This week, I have a fun video for you. In the video, I create a watercolor greeting card and talk about my obsession of painting flowers.
The card is A5 in size, so about 6 x 8 inches and I have painted it on watercolor paper.
My smallest brush is very narrow and I could have coped with two brushes. In the course Freely Grown, we use the similar process, but finish with colored pencils, so it’s much easier than working with tiny brush strokes.
Watercolor Flower Obsession – Watch the Video!
In this video I confess how goal-oriented I am about painting flowers but also talk about the importance of play.
In the video I talk about a boutique that’s not a commercial thing at all, vice versa:
“I believe that we can create the best boutique out of our own art. Imagine your workspace as a paper shop where you sell hand-painted cards, bookmarks, hand-drawn stickers, patterned papers – everything that is already art as such, but from which you can look for inspiration for bigger works. I have even come up with a name for this kind of personal shop. It’s Boutique of the Heart. There’s only one customer in the Boutique of the Heart – you, and one seller and manufacturer – you! The longer you keep the shop, the more you learn to love the things you draw and paint yourself.”
My message is that the essence of art is in play. Thus no matter how high you want to reach, you can still create art with a playful attitude and have your Boutique of the Heart. I know there are art instructors that solely focus on the techniques and those who are about fairytales and imagination, but I feel I am something between. I want to create art with people who want to move forward in art-making, but who also love imagination and free expression.
We can have obsessions, but there should always be time to play too.
This week, I talk about making weekly art and the feelings behind creating regularly.
“Elämää alavilla mailla – Life in the Lowlands”, watercolor, size: A3
I feel that although artists talk a lot about techniques and creative process, something gets left out. It’s a time perspective. I don’t mean how much time it takes to make one piece, but what it’s like to make art week after week. If you create art, you will surely recognize this: sometimes you feel excited, sometimes you don’t. People’s moods vary and you can’t always choose the best day.
Not the Ideal Mood
I felt nervous when I started doing this watercolor. The best part of the morning was already over and I was splashing color very fast. My weekly art session had a messy start.
I found an unopened bottle of granulating medium in my stash and thought it might speed things up.
But I found the medium a useless acquisition. Some of the pigments are naturally spreadable and the spray bottle works better for them. All this took time, and my nervousness was still present and there was a new feeling too: self-doubt.
Not Feeling Confident
When you make art week after week, success is based on self-confidence more than mood. It’s easier to be confident at the beginning than later.
I usually paint with intuition and don’t use any models, so I often end up feeling hopeless. All I can say then is something like: “Keep going!” with a fake smile, and I don’t know if that helps at all.
Different Mood – Different Ideas
But art doesn’t put one mood above the other. Different mood brings different ideas. For example, if I am feeling nervous, there is an opportunity to be less conventional and express something that I would not otherwise come to mind.
The idea of this painting culminated in the Finnish expression “alavilla mailla hallanvaara.” It means “the danger of frost in the lowlands” in English, but the beauty of the statement is not in its content, but in how it sounds in Finnish. While painting, I began to think about those lowlands that suffer from rain and cold. Similarly, as painters paint week after week, flowers bloom constantly there, also in bad weather.
For me, in art, it’s not important in which mood it’s started, but that the end result contains both a trigger and a solution. Here, wind and rain bend the grass and break flower petals, but at the same time they make room for light.
Who Are You Creating Art For?
Within time, the mood evens out and focus is on the finishing. Then I also change who I think as a recipient.
I often start the weekly art by saying that “this piece is for me,” but when I finish I try to reach “for us.” There “we” includes all who like my art, both old and new friends in art. I don’t want to make art only “for you”, because then I lose myself while doing it, and not ” for them”, because it’s hopeless to hope that maybe someone would like the work even if we wouldn’t.
So, weekly, this happens again: the wrong moment, the wrong mood, the choice of brushes and colors, calming down, “I’m just doing it for myself”, uncertainty, slowly emerging ideas, concentration, triggers and solutions, happiness, and a feeling of gratitude that I can do this again for us.
Although I usually aim for a grandiose atmosphere, my art is a lot about insignificant everyday moments.
For example, when I …
… gathered apples from our apple trees
… walked in a rainy storm with the dogs
… admired autumn colors from the car window.
Or when I smiled at the hopefulness of the roses in the front yard and promised to give them a home from a painting before winter would surprise them.
Floral Watercolor Dreams
When I paint in my small studio, my mind tells me that I am a flower painter in 17th or 18th century Holland. I imagine lovely high windows, old costumes, and the clatter of shoes on the street. I imagine the flower market and how I will assemble a bouquet from the best finds.
But in reality, I’m just an ordinary Finn whose everyday life pushes through the brush.
There is a huge gulf between me and the master painter of the 18th century and yet I still jump into it again and again. Every once in a while, I decide to stop painting flowers because there’s so much more to paint. And yes, if I look at my oil paintings, my favorites don’t have many flowers. Nevertheless, the flowerless period never lasts very long.
When I go to the garden, the Flemish master is waiting for me there. He says: “It’s time to practice again, Päivi” I answer: “Yes,” and then assure him: “One day I will master this art of painting flowers.”
Still, I know that life can be far too short and far too mundane for me to ever reach that level. But like a rose facing winter, I take out my button and wet the paper again.
This piece was painted on Arches Hot Press watercolor paper. It has a very smooth surface so it’s great for a detailed painting, but I also find it a bit challenging because every stroke shows!
What’s Behind the Title?
Even if I painted autumn watercolor flowers, can you also spot the apples?
This piece is called “Satokauden kuulas” and I think it’s a beautiful title in Finnish but a bit complicated to translate. “Satokausi” means harvest time and “kuulas” is a romantic word for translucent. But there’s more. “Valkea kuulas” is an apple variety that is called White Transparent in English. So I think that the suitable English name is “Harvest’s Transparent” even if it doesn’t quite have the same romantic sound as the Finnish version.
This piece has a strong autumnal feel: bright colors meet more muted tones on a dark background.
This week, I am revamping an old watercolor painting and sharing some things I have learned over the last five years. Let’s make your paintings more fantastic with five tips!
The size of my example is 28.5 cm x 28.5 cm, so 11.25 inches x 11.25 inches.
Revamping a Watercolor Painting – Best Candidates
Here are the original and the revamped paintings side by side.
I got the idea of the revamp when I was going through my old pieces to find ideas for the new course Joyful Coloring. The watercolor painting from 2019 had good paper and fairly light colors, so I knew it could be revamped quite easily. A part of the revamp is to wipe off some paint, so it helps if the paper is thick and durable. And the fewer layers the painting has, the easier it is to alter it.
Making the Old Version – Watch a Video from 2019!
In this video, I teach the negative painting technique. It’s very useful for watercolor because when you paint around the shape, you can highlight all the lightness and loveliness that has been born in the first layers.
The problem with highlighting the best parts is that we see too many. There’s a mental barrier to paint over them in later layers. And that makes the painting less atmospheric and more busy. Then it also remains less finished-looking than it could be. My painting definitely had these problems. Now I see it as a nice start, but not a finished piece.
Using Watercolor Pencils for Finishing
I could have continued the old painting with watercolors, but I want to grow my skills in using watercolor pencils. So I picked Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelle pencils, filled a water cup, and chose a couple of narrow brushes. It’s easy to do very detailed things with watercolor pencils so they are suitable for finishing. The watercolor paper of my old painting was the Cold Press quality, so fairly textured, and Hot Press would have worked better for watercolor pencils. But I made the color more even with water, and it worked fine.
You can use any supplies for these tips! Tip #1 is the most important, so start your revamp with it.
Revamp #1 – Less Modesty – Make the Focal Point More Dashing!
What’s the central element in your piece? Is it the best treat of the painting, making you look at it again and again?
Mine was some sort of a daisy, much too modest and simple to my liking, and a bit clumsy too.
I started wiping off the darkest parts and then made it a peony. It’s a flower that has many layers of petals and is not a shy wallflower at all. Much more eye-catching!
It’s good to arrange some breathing room for the central element and add contrast to the background so that it stands out.
Revamp #2 – Less Bulkiness – Make Shapes More Elegant!
Do you have thick or straight lines? Do the shapes have extra angles? Are the negative shapes (background shapes) as beautiful as the actual shapes?Are many shapes connected to each other?
My painting had a lot of thick stems. Making them narrower immediately adds elegance to the flower. The stems were also very close to the flower and that makes the painting look flat. I added a dark color where the stem and the flower meet so that the flower stands out more.
My old painting had many shapes that looked quite random and not finished at all. I made them more organic and sharper.
But when revamping a watercolor painting, remember that everything doesn’t have to be sharp. The painting can have blurry spots as well, especially near the edges. Blurriness makes the sharp center stand out.
Revamp #3 – Less Evenness – Add More Subtle Patterns!
Have you used only one color on one area?Does your background look boring? Does your piece have an atmosphere?
My old piece had a background that was much too simple for my current taste. It didn’t have a sense of place at all. I want all my paintings to answer the question: “Where am I?” Even if it would be just an imaginary location, at best, the viewer can continue the scenery in her mind.
The background can have patterns. You can pick any idea suitable for fabric design! I wiped off the paint so that I got stripes going in all directions. This kind of bold patterning doesn’t improve the painting right away, but after tip #4, everything will get so much better!
Revamp #4 – Less Separate Color Areas – Add a Dominating Color to the Background!
Are your colors separate islands? Do you see problems in the composition? Is there too much of everything and a need to simplify?
The atmosphere can be often as simple as one color that dominates the background. However, it doesn’t mean that the background only has one tone. You can first add a variety of colors, and then color over them with one color. Separate colors are like strangers, but once they get the same color over them, they become a family. My choice was green, but yours can be any color.
Color a thin top layer so that the lower layers show through. You can color lightly and dilute the color with water.
Don’t color over everything though. Leave out the details that you want to keep front!
Revamp #5 – Less Distracting Details – Choose Only a Few Shiny Stars!
Do you still see problems in the composition? Is there still too much to look at? Go through the painting and point your finger to every light and every dark area!
You most probably have too many white or pale pastel areas and/or too many dark areas. If you use high contrasts or very bright colors near the edges, the painting looks busy. Unfortunately, the best details often are born near the edges, but we don’t want the viewer to look there, so we must let them go.
When revamping a watercolor painting, use the dominating background color to cover the less important details. Compare the two pictures below and see how I have reduced the bright spots, for example, the two round flowers in the right bottom corner have been colored green in the final version.
In the center, the contrasts are good. So I made the background near my shiniest star – the peony – darker.
What a difference – isn’t it?!
I hadn’t signed the old painting, but I am so satisfied with the revamped version that I added my signature to it.
Joyful Coloring for Watercolor Pencils
Learn more about using watercolor pencils and create enjoyable projects!
