Watercolor Dirtbag
At the beginning of 2023, I posted my 2022 “sketchbook” (i.e. all my paintings of 2022, whether they were actually in a sketchbook or not). For completion’s sake, I decided to go back in time and do 2021. This is the year I started painting, so I can’t go back any further than that!
It’s a trip to look back through these two years later, because I have such specific memories associated with each one!
The theme of this month was spring! I built my Spring Palette and painted some swatches and paintings – indoors and out – using spring colors and themes. Focusing more on my actual surroundings, I took a break from my National Park project until late in the month (then rapidly did four). It was an … Read more
This month, though I didn’t have any subscription services, I took a Domestika gouache class from Ruth Wilshaw, a one-day Grand Tetons class from Shelby Thayne, and a watercolor triad class from Jane Blundell through Art Toolkit (output not pictured below, since I did swatches instead of “full paintings”, but you can find the results … Read more
Goal Updates In January, I set a February goal and prompty forgot it! Evidently, I was supposed to not spend money, but I did. I bought a few paints. Oh well. On the plus side, I did cancel all my monthly fees/classes (Kolbie Blume’s Artist Co-op, Claire Giordano’s Adventure Art Academy, Skillshare). I’ve enjoyed all … Read more
One of my first watercolor challenges I ever did was Kolbie Blume’s Painting the Wilderness challenge in fall 2021 (I did it about a month after it premiered), and in summer 2022 I painted along in real time to their follow-up Seascapes challenge. In February 2023, it was time for round 3: World of Color! … Read more
I’m working my way through Kolbie Blume’s Intermediate Landscapes course; last time, I discussed module one, on light. In this post, I’ll share my paintings from the color theory section. The Paintings Complementary Snowy Mountain Loved Learned Split-Complementary River Sunset I consciously chose to differ from Kolbie’s color choices and make mine more like the … Read more
For my 2022 Retrospective, I put all my paintings for the year on one post, which ended up being a Lot. So, I thought I might make a monthly habit (if I remember) of retrospecting one month at a time, including the paintings and goal updates. Goal Updates My New Year’s Resolutions for painting were … Read more
I thought it would be helpful, as I review 2022 and move into 2023, to review the paintings I’ve done this year! This may not include everything I painted (especially practice and swatches), but these are all the paintings that I was happy enough to save to my photo roll. The stats: TOTAL: 175 Numbers … Read more
2022 has been an exciting year for me as a watercolor artist, at the same time as it’s been a pretty dreary year personally, with health challenges for myself and my family members, career angst, and garden variety depression. But I think that hard times in life are when we need art the most, and … Read more
Last week, I was in the suburbs of Las Vegas for a family wedding. I was excited to see the surrounding desert landscape, as I’ve never been to the desert! We didn’t have a ton of time outside of family activities and our ambitious stretch goal Grand Canyon trip got predictably cut (though I did see it from the plane window!), but I was delighted with our naturey day trips in the immediate area.