Day 6, Autumn Day Collage

Autumn Day

Collage, 7.5 X 5.5

The next few day's collages are a bit bigger, they fit in an 8 X 10 mat for framing. This one, with the orange and green made me think of the early days of fall when some of the leaves have turned and some have kept their green for just a little longer. The papers are painted tissue, water stained tissue, and an altered magazine page. Acrylic paint is lightly wiped on and wiped off in places to bring the piece together, then it is coated with gloss medium.  

Autumn

We have a beautiful maple tree in our backyard and it's leaves are turning the most wonderful shades of autumn. There is no way to paint that kind of color but I had to try before leaving for the winter. It's interesting that the leaves change first on the south side and top of the tree while the north side remains green. This will probably be my last post until I'm up and running in Florida again. I couldn't leave without painting a fall scene.

Georgia Blue Ridge

I spent a long week end with some wonderful "sisters" in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Georgia. What I painted in my little Moleskine doesn't come close to the beauty of that area but I give myself credit for trying. The trees on the hills in the distance had lost all of their leaves so it was just a mass of grayish brown. The center hills were full of evergreen trees with trees with orange leaves interspersed among them. That combination of green and orange was quite striking. Closer was another hill of trees that were barren. The skies were a striking blue the whole week end which is unusual according to the one whose cabin we were visiting. We had an interesting visit by a young bear who wanted our garbage can in the worst way. I wish I had gotten a good picture of him/her but I wasn't willing to venture outside to do so. As a result, I have a picture with a fuzzy black thing in it. At least I know it was a bear.

Starting tomorrow I'll be taking a 3 day workshop with Don Taylor, I hope to have some interesting paintings to post.

Mini equipment

Today's post is a picture of the second painting I did at the lake. It's of one of the clumps of birch trees that are around the property with the lake in the background. To my dismay, I've painted so many Florida scenes that I have almost forgotten how to paint birch trees, one of my first watercolor lessons. I think I captured the look eventually, though. Along with the painting is the the tiny brush, Pocket Box and and Moleskine. Until I started painting the miniature paintings with gouache last summer, I never used a small brush except for an occasional detail. Just look at me now!

A Break at the Lake

We were invited to spend a few days with our friends at their lake cabin in northern Minnesota this week. I was looking forward to some fall color and I wasn't disappointed. The maple's reds, oranges and yellows were a lovely contrast to some of the trees that were still stubbornly green. It seems like the maples always go first. I sat on the pontoon boat and did a quick painting of the shoreline in the distance. I finally got to use my watercolor Moleskine that has pages that are 5 1/2" by 3 1/2". It's pretty small but the only brush I had was the one in Sketchers' Pocket Box with 12 half pans of paint in a little palette. I'm trying to see how "minimalist" I can get with my equipment. I'm not sure of the size of the brush but it's certainly no bigger than a #2. It's fun to see what can be done with a small book and palette.