Study of Cezanne Landscape 3-Masters Class-Week 3

The third, and last, of my Cezanne studies, for now. It's a landscape, and I've forgotten the name of it, but I think it's oil on canvas.

Cezanne's original painting above...

I forgot to take pictures of some of the progress, but above is the under painting, I think, in my mixed media journal, using acrylics...

More layers of color...

And the version where I called it done! I lost count of the layers and the time I spent on it, it was starting to wear on my nerves, so I decided to leave well enough alone and move on! I do have a new found respect for Cezanne and his work though, and I learned a lot from him and Teresa Sheeley!

I am actually way behind in my posting. These are from week 3, and we have just finished the tenth, and final, week, using week seven as a break week to play catch up. I haven't had time to paint or attend the last two online classes for the last two weeks, and I have portraits by Botticelli and De Felice in progress. Hoping to finish them this week! Again, thankful that Jeanne is leaving the whole class up for two years, so we can re-visit all the artists!

Also sharing on Creative Every Day and Paint Party Friday (links on sidebar)!

Study of Cezanne WC Pitcher 2-Masters Class-Week 3

I had written quite a bit, but somehow when I went to publish the post, it lost all the text I had typed, so I'll make it short this time! :)

I also lost the picture of the original Cezanne painting by itself, so above is Cezanne's watercolor painting of "The Blue Pitcher", on the bottom, and my version on the top (above). I'm sure you could have told the difference even if I had not pointed it out. :)

I'm not partial to exact drawing or using a grid to get an exact drawing, so I did a very loose freehand sketch in my mixed media journal...

I used Chinese watercolors and a black Stabilo marks all pencil to get my version. It was a lot of fun to try!

Also sharing on Creative Every Day and Paint Party Friday (links on sidebar)!

Study of Cezanne Watercolor Apple 1-Masters Class-Week 3

Merry Monday! I hope you all had a good weekend! I did! Today I'm sharing my attempt at studying a Cezanne watercolor study of an apple. It's for week 2 of the Studying with the Masters Class (see sidebar for link) with Teresa Sheeley. Once again, I chose something different from what she shared in her demo. I used mostly Chinese watercolors in my mixed media sketchbook for the practice.

I'm sure Cezanne's watercolor was on toned paper. Mine wasn't, and I used totally different colors to get my colors, I'm sure. None of these practices are simple, but...

I started with a very loose sketch...

and I forgot to make pictures of the process on this one, but this is a picture of Cezanne's version and my version...

plus a closer view of my version. I'm learning and getting in a lot of practice on color mixing in these classes, and also learning new brush strokes as I go. Lots of layering! Every time I look, I see something else to incorporate. I think one could spend months on one painting and still not get everything in. After all, the masters often spent years on one painting.

I enjoyed getting to know Cezanne and his process a little better through this painting, and have become a bigger fan of his work as a result.

Also sharing on Creative Every Day and Paint Party Friday (Links on sidebar)!

Study of Antoni Gaudi Mosaic 2-Masters Class-Week 2

Project two with Junelle Jacobson and Antoni Gaudi in Studying With the Masters (see sidebar) is a paper mosaic, based on a Gaudi work. I chose this vine looking swirl, which Gaudi did with pieces of glass and morter. His mosaics are beautiful...

The Gaudi mosaic that I chose to study...

I used black gesso to seal the page in my mixed media art journal and loosely sketched the design in a white Liquitex paint pen. I don't know why. It just seemed like what I should do at the time. I guess you could say that I followed my intuition...

Using some old hand painted water color paper, which I already had, I cut the pieces and stuck them down with flexible modeling paste, leaving space between them to look similar to grout. I didn't have enough of the green/copper paper to curl the vine all the way in, so I left it in the shape of a question mark...

This is in my journal, hence the white across the top with my notes. Cutting and laying the blue pieces in randomness...

More blue and I've added multi-colored pieces to the center, with one large piece that resembles an egg...

Done! I didn't have a plan for the multi-colored pieces. I just worked it out as I cut and pasted. I now realize that the red/pink tear in the upper corner might should have been in the lower left corner. Oh, well! That's what practice is for!

After I got it finished this far and looked at the whole thing from a distance, it came to me that the blue represented water, the green/copper nature, and the colored pieces, including the "egg" in the center, represented life in all its variations. So the title would be "Water, Nature, Life"!

And then I went and put a burnt umber wash over the whole thing and wiped it off for an "old" effect. That was ok for it all except the green question mark pieces, which were watercolored and hadn't been sealed. The umber absorbed into the paper too quickly to wipe off. Another lesson learned! I still like it. The last thing I did was to put a coat of Plaid Royal Coat Dimensional Magic over the whole thing to give it a "glass" effect, which really made a difference in the look of it.

Incidentally, I'm not using the same materials or exactly the same techniques that either the masters or the teachers used. We are encouraged not to go out and buy every supply that is mentioned, but to use what we already have, so I'm watching the teachers' videos on how they did the works of the masters, then doing my own thing and trying out the techniques that I'm learning on works that speak to me to study. We're not trying to copy anything exactly. It's all about the process! And there's some amazing work being done by the teachers and the students, which is very inspiring.

I am so thankful and glad that my FB friend, Phyllis, share this series of classes on FB, and that I signed up for them. I have already been changed so much, as a person and an artist, and I plan to write a blog post after the last master listing the things I've learned and gotten from this class.

Thank you so much for visiting, and I hope that you're finding the joy in your creativity that I am! :)

Also sharing this post on the sites Creative Every Day and Paint Party Friday (links on the sidebar), where you will find a lot of inspiring work by just clicking on the names!

Antoni Gaudi Gate Sketch1-Masters Class-Week 2

In week 2 of Studying with the Masters, with Junelle Jacobson, we studied Antoni Gaudi, a Spanish architect, who used mixed media elements in his elaborate buildings, gates, and parks. I had never heard of him and wasn't particularly interested in an architect. Even after I looked at pictures of his work on Pinterest I wasn't interested, but once I watched the videos about him, watched Junelle's demos, and started really paying attention to his work, I was hooked. I particularly love the mosaics and the gates in his buildings.

Above is a gate designed by Gaudi. If you look closely, he has used all sorts of recycled elements in the design. Once I started sketching the top of the gate, I realized that it was shaped like a morning glory. At least that's what I perceived it to be. His work was very much inspired by elements in nature.

My pitiful partial rendition of the gate in Stablio black pencil in my art journal with notes, gone over with a Pitt pen that was almost out of ink. It's in my mixed media journal, and I gave up trying to draw all the quirky swirls of wires, pipes, and hoses, as I ran out of patience. Gaudi had a lot of patience and creativity!

I have two other Gaudi projects in progress, a paper mosaic piece and a painting, but I'm moving on to week 3, Cezanne. I will continue working on these, even as I study about and practice on other artists. Matisse and Gaudi have been awesome, and I expect the other seven masters and teachers will be, also.