Hello everyone, Charles here.
This past week I received a very kind note from a young woman, today’s featured
guest artist, who I met while giving some live painting demonstrations at a
conference in California, back at the end of July. Throughout this particular
education conference, I had a booth where I could paint and give out info about
my blog and YouTube channel, and I will let her fill you in on the rest...
“My name is Meorah C., and
I'm 13 years old. I went to a homeschool convention with my family in Modesto,
CA, where I met Mr. Wolf, an artist in the booth next to mine. I have always
loved art, but never felt that I was good enough to do much with it. Mr. Wolf
inspired me to learn and practice more. He also allowed me paint on one of his
canvases. I really enjoyed it! Mr. Wolf is an amazing artist, and I want to be
just as good someday. I'm so glad that he inspired me, and I hope he continues
to use his talent to inspire others as well.”
Meorah is more talented than
she thinks, and with only a few directions on my part (she did all the
painting), she created a beautiful sunset painting based on one of the photos from my trip to the Outer Banks of North Carolina.
Here is her beautiful
artwork, shown with permission. Please leave her a kind comment below if you
think she should keep practicing her art!
Thank you Meorah for sharing
your art with us today. I think you should definitely keep practicing, and it
was an amazing experience for me to work with you on this painting. Keep at it,
and I can’t wait to see more of your work in the future!
Have a fantastic artistic
week everyone,
—Charles
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Artist!
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or on the tab at the top, “Get Featured!”
Recently, my wife and I took a trip to the amazing North
Carolina Zoo in Asheboro, only about an hour and a half from our home in
Raleigh. It was a perfect day, not a cloud in the sky, bright blue, humid and
warm (hot by the afternoon). The zoo is the largest natural habitat zoo in the
world, with beautiful enclosures containing flora indigenous from the animals’
homes. In addition, the park is divided into two major geographical sections:
North America and Africa.
We intended to enter on the North American side, saving the
“traditional zoo animals” (Africa) for the second half of the day, which we did
accomplish, but only after a 20 min hike from the African parking lot to the
North American entrance. Later, we realized, laughing, that we had missed the
turn to drive to the North American parking lot, but it meant a shorter walk
when we were ready to leave!
I took a number of photos at the park, but due to the heat
of the day, many of the animals were lounging in the shade, making it difficult
to capture them well. However, as I mentioned, there were many beautiful
flowers and plants to see that were much more photogenic. My favorite exhibit
was a large tropical aviary, containing brightly colored birds and vegetation. It
was very humid inside, but well worth the effort. I hope that you enjoy this
photo set from our day at the zoo!
Thank you so much for reading this article and viewing the photos from my wonderful day at the zoo. If you enjoy creative projects, love
photography, painting, music and more, then be sure to sign up to the Impulsive
Artistry Email List to get instant notifications of new blog posts about these topics!
Whenever you find yourself in a creative rut, revisiting an
older idea can sometimes inspire you once again, causing you to see new
possibilities. It had been a while since I had worked with textured canvases,
and I felt that it was time to resume that style. The last time I dabbled
with the medium of PVA glue, about four months ago, and I created two abstracts that I
felt were very successful: “Autumn Leaves and Spring Leaves.”
My last painting, “Cornfield Impression” used a panoramic
style canvas, 6x18 inches; a unique 3:1 ratio that I have not seen often. I
actually bought two canvases of this size and decided to use the second one for
today’s abstracted sunset painting, titled “Sunburst.”
While there are certainly several ways to texture your
canvas in preparation for painting, I am currently using pure PVA glue, also
called “Tacky” glue, that I purchased from my local art supply store. One
bottle costs about $5-6 currently, which is more than enough for an average sized
canvas.
Some artists use modeling clay or plasters, but to keep
things simple, I will only be using the PVA glue, which is Acrylic based glue
like the paint. Squeeze out a good amount, looking for somewhat even coverage,
spread it out with an old 1-inch brush that you do not mind ruining (glue is
hard to clean off!).
Here is the glue that I used:
Take a hairdryer and dry off the canvas for about 5-8min,
continuing to work the glue as it dries. The glue will form small mounds, but
will give you a semi-flat surface to paint over. You should be able to touch
the glue once it is sufficiently dried, which will be pliable but not sticky.
I do not wait any
longer to let the glue dry, but get right to painting. Because the surface of
the canvas is uneven, the paint will collect in the shallower parts of the
glue, which might shift as well, giving you a wonderful cracks throughout the
canvas and allowing the white to show through. I really like the look of this
effect, because it adds a textured dimensionality to the painting.
If you do not want this to occur, allow a day to let the
glue fully dry and then use a brush to apply the paint; I will employ a large
metal spatula and be generous with the paint. You can encourage the cracks
further by standing the canvas up on its side for a minute, allowing the paint
to be pulled by gravity.
The Painting Process
"Sunburst." Original Acrylic Abstract by Charles Wolf.
Apply the acrylic paint directly onto the canvas, spreading
it out with even strokes using a metal spatula. Here are the colors that I used
in this abstracted landscape painting:
Cadmium Yellow Medium
Cadmium Orange Hue
Cobalt Blue
Ultramarine Blue (optional)
Orienting the canvas vertically, like a portrait, and then
dividing it into 3rds, place the Cadmium Orange Hue in the top section, Cadmium
Yellow Medium in the middle and then Cobalt Blue at the bottom, blend only
upwards, Yellow into the Orange, Blue into the Yellow. Blending the Yellow into
the Orange will create a sunlight effect, and pushing the Blue up into the
Yellow creates Green, which I formed into trees.
Taking the edge of the spatula, cut-in some tree trunks
through the paint, revealing the white underneath. Use the corner to pull up
little holes in the Cobalt Blue to create a stone path, add some sharp vertical
lines for flower stems, and then lightly add Yellow and Orange above these and
in the tree, cleaning off the spatula with a paper towel after every
application, to add some layers of interest.
Instructional Painting Videos!
Check out my YouTube painting video below to watch me
create, “Sunburst.” This video contains audio and text instructions on how to
paint this piece.
There is a small jump forward in the video, due to an issue
I was having with my camera at the time; however, I do explain how I created everything
above, and you can watch me create the previous two abstract paintings in the
style below, which use the very same techniques:
Feel free to
paint along if you are trying to learn to paint, you can also share these videos with your friends on social media, just please do not use it for commercial
endeavors, which violates copyright law. Thanks! Painting Video Links: If you would share my videos it would make my day! Just paste the following URLs in your post or tweet on your social media page to link to them! Sunburst URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fs9mgBLNFZ8 Spring Leaves URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX_nuN_qcGU Autumn Leaves URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziFzY4G5Ed8
Questions of the
day:
Have you ever painted before? What type of painting are you
interested in creating? Does this seem simple enough to do, or would you like
me to share something even simpler?
Thank you so much for stopping by Impulsive Artistry today!
I hope that you found this article to be informative and engaging. If you try
to create a painting similar to “Sunburst” or one my other paintings, I would
love to see it! You can tag me on Facebook @ImpulsiveArtistry or Twitter
@ArtImpulsive!
While you are there, be sure
to check out her blog as well. A big thank you to everyone who participated in this
photography contest!
If you would like to enter a
future photo contest, then be sure to like or bookmark the Impulsive Artistry Facebook Page. The next contest (nature themed) will be announced in about two
weeks.
Well, after last week’s "Rainy Days Photo Set" was posted;
the weather has improved significantly. I found the adage that “if you don’t
like the weather, just wait five minutes” to be quite accurate here in Raleigh,
North Carolina, and we’ve been enjoying several bright sunny days this past
week. Over the weekend, my wife and I took advantage of the nice weather and visited
the North Carolina Zoo, the world’s largest natural habitat zoo, and I will
have a photo set of that trip coming soon!
Creatively, I have had a few set-backs in my painting endeavors. My camera was not recording properly for some reason yesterday, and I had
a few painting experiments that proved to not work out as well as I would have
liked. One of the great things about painting is that you can always apply a
layer of Acrylic Gesso (a primer) over a piece and start again. I have several
canvases that I plan to treat this way today. To all you creative people like
me, keep at it; you never know if your next project will be a success! As the
saying goes: “better to try and fail then to not try at all.” In the end, the sun is sill shining brightly and each day is an opportunity to be persistent artistically!
Thank you for visiting Impuslive Artistry today! I look forward to seeing you again soon. If you like what you find on this blog do write a short comment below; I always enjoying hearing from you all.
Rain. The one word answer to what is the biggest difference
between living in California versus North Carolina. Now, it probably doesn’t
help that most of my life, when I was growing up in California, we were having
one drought or another, but on the other hand, it’s not called “Sunny
California” for nothing. When my wife and I were dating, she grew up on the
East Coast, I asked her what it was like moving to California? She replied that
she was struck by “how blue the sky was,” because there are very few clouds on
most days. Here in North Carolina, it is somewhat rare to have a perfectly
cloudless day.
Now that we live in Raleigh, I get what she was talking
about. This past month has been a seemingly endless stream of one thunderstorm
or scattered showers after another. As an artist and blogger, this doesn’t
really hamper my job in any way, but there are days that the dreariness can get
to you. The benefit of all this water is the green brilliance I see around me
every day, compared to the “golden hues,” as optimistic Californians
characterize the drab “browns” prevalent throughout that state during the
Summer, Fall and Winter. Don’t get me wrong, I am still a Californian at heart,
but it my home state mostly falls under the “rugged beauty” category of nature.
Looking back over my photography from this year, I am struck
by the number rain-centric photos that I found. Several of my shoots took place
during or just after a rainstorm, and so I thought that I would compile these
into a set for you to enjoy!
Impulsive Artistry Instagram You can see more of my photography on the Impulsive Artistry
Instagram; new photos are uploaded every day so be sure to Follow! Check them
all out here:
In what state or country
do you live? Is where you live a wet, dry
or in-between climate? Let me know in the comments below of on the Impulsive Artistry Facebook Page!
Your comments are always appreciated. I do take the time to
read through them and reply as often as I can. Drop a little note if you enjoyed
this post, I would love to hear from you!
Thank you so much for stopping by today here on Impulsive
Artistry. I hope that you will visit again soon and have a fantastic creative
week!
