together to make a 12 page zine. It measures roughly 7.5 cm by 10 cm and I felt this is a good size because I wanted to make a small zine so I didn't give myself too much space to worry about filling. A preference of mine when creating is in miniature or smaller than average scale because having lots of space to fill on a page can be overwhelming, so this zine was a perfect size to get my context across to the viewer without having to fill large pages.

Conversely, my spirographs would have turned out better if they were on a slightly larger scale. This is because being on a smaller scale the design didn't quite match up geometrically, so when it came to fill in the design I struggled to find a common pattern. To make my spirographs I cut out a circle and a square from a very thick card. I then put a pin in one side/corner and drew round the shape, I would move it slightly clockwise and draw round it again. Each time I moved it I would keep the distance the same, this is where I think it went wrong because of the small scale I couldn't measure exactly how far I was rotating the shape each time.

Throughout this project I have been analysing what I've been doing each week and what I plan on doing the following week. This combined with having a cork board above my desk with the project plan and checklists has helped me to organise my time to get all the tasks done on time. I have managed my time well and I feel, even with one not-so-great week, I have been able to hit each assessment criteria.

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whatsanalec · 4 years ago

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3rd year week 1&2

The first two weeks have been stressful for me, mainly due to my poor luck in teammates for the moving image module.

Moving image

Pre-term task

We were told to make notes for the task so I did so on my phone. What I didn’t know was that we were going to present our notes by sharing a document. So while the forts meeting was going on I scrambled to make a PowerPoint with my notes, but everyone else just did a word document which was very embarrassing for me, as well as my inability to talk clearly in front of a crowd. Yikes.

Instant film project

My partner and I were given the prompt “the Austrian experiment” which confused me, but my partner, Jamie Mathie, rather condescendingly said “The obvious first thought runs to famous Austrian scientist Erwin Schrodinger.”

As I said, I’ve had bad luck with teammates thus far, evident by this project. My partner didn’t respond to me for 3 days after that brief conversation, meaning 3 days without any progress done.

Eventually he did reply but we only had one day of research and one day of production. Throughout those days, he was flakey and wasn’t answering all of my questions despite reading the messages.

So, I took it upon myself to make the film individually. It was comprised of royalty free stock footage, voice recordings that I recorded under my duvet for soundproofing, and music that Jamie said was royalty free but I got copyright claims before my YouTube upload was even public. It was made in one day - the day before it was due.

That’s not like me and I wish Jamie had been more communicative so I wouldn’t go through that amount of stress. Despite that, some elements turned out well: the bookending with shots of eyes, some shots matching up bc (i.e. casino-coin-drop and couple-frames), and the monologue and music syncing at the end. Wish I could have filled something off my own though.

Scriptwriting assignment

My bad partner luck carries on. One of my teammates has moved to another module (why was he even in the list?) and another has decided to work with someone else. And so far (I’m writing this 3 days after the assignment was announced and 4 days before it’s due) my one remaining teammate and I havent even discussed it.

I think I’m going to do the rest of the term alone.

Fine art module

Has been less stressful. I haven’t done much so far due to the stress of the moving image module, but I’ve got a list of titles/ideas I want to work on. Knowing me I’ll get through about half of them throughout the year (maybe less due to corona).

So far I’ve been working on the title of “pool of twilight,” based on how my mum described the aesthetic of my room back home. Inspired by Andhika Ramadhian, I’ve laser cut a crescent moon-shaped pocket in a piece of mdf and painted deep purple’s and blues around it in gouache, like a mellow Leonid Afremov.

Then it came to painting the pocket white. I was running low on patience so I came up with the frankly quite genius idea of mixing acrylic with water and print it into the pocket. Aside from some gouache and mdf leaking into the mixture, it was quite successful in my opinion. My iq is exponential.

#twilight

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landscapepaintingclass · 5 years ago

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Course Syllabus

Landscape Painting

Spring 2020

Weeks 13-17 (March 24-April 24)

Gerlesborgsskolan Stockholm

Instructor: Todd Gordon

Email: [email protected]

COURSE DESCRIPTION

This intensive workshop will introduce students to several fundamental concepts, methods, techniques, and materials associated with the process of plein-air landscape painting. Emphasis will be placed primarily on perceptual, observational painting done outside, on-site, and, due to the current health emergency, mostly on an individual basis. Instruction, individual and group critiques will be conducted online. This course will be taught in English.

COURSE OBJECTIVES

Students will be encouraged to develop and improve their technical facility through the investigative processes of observational painting. We will, essentially, learn how to see. This workshop will stress the importance of critical and analytical thinking as essential intellectual and verbal complements to expressive visual communication. Students will work toward acquiring the basic, necessary skills and visual vocabulary to begin to approach painting from their individual, unique points-of-view.

COURSE SCHEDULE

This course will consist of 2 parts: studio/painting sessions and online discussions/critiques. Students will be divided into the same four groups as their corresponding atelier numbers (i.e. Ateliers 5-8). Typically students will work individually for 3 hour painting sessions either during the morning or afternoon, and have 40 minute online discussions/ critiques, by group, about the work in the alternating morning/afternoon sessions (see weekly schedule below). If during individual painting sessions, students need additional instruction, individual or group conference calls with the instructor will be scheduled accordingly. This will be on a first-come basis. Students will create individual blogs using Tumblr and upload their work for review. During the two week break (Weeks 14 & 15), class will not meet but students are expected to work independently on course assignments.

WEEK 13

Monday 23/3 Mentorsmöte/ Konsthistoria

Tuesday 24/3

(9:00-12:00) - All Students - Introduction to course, explanation of materials list, clothing recommendations, discussion of painting set up, surfaces, palette, color (hue, saturation, value), image presentation

Wednesday 25/3

(9:00-12:00) - All Groups (Ateliers 5-8) begin morning paintings outside.

(13:00–16:00) - ZOOM Meetings:

Atelier 5 - 13:00-13:40

Atelier 6 - 13:45-14:25

Atelier 7 - 14:30-15:10

Atelier 8 - 15:15-15:55

Thursday 26/3

(9:00-12:00) - All Groups (Ateliers 5-8) continue working on morning paintings.

(13:00–16:00) - ZOOM Meetings:

Atelier 5 - 13:00-13:40

Atelier 6 - 13:45-14:25

Atelier 7 - 14:30-15:10

Atelier 8 - 15:15-15:55

Friday 27/3 - NO CLASS

WEEK 14

30/3 - 3/4 - NO CLASS - Independent Study/ Open House - Work on assigned paintings

WEEK 15

6/4 - 10/4 - NO CLASS - Independent Study/ Easter Break - Work on assigned paintings

WEEK 16

Monday 13/4 ANNANDAG PÅSK

Tuesday 14/4 Mentorsmöte/ KROKI

Wednesday 15/4

(9:00-12:00) - ZOOM Meetings:

Atelier 5 - 13:00-13:40

Atelier 6 - 13:45-14:25

Atelier 7 - 14:30-15:10

Atelier 8 - 15:15-15:55

(13:00–16:00) - All groups work on afternoon paintings.

Thursday 16/4

(9:00-12:00) - ZOOM Meetings:

Atelier 5 - 13:00-13:40

Atelier 6 - 13:45-14:25

Atelier 7 - 14:30-15:10

Atelier 8 - 15:15-15:55

(13:00–16:00) - All groups work on afternoon paintings.

Friday 17/4

(9:00-12:00) - Work Session

(13:00–16:00) - Individual Critiques - Sign up as needed

WEEK 17

Monday 20/4 Mentorsmöte/ Konsthistoria

Tuesday 21/4

(9:00-12:00) - Work Session

(13:00–16:00) - ZOOM Meetings:

Atelier 5 - 13:00-13:40

Atelier 6 - 13:45-14:25

Atelier 7 - 14:30-15:10

Atelier 8 - 15:15-15:55

Wednesday 22/4

(9:00-12:00) - Work Session

(13:00–16:00) - ZOOM Meetings:

Atelier 5 - 13:00-13:40

Atelier 6 - 13:45-14:25

Atelier 7 - 14:30-15:10

Atelier 8 - 15:15-15:55

Thursday 23/4

(9:00-12:00) - Work Session

(13:00–16:00) - ZOOM Meetings:

Atelier 5 - 13:00-13:40

Atelier 6 - 13:45-14:25

Atelier 7 - 14:30-15:10

Atelier 8 - 15:15-15:55

Friday 24/4 (9:00-16:00)

FINAL CRITIQUE - Students from all groups (Ateliers 5-8) will show work from class, including work done on site, assignments, and unfinished paintings. This will be a very intense day and time will be strictly limited for each student. Constructive, verbal participation during the critique is encouraged and expected from each student.

WEATHER

This is an observationally based, landscape painting class so we will be working outside, regardless of the cold weather. DRESS APPROPRIATELY (wear layers, fingerless gloves, warm socks and footwear, etc.) If the forecast calls for rain or snow, look for a spot to set up under a bridge, on porch, etc. If the weather is too uncooperative, work inside looking out of a window.

MATERIALS*

This course would normally emphasize oil paint as the chosen medium. Students, however, will be working away from Gerlesborgsskolan due to the current health situation and may not have access to proper storage, ventilation, or disposal for oil paint, mediums, and solvents. As a result, acrylic or other water-based paint (gouache) may be used during the course.

Recommended colors for both oil and water-based painting:

Cadmium Lemon or Hansa Yellow

Cadmium Yellow Medium

Cadmium Orange

Cadmium Red Medium or Pyrrole Red

Quinacrodone Magenta or Alizarin Crimson

Ultramarine Blue

Cerulean Blue

Yellow Ochre

Titanium White (large tube)

additional colors:

Raw Sienna

Phthalo Blue (green shade)

Do not buy “hue” paints – they are cheaper, but have more white or more binder and less pigment.

“Student Grade” paints also have less pigment and more binder.

Brushes

There are 4 basic shapes of brushes – filbert, round, flat, and bright. Each shape also varies in size (designated by a number, ie #4 Round, #12 Flat). Brushes also vary in the material of the bristle, ranging from stiff hog bristle to soft sable to synthetic nylon. Buy at least 6 long-handled brushes for oil painting. Try a mix of bristle and synthetic in varying sizes (i.e #2, #4, #6, #8, #10, etc.).

Recommended:

2-3 Rounds (at least one #2 synthetic for detail work)

2-3 Flats

1 Filbert

Also, if you plan on priming your painting surfaces with gesso, you will need a cheap house painting brush (called a “chip” brush in English) that you can purchase from a hardware store.

Surfaces

Students are encouraged to paint on primed canvas, wood or paper. Students can either purchase pre-stretched canvases or prepared wood (rigid) surfaces or prepare their own. Surfaces should vary in size and should be no smaller than 20 x 30cm.

Other Materials

If you want to use oil paint:

Odorless mineral spirits - Gamsol, Turpenoid, Becker

Stand oil

2+ glass jars with lids (recycled food jars work well)

If you are using acrylic paint:

Gel medium (I sometimes use a medium body gel when working with acrylics, but there are many varying mediums depending on the drying time and the type of finish you want - matte, gloss, semi-gloss, etc.)

Plastic spray bottle commonly used for watering plants

For both oil and acrylic painting:

2 palette knives (metal, not plastic)

Palette (Disposable paper palette, freezer paper or glass)

Plastic container to hold water (food container like large yogurt container works well)

Paper towels or cloth rags

Liquid dish or hand soap, brush cleaner

Gesso

1” blue painter’s tape

2-4 graphite pencils (4B, 9B)

1 white plastic eraser

Small sketchbook

Optional:

Pizza boxes or portfolio case for carrying wet paintings

I also recommend that you use an easel when painting. If you cannot borrow one from school, it might be a good investment to purchase one to have beyond school. For landscape painting, I recommend a standard French plain-air box easel. This easel is useful for both small and larger paintings (up to 82cm high). Here is a link to the brand and model I use:

http://www.mabef.com/en/products/easels-sketch-boxes/m23.

You do not need to purchase this very model, I am only providing you with an example. There are several other brands (Julian, Richeson, etc.) that make similar style easels. Find the one that is most cost effective and suitable to your needs and interests.

You may also try pochade boxes. They are usually much lighter than French easels, which is nice for transport but can cause other stability problems on windy days. They are also limiting in terms of the maximum height on which you can work.

Here is a link so you can see the actual easel:

https://www.dickblick.com/products/mabef-pochade-box-and-tripod/

I have one of these pochade boxes. Please note, they require the purchase of a separate tripod as well:

https://www.dickblick.com/products/sienna-pastel-pochade-box/

ASSIGNMENTS

During Weeks 14 and 15 CLASS WILL NOT MEET. Students are expected to continue working independently. Choose TWO of the following painting projects to complete by the Final Critique (24/4/2020).

Paint one large landscape painting, minimum of 70 x 100cm. Work on painting over a minimum of 3-5 sittings. Consider time of day, consistent lighting, weather, etc.

Work on a series. Choose a single landscape view - outside, from a window - and work on a series of paintings using this composition over the course of several days or weeks. Vary the times of day (morning, afternoon, night) when you set up and consider the light in the motif. Each painting should be completed in a single sitting. Make a total of at least 6 paintings.

Paint 6 small premier coup landscapes from direct observation. These paintings should be done quickly and gesturally. React and respond to the perceived environment. Experiment with different size brushes. Paint economically. What’s essential, visually in the landscape to make a successful painting?

Paint 2 landscapes from the same window in your house/apartment or studio. Paint one during the day, and one at night. Work on paintings for multiple sessions. Paintings must be a minimum of 46 x 60cm.

Paint 2 nocturnes outside. Consider lighting sources (wearable headlamp, streetlights, signage, light from windows, etc) when setting up - how to light your surface? how to light your palette? Dress warmly. Paintings must be a minimum of 46 x 60cm.

Make 2 paintings of the landscape from the same window. Paint both pictures entirely from observation. Paint a third painting from memory, using the finished paintings as source material.

Make several drawings (5-10) from differing vantage points of an interesting landscape. Use charcoal, graphite, colored pencil, pastel, marker, ink, etc. or a combination of all of them. Drawings should be done from life. Make a painting using the drawings as source material.

Paint two transcriptions of one of the following Old Master paintings. This should be an interpretation of the painting, not an exact copy. Focus on the compositional structure and the essential elements of the painting. Think in terms of abstract shapes, flat planes of local color, and edges when describing form

Uccello, The Battle of San Romano, 1436-1440

Titian or Giorgione, The Pastoral Concert, 1509

Titian, Bacchus and Ariadne, 1520-1523

Titan, Rape of Europa, 1560-1562

Titian, The Death of Actaeon, 1575

Bruegel, Hunters in the Snow, 1565

Bruegel, The Harvesters, 1565

Poussin, The Adoration of the Golden Calf, 1633-34

Poussin, The Triumph of Pan, 1635

Constable, The Hain Way, 1821

BLOG

I have set up a blog for this class on Tumblr: https://landscapepaintingclass.tumblr.com . Students are required to create their own blogs at the beginning of the course, using whatever platform they choose (Tumblr, WordPress, etc.). After creating their individual blogs, students will email me the links to these respective blogs. I will then post a list of these links on the class blog so all students have access to their classmates’ blogs. Students will use these blogs primarily to post images of their work, both in-progress and completed paintings, throughout the month. As a class we will be able to access these images during our online discussions and critiques. Students can also add comments or share their experiences about their work or the experience of painting the landscape.

Please note: for easier login access, the classroom blog will be not be password protected. If, however, you would like to make your blog private and inaccessible to anyone outside of class, you will still be required to share your password with me and members of the class.

For inspiration, here are a couple of painting blogs to check out:

https://paintingowu.wordpress.com

This blog is written by Frank Hobbs, Painting Professor at Ohio Wesleyan University. It is a thoroughly comprehensive site which includes essays about several painters and links to other contemporary painters’ websites. Fantastic resource for painting.

https://stuartshils.tumblr.com

This is an artist’s blog, composed by Stuart Shills, and American painter from Philadelphia.

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doodlewash · 7 years ago

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My name is Jenny Kroik. I was born in Russia, grew up in Israel, and now live in New York City. I started painting very young. I always felt that painting was a great tool to communicate my point of view with the world. I think the biggest struggle I had (and still have) is to find a meaning or purpose in what I do. When I was younger, I felt that you should only do things if they benefit society in some large, heroic and long-lasting way. That idea brought a lot of aggravation into my work.

It also took the joy out of it to some extent, because no matter how I looked at it, my paintings seemed smallish in the great scheme of things. I went to grad school hoping to resolve some of these conflicts relating to my work, but even though my degree was in Painting, I found that I was making art that I didn’t like to please others. Lately, I’ve found that, ironically, as an illustrator, I was making art that was more pleasing to me, and felt more like it was for myself (even though there is a clear “client” and “market” involved). It was an important re-discovery, and I became more confident about the things that I produce now.

I started to take painting lessons when I was about 13, and I started with watercolors (because my mom deemed all other paints too toxic). I’ve used watercolors a lot, and it is still my go-to medium. I think that as a kid, I felt that the watercolors were missing a bit of solidity to them, so when I tried gouache paint years later, it all clicked. With gouache, I could use the paint in the watery-style that I am used to, while adding opaque tones and solid layers. I think it fits how I feel now, that I’d like the painting to be more like a statement rather than a suggestion, or something in between those two.

I use Yarka St. Petersburg for watercolors. This was the first set I used, and my mom actually brought it with her from St. Petersburg. Sometimes, when I run out of a color in my set, I squeeze some M. Graham watercolors or Winsor & Newton, whatever I happen to have around. The most important colors for me to have are sepia, cad orange and ultramarine blue. Besides all the basic colors, these complete my color palette and I have trouble painting without these.

For gouache paints, I use Holbein, they are my favorite. Their colors are very solid. I found with some other brands, when you open the tube for the first time and squeeze out the paint, lots of liquid comes out, this doesn’t happen with Holbein. If you pre-mix them in little tubes with a few spritzes of water (like I was taught by my art mentor) then they last for a long time.

I like to use brushes that are on the cheaper side, because they are usually stiffer. They are not quite as stiff as acrylic brushes, but not as soft as the nicer watercolor brushes. The softer ones are not as precise for me. Maybe I used crappy brushes for so long that I got used to them, and when I paint with a fancy sable I just don’t like it.

I can’t really name any particular brand of brush. I used to love these Princeton Art Advantage brushes that I would always get at the $2 bin at the university bookstore in Oregon, but I haven’t been able to find a good substitute yet, I’ll let you know when I do.

My current favorite for paper is Fluid 100 paper, hot press, 140lb. I also use Arches hot press paper a lot, and sometimes Arches cold press for portraits and quicker paintings. (the cold press absorbs too much, and for longer paintings it just eats all my paint).

I also like to use “mystery paper”- I have a stack of paper I’ve collected throughout the years, and I have no idea where it’s from or what it does. some of it is for printmaking, some for markers, some of it rice paper.I pick a sheet from the stack and paint on it, and see what happens. It’s always most stressful when it works out really great, because then I don’t know what this paper was and where to find it again. But it’s good to be a little bit stressed about your art sometimes.

I use palette paper (any brand) and the paint tub with two sides – one with a scrubby side. That is perfect for cleaning the brush and avoiding running to the sink every 4 minutes. Also, a cotton rag is crucial. If I forget my rag I feel lost. Paper towels absorb too much and I don’t like to pollute the planet.

I used to use a lot of waterproof pens, like the Winsor & Newton pens or Microns for sketching and doing a wash on top, but I haven’t been working with line in a while. Maybe I should go back to it a bit. I also like Pentalic sketchbooks.

Learning meditation really helped me and my work as well. It’s similar in many ways to the artistic process, and learning and reading about mindful meditation helped put into words the things I was always struggling with at the studio. For instance: how can I sit down every day and make painting after painting, and still find new possibilities in the work? Or how can I reconcile the painting I planned to make with what actually came out (including spills and dirty fingerprints)? And one of the hardest things: how can I sit down to paint when my mind is constantly filled with noise, judging voices, criticisms, endless comparisons to other artists and their successes, and just random static?

Meditation definitely made my time in the studio not only less torturous, but also more productive: It gave me the framework to study unpleasant emotions like an objective observer, and I find many treasures in the icky moments that I would normally try to push away.

After moving around a lot in my life, I now live in New York City. This is probably the favorite place I’ve lived in so far, and also the least comfortable, dirtiest, cramped with jerks, and most aggravating at times. But I feel most comfortable in the city, and I feel like being around so much creativity and energy has really given me an artistic push. I can let my inner jerkness out and be pushy and demanding. Things that were absolutely not allowed in Oregon, where I lived for 8 years.

Oregon was quite the opposite of New York. it was quiet and calm on the outside. There was one museum in the town I lived in, and the art scene was fairly small. I developed a practice of mining for inspiration in daily life. Going out and looking for interesting things, applying a “filter” on the world, trying to see everything as an interesting or funny painting. Instead of museums, I roamed around thrift stores and antique shops, sketching what I saw. Finding visual interest in an army of white older ladies that all wore the same khaki pants and Patagonia fleeces. Going back to the same place or person, and painting them over and over again.

Oregon was maybe a quiet, and lets face it, boring place, but it was an awesome place to really figure out what I’m into as an artist. It’s a great place in general where one can fall apart and reconstruct oneself. (If you’re looking for such a place, I recommend it.)

The way I developed my practice came from all the time I spent thinking about what “inspiration” is. It started from this damaging idea I had that inspiration is something that comes to you like a vision from outer-space: I had a vague memory from some time in my past, maybe high school or when I was working on my BFA, that art ideas would just float into my life like a religious experience, and I would see the painting in its entirety in my mind, accompanied by a strong emotion that made it feel like it’s going to be the most important painting that ever existed.

This was my idea of what inspiration is, and I had no way to go back to this magical past memory and confirm or deny that this is actually what I felt, but I was left with a strong belief that, at one point, I was inspired, and painting was easy, and now I’m all tapped out. It was a very upsetting feeling. There’s nothing more damaging to your practice than to become convinced that once upon a time you had a sack of magic art beans, and now that they’re gone, you have to live out the rest of your life being uninspired.

Finally I’ve decided that, even if I did have magnificent magic art beans and now they are gone forever, then those beans were bullshit, and I didn’t need them anyway. They were crap scam beans. Instead I’m going to develop a sustainable practice that won’t fail me. It’s going to be with me on good days and bad days, when my art is pretty and loved, and when it’s just an undefinable mess. When I’m in the middle of New York surrounded by hordes of amazing drawable people, or if I’m in a deserted industrial truck-depot.

And, honestly, without such a practice, I wouldn’t have known what to do with all the amazing visuals I encounter. I probably would have “saved them for later”, too intimidated to approach them.

My practice consists of doing something hands-on, art related on a daily basis. Ideally, I would paint/draw at least an hour a day. It could be anything from sketching or doodling from life, drawing silly cartoons, mixing colors, cutting papers into little compositions (I haven’t done that in a while, that sounds like fun right about now!) .

Sometimes on an unproductive kind of day, I count collecting imagery as part of my daily practice, but I don’t think it exercises the same parts of my brain that keep it playful. Taking photos or looking for reference material online is important to plan a solid illustration and keep concepts sophisticated and fresh, but this process can become too mechanical if you make that your only prep work before a painting.

Doodling and playing with actual materials brings the lightness and fun into my work for sure. That said, I work from photos and think it’s very important for my paintings to have a variety of really solid photo reference. Sometimes, one blurry photo is all I have, so then I have to supplement it with studies of my own anatomy, or search for pictures online of someone holding a certain pose, a material, a detail, a machine or animal I don’t quite know how to paint, etc.

While working from photos, the biggest challenge is to stop it from becoming flat, or just a copy. There should be a point to why this is better as a painting, something that you’re trying to show with it. A lot of it is about editing and color. I want to stop the world, remove everything that isn’t important, and shine a spotlight on a little moment, a beautiful expression, a funny juxtaposition, or something that tickled me in the right way, but I’m not sure why.

The painting process for me is definitely a way to reexamine a fast-moving life and slow down time in order for me to think about my experiences, but do it in a form of indirect conversation with whoever looks at my work.

I think I have been slowly bringing together all my styles and interest, and distilling them. All my interest: abstraction, figurative art, concept, color and a journal-style practice, where I draw very fast what I see that day, I have been cooking these down into a nice reduction of all the sauces of my previous practices. The test of what a “successful” painting is to me is that I actually love looking back at my work over and over, and I feel like it’s “me”.

In this past year of living in New York City, I realized that painting people was something I really love doing more that other subjects. A big part of my work has been loitering around town. This is a practice I revived back form when I lived alone in Boston when I was working on my BFA.

I used to spend a lot of time walking around thinking about what I should paint. Now that I’m older and bolder, and also shameless, I incorporate into these walks taking pictures of strangers and also sketching them, when I can.

One of the things I felt most deprived of in Oregon are museums. I made it a point to go to all of the museums in New York City. (So far I haven’t even seen half! There are so many!) One thing that I discovered is that museums are a great place to look at people. Not only do they walk slowly, they are also usually well-lit.

I can sketch and photograph them, and if I miss a cool person, I can snake around the displays and catch up with them in the next gallery! (I’m not creepy at all). There are also a ton of tourists in museums who take a thousand pictures of everything, so I blend it well.

There are a few museums that I found people dress up for more than others, for instance the MOMA. I love it when people dress up for a museum, it makes me hopeful that art means something to people. It’s almost like the artists themselves were there, and people want to honor them with their best clothes. The recent fashion exhibit at the MET (Rei Kawakubo/ Comme des Garcons: art of the in-between) brought out the most amazing people. My head almost exploded trying to capture everyone I saw. So many interesting people!

I still have a huge backlog of ideas for paintings on my to-do list. Since moving to NYC I probably shot about a Terabyte of photos. I probably did about 70 paintings of people in museums so far. I really enjoy it, so I hope that people aren’t sick of seeing them! This is a fun project, and maybe it will evolve into something more in the future.

In the next step in my art, I would love to continue evolving my composition style, making it more sophisticated, and also developing concept further in my work. I would also love to work in animation again.

Jenny Kroik Website Instagram Facebook Twitter Society6 Store

EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the second feature from Jenny Kroik who was one of the very first guest artists on Doodlewash back in August 2015. The format has changed a lot since that time. If you’re a former guest and would like to share your latest story with the community, please contact me!

Don’t Miss World Watercolor Month In July!

GUEST ARTIST: Aimless Strolling, Kind Trolling by Jenny Kroik - #WorldWatercolorGroup @jkroik My name is Jenny Kroik. I was born in Russia, grew up in Israel, and now live in New York City.

#WorldWatercolorGroup #conceptual #doodlewash #featured #gouache #illustration #museum #New York #painting #watercolor #watercolour

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cgpaints · 7 years ago

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Monthly Review May 2017

whew here we go again. I actually forgot to do this for April, whoops.

That being said April has been a pretty slow month so you did not miss much.

May however has been pretty busy as you can see, probably the busiest month I had so far as far as freelance as concerned, I have no Idea how I managed to cramp some personal stuff in there as well. I actaully have finished some more work, both commercial and personal stuff but I can’t /don’t want to show that yet :)

Soo let’s do this.

Art/ freelance stuff

Freelance has been going well, it has slowed down a little bit since the last month but there has not been a shortage of work nevertheless. June might turn out a little bit slower but I am actually planing on picking up some personal work again, so that’s not too bad :)

In my freetime I’ve been picking up the real paints and brushes again and gave gouache a shot. I’ve been wanting to focus on traditional painting for quite some time now jumping from oils to markers to watercolors which was a lot of fun but none of these mediums proved to be something I wanted to persue for actual finished work. Gouache is really different there, I am having a lot of fun with it as it’s so damn flexible as a medium and at the same time it’s really easy to use as far as setting the whole workspace up is concerned, it kind of unites the best of all worlds in one medium at least for what I am planing to do with it.

For now I’ve been experimenting a little bit with it, trying a bunch of different stuff and trying to figure out a workflow that would end up in results that I actually like. Still not where I want them to be at all buuut I am getitng there:)

personal/life stuff:

Weightloss has been going really well even if it has slowed down a bit (which is bound to happen I believe the closer you get to a “normal” weight) . I still have to lose around 7-8 punds until I am where I want to be and I hope to be there by the end of next month.

The much more interesting news is the fact that my girlfriend and I do fiiiiiiiiiiiiinally know where we are going to live haha. She actually got a job in Hamburg and we will be moving into our new appartment on July 1st which is SO SO SO SOOO AWESOME!!!

We found a really cool appartment and will finally have my own “office” again to stuff all my stuff and myself in. I can’t wait until we can move in, it’s going to be so great!

I guess that’s it for this month I guess. A lot of stuff has happened but I am also super happy that freelance is just keeping it’s pace more or less. Having the feeling of being able to just flow along with it is a nice change of pace compared to the constant existential fear stress levels of the last months.

Right now everything is “nice as it is” and I feel great being able to enjoy where I am at for a short time and being able to catch my breath a little bit before pushing on to greater things :)

#art #painting #drawing #illustration #review #monthly review #freelance #conceptart #gameart

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boelterdesignco · 6 years ago

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5 Ways to Overcome and Use Creative Block Effectively

What Is Creative Block?

Creative block is when you feel like you are in a rut with your art. You can be outputting art regularly and one day just feels like you’re stuck. It’s like you forgot how to create art and feel bored with what you’re creating. It’s a feeling of total loss while everyone else around you is excited about creating wonderful works of art. You feel like you lost an ability. A sense of dissatisfaction with what you create or what you think you can create. These feelings are okay as an artist. It’s okay because it happens to us all. Picasso, Matisse, Pollack. — All of these artists have most likely gone through a creative block which impacted the work they created. You can tell because their work changed over their span of life. Picasso went from having a blue period to cubism. Matisse went from colorful still life and Fauvism to modern pieces that only used one color. Pollock went from abstract expressionism to the more infamous contemporary drip paintings he is now known for. We tend to think the creative block is a negative, but maybe we need to shine a positive light and begin thinking it’s a way our art is about to evolve.

Helpful Ways To Overcome & Use Creative Block Effectively

1. Start sketching and doodling in a personal sketchbook

Keeping a personal sketchbook by your side is a great way to keep your pencil active while your brain or heart isn’t. The first thing I pick up when I have creative block is my sketchbook. I don’t have to show my work to anyone but myself, and I don’t have to worry about what I put down on that paper. It can be a doodle, a quick sketch, a still life. It’s freedom from critique, and I can be free to go back to basics with just drawing shapes. I’m also able to pick up other mediums like different colored pens, inks, pencils, pastels, charcoal, or even lay down some collage. Not only do you leave the criticism aside, but a sketchbook is the best way to get your creativity sparked because you forget about the cost of paper. A sketchbook is a cheaper source to free your mind from using an expensive piece of canvas or paper. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked at a blank canvas and felt lost on what to create. Sometimes a new canvas or expensive piece of watercolor paper can create my creative block because I worry about the cost too much. When this happens, find your sketchbook. It might lead to your next great painting.

2. Visit museums and gardens for inspiration

Creative block can be a great excuse to get yourself outdoors and explore. Removing yourself from your creative space and studio can help ease your mind from thinking about the need to create. A great place to visit is the museum. I like to visit a museum to find inspiration and educate myself on other artists, color, imagery, mediums, and more. It’s a good way to keep your brain actively thinking about your art without the stress of creating at the moment. Being outdoors is a good way to find inspiration. Everywhere you look is color and shape. You can look at a building or landscape and think about what you're looking at to see if anything sparks your creativity. Switch it up and visit a botanical garden. Botanical gardens are therapeutic and relaxing while being very inspiring with loads of color, landscape, and shapes. While in Phoenix, Arizona, I visited the Desert Botanical Garden and left with loads of pictures and inspiration. I went home and painted tons of cacti and landscapes. Whenever I feel like I get a bit of creative block coming, I look back in my photo album from that trip and it gets me excited to paint.

3. Take a trip to the art store and seek out new mediums/materials

Not only will visiting the art store spark some creativity but coming home with a bunch of new supplies will get you excited to create. If you’re still feeling lost while in the art store, you can always pick up a new medium or paper product. As artists, we have so many different mediums at our disposal. Last year, I went through a creative block while I was painting with watercolors. I had seen some artists using gouache as a medium and I really wanted to give it a try. I was a bit torn about spending more money on a new medium but I’m so happy I did. I have found a new medium that I’m in love with, and if I never gave it a shot I think I could be going through more cycles of creative block. If you’re unsure what type of medium to switch to, a good source of inspiration can be found on Instagram and Pinterest. You can always look at an artists social page to see what products they tag or click on their website to see if they have a section that lists the products they use. Don’t be shy to ask the artist. I’ve had many people ask me what type of paint I use, and I always tell them. I also have a list of products I use and recommend that you can find here.

4. Play with line, shape and color

Another good way to battle the creative block is taking a step back and playing with line, shape, and color. It can be fun and less stressful when you allow yourself to play around. Often, even when I don’t have a creative block, I like to sit down and paint different colors on paper. This not only helps me see what my paint will look like when it’s dry but also gives me a sense of what colors look great next to each other. This might set you up with a future palette that you’ll want to try out with an old drawing or painting. Drawing senseless shapes and lines are also a good way to let your mind be at ease. Try drawing shapes and lines on a piece of paper while allowing your mind to be stress-free. Don’t think about the lines and shapes you create. After it dries, go back and use colors to fill the spaces. Another way to ease your mind on creating but staying active is by creating a color wheel. You can create a variety of color wheels using different colors you might have. Try creating a color wheel with colored pencils, gouache paints, acrylics, oils, or watercolors. All of these color wheels will help you in the future when you find that boost back into creating.

5. Take a break

Sometimes, you just need to take a break altogether. It’s okay to take a break. Especially if it will help you forget that you even have creators block. You’re mind and heart will let you know when it’s time to create again. I once took a year or more off while I was in college, but there was always something within myself that made me have an urge to create a piece of art. Whether it was creating a large collage on canvas or a simple sketch — the urge of creating has never left my mind. While taking a break, spend some time cleaning out your art supplies, organizing your art bins, and archiving old artwork into archival storage boxes. You might come across a pen, a tube of paint, or a piece of paper that will excite you to create something. During your break, take a class such as a cooking class, learn how to give a massage, or try a new workout studio to keep your mind active. I’ve taken mixology classes that are very interactive and you can be creative while creating a drink. These can be fun and less stressful while being creative. While you’re at it, you can invite a friend or have a fun date night.

Conclusion

I hope these tips on overcoming and using creative block effectively are useful. I know it’s never easy battling creative block, but if you can find any positivity through it, then you might just find a new artistic style or hobby. Whether it’s taking a new class, playing with colors, taking a trip to the art store, or visiting the museum; I hope that you keep your mind actively seeking creativity.

My personal feeling: Recently, I’ve been battling with my own creative block. I have spent time painting different shades of gouache in several shapes to see what palettes I love, I picked up new art supplies (oil paint sticks) at the art store, and started a passion project creating different patterns of color and geometric shapes to create different styles of packaging. These have helped me tremendously and I have felt a new spark of creativity.

#creative block #blog

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jmj973 · 6 years ago

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Watercolor Paintings-- Why You Ought to Attempt It

Paintings add up to the beauty of houses, offices, and business facilities. If you have the skill to paint, you ought to try to establish it. Find out more about painting by registering in painting classes or you can research about it online. Whether you're an adult, teen, or a kid, discovering the best ways to paint is not that tough particularly if you put your heart into it. While you're trying to find a media to utilize, maybe you might wish to try watercolor paintings.

You can reveal your selected topic through the use of watercolors. There are lots of benefits in utilizing this media over other types of media. It is likewise a beautiful method to communicate your sensations through your painting.

Here are some of the very best reasons that you should try watercolor painting.

1. It is easy-- as compared with other kinds of painting, watercolor painting is really simple and you can anticipate better lead to a very short time.

2. Quick-- there are certain methods that you must discover in watercolor painting. When you discover such strategies, you can do fast washes and spontaneous strokes. This is the beauty of watercolor painting and you can finish your piece in less than an hour and the greatest thing is that you will get rewarding results.

3. Great for individuals who are always on the go-- if you take a trip typically, bring watercolor packages is not an issue. The kits are light-weight and included compact boxes that you can carry around with ease. The paper used in watercolor painting can be acquired in blocks so you don't require a lot of space. Preparing the papers needed is also not required.

4. Does not smear-- as compared with charcoal and pastel, watercolor painting does not spot.

5. Dries quickly-- in numerous minutes, your art piece is currently dry. If you utilize oil paints for your painting, it would take days or even weeks prior to the piece dries up entirely.

6. Watercolor is also a fluid-- because of its nature, with just a few strokes, you can currently fill big areas.

7. 'Accidents' can contribute to your creativity-- you don't have to fret about accidents during watercolor painting since it can magically turn into something stunning. You can even pour the watercolor on the paper as you start your painting and see what develops it can create.

8. Watercolor painting is versatile in appearance and style-- you can do illustrational works along with abstract arts. You can experiment in some designs that you haven't done before and it will all depend upon your ability and imagination.

Professionals state that using watercolor is hard because the artist or painter cannot control it quickly. For novices, here's an excellent advice-- let the watercolor's magic work.

As an art fan, you already understand that sometimes beautiful paintings come as accidents. However this ought to not be the reason to stop practicing. If you frequently practice, in time, you will be able to control your strokes and create more artistic and distinct watercolor paintings. Never stop discovering because by doing so, you can establish more fascinating and artistic concepts that you can use in your paintings.

While you're attempting to discover a media to utilize, possibly you may want to try watercolor paintings.

Quick-- there are certain strategies that you need to discover in watercolor painting. The paper utilized in watercolor painting can be purchased in blocks so you don't require a lot of area. 'Accidents' can contribute to your creativity-- you do not have to stress about mishaps during watercolor painting since it can magically establish into something beautiful. If you regularly practice, in time, you will be able to manage your strokes and develop more creative and special watercolor paintings.

My number one tip if you are considering trying painting? Find yourself good watercolour brushes to give yourself the best chance of success.

Nowadays you can buy your brushes and watercolour supplies for over night delivery on line. For instance, depending where you work, just search on Amazon for: pinceaux peinture in France, or oleo pinturas in Spain. The mediums of the art world have not changed much over the years but instant access to high quality supplies, and inspirational materials from great teachers to help you get started with watercolours, oils and all the other mediums are just a few clicks away.

I hope these watercolor painting pointers have assisted. Don't give up if you ever discover yourself getting dissuaded or frustrated by your development. Instead, welcome and learn from your mistakes. It will make you a better painter.

Plus, make sure you enlist in the best type of watercolor lessons. If you are actually interested in the location of watercolor painting, you actually should look for some lessons to take.

gouache paint brush set

#paint #painting #art #brush #brushes #amazon #watercolour #acrylic #gouache #artist

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amberjacksonart-blog · 7 years ago

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Part 1 project #1 - Stamping Out Disease - Vis Comm

Our task for the Stamping Out Disease project, assigned by Karl, was to use our research from Eden to create a series of six first class postal stamp designs. These were to feature illustrations of plants that harbour medicinal properties. Having not found any medicinal plants that I felt worked during my research in Eden, I had to go away and research some more. I visited the library and spent the day jotting down various plants I felt could work nicely, while also selecting plants that were aesthetically beautiful and appealing for me to draw. I chose to focus on flowers, as they would attract my interest, as opposed to plants I felt were boring, as they did not bloom.

After a while of searching, I established that a lot of the flowers I wrote on my list were those to help with mental health problems, particularly anxiety, stress and depression. These did not heal the ailments, but simply eased them slightly. This appealed to me personally, having suffer from depression and anxiety myself. After some narrowing down, the six plants I selected were valerian, skullcap, damiana, opium poppy, codonopsis and passion flower.

From here, in my new sketchbook, I began to illustrate and play around with various styles and mediums of drawing. I tested graphite, both a realism sketch and continuous line. I developed this by switching graphite out for a fine liner. I drew closed poppy buds and the blooming poppy flower. To enhance these drawings further, I scanned and photocopied them, working further into them with watercolour and coloured pencil. Though I felt satisfied with the result of the coloured pencil illustration, I preferred the watercolour, as the colours were stripped of shadows and tone, and the colours were flat. The drawing resembled a much more graphic style and contrasted against the black ink outlines well. This sent me into creating more flat drawings.

The next test was of more poppies. I tested ink this time, filling in a line drawing of poppies that I had photocopied multiple times, to test out different techniques and see closer how they contend against one another. I established that I frankly detested how the ink dried. It bled into the black ink (already dry) and smudged and feathered around the edges of the illustration. Additionally, the ink did not take to the paper well. It sat on top and feathered all over. I scrapped this brand of ink entirely, concluding that the paper I was using just didn’t get along with the ink.

Proceeding this, I took to the photocopied line drawings to test the layering of tone and colours better. Four illustrations came from this. One I left monotone, entirely cross-hatched with black fine liners. As a second experiment, I returned to ink, only a different brand. Using the black ink, I painted in the shadows of the poppy’s petals, ensuring I had a strong contrast. From here, I wanted to incorporate colour to these drawings, with the black shadows underneath.

Upon speaking to Karl at the desk assessment, he told me he liked the graphite drawing I had done of the poppies, and felt it might be an interesting series of stamps if I kept them graphite and monotone. However, still struggling to break out of a-level habits, I wanted to avoid graphite as much as possible, as during my a-levels, I had a teacher who felt my graphite drawings were bland, and tried to break me out of using it.

Karl also told me that though my poppy illustrations were good, I needed to investigate the other flowers I had chosen. It was then I realised how carried away I had gotten with the poppies, so decided to finish off these illustrations as soon as I could and move on to the other flowers.

Returning to my sketchbook, before I went ahead and coloured my black shadows illustrations, I tested out how different materials would layer over the ink. For this, I tested red ink, gouache paint, watercolour and coloured pencil over the top. The ink was the most unsuccessful, as it had virtually no coverage and the black was prominent. It made the illustration dull and flat. Following behind that, the watercolour was also unsuccessful. Instead of darkening the red, the black actually removed the saturation of the red, resulting in a white layer of dust when dry. Next, the coloured pencil. Though the most successful in showing the change in tone, the coloured pencil left a scratchy finish, which didn’t compliment the graphic style I was going for. Finally, I established that the goache paint worked best. It left the cleanest finish, though still didn’t incorporate the black undertone well. I concluded that none of these would work in showing tone under the red colours of the poppy, so scrapped another idea.

Taking Karl’s suggestion, I moved on to working with the other flowers I had selected for my stamps. I decided to paint the skullcap flowers in gouache. The style was less towards graphics and was a realism painting. Though I liked the painting, I had added a green painted background, and did not like how this tore the attention from the flowers. I felt the focus was less on what I wanted.

To test another medium, I brought my coloured markers into the studio. I drew out the outlines of the damiana flowers with a brush pen, then coloured the green leaves and yellow flowers with my markers. This was a lot more on the graphics side again, stripping the illustrations of shadows and keeping colours flat. I very much liked this illustration, as the green leaves behind the damianas complimented the yellow in the foreground, making a strong contrast and the focus on the flowers themselves.

Karl very much agreed with this sentiment, as when I addressed that I liked the styles of my cross-hatched poppies and marker coloured damianas, he agreed entirely. In fact, the others in the review also agreed that those were my strongest pieces. They suggested that I try going back to my cross-hatched illustrations, finding a way to add colour to those, and that would perhaps be my final style I use on my final stamp designs.

To conclude my investigation with the other flowers I selected, I both painted with gouache and drew with coloured pencil the passion flower. Trying to keep the colours flat, I tried to resist shading as much as possible. From these experiments, I decided that I liked the vibrancy of the colours in the coloured pencil illustration, and the flatness of the colour in the painting. From here, I knew my final designs would have limited tone and saturated colours.

Taking the advice from the project review, I returned to my cross-hatched poppy illustration. I photocopied the illustration and painted over the poppies in watercolour. Result! The colours were vibrant, and despite the crosshatching, the illustration still appeared more graphic in style. I very much liked how the poppies stood out from the white background, and loved the contrast between the line work and colour. This was my final style moving forward.

So, from here, I began to draw my final six stamp designs. Sketching out the flowers, I inked their outlines and added the crosshatching. to each petal and stalk. Later, I added the colour, making the flowers a lot more bright and saturated than they typically are in reality. Next, I stencilled the Queen Elizabeth II’s head, found on all first class stamps in Britain, along with the 1st class lettering. This was added to each of the six stamps. Finally, I took a hole punch to create the perforated edges.

This project’s results turned out remarkably strong. The stamps are very much modern, pulling the 1st class stamp into 2017. The flat colours and strong contrast, along with black silhouette of the Queen, make for a punchy, eye catching and graphic set of stamps.

#reflection

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