Horse Mandala

The Yeoksam Global Village Center (Seoul, S. Korea), a center for promoting cultural programs for expats in Korea, offered a month-long mandala class. Participants would meet once a week for two hours and, depending on the creativity and time spent, by the end of the month each participant would have created a personal mandala.

To reach this goal, participants are given a package of materials:

• a book, "My Nature Sound Therapy" (published in S. Korea by My Nature Sound Research Society, 2016)
• a 25cm x 39cm sketch book
• a package of markers
• a gold gel pen
• a two-piece stencil set
• an eraser

A tiny lecture begins each session but the majority of time is for creating a mandala while nature sounds are played. Music therapy at work! Participants are encouraged to hum along, but I find this VERY distracting! I'll find my inner zen just listening.

The examples in the book and with the instructors were all made with geometric shapes, hence the stencil set. Maybe I'm thinking out of the box, but mandalas don't have to be based on geometric shapes but can also be regularly patterned shapes, figures, whatever. So with this in mind, and since I love animals, my mandala started out as horses in perpetual flow, and later peacocks and fish were added. If you think about it, these animals represent all the sentient beings--those from the earth, from the air and from the water--very Buddhist thinking. I'm not Buddhist, but have lived here long enough to pick up quite a few cultural beliefs and symbolisms.

I also used watercolor pencils and Micron permanent ink markers (size .005, .02 and .08) instead of the supplies provided. Just seemed more suitable to the topic and because markers bleed through paper very easily and can't be layered.

After a total of 8 hours in broken sittings, I had completed my simple mandala.

Fun new experience, and my niece will get the materials now with a sample mandala in the sketch book. Think it'll be something she'd really like ... and have time for. 

Horses, peacocks, fish in perpetual motion

Art Deco Tulips

Day 10/30 of the #30x30DirectWatercolor painting challenge on Facebook. I won't be finishing this paint 30-consecutive-days challenge but it's been fun participating until my busy summer schedule kicks in. I've learned a lot more about color mixing, but mostly I've learned that I've been VERY dependent on presketching the basic shapes before laying down color, which limits spontaneity. I'll have to figure out strategies to develop myself as a more spontaneous painter. One strategy I used was in this painting -- I spontaneously masked with masking fluid where the tulip flowers, stems and fore-leaves would be. The masking created the overall shape of the painting so the rest was easy.

So, the tulips painted yesterday turned out a bit like art deco. I'm not too keen on the Canson cold-press watercolor paper, esp as Manganese Blue Hue Daniel Smith, salt and this paper all create granulating patterns. For this color and paper combo, the granulation process just doesn't work ... the color turns out very flat. Usually I've used Arches hot press paper and have loved how the colors, even Manganese Blue Hue, granulate on that paper. The Canson also buckles badly with much water,  despite being #140 lb. Live and learn. The Canson is inexpensive and is more suitable for casual plein air painting done with waterbrushes and not watery washes.

trial run .... I think I could fix it with a bit more time but wasn't liking how the leaves were turning out

second attempt - the background and main subject colors didn't have enough contrast so added the fine liner inking. Turned out kind of art deco, but kind of cool at the same time.

Art Deco Tulips

Bees and carnations on scrap paper

Doodling on scrap paper for the #30x30DirectWatercolor painting challenge, and I started liking my doodles better than the tulips I was working on. So here's my doodles paper.

Day 9/30 of the direct watercolor painting, which means directly laying down color without prepping with pre-sketching on the canvas. Thus my reason for "practicing" bees on scrap paper.

Surreal Moose

This was kind of a hilarious painting. Laid some orange down on the paper and absentminded put some blue sky beside it and suddenly the paint was dull. Hah! So I went with it. While I planned on having a vibrant orange painting, the shapes that started emerging were quite interesting .... and so no more orange was added, and the mountains took on a surreal wintry look. Added the moose as an afterthought to balance out the empty foreground. Kind of a bizarre surreal look overall but there is harmony in the end product ... although if someone had said I would be painting moose today, I would have laughed :)

Day 8/30 of the #30x30DirectWatercolor daily painting challenge (no pencil lines, just laying color on paper so rather challenging but definitely developmental).

Surreal moose - lol! 

Mandril Watercolor

Day 7 of the #30x30DirectWatercolor2018 painting challenge on Facebook. Had a hard time getting the perspective right without making an undersketching, and then had a miserable time getting the color contrast right. I'm realizing one of my biggest weaknesses is not saving white in the paper. Note to self: remember to retain white to get better contrast!

Mandril - Canson Montval 140lb cold pressed, 18.2 x 25.7cm

Toucan Popping a Berry

Day 6 for the #30x30DirectWatercolor2018 painting challenge. Now this picture painted directly on paper without preliminary lines or undersketching really worked, and I got the colors pretty well too. I am so in love with the Daniel Smith granulating primateks! They really made this picture great!

Toucan popping a berry

Canson Montval 140lb cold pressed, 18.2 x 25.7cm

Horse from the Mist

Day 5 for the #30x30DirectWatercolor2018 painting challenge. It's rather hard but challenging to paint directly, without lines or undersketching. It really helps a person develop ... but if I prefer the undersketching method as I can erase repeatedly until I get the shape and contours I like. And it would be easier to position the objects, case in point, my horse wouldn't be almost standing off the paper. Good development though to practice this way!

Lovely Red Flowers

What a muddle! When I got the flowers painted in, there wasn't enough contrast. Added dark greens and then it was too dark. Added white gouache and then the picture looked weak. More dark touches. A bit more white touches and a white gel pen. Arg! The light picture didn't turn out as I imagined ... but that's learning for you!

This was done for the June #30x30DirectWatercolor2018 June painting challenge on Faebook. My Day 4 entry,. The June painting challenge period has timed out, but I'm just painting what I can and in my own time. The paint-something-daily challenge is a bit of a motivator, now that I have time post-semester.

Day 4 for the June daily painting challenge (yep, it's July but I'm slowly working at my own pace). See #30x30DirectWatercolor2018. This was done using the direct painting method ... no penciling or lines. I did mask directly but that's acceptable since I created those lines directly.

Field Daisies

Field daisies painted as direct watercolor for a painting challenge. Direct watercolor means no pencil marks, tracing or any guide marks. Reference photos are of course permitted. I didn't really have a reference photo for this ... and it shows. Rather messy.  So there are 2 versions for this:

(1) Direct watercolor using a bit of salt for texturing

(2) Incorporating mixed media: outlining the petals with 0.8 Faber Castell Ecco Pigment

I think I prefer the first one without the outlining of petals.

cold pressed Canson Montval 140lbs - 18.2cm x 25.7cm

Day 3/30 for the direct watercolor painting for the month of June painting challenge. So it's no longer June, I still plan to finish as much as I can, especially as July is watercolor month. See #30x30DirectWatercolor2018 on Facebook for my entries and so many other peoples. It's a great learning and development site.