That Fancy Peacock

Click image to view larger

Ta-da! Here he is in all of his crazy colorful splendor. I wanted to paint a peacock, not an entire peacock, just this much, and I wanted it to be artistic. I think I did a good job in thinking through the composition and drawing from many source photos, but what I had in mind for the final piece is not exactly what I got. But I still like it, and other people like it so that's cool.
What I was imagining was something much more loose than I usually paint, that kind of deconstructed as it faded into the top left corner especially. Since I have been such a tight painter and don't really know how to loosen out that much, I think that what I got was a good stepping stone. I wanted the body of the bird to be perfectly realistic, which it is, but among all of those feathers it doesn't stand out quite as much as I had hoped. He ended up with more eyes than is realistic, but it is an artistic representation, so it's all good. Definitely not something to toss out. The colors are very bright, lots of orange and blue streaks mixed in with the bright green in the feathers which was fun (not sure how much of that you can see in the photo). It is definitely a Whabam piece, I'll give it that. It would be an amazing pop of color in someone's home or office. What do you think?

This piece is for sale! 22x28 oil on canvas $450.00 contact juliamillerartist@gmail.com

Gibraltar

This is a 6x6 painting, oil on canvas, of a Betta fish named Gibraltar. These fish are so gorgeous, so I took some photos of this one and did a little painting. :)   For the background, I wanted to do something more abstract with water type movement. I started at the top and got something I really liked with a couple circles and swirls.... but then.... I wiped most of the background off at least six times. Hah. BUT! I finally got out onto canvas what was in my head :D  I had to darken around the edges, and I finally succeeded in getting some depth....it was so much fun. It was one of those nights when I stayed up late painting after work, because that's when it came to me.
I really really like this painting and I was so pleased with myself for actually doing something more abstract like. I want to do more backgrounds like this, and now I have proved to myself that I can do it. Now I need to make a series......

Sunny Petals stage 1

I got ahold of a sunflower a few months ago and had taken pictures outside, so I am working on a painting from those pictures right now. I wish I could be working from life... but it's ok. This one is a little bit larger, 11x14, here is where I am at right now. (click on the picture to see it better!)

  I was having a lot of trouble getting the shadow colors. I started with the center, which was easy to get looking nice, and then I went up to the top right which had a lot of shadow, but everything was looking too brown. The sunflower is really a dark dark yellow, or light orange color, and what I finally figured out by the time I got to the bottom of the flower is that the shadows in the petals are really a cool orange. At first I was using some transparent red oxide and terra rosa and mixing that with cad orange or cad yellow deep. Some of my problem was that I was working off of a picture and I couldn't figure out what colors I was seeing. Some of the problem was me not really thinking through it....  The picture was in bright sunlight so the shadows should be cool, but they still had the orange of the petal showing through, especially in certain parts of the shadows. So what I figured out by the time I was finishing was to mix yellow ochre, which is a super cool yellow) with a tiny bit of ultramarine blue and some cad orange. It worked much better. Don't ask me why I was using brown before...I thought I was seeing brown I guess, but I wasn't. I've tried to go back towards the top and fix some of the shadows, but I may have to do some more. Gonna paint the green backing leaves and background today. Probably could have used a larger canvas, but oh well.
I'll post the finished piece tonight or tomorrow :)

Roses painted from life

So I finally got the book Alla Prima by Richard Schmid and read it over the past few weeks. I have really loved learning more about painting this year, and I can see myself growing and becoming more confident. I still have so much to learn and master, but at least I'm not afraid to try :)  If you are serious about painting, READ THIS BOOK! He paints completely from life, almost always in one sitting, which is the best way to paint. I don't think I will always be able to paint from life, but I definitely need much more experience from painting from life. Sooo.... Yesterday, I picked some knockout roses from our garden and set up a little box and a light in my studio and started painting on an 8x10 canvas. I had actually picked some other smaller roses to compliment, but they have so many petals etc that when I got to them I said phooey and got a couple more knockouts and painted them solely instead. It was a good decision. They are really pretty easy to paint I think ;) The harder part for me was today when I had to paint the leaves and the background. I'm still not amazing at that.. but I think it turned out ok. The roses themselves are still my favorite part :)
So here it is!

I did notice that I painted differently this time, partly because of my studying and partly because I painted from life with a smaller amount of time (5 hours yesterday and 3 1/2 today). I am becoming more lose and confident..... that I am learning and progressing....and I'm quite enjoying it :) 

In other news, I'm getting stuff ready to start going to art festivals! Purty exciting stuff right there, lots to do to get ready.... Got a tent, got most of the wall/hanging stuff, starting the process of getting prints made etc. All lots of money up front, but I so hope that I can sell paintings! I'll post an update about that soon. I'm going to be doing as many paintings as I can pop out, and I want to do some things other than flowers also, something interesting...still haven't come up with a good idea yet, but look for it! haha. 

"Cherry Blossom Puff" For Sale!

"Cherry Blossom Puff"

 Oil on canvas 8x10

FOR SALE $250 FRAMED $185 UNFRAMED

I will post pictures of it framed soon, it will be a super nice frame. 

Don't forget to click on the picture for better viewing!

Rhododendrons Final

Here it is! "Rhododendrons" is finished and is For Sale!
14x14 oil on canvas

For inquiries email juliawichmanartist@gmail.com
Click on the picture to see it better.

Rhododendron painting update

I had painted the majority of the flower earlier, I think before Christmas even...  And now, a couple of paintings later, I'm getting back to it to get it done for an art contest that I'm entering soon! I've painted more than half of the leaves and background now and really love how it is all looking with the colors and the contrast. I am more pleased with it than I thought I would be. The colors  are so vibrant, it makes me happy! Gotta love COLOR! I have had a very productive week working on this painting and launching my Etsy shop, Jule's Fleurs. Check it out etsy.julesfleurs.com 

Exciting times!

Connor's harbor boats

My brother asked me to paint a "harbor" painting for him for his Christmas/birthday (two days after Christmas) present. He built a room for himself in our garage and wants art on the walls hah. So I started on a painting for him before Christmas, I got the sky done then...  Then a few weeks ago I painted the ships and water, and today I finished it up finally! It's not much of a sunset like he wanted, but it was the best overall picture that I could find for a source.

Click on the picture to see it larger!
I had fun painting the cloud, especially the edge of the cloud as it whispily blends into the sky. I used my new manganese blue mixed with lemon yellow to create the turquoise in the lower right corner and also mixed in with the blue in the ocean.  Ahh so peaceful :)

Oil paints and mediums, what I have learned.

Here's my experience from going to get "real" oils a few weeks ago. Hope it is helpful.

I went to Blick's art supply a couple weeks ago because I needed to get myself some "real" oil paints now that I'm moving up and trying to be a real artist... hah   By "real" oil paints, I mean more expensive, higher quality, than say, Winton or some other student grade stuff from Hobby Lobby. I mean, as far as I new they worked just fine, but I figured there was a reason why professional artists didn't use the low grade stuff.
Basically, what I learned was that the more expensive paint has more pigment in it and has a better, creamier consistency. 
I have always used a small palette- basically ultramarine and prussian blues (also experiment with cobalt and cerulean), yellow ochre, burnt sienna, cad yellow, cad red, alizarin crimson, sometimes orange and raw umber and sap green, and of course titanium white.
But I had been reading Color and Light by James Gurney, AWESOME BOOK, and he was talking about other pigments you kind of should/could have, and I thought YA! cause certain pigments make colors that certain other pigments can't!
A small palette works fine, and is good especially when you're learning and starting off, but I am enjoying the new colors I can mix with some new pigments that I got.
What brand to choose?
So anyway, when I got to the big art store and saw like 10 brands of oils I realized I had no idea about paint. (Why didn't they teach us this stuff in college? guess they wanted us to go to grad school.) Some brands had certain pigments that I wanted, while other brands didn't. Some were a little more expensive, while some were handmade and wayyyy too expensive like you've got to be kidding me.
So I started asking the people who worked there, and they actually were painters and knew what was up with paint! Score! So basically, a lot of them are good... Winsor and Newton is good, but Gamblin is a little cheaper and probably just as good. Winsor and Newton was the only one that I could find Pyrrole Red in, and that is also the only "real" oil paint that Hobby Lobby carries as I later realized.
BUT  Grumbacher Pre-tested is great too, and decent price :) A lot of artist like that paint, and I later realized that I had some of this at home somehow in a Thalo red rose that I love.
White: Soft formula and Transparent
Grumbacher has big tubes of Titanium White SOFT FORMULA. If you don't have Titanium white soft formula go get some! It will make your life so much easier. Have you ever realized how hard that paint is?  Also I learned about mixing white, or translucent white, i.e. zinc or flake white, both of which are toxic! gasp! But there is a synthetic! The only brand we could find the transparent white (the fake non-toxic stuff) in was Rembrandt, and I have been using this stuff like crazy! It doesn't dull your colors and make them super cool, it's just amazing. So definitely get some of that too. 
My Favorite: M. Graham
And here is my favorite I think....  M. Graham. Made with Walnut oil, which is non-toxic unlike some of the other oils and stuff that they make paints with. Back in college I had learned of walnut oil from a friend in my class who had learned about it from her fiance who was getting his MFA. So, instead of using Liquin or linseed oil or whatever for my medium (which honestly I never used a medium until after college, another thing we weren't taught much about) I use walnut oil.
Walnut Oil instead of Mineral Spirits
And here's the coolest thing about this. You can clean your brushes in walnut oil and not have to use mineral spirits! I have an extremely tiny studio space, like 12x5 but even less floor space, and next to no ventilation especially in winter, so this is awesome for me. No more wooziness and cancer. Heck ya. The nice lady at Blick's taught me about this, and it is working awesome, and I love the M. Graham paints.  So basically I have a mix of all of these brands and I like the consistency/feel of them all so far. Each small tube was between $9 and $14. I didn't get any of the more expensive pigments. It is so worth the money though.
So go get some good paint! This good stuff is so much more creamy and awesome. And get some Walnut oil and seal up those mineral spirits.
These are the new paints that I purchased.
Dioxazine Purple
Quinacridone Violet
Manganese Blue (this one is just cool)
Pyrrole Red
Lemon Yellow
Pthalo Green?
Sap Green
Titanium White soft formula
Transparent white
I can't wait to replace all my paints with these nicer paints.

Mom's Childhood Portrait

I finally finished this portrait of my Mom for her Christmas present. She had brought me a little picture one day that was taken of her (at Lake Michigan I believe) when she was three. It's a super cute picture, little toddler smirk on her face, very nice lighting, great colors. The photo was actually in great condition, not faded or yellowed, so that made it easy to work from. I did also scan it into my computer and enlarged it to work from.

For this painting, I was focusing on mixing the correct colors and not going over and over an area on my canvas a billion times. I did pretty good on this I think, trying to break old, bad habits. I could have payed more attention to colors and warms/cools etc. when I painted the sand, but I got a bit bored with that part. I really enjoyed using bright, clean colors to depict the sunny day at the lake.

I painted my first set of bare feet! They turned out great I think, I was quite happy. (They look better in the real painting). The hand, on the other hand, was all blurred out, so I had a little trouble with that, but it will have to do for now.

I'm still working on my brother's Christmas/birthday present painting, but hopefully that will be up shortly!

Christmas painting

This 6x8 little painting is what I painted for my boyfriend's parents for their Christmas present. He told me that his mom loved orchids, especially purple ones, so that was my subject. I also framed it at the frame shop I work at, and that added a pretty finishing touch.

I had originally painted this with a dark, smooth, boring background. But fortunately I realized that it could be so much better (I've been studying painting and great painters a lot lately) so I re did it with more color and in a more painterly way. It dried a little darker than I wanted, and the picture is not that great, but I am learning. :)

The images look much better if you view them after clicking on them!

I think I am going to start painting lots of small flower paintings... so be looking for more soon!

Rhododendrons

This is a painting that I am working on. It is actually moving along pretty quickly, and I am really enjoying painting it. So many pretty pinks!  Oil on canvas, 12x12. I wasn't getting the right pinks with just my alizarin crimson and cad red, but fortunately I happened to have some rose (rose something?) oil paint that was perfect.
I took the photo for this in the spring up at Raven Cliff Falls. It's a very dramatic picture, one of the best I've taken. As soon as it's finished I'll put it up here!

Oil Wash

Today's post is about the drawing technique called "oil wash". I always get asked about this process, so here you go. 

Why I love the oil wash technique:
- I love the simple and kind of antique feel of the drawing/painting.
- It is a quick process.
- It easily lends to great contrast between lights and shadow. Btw, sources with lots of contrast work best for this technique!
- It is fun and very hands on.
- It is a mix between an oil painting and a drawing which has many pros in my opinion.
- It is my favorite drawing technique hands down.

This is the first oil wash I did when I was introduced to the technique in Advanced Painting class my Junior year. An oil wash is done on a canvas board (stretched canvas doesn't work as well) with oil paint, copal medium, mineral spirits, a white t-shirt rag and a couple paint brushes. The first step is to do a pencil drawing of your subject on the canvas board. Be careful not to draw too darkly or to draw in areas of light because the pencil will show. After you drawing is solid, spray it with fixative so that it does not get washed away.
Typically, burnt sienna is the color of oil paint used for an oil wash, but because the burnt sienna can look so orange  by itself, you may want to mix some ultramarine blue or some burnt or raw umber with the burnt sienna until you get a color that you like. Adding the blue may also help darken the areas of shadow. I mentioned copal before, it is the medium that makes the oil wash work. It thins the paint and also quickens drying time. Mix the copal into your oil paint with a palette knife until it feels like soft butter. With a large brush, cover the whole canvas with the mixture. Next, begin taking out your light areas with a rag dipped in mineral spirits. You can rub off just a little bit of paint, or all of the paint back down to the white canvas. You are erasing out the light areas, leaving the midtones, and adding more paint to the dark areas.
Using the rag and brushes (for more detailed areas) dipped in mineral spirits is my favorite step in this process. You can work in large areas and very quickly see the form appearing. For darkening your shadows, use a brush and oil paint without copal in it.
You will find that using too much mineral spirits causes runs, but this can be used to create an awesome effect on the background. Experiment with the copal, paint, mineral spirits, rags, paper towels, brushes, fingers, anything! If you do not like what you have done on your canvas, wipe it off or add more paint and try something new. With this technique you have some very creative, quick options for backgrounds that can strengthen your composition.
The workability time for this technique is about one day, but that is not a problem because you will find that once you get your pencil drawing finished, you will only need maybe five or six hours to complete the piece. If you start in the afternoon of one day, you should be able to touch up those problems that your eye finds on a second look the next morning.

This is another oil wash portrait I did just this summer of another good friend of mine. The color difference is because I added more ultramarine blue into my burnt sienna paint. For those of you "non-artists" I'm sure you think it's just beautiful. But for those of you who are artists you may notice that it looks a little off, it's in the right eye and eyebrow (left side of painting). Too bad I didn't take the time to notice or fix it at the time, because now it's too late to fix. So my suggestion- Do the pencil drawing, and come back to it the next day with a fresh look and make sure it's all spot on. And then be careful to keep the integrity of the drawing when you apply the paint. When you come back to a drawing you always clearly see the issues with it, so take advantage of the fact and don't be lazy or rush!

-Julia