10 Black and White Art Techniques with Personal Stories
I have made the first ten prompts of Inktober 2019, and want to share the art techniques and stories behind the images. I have been following the official Inktober prompts that are single words. By brainstorming around the prompt, I have decided what the first element is, and then worked from one association to another. After creating the image, I have documented my thoughts in writing. For me, Inktober is as much about finding personal stories than making the drawings. The stories help me to see where I am as an artist and as a person in general.
For these first ten images, I also set an art technique to make creating in black and white more interesting. I hope you find these black and white art techniques inspiring too!
Day 1 – Ring
Technique: A big solid shape in the background. I like to use a brush pen for large black areas.
Story: As a teenager, I read Jane Austen’s novels and wondered if those handsome and honorable men really exist. But when I moved to a bigger town to study at the university, I found my Mr. Darcy. Dark hair, brown eyes, doesn’t smile or talk much, but when he does, it’s always worth listening. He looks at my art like Mr. Darcy watches Lizzie playing the piano. He has many skills, but he never brags about them. What others might consider as faults, are what makes him whole to me. So here’s to commitments and true love!
Day 2 – Mindless
Technique: Strong shadowing so that the outlines disappear to the background. It is quite time-consuming but I love the 3D effect.
Story: Instead of mindfulness, I practice mindlessness. I like to think about thinking, imagine the impossible, and when I relax, I knit, because it can be done mindlessly. Pick a circular needle and row never ends – until it’s 3 am and the low energy level makes you stop! The mindless world of imagination where no one needs to do laundry, make dinner, or find a missing sock, is what we humans need every single day. It’s a world of magic that we carry inside us, and no matter how mindless it feels, it’s one of the best things in being alive.
Day 3 – Bait
Technique: Using white space. The earlier I get the idea about the content of the image, the easier it is to leave white space as well.
Story: In today’s world, money seems to be everything. Still, we know that there are more precious things like saving the globe. Sometimes I wonder if someone gives us small rewards just to distract our attention from the bigger destruction. Is the world only a big purse waiting for the next coin, or can we stop the fire?
Day 4 – Freeze
Technique: Spraying black ink. It’s often the best way to remove blank page syndrome!
Story: I love historical places and old art. When I begin to create, I imagine time-traveling to the past. My pens take me to an old palace and start vigorously blowing dust away. I imagine revealing all the beautiful designs under white cloths, opening windows and letting fresh air come in. What’s frozen begins to warm up and get color. My biggest dream is that I can make the forgotten world bloom again.
Day 5 – Build
Technique: Using lots of circles and round shapes. I also like to start with a simple circle and then slightly adjust it. See the jewels, for example!
Story: When we draw, we are free to build anything. Impossible becomes possible, small can be big and big can be small. All the things we see and collect can be toys for the imagination.
Day 6 – Husky
Technique: Shades of grey. I sprayed ink to make the start grey already. Then I added more grey shades by drawing thin parallel lines.
Story: Having a dog of my own – that was my dream as a child. I drew dogs and imagined taking them to shows and running a kennel club. I read books about dogs, learned to identify hundreds of dog breeds, knitted stuffed toys that were as close to real dogs as possible. I wondered how it would feel to be a dog, to look at the world from the animal’s perspective, to run with four legs, and to love undoubtedly. It was a long wait. I was over 20 years old when I finally got a dog, a little spaniel. Now I have two beagles, and I hope I don’t ever have to live a day without a dog. Yes, I am definitely a dog person, what about you?
Day 7 – Enchanted
Technique: Rectangular blocks in watercolor. I used only Dr. Ph. Martin’s Hydrus liquid black for the image.
Story: If I had to choose between outdoors and indoors, my choice would be indoors. Now when it’s autumn, it’s easy to make the home look like an enchanted place. Just switch off most of the lights, light some candles, and make sure you have houseplants, preferably bonsai trees. They look magical in the dark and bring some outdoors to the indoors as well!
Day 8 – Frail
Technique: Combining watercolors and drawing. Some of the areas are painted only so they look softer.
Story: I hope that it wouldn’t be so difficult to remember that people are like plants, not always saying aloud what they feel, think, and plan to do. Their pots can be broken, their roots can be too dry, and their vision can be blurry. But they function, participate, and comprehend anyway. Their beauty is more about persistence than perfection. Their origin is more about cohesion than separation. I wish I could remember that like plants, every person is unique but still shares the need for warmth, hope, and attention.
Day 9 – Swing
Technique: Detailed figure as a focal point, and abstract freely-painted shapes in the background. I love to play between abstract and representational.
Story: Rococo is one of my favorite historical styles, and I always try to find a way to include some of its abundance in my art too. So no wonder that today’s prompt immediately brought a famous Rococo painting to my mind. It’s Jean-Honoré Fragonard’s Swing, where the main character is a young woman, and other people and details are secondary to her. When we are creating, we are that lady on the swing. The outer world becomes more distant, and we get to rest in the sceneries of our minds.
Day 10 – Pattern
Technique: Designing a pattern, then making it look like a representational image.
I drew a few black shapes in Photoshop and arranged them so that they formed a pattern. Then I traced the printed pattern on another paper by hand. By changing the darkness of the shapes and the background, I made a fall scenery.
Story: I haven’t ever taken an ink blob test, but I assume I would see plants. Bonsai trees, orchids, herbs, flowers in bloom, seedlings, you name it. “I hate nature,” I said as a child when a teacher praised my essay. She was astonished: “But you write so beautifully about your surroundings!” I have always wanted to get away from the influence of plants but have never succeeded in it. They enchant me with their silent whispers. Their organic shapes are like stamps in my mind when I start drawing. They never leave me alone, let me be who I am not. The more I age, the more I surrender. My imagination lives in a pot, blooming only when plants are.
What can’t you escape? What do you keep creating time after time?
Hello Fall! – 10 Problems and Solutions for Watercolor Landscapes
It’s fall in Finland, and it’s a bit sad, even if it’s also beautiful. Our beagles Cosmo and Stella have their quilts, and when we go for a walk, we have to speed up because it’s getting colder every day.
I have done a lot of drawing lately, and to relax a bit, I picked my watercolor set and a piece of Arches cold press watercolor paper. My watercolor set is a good friend, always ready for a new adventure. This time I started with a photo that was taken when walking the dogs, but I also painted freely. I hope you enjoy the video below!
10 Problem and Solutions for Watercolor Landscapes – Watch the Video!
Paint with me! Take a photo of the nature scene of your surroundings, and create a watercolor painting with this video tutorial. This time I built the video so that I picked 10 common problems in watercolor painting and explain how I solve them in practice.
Express Yourself by Painting Watercolor Landscapes – Buy Watercolor Journey!
Connect the dots between techniques and expression! Watercolor Journey has expressive watercolor techniques for beginners who want to loosen up and for more experienced artists who want to boost their imagination.
To celebrate the season and beautiful autumn colors of Finland, Watercolor Journey is for sale this weekend. Get 20 % off! The sale ends on Oct 6, 2019, midnight PDT.
Out of a Creative Rut – Do What Illustrators Would Do!
I am currently reading James Clear’s book Atomic Habits. It’s about growing skills and making changes in life a small step at a time. James Clear doesn’t believe in setting goals as much as building a new identity. James tells about a person who lost weight by thinking “what would healthy people do” every time he had to make a decision about eating, sleeping, and exercising.
Out of a Creative Rut by Asking What Would Illustrators Do
Since last fall, I have been practicing “what would illustrators do.” I have wanted to make art that is less abstract and more joyful and rememorize the things I learned when studying design several years ago.
When building the latest classes Animal Inkdom and Magical Inkdom, I have wanted to include more small projects than before so that you can quickly grab a pen and draw more regularly. James Clear advises building habits by combining them with our current ones. When we do something like having a cup of tea in the evening, we can also grab a pen and doodle a bit. It’s not much, but when it’s repeated regularly, the results will come.
To me, drawing small collage pieces has brought back the joy of drawing. I haven’t always had the time to do a lot, but I have made it a regular practice because “that’s what illustrators do.”
Drawings are Like Pets – Treating Them Gently
I have also developed gentle self-talk by thinking of these animals as my pets. That way, I don’t try to control the outcome too much or negatively judge a single piece. They are my pets, and I love and care about them because “that’s what animal lovers do.”
Breaking a Creative Rut and Moving Forward
At the same time as I have developed the illustration classes, I have also built my illustration portfolio.
During the next couple of months, I am doing more “what illustrators do” when I am making images for a book. I will share more pics about this commission later.
Practicing illustration has also brought new perspectives to my fine art projects and what I want to create in general. So, I highly recommend practicing “what illustrators do” – especially if you are in a creative rut or have a too strong inner critic.
Start now – Animal Inkdom Is for Sale!
This weekend: Buy Animal Inkdom for 59 EUR (normally 79 EUR).
The sale ends on Sunday midnight Sept 1st, 2019 (PDT).
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All Things Necessary in My Artistic Journey
Here’s my recent drawing called “All Things Necessary.” It’s inspired by the discoveries that I made while building the class Magical Inkdom. When I taught IT professionals back in the 1990s, we teachers used to say that you learn best when you teach a class. We had to constantly learn new technologies, and it made us professionals not only in teaching but also in learning.
However, some things take time, and even if trying to find the best ways to work with both ink and watercolor enabled this piece, the idea behind it goes much further back in my artistic journey, to the year 2014.
A Great Idea but Not So Great Execution from 2014
I have archived many of the old blog posts because back in 2014 I wasn’t very good at writing, and the posts are too short for the search engines. But I found the blog post in my personal archive and here’s what I wrote back in 2014:
“I often get these ideas that cost a million. Like the big painting that shines in gold and silver. It would look like a reproduction of the beautiful doors I saw last year when visiting the Hermitage Museum, in St. Petersburg, Russia. Someday I will make it! So I made a small prototype. It is a wooden block that is covered with all kinds of stuff found in my crafting space.”
This idea has haunted me since I made this crafty block, or I could say since I visited St. Petersburg, Russia. I have two blurry photos from that trip that I look at quite often. One is the golden door and the other is a handpainted plate at The State Russian Museum.
I felt I had found the aesthetics that I also wanted to create. First, I thought I would literally need real gold. Here’s how I ended the blog post:
“So, if you follow me, then you know what I will do if I win in a lottery! Real gold, jewels … wow, it will look astonishing.“
I wish I could turn back time, and say to myself: “Don’t lose this idea! Keep creating, and once your skills will grow, you will find the way.”
Dumping the Idea – “It’s Too Superficial”
The problem with me has been that when my skills haven’t met my vision, I have let go of the ideas around it. I have said to myself:
– “It wasn’t what I wanted to create anyway.”
– “It was too superficial, I want to create deeper stuff.”
– “The idea was great but not what other people would want to see”
– “Only rich and overly successful people could do that.”
– “There will be new and better ideas that are easier to execute.”
And so I have felt lost many times in my artistic journey because I haven’t been able to re-create that golden door, my true desire.
Getting Back to the Idea with More Skills
But for Magical Inkdom, I wanted to create gold. There my main message has been that we can make the wrong right, and define what’s magical to us. So I drew some golden frames, and they looked magical! (Instructions will be published in Lesson 4.)
Of course, I couldn’t just have a little bit of gold and settle with that. So I began a new piece, approximately 18 by 18 inches. It’s the biggest ink drawing that I have made so far. I knew my skills are there. I didn’t need a sketch or a prototype but just pour out everything that I love.
While I colored the drawing with watercolors, I thought about the appropriate title. The most accurate that came to my mind was “Kaikki tarpeellinen” meaning “All Things Necessary”. This kind of golden luxury may seem unnecessary and even overwhelming to many, but it’s necessary for me. I need to load this daily into my mind to keep my zest for life alive.
All Things Necessary: It’s a world where Salvador Dali travels to the Rococo era, and then back and forth between the Renaissance age and the 20th century.
It’s a world where golden birds lay Faberge eggs and land on golden fingers.
It’s a world where people, animals, and physical items share the same qualities and play the same symphony.
It’s a world where a cembalo plays a bit too loud, where all the gold hurts your eyes, and where the chaos is suspiciously acceptable.
It’s the same place that I was trying to find in 2011, when I was madly drawing circles, and when some of you started following this blog.
All Things Necessary for Moving on in the Artistic Journey
This new piece has made me re-think about the whole discussion about the artistic journey and finding a visual voice. I have blogged a lot about it, coached people for it, but it’s not easy to dig out a quiet seed that needs a lot of time and care to grow. Our artistic vision, the road sign, can be an ugly “prototype” like my old craft project that we carelessly toss away!
Let’s hold on to the things that keep deeply touching us while growing our skills in drawing and painting.
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