A few posts back I wrote that I was struggling to do art. Although I'm not back to my former productivity, it's getting better, and what's helping is color.
When I participate in or host zoom chats, I've tried to be conscious of what kind of visual impression I make. Though I'm not a person with a closet full of bright colored clothing, I've worn a lot more of it this spring and summer. Color always lifts my mood -- most of us respond that way. For some reason, human beings seem to echo or take cues from their environment, and while people in the south have no trouble wearing tropical colors, we northerners are notorious for wearing black, grey, brown and white in the colder months, just when everyone needs color the most. (But we're Canadians -- wouldn't want to stand out too much!) Anyway, all I'm saying is that I've been conscious of the effect of color on my spirits during this pandemic, and when I was trying to get back into doing some artwork, it wasn't linework that drew me in, but pure color.
After these still lives of fruit in straight watercolor, I did the piece below, which began as a drawing and ended up with the addition of watercolor.
Still life with Mycenean cup and Mycenean snail shell. Pen and ink with watercolor, 9" x 6".
I felt better after doing these, and I hope they cheer you, too. What helping you these days? Have you have had any thoughts about color during this time?
That still life with fruit would be gorgeous as a needlepoint.
Posted by: Deborah | July 28, 2020 at 02:01 PM
Beautiful! I love the fruit still life.
Posted by: bev wigney | July 28, 2020 at 02:25 PM
Love these Beth! Totally agree with your views on color. If I have on colorful clothing I am in a better mood...lifts your spirits. Especially with all we are dealing with we still have to try do things that make us feel good...even if it is just what we choose to wear! Your art is inspiring!!
Xxooo
Posted by: Kathy Hughes | July 28, 2020 at 04:26 PM
Your work in color work definitely cheers me as it cheered you.
I turn to color in my life even more than I turn to music when I need something to sustain me, but the use of color in my art work didn't come until I was in my 30s.
When I went back to college at age 30 to complete my degree in English Literature and Studio Art, my drawing professor who drew only in black and white showed no interest in anything that I drew until I began working with some Rembrandt chalk pastels that had been given to me years before and had remained untouched because I had no idea how to use them. I brought them to his life drawing class one day and proceeded to make a drawing of the model using the vivid saturated colors of Rembrandt pastel palette. The professor raved about my drawings. He commented a few weeks later that my subject was not the model but color. In response, I did a black and white drawing using a photograph of Georgia O'Keeffe's head in the style I had developed using the chalk pastels. His comment was, "Obviously, she has nothing to say in black and white." I disagreed with him but titled the drawing "Nothing To Say In Black And White."
As for color in clothing, I try to wear clothing that does not draw attention to me in any way, although the flip-flops (we called them "thongs" when I was growing up in California in the 1950s and early 1960s) I wear are bright red on the top with a black sole, and wearing them makes me feel good.
The concept of "wandering" through my days is helping me. I set out to wander through each day the way I would set out on a long walk in a place I want to explore. No map. Freedom to go this way or that. Freedom of movement. Mental and emotional and spiritual freedom. That has been fruitful.
Thanks for asking.
Posted by: am | July 28, 2020 at 04:44 PM
Would you post your paint choices? I have just gotten out my watercolors to give it a try and have ordered a few. Half of my old tubes are solid and I might try to cut them apart to use.
I love the clarity of the fruit painting colors.
Posted by: Sharyn Ekbergh | July 28, 2020 at 08:31 PM
and I really like the turquoise blue in the still lifes.
Posted by: Sharyn Ekbergh | July 28, 2020 at 08:33 PM
The Transformative Power of Colour. And in real-life as we familiarly drove north from the scorchingly brilliant vineyards round Béziers (about 25 km from the Mediterranean), eventually into the darkness of the Channel Tunnel and out into grey old England. Colour reflecting our changing mood.
Posted by: Roderick Robinson | July 29, 2020 at 02:14 AM
Oh, those colors! The purple of those plums, the blush on the pears -- I could almost taste them.
Posted by: Rachel Barenblat | August 03, 2020 at 01:08 PM