Pat's Garden

Diane Mannion, Pat's Garden, 8x10" oil on linen

Dailypaintworks.com FB pick of the day!

Pat adopted a pair of my canaries and in exchange posed for me in her garden.  I snapped over fifty reference photos and at least half are potential painting material!  Her garden is amazing, filled with flowers, interesting plants, shade house, and a collection of blue glass bottles.  It was cloudy all day, but the late afternoon sun came out just in time to photograph Pat and her garden dappled with light.  

This is the first study which suffered two total wipe-outs yesterday.  I struggled with it today but managed to push through.  I've been studying the work of several artists that I love and striving to incorporate some of their methods in my own work.  I don't want to paint like them... but rather see how far I can grow my own technique with some of their knowledge.  Wolf Kahn, Kim English, and David Shevlino are a few.  Kahn for color!!!  English for light.  Shevlino for brushwork.  

 Just one of my wipe-outs from yesterday.  This was first stage but it got completely out of control along with the second attempt.  I could visualize where I wanted it to go but the paint and brushes would not behave.

 So today, I started with a "tighter" drawing using ultramarine blue and transparent red earth.

Actually signed it way before it was finished.  Sometimes, I can see enough is working and signing it encourages me to finish.  It's also much easier to scratch a signature into wet paint.  I liked how the light was working and was excited about the color.

And here's the finished sketch, study, experiment, practice piece, whatever... 

Dreama Tolle Perry said, "When you study, study.  When you paint, paint."  Not easy when your head is spinning with Wolf Kahn's color, Kim English's light, and David Shevlino's brushwork.

This is also the 57th painting for 2013... yes, I keep count!  What gets counted gets done!