How to Stay Motivated – Colored Pencils and Free Video!
This week, I have a free video for you! I hope it helps you to stay motivated and keep creating.
In the video, I am creating this small spread for my colored pencil diary and talking about how colored pencils help me to stay motivated. I share some thoughts about taking a break and getting back to making art. There are also lots of visual examples and an idea about Modern Me and Ancient Me. Imagining these two sides can help too.
How to Stay Motivated – Watch the Video!
I hope you enjoy the video. Let’s keep creating!
Drawing Swirls with Colored Pencils
This week, let’s make a summery drawing by coloring ornamental swirls!
Here’s the latest spread in my colored pencil journal. I have been recovering from painting a big series of oil paintings, so I wanted to create something small and experiment with the idea that I got in mind while cleaning the studio for the next paintings. Because I like to create freely and intuitively, my colored pencil journal is not a direct sketchbook for paintings, but more like a study book of ideas – a place to ponder and practice at the same time. This time, I wanted to focus on ornamental swirls so that they flow freely on the page. The elements themselves have stiffness but the overall impression is dynamic when the ornaments are layered on top of each other.
Drawing Swirls is a Good Art Practice
Practicing swirls makes all your drawings more beautiful because it develops both the hand and the eye. Try to make a perfect curve that ends with a perfect little circle, then widen parts of the curves so that they grow broader gradually. Observe not only the swirl itself but also the shape that it creates besides it.
If you tend to place the swirls stiffly row by row, draw some free lines as guides for their placement. You can also turn the page in different directions and color ornaments that are directed differently from each other.
Shadows Can Be Swirls Too
I like to color many layers and make some swirls disappear into the background. When layering, you can make everything ornamental: the background, the shadows, and the actual elements.
There are lots of swirls in my drawing but I also included some simple scallop shapes and circles to make the visual language more diverse.
Darkening a Little More Than You Would Normally Dare
If you want to make your drawing atmospheric, cover most of the white spots.
Darken the drawing gradually by coloring thin layers over most of the elements.
Add Something Angular to Go With Swirls
When my drawing progressed, it started to remind me of old still live paintings, for example, those that Riks Museum in the Netherlands has. There the vase was often placed on a tabletop. The rectangle on the bottom works as a contrast to the organic flowery shapes.
Add some shapes that break the rectangle, like the leaf-like one in my drawing. This way the result looks less strict and more layered.
Summer Coloring – A Little Bit Now and Then
I like and need this easiness of colored pencils when I slowly rebuild and restrengthen my creative core. Colored pencils are easy to grab for short sessions and you can color outside too. It’s now summer in Finland, and the weather has been fantastic. I think it shows in my drawing.
This journal has quite many colored pages already. It brings me joy to browse them. I am dreaming of the day when the journal is full even if it may be far away.
P.S. Check the class Fun Botanicum for more journal inspiration!
Art Inspiration from Period Dramas
This week, I am sharing art inspiration impacted by period dramas.
Visual Deliciousness of Period Dramas
I am a fan of period dramas. Recently, I have been watching Gilded Age and Bridgerton. Both of them have beautiful outdoor and indoor scenes, and dresses too, of course! My eyes like the delicious visual world they illustrate and my heart always feels a bit lighter after an episode or two.
Even if the dramas have historical settings, their colors are not dull at all. A picnic in the forest looks vibrant and is full of sunlight.
I like how flowery everything is, and how the jewelry frames the faces of young ladies.
Being so inspired by period dramas, it’s no wonder that my art is full of romantic and old-fashioned elements. They speak fantasy to me.
Fantastic Old-World Impact
I think that every artist needs to find their approach to fantasy and fairytales – how to use imagination and what to express with it?
I am fascinated by the power of the inner world and all my pieces are inner sceneries in one way or another.
Pablo Picasso has said: “Art is a lie that tells the truth.” Similarly, I would say that art is a fantasy that gives us what we need.
Bringing Fantasy to Life
I often talk about seeing art as a story or a collection rather than a single piece. In the new class, Fun Botanicum, we create a set of illustrations that are all unique but still a part of the series. This is a great project for setting a style and bringing different coloring techniques together.
Plants are a fun theme to explore what you can do with colored pencils and imagination!
>> Sign up here!
Pink Inspiration
This week is full of pink art inspiration. I hope that this post will get you to find your pinks and start creating sweetness!
Dreamy Pinks in Colored Pencils
First, one of the journal spreads that we will create at Fun Botanicum, the newest class.
The softness that you can create with colored pencils is divine and you can highlight that with sharp strokes. The versatility of colored pencils always amazes me. With one pencil you can create the whole value range from light to dark so a few pencils go a long way. I like those shelves of individual pencils in art supply stores because it’s like picking candies!
Pink Handdrawn Playing Cards
These cards are from the class Magical Inkdom. They are drawn with a black pen and then colored with watercolors.
My husband asked when he saw me drawing these:
– “Playing cards? What’s the game?”
– Well, these are like collector’s items! And you can invent the game yourself!
Because if you make more than one, isn’t that like a little oracle deck? You can ask yourself how you feel by picking a card that reflects your mood.
Lots of Pink Petals
I am already waiting for summer and see my pink peonies bloom in June. If I was a small fairy, I could live in those petals!
Petals, petals, more pink petals – that’s how the flowers are constructed! These are from the class Decodashery.
Pick a small brush, some pink gouache paints or watercolors, and paint small spots in layers!
Red and Green are Pink’s Best Pals
Here’s more pink gouache art – a small journal cover that also has reds and greens.
I love this color combination. Each color makes the other shine brighter. I can almost taste the colors when I look at them.
Pink Glow in the Dark
Pink is also a wonderful color with darks. You can paint a pink glow that makes the image look romantic.
Here’s a blog post where you can see process pictures of this painting.
Powder Pink Inspiration
One night my husband showed me new Swatch watches. I wasn’t so interested at first, but when I saw the photos and got the concept, I got so inspired that I am using that inspiration for the new series of oil paintings!
Here’s the new pink Swatch called Mission to Venus. I am definitely going to somehow incorporate all this into a painting! Not literally, but conceptually.
The powder pink with decorative details speaks of a beautiful adventure to me.
This watercolor painting has powder pinks too.
I painted this one a few years ago when my mission was to find the best way to paint flowers freely in watercolors without using a reference. I have a class about it too Floral Fantasies – Watercolor Edition!
Pinks and Other Pastels
What about selecting some acrylic paints and going wild on an art journal?
Add darks on the bottom and let dry. Then mix white to the colors and have fun with pastels. Use different brushes to have some variety in strokes as well.
You can be rough like above, or go in a more delicate direction with thinner brushes.
Black with pink is also a great color combination!
Pink Inspiration – How to Go Deeper
If you are a color-oriented artist as I am, pink is never just one pink. Challenge yourself to make all kinds of pinks from light to dark, from warm to cool, and use them all in one painting. Nature doesn’t select just one pink, so why would you?
The same goes for shapes, lines, and ideas. The more you embrace the variety, the more exciting the art-making becomes, and the more you create. Restrict supplies and increase imagination!
I hope you have an adventurous Pink Inspiration Day!
P.S. You can still sign up for Fun Botanicum and make wonderful colorings of plants!