Sue Johnston Art

Long time no blog

2011-08-21T13:58:00.000-07:00

So summer got in the way. Not that I haven't been painting. I am still painting on Tuesdays and Thursdays

So summer got in the way. Not that I haven't been painting. I am still painting on TuesdaysandThursdays

but the rest of the week has been filled to the brim with other stuff. Not an excuse, just a fact. I have been excited about my latest paintings. Focusing on landscapes that have a special mood for me. One from a photo I took on the road last summer in North Dakota has a feeling of remoteness, yet a comfortable life. I had the feeling, looking at it, that I do when I look at Edward Hopper's paintings. Now I've begun another of the same mood. It's from a photo I took at least 12 years ago in Samoa, a company town in Northern California. Having visited it many times since childhood it has a special meaning for me. I actually did a painting from the same photo at least 10 years ago when I was just learning to paint. I still have the painting but won't look at it til I finish the current painting. Then I'll post the two paintings side by side. Shown here, North of Bismark 18x 30 and my underpainting for the Samoa scene.

Nameless Painting

2011-05-18T16:35:00.000-07:00

Sometimes the hardest part of a painting is it's name. In this case, I really don't know what it is and so it makes it harder to come up with a title. I know that's stupid, but it is what it is. I chose to paint this scene because of the strong values I found in my old photo source. It had such an interesting design pattern. I really liked the old peeling paint on the device in the foreground. The challenge was to come up with a textural feeling that was believable. I used a little salt, sprayed some paint over patterns for the background, and used paints that leave a good granulation like Lunar Earth by Daniel Smith. The one disappointment was that I did not use Arches Rough, because it really helps when trying to paint lots of texture into a painting like this one. That said, I'm happy with the result. If anyone has an idea of what the machinery is I'd like to know.

Art Camp

2011-05-09T15:52:00.000-07:00

I spent last week in Grass Valley with four good friends, making art....well, that was the idea, but we were all tired and slow to start. Once we got going some very nice work was done by one and all. We spent one day exploring Nevada City and taking tons of photos with hopes of some good references for new paintings. We enjoyed the geese and goslings ( counted 28) that came to wake us every morning on their way to the lake viewed from the deck on the property. I felt as though we all benefitted from the time together and since this is our fourth time at 'art camp' I can see the strides we all have made in these four years. Looking forward to next year. Above you can see 2 pieces I finished while there. The first one, 'Trees across the Lake' was an attempt at plein air painting. Wanting to project the mood of the serenity of the scene, I used 300 lb Arches wet in wet, and completed most of the painting outside. Later I used Carn d' Ache watercolor crayons to finish the job. The second piece, ' Cottage in the Woods' was painted directly, dropping in colors that I wanted to show through to the finished work, yellow, opera and permanent rose, peacock and some cobalt. I wanted to keep the mood warm and give a sunny feeling to the tree trunks. I think they both have the mood I was working toward.

Trying to Finish

2011-04-25T15:28:00.000-07:00

Day after Easter, kind of cold and wet, just the weather I like for working in the studio. I'm not drawn outside by sunshine. Still trying to wrestle three paintings to the ground and call them finished. 'Take a Seat' is close, the other two I'm still lost in composition with. One reminds me of a trip to San Miguel Allende and I am still working on capturing the mood of that wonderful place. Today I took a step in that direction, strengthening some darks and defining a few of the shapes. The other is still giving me trouble. I feel like it's almost there except for one shape on the upper right. It is becoming more organic but needs something I can't define. That's the challenge of working with abstraction, knowing when enough is enough.

Happy Easter

2011-04-23T12:09:00.000-07:00

view from our deck courtesy of our friend Jan

I'm still trying to get this thing going. With the help of my nephew, Matt Curry, I think I'm there. My painting adventures this week included almost finishing 'Take a Seat' and struggling with two abstracts, one of which was sorely critiqued by my Thurzday Painterz friends. I still like it but can't figure out how to finish it. My problem was going into dark values too soon. Now I have to go back and take out some color, always risky. I read an excellent article in Watercolor Artist by John Salminen, reviewing Chinese artists work shown in the Chinese International Watercolor Exhibition last year. The paintings are beautiful and remind me to slow down and consider every element of design, every day if I ever hope to paint something as beautiful as those artists have. That's what's wrong with the 'problem' painting, charging in too fast without enough consideration of the details. Finally, I did enter the California Watercolor Association's 42nd national Exhibition. I took a risk and entered 3 pieces of my current series from one still life. I had a hard time deciding what to enter but finally decided to go out on a limb and enter the edgier more risky pieces. I hope one will catch the jurors eye. Happy Easter

Another Day

2011-04-18T15:47:00.000-07:00

My favorite painting weather. Fog/ rain. spent some good hours working on 'Take a Seat" It's close to being finished and with Tues. Wed. and Thurs. guaranteed as at least a few hours, I should be done by Friday. I'm also working on a 'random' piece that started as a response to a 'dark' mood I was in last Monday. Attacking the paper with no plan, I was surprised to find that my mood wasn't what I thought. Apparently I was happy! Wonder what would happen if I felt happy and started with the same attack mode. Anyway, I like what's happening so far, and finally got the nerve to approach it again today. After removing the resist, I added more color. It's warming up. Now I've got to make some hard decisions about how to finish. I keep trying to avoid the inevitable 'it looks like' vibe and just stay loose. I don't want to start trying to make it conform to a thing -but the mood is happy and tropical. Can I stay there?

Getting Started

2011-04-17T15:31:00.000-07:00

Just getting started on my blog. Don't exactly know how it all works but I guess I'll find out. My intent in creating this blog is to record the events of my art life. Paintings I'm working on. Shows I am entering. Workshops I'm taking. And anything else that will help me process the work I love to do. Right now I'm finishing up one painting that is part of my collection series, named "Take a Seat" . I love the perspective and abstraction of this piece and think it's going to be exciting to view when it is finished. Getting the drawing on paper was very difficult and I had to succumb to projection to get the basic lines in order. After that it took another day of drawing before I was ready to start painting. I began with a simple palette of opera, naples yellow and manganese to create the shimmering light in the background. From there I added cobalt, yellow ochre and permanent rose to strengthen the values. The images above with the exception of the first are examples of other paintings in my collection series. I really enjoy finding ordinary objects that show a different view of life. As Mike Bailey says: Exault the mundane to the Extrordinary!