An Art is not a lifeless piece of colors...

Gateway Arch, St. Louis

This Day That Age...

It was 28 years ago today I did this small Painting of Gateway Arch, St. Louis. At that time, I didn't even know where on the earth this Monument was. But, it was an amazing feeling when I went to St. Louis and spent a full-day on a weekend at the monument in the year 2003, almost 15 years after I did this Painting.

Today, when I look back 28 years from now, it takes me into my small but wonderful world of that student-life, filled completely with nothing but just Books, Friends and Love of Art.

"An Art is not a lifeless piece of colors. It has life and tells it's own story even to the Artist who created it. As the time goes by, the story it tells is filled with some of the finest moments of an Artist's Life."

This was done based on a photograph published in a local Telugu News Paper.

Details
Reference: Picture published in a Telugu News Paper
Mediums: Indian Ink and Poster Colors on Paper
Surface: Paper

Size: 8" x 6" (20 cm x 15 cm)

Time to clean up that mess...

messy Palette - watercolor

Artists' palettes usually look very messy. I myself often wonder how such messy surface can be the base for creating beautiful and wonderful paintings. Believe it or not, some Artists never clean their palettes ;)

I took a break from my watercolor painting to experience Painting in Oils last summer. Just opened my palette today to see what kind of mess I had left on it after my last watercolor painting. All of the color-slots have pretty dry paint left and the mixing areas and large wells for washes  all got dried-up. Before I clean this mess, I thought I'd rather take a snapshot of it, which when I look back reminds me, two years of wonderful journey into my dream of watercolor painting.

Now, it's time to clean up that mess and start a new journey from here again. Looking forward to fantastic experiences again after this break.

Creation is always a messy process, but the outcome of a creation is always wonderful.

Don't be afraid to get into messy things when you are trying to create anything that is wonderful and beautiful!

Happy Painting and get into it by all means of messy ways!

Value study...

"Value study" done before watercolor painting

Many Artists do a value study of the subject before they start Watercolor Painting. Value study is nothing but a quick sketch done to study the composition of shapes that make up the painting. The study of composition also includes finding the values, usually classified into three: 1) darks, 2) mediums and 3) lights.

Typically, value study is done with Pencil as pencil is close to Watercolors. Pen and ink is also good media to do a value study as darks and mediums can be easily shown. The sketch done to do value study is generally smaller in size than the actual painting. It basically helps studying the subject quickly. Once the study is done, it will be a good reference during the actual painting.

This sketch is done as a "value study" to my next painting. Darks are identified with dark black, mediums are shown with finer lines of black, and lights are nothing but the areas of paper not touched.

Happy Painting!
If you have a passion of Painting, keep painting.
Today is yesterday's tomorrow, to have no regrets of yesterday ;)

Details
Reference: Picture from internet
Mediums: Ink Pen on Paper

Size: 11" x 81/2" (28 cm x 21.5 cm)

Toolkit
Pens: Prismacolor Premier Brush Tip Marker (black), Staedtler 0.33mm ink pen
Surface: Heavyweight (80#) Sketching Paper