Day 2: The Sketcher’s Box
The real title of today’s post should be “A Lesson in Mental Resistance.” That’s because today’s painting did not come easy and I was struggling.
I painted 3 paintings and what you see is the third and final one.
My own personal form of mental resistance when painting shows up when
1. it does not come easy- whether that be the composition, the colors, applying the paint, it just does not “flow”
2. I am tired, cranky, my mind is elsewhere (making mental to-do lists while painting) or just generally not in the mood
3. I think that this should be easy and/or I should already be able to do this
So I don’t know about you, but for me what I am talking about when I say resistance is exactly what it’s like when I try to do forward bend stretches and at a certain point it just hurts, like hurts so bad I could cry. There is a trigger that goes off in my brain that says stop!, do anything else, but do not stay here! That is mental resistance (or my form anyways). The best thing to do is stop, breathe and keep going. But keep going not like a bull plowing through a china shop, but just moving ahead anyway and not letting the resistance take over.
With that said, I chose to change my subject after attempting and failing to paint another initial still life and got out an extra travel watercolor set and decided to paint that instead.
The Sketcher’s Box
Watercolor on Paper
7 x 10″
$115 | Available
Purchase
Today’s challenge was creating several and varied grays. I was more successful in some areas than others. I do not keep black in any of my watercolor kits and instead love to mix grays from mostly complimentary colors.
Some of today’s grays included mixtures of purple and yellow, red and green and blue with brown. The best part of the painting, the part that was the most fun, was painting mixed colors in the little palette. Mixing colors to paint mixed colors makes your mind do little flip flops of momentary confusion, it is a good mind scramble!
And there you have it, day 2 and it is only the beginning. Of course I am now off to do some very fun forward bends.
Kathryn Hannay
January 3, 2017 at 6:28 amthe light drawing that keeps the paint pans lined up and the box straight is a very challenging subject. will see what I can do. wonderful how the colors pop when the watercolor set is brand new!
Kelly
January 8, 2017 at 3:45 pmKathryn, the perspective all follows the same parallel lines, so you just have to get the dimensions and angles right and you are set. A tool that I use is a small mirror and I look at my drawing in reverse using the mirror when I know that something is off but am not sure what exactly or how to correct it. Looking in the mirror helps to see big differences between your subject and your painting.
So true about the shiny gloss of a yet unused watercolor set- that never lasts long!
Karen Cogan
January 8, 2017 at 6:06 pmKelly, thank you so much for describing your feelings in “lesson in mental resistance”. I have a difficult time giving up on a painting that isn’t working and frustrating me. Like a book I’ve started reading, even though it’s garbage, I force myself to finish it. My New Year’s resolution is to move on to something else. I have to remember that great artists don’t hit it out of the ballpark every painting. And I’m nowhere near a great artist. So I’m going to cut myself some slack in the future. You articulated all my feeling so well during that thought process. Thank you. You continue to inspire me so much.
Kelly
January 16, 2017 at 3:38 pmThis is a really interesting comment Karen and I thank you so much for sharing it, especially so that others can benefit from what I imagine is a shared experience for anyone who paints.
I am pretty sure that the ratio of keeper paintings to not keeper paintings is pretty low, like 1 in 10 minimum. So the point besides just creating sheer quantity is to also reflect on what there is to do differently and try that. This is the useful part of having a blog, it gives structure to the reflective process.
Thank you for taking the time to share you thoughts and valuable input and paint on!