Brush Abuse!

Finished my fungus painting!


I'm preparing an oil painting class for CraftEdu and I'm anxious to make some progress! Given that I still had oil paints on my palette from finishing the fungus painting and that I had done a sketch on a new canvas, I began a rough in.

This is what I do to brushes!! Oil painting is hard on brushes and I learned a long time ago to buy good brushes, but not expensive brushes. I like a brush that can hold its edge. I prefer flats and brights to any of the other brush shapes. I have tried them at one time or another. Flats and brights work well for me. I've tried a lot of different brushes and when I find a brand that really suits me, I stock up! I can go through many brushes during the course of a whole painting. Pristine brushes, like the one on the right, are usually reserved for "serious painting", while brushes that have already been at work get down graded to "rough in" duty. When they start looking like the brush on the left, they will soon be tossed!

It's all mixed up!

In recent years I have not been able to pursue my real passion - painting. My husband became very ill and was in the hospital for over a year and I had too many additional responsibilities placed upon my head. I wondered if I would ever be able to get back to painting.

Then one day Donna Kato discovered that I paint and asked me to prepare an oil painting class for CraftEdu.com. Seriously, I wondered if that would be possible so I started writing out notes and within two days had 19 pages on just the backbone information! What a delight to be able to really indulge my love of painting. All sorts of knowledge that I had accumulated over the years just flowed! What was really exciting was to find that my subconscious had continued to ponder painting and, given the opportunity, delivered new insights. I just love when that happens!!

I was a bit afraid when I picked up my brushes again that I was going to be rusty, but it's like a close friendship. It doesn't matter how long you've been apart, you pick up right where you left off!

The first thing I do every painting day is lay out my palette and mix my colors. It can take me up to a half hour to prepare my palette, but once done the magic can begin! I don't hold a palette in my left hand. I use a table top. I can't even remember when I first started doing this but it was long ago and I've refined it over the years. Some days the palette will be all the colors within the work and other days I may do a limited palette for detail work on specific areas.

The above is a typical palette during a good painting session. Colors get refined as I work and what a wonder it is to see those blobs of color on the palette come to life on the canvas!!

To get back into painting, I decided to finish one that had been left undone. Oh! How I have missed painting!!
I should be able to finish this one up today.

I have so many ideas swimming in my head for the oil painting class! I feel like a kid in a candy store!!