August 2020

In late July/early August I began reading “Atomic Habits” by James Clear. Such a great book. I’ve always been a list maker and goal setter, but these last few months turned everything upside down and I needed a reset. One of the big takeaways for me was the idea of doing something just once - one push up, one walk around the block, one page, one ________. The idea is that after you do “just one” you realize you can do more. So now I set daily goals for myself in my planner and tick them off each day. More often than not, I find that I get them all done. Some days I don’t, and that’s okay, too. I’ve also started making more detailed notes about what I accomplish each day so that I can go back and see how little things compound, mushroom, grow into a larger collection. It’s really helpful on days like today when I look back at the month and see what happened in my little art world. So here goes ...

Daily Doodles with the Royal Academy - 20 (I think that’s the correct count) - here are some of my favorites from August:

I finished “Sunflowers on Blue” and “Hydrangeas and Satsumas.” Both of these were accepted into Atlanta Artists Center’s upcoming exhibition, Reality or Abstraction.

I started working on a painting of 3 green peppers, but I’ve stalled on this one because I have no idea what to do with the background.

I finished a larger painting of Red Tulips. I also painted a small version of tulips in a small blue vase, which I *hate* so I’m not posting that one.

I finished an 8x10 painting of peaches

I finished a 20x16 painting of a large bouquet of Trader Joe’s flowers. This one took forever, but it turned out pretty well. I love, love, love painting stems. No clue what it is that is so much fun about it??? Who knows. 

I started a new painting, which I’m still working on 

I also began a copy of a painting by Elizabeth Floyd. I really like the way Elizabeth paints, very classic. She is offering a virtual painting course, which I’m considering taking. Here’s my version of her painting of Pink Hyacinths. This is 10x8, oil on panel.

Towards the later part of August I picked up some gorgeous roses at Trader Joe’s. Normally I don’t buy roses because they’re so difficult to paint (at least for me), but these were too pretty to pass up. I painted one version on Thursday (8/20) that I absolutely hated, then tried it again the next day with different brush choices and less initial sketching, and felt much better about the second version.

 

I let them sit for a few days, then went back in and worked some more. Funny enough, I kinda like the first one better than the second one now? I could change my mind again. 

               

I struggled mightily through a Sunflower painting, but finally made it work by going back to very basic principles - paint what you see no matter how weird it seems or looks. Take it piece by piece. Don’t think or over analyze because logic or what you think you know does not always translate in art. (Example: water is not blue!!) And I always have to remind myself that I am not recreating a photograph. My paintings are my interpretation of what I see.

You can see below that my initial painting looks way too much like a Van Gogh. But that’s understandable because it’s such an iconic painting. It’s hard to not be influenced by it! I had to stop, go back and really look at my subject and that’s when things started to fall into place. This one’s not quite done, but very close.

                             

And that’s about it for August. Not bad! Oh, one last note ... I have tried painting JuJu several times. That’s not really working right now. I’ll post something if and when I get it right. 

I also have some exciting news that happened in September - that’ll be in my next post.

Stay safe, wear your mask and thanks for reading.