Themeless Week

I’m still afloat, my friends! I decided not to post last week, but the painting continues. This week, I have 11 works to share, mostly in the watercolor genre. Having reached my maximum frustration level with oils, I decided to give them a short break and go back to my first love. This time, I incorporated watercolor pencils and india ink, mixing the media in a new way. And I’m happy to report that I am largely pleased with my work this round. Hoorah!

This first one comes from molding found in a beautiful art gallery in the medina. Click here for photos of that excursion.

March 28, “More Than Molding,” Watercolor Pencil dipped in water

Then, totally stream of consciousness, I painted this design using a brush and india ink. I went back later and added watercolor to reinforce the movement. Sometimes, just putting a brush to paper is a bust, but sometimes, it really works out.

March 29, “Swirlin’,” India Ink and Watercolor

Then in an effort to capture the beauty of the zelij tile work in my house, I did a rubbing of our fountain with a pastel stick. Then I went back over it in watercolor pencil to fill in the blanks. In hindsight, I would have used my own color scheme rather than try to match the colors of the actual fountain. The piece below represents such a small portion of the fountain that the colors don’t do the whole piece justice.

March 29, “Zelij,” Pastel sticks and Watercolor Pencil

Another attempt to capture something I love. I used india ink and a bamboo skewer to sketch a Turkish coaster Matt brought back from one of his travels. The color was added with watercolor pencil, dipped in water.

March 29, “Turkish Coaster,” India Ink and Watercolor Pencil

I’m not crazy about this watercolor of a bloom in our yard. As with many of my less-than-stellar watercolors, patience would have made this painting significantly better. But who has patience when the kids are sleeping at the same time and you still need to prep dinner?

March 27, “Failed Botanical Sketch,” Watercolor

These swirls were done in watercolor. Before the paint dried, I sprinkled a little india ink on the paper and let it spread to its hearts content.

March 29, “Swirlin’ 2,” Watercolor and India Ink

This tea kettle is growing on me quite a bit. William was having a grand ole time when I started, but got increasingly fussy toward the end. I plopped him in my lap and he promptly grabbed a pencil and rolled it across the wet paper. The pencil took some paint with it (see the top left of the nob) and temporarily “ruined” my painting. But then I decided to make the most of it by rolling a pencil in the same manner at the spout. Voila! I love the effect.