About the art

This morning, I started to add watercolour to the abstract drawing I started yesterday.

I spent over 45 minutes doing this, but I’ve sped it up and added music.

I’m not at all sure about the colours used. It may be the Distress Ink from the background interfering, or it may be that the Arteza mixed media paper is a creamy colour rather than white.

It led to me experimenting with colour, working out how to get more intense colours from the pans. Knowing that is what I’ve done is likely to mean I will put this to one side as a learning experience, some time to relax and enjoy being creative and not worrying too much about mistakes.

Still, I may persevere with this. Though it is yet another artwork that isn’t finished. I seem to be collecting art that I’ve not finished adding colour to.

I may have to question myself as to why I start but never follow through with so many pieces of artwork when it comes to adding colour. I never have a problem working on drawings that may take several sessions and many hours to complete.

Is it that I fear failure? Or is it that I loose the oomph if I don’t finish it in one session. Or is it that I worry I won’t remember what colours I used and how I mixed them? Perhaps it’s that I doubt my colour palette? Maybe it’s that I doubt my ability to work with colour? Or maybe it’s a combination of some or all of these.

For now, I don’t know for sure. But I do persevere, even in the face of the bleedin’ obvious yeuchy colours!

Other things

Yesterday, I managed to focus and get plenty of art done for the book I’m working on. Not only did I scan in and clean up the drawings I’d already done, but I have two new ones almost completed. I just have to finish inking in the second, then I’ll scan them in and clean them up and get them sent over to my editor for the team to critique/approve.

I really enjoyed the work I got done yesterday. It was easier to settle into it now I’ve decided that I’m going to work with pen on paper and use digital tools to clean up and edit the images. Except when mandalas are concerned, I’m still going to draw them digitally!

I felt really good about the amount of work I’d got done, even though I’d not had much sleep the night before and I still wasn’t feeling 100%.

I was hoping for a good night’s sleep last night. No such luck. I was awake again after just a couple of hours, all hot and bothered. So, I drew until I was ready to sleep again. And I only slept for a couple of hours then, waking headachy and tired again.

I started my morning off with a big mug of tea and some time to just watercolour, even with all the frustrations it can bring me. It’s about learning and practicing and experimenting with the medium to work out how it can work for me and my style of art. As always, it’s the choice of colours that seems to vex me so much.

Still, despite me often saying I’m giving up on watercolour and sticking to adding colour to drawings digitally, I keep going back to it, and other traditional media. This is, I think, as I do want to get out to sketch in old churches and abbeys, in nature, and museums. Although I’m happy to photograph what I see, there’s nothing quite like sitting with sketchbook, pens and/or pencils and taking quiet time out to just observe and draw for pleasure and relaxation. And I’d like watercolour to, perhaps, be one of the tools I can take with me.

I remembered yesterday, as I was playing with watercolour yesterday after finishing the drawing I started yesterday, that I found working with watercolour from tubes so much easier than the pans. Duh go me! So, I’ve ordered a set of Mijello Mission Gold tube paints and a palette that should arrive today. They’re not the top of the range sets from Mijello, but they should be good enough for me to work out if this is the way I want to go, and not too pricey either!

Then, my plan is to work out which colours would be useful for me in a travel palette and create such a thing.

Looks like I’m going to be spending some time setting up the palette that arrives today and swatching out all the colours. That’s kind of exciting!

First, however, I need to get these colouring templates inked in, scanned in, and edited before starting work on some more templates.