Fealing Lin Workshop-Days 2, 3,and 4

This week took forever to get here, and now it is almost over.  This has been an intense week of learning about composition, style, and brushwork.  Fealing is a great teacher and a very nice person. Our class is relaxed and very friendly.  Each day Fealing teaches a lesson in some element of art, and does a painting demo.  She does not mind us taking photos while she is teaching.

We also do some critique of student work each day.  I learn as much from looking at other student work as from trying it on my own.

It has been very humbling to see the amazing work done by my classmates!  There is a high-quality camera that projects the artwork and the reference photo onto a large whiteboard. I really liked this one of a girl who is a professional model.

I have learned my lesson about having a good photo to work from.  It should be taken with no flash, either outside in the sun or with a single light source.  You need some good shadows on the face.

Every day we find a new surprise from Cheap Joe's Art Stuff at our workstations.  We have gotten towels for dabbing our paintbrushes, some Kilimanjaro watercolor paper samples, and some watercolor board.  Joe himself came in today and spoke to each of us.  Yesterday I ate lunch with his granddaughter, Megan, who works in the marketing department.  I am so impressed by the staff at this place of business.

Even though I have to drive 48 minutes each way to get to Boone,  almost the whole drive is on a scenic mountain byway.  The weather sometimes starts out golden, changes to threatening skies, maybe a little rain, and then back to beautiful skies.  I love it when the sun moves in golden shifts across the dark mountains.

I have almost finished two portraits.  I think they are okay, but I want to practice a lot more to get my paintings to the quality that I want.

Here is Lily. with a darker background.  Still has a lot of color!

Here is a smaller painting of my great-niece Holly when she was a baby.  She was wearing my straw sun hat and sitting on the table while I was eating lunch.  The sun light was pouring through the hat and reflecting on her head.

Today Fealing taught us about making loose paintings with groups of people forming interesting shapes.  You do these very quickly, with very few brushstrokes.  Here are two that I tried using her reference photos.

Now that it's dry, I think the first one needs some more darks for more contrast.

The next one looks almost tropical.

One more day tomorrow, a short day where we wrap up our projects and do a final critique.