PS Whimsy - Behind the Brush: watercolour painting triptych

Wednesday, 18 May 2016

So Darn Cute

The goslings are here, and they are so cute I decided to start with them today. There are only two so far this year.

This little one stopped to pose for this picture!

Cute as can be, and below it did a couple of stretches, straightening up in between.

Don't need a lot of words here, the goslings are stealing the show.

It was a beautiful day and their fine down was glistening in the sunlight.

watchful parents...

AAAAAAAWWWWWWW!

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Next the art news:

Great news, two of my paintings have been accepted into the South Delta Artists' Guild
"2016 Oil and Water" exhibition:

Ink and watercolour - "Squashed"

and watercolour - "Angels Trumpets".

They will be at Gallery 1710 in Tsawwassen, BC.

The exhibition runs from June 2 to 24 and

the opening reception will be held on June 2 starting at 630 pm.

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So how is my triptych progressing? Well here is part two almost finished and part three is well on its way, I hope to be able to share that next week.

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Two other things for your entertainment:

First, a heartwarming video about a baby hummingbird:

Second, a treat from surrealist painter Rob Gonsalves at:

http://www.boredpanda.com/magic-realism-paintings-rob-gonsalves/

"The beautiful and mind-bending illusions in Canadian artist Robert Gonsalves’ paintings have a fun way of twisting your perception and causing you to question what in his paintings, if anything, is real."

That's all for this week, thanks for dropping by,

happy Wednesday, with whimsy,

Gillian.

Thank you for your comments, I thrive on them!

Wednesday, 11 May 2016

Firsts

Something new for me, in fact two firsts. My current painting is the biggest I have every done (18" X 24") and it is a triptych, so there are three parts.

Triptych literally means three fold; three panels that were attached together and could be folded shut, often the centre panel was larger than the other two, the three paintings sharing a common theme. I think it was first used in early Christian art for alter paintings.

My painting(s) are equal sizes and will not hinge.

This is the centre of the three paintings; it is a painting of a statue seen and photographed in northern Italy a few years ago. It is not finished yet because I can't do the background colour matching and finish the ivy until I have all three paintings almost done. I have more work to do, I hope to show you more next week.

I intend to varnish the paintings so that they do not need to be framed under glass.

For these paintings I have stretched watercolour paper over canvas stretcher bars, each painting uses a full sheet of watercolour paper (22" X 30"); I watched several YouTube videos before I made my first attempt. The end product will be lightweight and I hope vibrant.

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My camera lens found some beautiful flowers this week. First is an image of only one corner of my clematis, which is really putting on a show this year: beautiful and fragrant too.

There is a honeysuckle blooming at the same time popping up between the clematis blooms.

Next to some pink beauties, first lupines and then poppies.

There are lots of purple lupines in my neighbourhood but few pink ones.

I think this is only the second time I have seen pink poppies, and this time I had my camera with me too! Such delicate petals, slightly crushed by recent windy days, they almost look as if crafted from crepe paper. I took quite a few pictures, here is just a small selection: