Barn Wax Batik

I took a wax batik class from Sandy Maudlin Nov 13 and 14. I'd had this picture in mind to do for a long time. It is my sister, Judy's, barn that you can see from Mom and Dad's back door.

I've done batiks several other times (I counted about 8 or 9), but I forget a lot of stuff in the process, and Sandy has added some things to make it better. I am pretty happy with the way this turned out.

One thing I do differently, is that I don't use ink for the last part, but a very dark mixture of watercolor paint. And I am more careful about applying it between the cracks, so I don't overdo the black crackling look. If I don't get enough on, after all the wax has been ironed off, I crinkle parts in my hand, and just put black over the tops of the crinkles until I have the effect I want.

Patrick

Here is a recent painting of a friend's
German Shepherd. It's only the third time
I've tried to do a dog. It's about 11 x 12 unmatted. It's a Christmas gift for June.


I was having some problems with spotting in the background. Since I'm not the neatest painter in the world, I end up that way sometimes. I found that going over the background with white gouache helped blend in the background with the more noticeable spots and gave it a mistier look.
I don't usually like to use gouache with it because it can make it look chalky if you're not careful, but I like the effect this time.

Here is a batik I did of one of Katy's photos. It doesn't really look like her, but I thought the style was pretty cool. This one is a cropped version of the first one. I have to study it a bit before I decide how much to crop. Maybe the title should be "Star Gazer" or something like that. The finished painting uncropped and unmatted is about 12" by 13".

Rose of Sharon/yupo and masa

I did the same rose of sharon picture two different methods. First I did it in yupo, and then masa paper. The masa one is around 11 x 12; the yupo is around 11 x 14. The masa paper flower is the one on top, the yupo on the bottom.

Baby Portrait of Ayanna

Ayanna was born this past winter, and I finally got to see her so I could make a painting for her parents.
She's really so cute, it's hard to do her justice, but this comes pretty close.

Done on Arches CP 140 lb. The original is 10 x 12.

I wanted to compare what it would look like with white background to blue background. I had originally thought white would show her skin color better, but now I think the blue does.

The Last Iris

I just finished this painting of an iris. Made the big mistake of not doing a value study first. I just started in on the iris, and really liked the way it turned out. I did a lot of glazing to make the petals look velvety.

Then I started doing leaves and background and thought I'd ruined it forever. My teacher and friends in class suggested I darken the background so I like it BETTER, but I'm still not in love with it.

The main thing I like about this is that it is a step in achieving one of my goals, which is to rely more on my own sketches for paintings and less on photos. I sketched this out first in the book Sandy bound and gave me a few years ago. I did take a picture because I can't paint faster than the flowers fade and die. Next time....value study.

Quilt block paintng

Sharon Roeder taught a class for DHAC today. We took 6" canvas squares and painted a basic shape on with acrylic paints., just to undercoat the canvas and give a guideline. We painted watercolor on tissue and used texturizing techniques to create a "fabric" for our quilts. We layered tissue paper over our shapes. When I was finished, I had to repaint some of the outlines in acrylic for mine, because they'd gotten lost. I think they will look nice hanging together.
Thanks Sharon.