Gouache

"Stanley Steamer" sketch by Lesley Spanos. Gouache and pen on kraft paper, 8" x 9". Copyright ©2011 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

I’d never seen a steam-powered car fired up until I saw this one. It was in the daily parade at the Indiana State Fair, it’s shiny red paint gleaming in the sun. When I looked up Stanley Steamer Motor Carriage Company on Wikipedia, I found a photo of this car in the article. Not just this model, but this actual car with the same US flag decal on the windshield, and the same owner/driver, photographed at the Indiana State Fair. Small world, eh?

I’m posting this one in Liz Wilzen’s Value Challenge on Daily Paintworks. Liz’s challenge requires us to use only four values, so I used black marker, white gouache, and a brown gouache. The light brown paper works as the fourth value. I used to like doing sketches like this in life drawing class in school, but that was a LONG time ago!

"Flare" by Lesley Spanos. Gouache painting on Multimedia Artboard, 6" x 4". Copyright ©2011 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

This is a harness racing horse I saw at the State Fair a couple of years ago. It’s painted in M. Graham gouache. I love gouache!  The matte surface is so velvety. I’d use it more often, if it didn’t require framing under glass.

"Gran Canaria Highway" by Lesley Spanos. M. Graham gouache on Multimedia Artboard, 9.5 x 5". Painted with permission from Google Street View image. Painting copyright ©2010, all rights reserved.

This one almost ended up in the dumpster. It’s another piece I started for Bill Guffey’s Virtual Paintout, but things didn’t go the way I planned.

This time we’re on the island of Gran Canaria, one of Spain’s Canary Islands:

View Larger Map

Such a beautiful place! I want to be on that road driving a convertible with the wind whipping my hair.

Here are a few shots taken along the way:

I like the look of taped edges on a gouache, so I began by masking off the margins with clear packing tape. The tape needs to be burnished thoroughly so the pigment won’t bleed through.

Since I can’t draw a straight line, much less paint one (see last painting), I’ve indicated the water line in pencil.

Color is blocked in quickly.

Starting to refine and add some detail.

This was the finished piece when I packed up my paints for the day. It wasn’t working for me, and I was ready to toss it in the trash and chalk it up to experience.

This morning when I came into the studio, that big empty space in the middle was staring at me, and I realized what it needed – a car! Duh! Just because it’s not in the shot doesn’t mean I can’t pull one up from another Street View, right? So I traveled a little further up the virtual highway and found this one:
View Larger Map

I have a hard time drawing cars and it looks a bit wonky, but it improves the composition enough so I don’t hate the painting so much anymore. A few more adjustments, like greying the highway, and it’s done. Yay!

"Stones" by Lesley Spanos. A country lane in Kettlewell, Wharfedale, Yorkshire. M. Graham Gouache on paper, 6 x 6". Copyright ©2009, all rights reserved.

I’ve become a Challenge Whore. I’ve taken hundreds of photos I could use as reference, yet I roam the net at night, searching for something different to paint. It’s not that I’m bored with my own photos. It just seems that I get into a rut when I get to choose every subject. Sometimes I need an assignment to force myself to break the mold and learn how to solve new problems. Often the photos posted in these challenges are things I’d never paint in a million years. For example, quaint little country lanes and old stone barns are far outside my personal experience and so NOT ME. So I had to try it.

This challenge was found in the Landscape forum on Wet Canvas. Thanks to the photographer, Yorky, for sharing this photo with the artists.

Here are some images captured along the way:

Since I’m not comfortable with architectural elements, I spent a little extra time on the drawing.

Talk about the “ugly stage”! Diving in with watery gouache and some bright color for the underpainting. Bright yellows and reds work best for me underneath foliage. It keeps the greens looking more natural. All the colors of Fall are always present in foliage. They’re just masked by green chlorophyll. It’s my job to expose them.

See how dull it looks now that I’ve added some greyed greens on top? But the underpainting is still there, influencing the paint in subtle ways.

I actually liked how the bush on the left turned out…

… so why’d I have to go and mess with it some more? That’s the story of my life as an artist – I never know when to stop. Uggh. It was looking so bad so I had to wipe it off with a wet paper towel. That’s the great thing about gouache – you can erase! On the down side, because it remains water soluble you have to work really fast if you want to keep previous layers from lifting. You get only one chance to lay down a good stroke.

The photo reference was taken on an overcast day, but I found myself adding some sunlight.

Fixed the bush, sharpened up the details, and we’re done! Now on to that Lake Michigan rower that Karin posted last week on DSFDF…

"Just Plane Sketching" by Lesley Spanos. Gouache on paper, 5 x 4". Copyright ©2009, all rights reserved.

Nothing special here, just a little gouache sketch from recent travels to prove that I’m still alive.  This was what I saw outside the window as I ate lunch in a small airport. The plane was gleaming in the early afternoon sun, and the palm fronds were swaying in a hot breeze. It was all very exotic. I didn’t even begin to do the scene justice, but by painting it, I’ve fixed it in my memory forever.

"Boogie Fever" by Lesley Spanos. Gouache on paper, 5 x 9.5". Copyright ©2009, all rights reserved.

I’ve long admired artist Karin Jurick’s paintings of people relaxing on the beach, so how cool is it to get to paint from one of her beach photos, with her blessing? That was our assignment for weeks 27-28 on Karin’s Different Strokes From Different Folks online painting challenge.

It’s mega cool, yes, but also intimidating. If there was one contemporary I wish I could paint like, it’s Karin. Her colors are rich and pleasing, like comfort food for the eyes. Her brushstrokes have that confident, casual look I long for in my own work. Her narrative demonstrates a keen sense of observation and a quirky sense of humor which takes a pretty picture to the next level and makes it Art.  She’s building a solid body of work, and I fully expect her work will hang on museum walls some day. Man oh man, why didn’t I buy something when her paintings first showed up on eBay, when they were more affordable?

Because I like Karin’s work so much, I have to dig deep each time I participate in her challenge to find myself. The last thing I want to do on her blog is a cheap imitation of her work, from her photo! I think it’s a dilemma most of the participating artists share. It’s like being a contestant on American Idol, trying to put your own spin on an iconic song. It’s damn hard, but if you can pull it off, you’re a better artist for it. Even if you can’t pull it off, you’re still a better artist for it, because you were true to yourself. That’s a big reason why I keep doing these challenges – it forces me to listen to my own voice.

That, and it makes me stretch my abilities by painting stuff I normally wouldn’t paint. Like those people on the beach – I love to paint surf, but I have never included a person in a seascape. Never! So it’s Challenge Time!

Here are a few shots I took along the way:

The painting begins with a waterproof pen drawing on paper.

This time I toned the paper after doing the drawing, using transparent washes of acrylic paint. Why? I dunno. Just felt like it.

The rest of the painting was done using M. Graham gouache. My palette consisted of:

• burnt umber
• phthalo blue
• ultramarine blue
• dioxazine purple
• cadmium red
• quinacridone rose
• cadmium yellow light
• zinc white
• titanium white

Oils might have been easier and more effective, but I needed a good workout in gouache. Gouache is tricky, because you need to work quickly, and you can’t put on too many layers before it turns to mud.

Waves are well within my comfort zone. People aren’t! So the beach background fell off the paintbrushes effortlessly, and within twenty minutes, it was done. Then I spent the next two hours struggling with the figures.

Having painted a few waves in my lifetime, I think the main thing I need to keep reminding myself is to let them flow. Because when you let the paint do its thing, all sorts of happy accidents happen that make it look more convincing. Labor over a wave for hours, and it looks contrived, like those frozen in time paintings of waves where every little droplet is defined. (You know the ones I mean… usually there’s light shining through the wave right where it’s starting to break.) I like to paint waves as I see them, churning and violent and random. Today’s waves started as dark humps with lots of brown mixed in, because they’re dirty with sand. Then I made a pass with a lighter color, using a circular, rolling motion to imitate the motion of the breaking wave. The cool thing about gouache is that it remains water soluble even after it dries, so as I painted the undercolor was picked up by the lighter paint, mixing with it and creating multiple tones in between. I finished the wave with a pass of thicker white mixed with a tiny bit of red. The red makes the white pop against the complementary blue-greens of the water.

That’s me smiling at my favorite happy accident in the painting.

Starting to mess with the figures (and yes, they are a mess)…

…and the (butt) end result. I’m not really happy with the figures, or with my gouache technique here. I didn’t know what colors to use or how to define the planes on a human body with paint so I fussed with them too much. Gouache strokes should look confident. Lay them down once, and move on! Mine are unsure. You can see me searching for the right answer. That’s why I need to practice in gouache a LOT more.

But there are some things happening here that make me happy. I like the bits of underpainting showing through, and I wish there were more of them. I like the looseness of the sky and the rough indication of clouds. I like the lack of hard edges around the figures, though I could have used a few hard edges here and there. I like the girl’s hair, another happy accident.

The foreground is a big part of the painting and it needed something to define it and bring it forward… so I added sand texture and pebbles. I flicked some light color on with a brush, then added burnt umber shadows to each speck. Fun.

What color is wet sand? Well, it’s darker than dry sand, and reflects a LOT of sky color. The wetter it is, the more sky it reflects. So I guess sand is a dirty brown mixture of sea color and sky color.

Here’s the finished piece. I was getting ready to send it in to Karin, but I have a few free hours to paint today (after I subtract Earth Hour), and there are more figures in the reference photo calling to me. I could just stop here, but in my head I hear Thelma’s last words to Louise – “Let’s keep goin’!” I’m thinking it’s diptych, or even triptych time!