"Connie" ~ watercolor figure by Texas Daily Painter Nancy Standlee

"Connie"
15" x 22" Watercolor and Acrylic with Collage

I took a photograph of one of my Canvas by Canvas "sisters" at a bridal shower this summer and I have been wanting to paint it since. Several days ago I got out my Carla O'Connor Daniel Smith Gold Gesso (I love this stuff) and looked over my Liz Hill notes and got to work and finished the painting today. Liz likes to draw in charcoal and that's what I did first before I used watercolor for the features. I did not spray it and Liz says use a light hand and it won't smear. I used some stamping and some collage papers that I'd printed. I usually like to give my ladies red hair but Connie is a blond so I opted for some lavender tones and exaggerated the amount of hair and the color.

You will probably be seeing more paintings of Connie and Maryann, another "sister", as we had a model/photo session yesterday and played dress up and tried to pose like a "real" model. We had hats, long black gloves, scarves, strapless stuff, long skirts and head wraps. We laughed so hard it's a wonder our chair didn't fall off our prop stage, but the model fee was modest. At age 74 just how serious can it be if you're in your San Miguel ruana and a strapless old KMart top. It just cost Connie and I Maryann's lunch since it was her birthday. The Mexican restaurant even threw in a Happy Birthday serenade and a sopapilla with whipped cream and a cherry.

Wanna have some girl friend fun and it doesn't even have to be your birthday. Get your friends together and have each one bring some outrageous clothes, dress up and take some photos for later paintings. Be sure and include someone in a do-rag. Connie has already named the painting where I was wearing one of Maryann's scarves around my head in a do-rag fashion with my Terminator arms exposed as "Waitin' for Willie". On second thought we may want to hire a model next time.

Please visit my website and comment on my blog.
Find me on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

BLOG.............Nancy Standlee Art Blog

WEB SITE ........Nancy Standlee

WEB SITE ........Canvas By Canvas

Other blogs where I post:

Daily Painters of Texas

Daily Abstract Painters Gallery

Daily Painters Marketplace


TEXAS CONTEMPORARY ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONIST FINE ART DAILY PAINTER WATERCOLOR FIGURES
NANCY STANDLEE ARLINGTON, TEXAS ART FOR SALE

Contact: NancyStandlee@sbcglobal.net

3 Figures ~ Acrylic Painting Workshop ~ Snooty Women ~ Blog

Figure #1


Figure #2


Figure #3

EACH $35.00
Reclining Figures on Red Pillow 5 x 7 Acrylic on canvas panel

These are 3 paintings I did in the Robert Burridge workshop in Mendocino, CA. See the post on Nancy Standlee Art Blog .

This was my first class to paint from nude models and I used lots of artistic license to change the models up as I saw fit. I gave them different hair color, changed males to female, etc. We had undraped models for 4 days and we drew and painted from timed poses and no photos were taken of the models so you were forced to get something down on paper or canvas quickly. I took lots of gessoed 140 lb. watercolor paper and some small canvas panels to work on.

I really enjoy painting portraits and figures but don’t consider myself a very good drawer for the photo realistic look but that is not the look I’m after. I want a more abstract, impressionist look and put my own spin on the painting.

When I was in Lubbock for the Carla O’Connor workshop, one of my painting neighbors was Renee Simpson and she paints women with her own spin…Snooty women and I think you’d enjoy a trip to her studio. Here work can be seen at the Newberg Gallery also.

Other blogs where I post:

http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/
· http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com/
· http://myspace.com/nancystandlee
· TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com/
· Eat Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often

Lady Emma ~ Boat Watercolor Painting ~ Port Bolivar, Texas ~ Art Blog

$150.00 unframed
15 x 22 watercolor painting on 300 lb. paper
(It would fit into a matt and standard frame 22x28)
Lady Emma was painted this past week in the Steve Rogers Workshop given by SWA in Fort Worth. The photo was taken during a trip with some CBC members to the Port Bolivar, Galveston area. Older posts will show some slides from other students and some of Steve's work.
I rented an interesting art movie yesterday and watched it last night.
Carla O’Connor mentioned a foreign film, Camille Claudel, about the sculptor, Rodin, and his passionate obsession with art – and with Camille. It is a historically accurate depiction of one of the most important collaborations in the history of modern art. It was a little hard to find but the Hollywood Video on Cooper St. had a copy, for my local readers. It has captions and runs 2 hours and 39 minutes and came out in 1989. I enjoyed the movie but I didn't enjoy reading the captions because you can't multi-task with your eyes glued to the TV. I belong to a collaborative group of 11 local artists, Canvas by Canvas and we are interested in collaborations.
I find this web site is a good place to research movies and plot summaries at the Internet Movie Database. This is where I always get into trouble and it happens at Amazon all the time with the recommendations…If you like this book, movie, then you might like this one… spend more time and money.
I see they recommend Frida and I loved Frida - the movie, her way of dressing, and the paintings. When I was in Puerto Vallarta for a workshop, I bought a beach wrap/sarong/shawl with her huge picture in the center and I do wear it.
Caution: These are not family movies with small children - adult children OK.
This interesting article about the secrets of Mona Lisa was on my Yahoo home page this morning. I know a lot of artists out there who would never want their paintings inspected that closely to really see how many layers it took to reach the final stage. This is not the case with watercolor. In watercolor you usually have to get it right the first time or start over. If you want to read about taking risks with watercolor and pushing the medium to its limits, check out the book, Taking Risks with Watercolour, on my Amazon link. I recommend it if you're ready to move up to the intermediate level. Every page is filled with exciting, colorful examples of Shirley Trevena's work.
Other blogs where I post:
· http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/
· http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com/
· http://myspace.com/nancystandlee
· TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com/
· Eat Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often

Steve Rogers Workshop ~ Tuesday, Day 1 ~ Fort Worth, TX

Disclaimer: Some of the photos were taken through an overhead mirror and the image is reversed and the mirror is cloudy in places and some of the paintings had plastic protectors on them.
I’m still not unpacked from the last 2 or 3 workshops. Well, maybe a little. It’s out of the suitcase and on the kitchen table and couch. Saturday was a blur. I did fit in a needed seafood fix at Fish City Grill. Then on Sunday the family “inlaws and outlaws”, friends, and cohorts had a kickball game in Alvarado. One new friend was welcomed – Davran from Krygstan, a foreign exchange student staying with a family member.
I was smart enough not to play and the sun was wonderful to sit on the sidelines and listen to the banter. I got to see my granddaughter Autumn’s recent college sorority’s mud wrestling photos on her laptop – a definite plus for the day.
The best news is that CBC members did not paint Monday but some of us had to meet for an El Chico lunch to discuss giclees and then home to begin to gather up the supplies for the Steve Rogers workshop. I didn’t begin to finish before our SWA meeting at 7:00 where he gave a demo. It was a great preview of things to come for the next 3 days but after coming home I did stay up until about 2:00 a.m. getting the rest of the supplies together and to get my palette to look like his. It is my goal someday, sometime to read a book, watch TV or go to a movie before a workshop. Instead my days and weeks and nights are filled with last minute details and things to pack. This is not how it should be done. The only excuse is that I’ve recently attended workshops from Donna Zagotta, Robert Burridge, Carla O’Connor and now Steve’s. It’s been the gamut from opaque watercolor to acrylic to transparent watercolor. I’ll get it all sorted out eventually.
I was glad that for Day 1 Steve gave us a demo first thing and then had us to do some color exercises and practice some painting techniques before diving into a painting. He wanted us to work on a full sheet, but chicken me opted for only a half sheet and by days end, I had a very wild colored sky and not quite as wild water. This painting may not be able to be pulled out of the fire and I'm not brave enough to share it yet. We are all working on boats and reflections. I don’t have enough down on paper yet to post the painting so I’m putting on a slide show of photos from last night’s demo and some from the Tuesday’s class.

When Steve began to paint his demo at the Monday night SWA meeting, he put on a red bandana so I decided I needed to wear one today to show support at the workshop with my new Llano Estacado T-shirt from the winery in Lubbock. Workshop participants might enjoy reading more about Steve’s life in this article by Stephen Doherty “Inspiration at Higher Levels” in the American Artists Watercolor Magazine.
Our class goal seems to be to put down color and modify it, bring it to life, and have the color show movement and to make an attractive painting. Steve is a master of color and there was many variables on achieving his look such as how you put the paint down, the tilt of the board, the tilt of the brush and we are all trying our best to mimic his work, not to copy him, but just get the feel of how he works and maybe sometime during the 3 days we will become more comfortable using vivid color in a loose way, and a way that we haven’t tried before. Check back here for Day 2 and progress reports.
Other blogs where I post:
· http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/
· http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com/
· http://myspace.com/nancystandlee
· TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com/
· Eat Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often

Carla O’Connor Workshop, Day 4, Thursday, October 11, 2007 ~ Lubbock, TX ~ Art Blog

Nancy's 11 x 15 gouache on 140 hot press paper
Painted today in the workshop NFS

(This post is the fourth in a series about a workshop in Lubbock, Texas. Please read previous posts to get the full story).
Our last drawing day with the model and she was a cutie, a granddaughter of one of the members and enrolled at Texas Tech and who wouldn’t want to try and draw her. Carla grabs her timer and gets us going and then we hear her familiar, Change, Change. She can be a tyrant at 9:00 in the morning when you want to drink coffee and visit with your neighbor but she has her rules so we fall in line and wonder “Is this painting potential?” Again she stops us with “Gather around” for a mini demo on how to design the whole page. Today it was the design principle “Imagination” and most of us failed miserably when she gave us an assignment. Let it be a wake up call for us. She gave us a list of things to include in the drawing and most of us put them about in the same places with little imagination. She wanted Original ….something that no one else thought of. We did more sketches and set ups for a future painting with just a few marks on the page since we’d have the model for a short time she wanted us to get the information down and paint them on Friday. In the afternoon we painted and Carla circled the room answering questions and seeing if the students wanted any suggestions or help. At 4:00 workshop participants were invited to a WTSC’ members home, Gale Webb. We had a lovely time still talking art and eating lasagna provided by Orlando’s Italian. We were privileged to have some chat time with each other and Carla. Thank you, Gale and Jerry, for your hospitality. Gale will be giving a workshop in the Dallas/Fort Worth area in April 2008 for the SWS.
Lubbock has a great evening of art, music and food the first Friday of each month and it showcases local art. Maps are provided and free trolleys run and the event is free and open to the public. First Friday Art Trail runs year round on the first Friday of each month from 6-9 p.m.
November 10 and 11, 2007 there is an Artist Studio Tour planned. Pick up a map and catch a free ride on a Citibus and they will run continually in a loop. Plan to Take in the Local Color, the tour, and visit 9 participating studios, with 50 artists sharing studio space. There will be painting/drawing, ceramics, fiber, glass, gourds, jewelry, leather, metal, miniatures, mixed media, photography, and wood.

Lubbock is a happening place when it comes to art.
Other blogs where I post:

http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/

http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com/
http://myspace.com/nancystandlee
TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com/
Eat Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often

Carla O’Connor Workshop, Day 2, Tuesday, October 9, 2007 ~ Lubbock, TX ~ Art Blog

NANCY'S START TODAY ON 1/2 SHEET WATERCLOR PAPER

CARLA WORKING ON HER DEMO PAINTING

CARLA'S DEMO TONIGHT (will get a better photo Wed. as this was through the overhead mirror and colors are more muted and painting is reversed.)

The Carla O’Connor Workshop is being held at 511 Avenue K (Mac Davis Lane and Ave. K) at The Underwood Center for the Arts. There are multiple studios, visual art galleries, a theatre and a rehearsal hall. First Friday Art Trail includes a monthly evening of arts and entertainment in downtown Lubbock. This art campus was planned to reflect the traditions of Lubbock and to create future traditions. “Art is much less important than life, but what a poor life without it!” –Robert Motherwell

The West Texas Watercolor Society is sponsoring this workshop. This is my 3rd visit to Lubbock to take a workshop with them. They are a talented group and best of all they are super friendly and fun to paint with.

The class today was packed with Carla's activities and instructions for us. And TEXTURE was one of the design principles discussed today. We had an excellent new model from the WTWS group and began on time 9:00 with about 40 poses in quick succession again on the same piece of paper to get us loosened up. She gave us hints on drawing the figure, for example, tie an imaginary plumb line to the ear through the center of the body to get the weight distributed correctly. We did a practice sheet, then on a 1/2 sheet of watercolor a figure with every black type of marking device (pens, crayons, charcoal, inks) we had plus black, white and grey gouache. We could only use one tool until Carla called out "change" then we'd pick up another tool of our choice and begin drawing where we left off all the while creating texture on the page. After lunch, each participant presented a painting or two for a critique. Carla wanted to see what type of work each one of us was currently doing and we all benefitted from hearing her comments. During the composition discussion I got so sleepy I nearly feel out of my chair and the note taking trails off looking like a someone had flat lined on a tv medical show. (I will add that it was not Carla but my nearly 72 year old body about to revolt from the schedule I've made for it for the past 2 months). I keep telling it to hang with me till Thanksgiving and we'll be home free. We painted for about hour to hour and a half and I got started on a piece I'd drawn in the a.m. and that is the piece in the photo. I want to do more drawing on the layers and it was Carla's suggestion to keep the figure white in the center. I liked the piece until after the demo and saw Carla's Time Travelers and I took another look at mine and thought how sad it looked but then you give yourself a little pep talk..this is your first time trying her technique, you had fun, and you learned some new stuff..go for it.

The demo at 7:00 p.m. was as exciting as we'd hoped it would be. She came with her design drawn on a gold gessoed toned hot press watercolor paper and proceeded to show us how she applies the paint. Her painting looked great to us but she said it takes her weeks to complete. It was a copy of one she did for the dvd for Creative Catalyst. She said the biggest hurdle we face is getting enough paint on the paper. We all laughed when she said "I could lick all the paint off some of these paintings (from people not using enough paint) and not get sick". We get the idea. Be generous with the paint.
The meeting room for the WTWS class is surrounded by designer dresses covered with plastic. Upon closer inspection these clothes are from other decades and were purchased from a local high end store in Lubbock. Read about Margaret’s HERE.

From the time Margaret’s opened in 1946 at Boston and 26th until it closed in 1994 at Broadway and Avenue T, this unique landmark was Lubbock’s window into the world of couture fashion and much more.
In the decades before West Texans visited New York, Paris, or Rome , Margaret’s was their portal to clothing available only in major cities. Once the store moved to Broadway and Avenue T, Lubbock had an establishment that could have been plucked from the finest shopping areas in Dallas, Chicago, or Los Angeles.
On the walls are enlarged views of the hand-drawn images of the figures that appeared in the newspaper ads and clothes under plastic ready for a show. Some of the images can be seen in the photos taken this week.
Other interesting places to visit in Lubbock:

Buddy Holly Center
Celebrate the life and achievements of Lubbock’s son, Buddy Hollyand see his guitar, the Stratocaster, and famous glasses. The Center also has the Texas Musician Hall of Fame and the Lubbock Fine Arts Gallery.

Texas Tech
Lubbock is home to Texas Tech University, home to about 28,000 students and a public art program ranked among the nation’s 10 best.

American Wind Power Center

Museum houses more than 120 rare and fully restored windmills located on more than 28 acres in Yellow House Canyon.

I’ve just come from visiting wineries around Mendocino, California and found Texas has wineries located around Lubbock.
Llano Estacado Winery

Texas’ most award-wining winery. Most of the world-class grapes used by the winery are grown within a 100mile radius of Lubbock.

Cap Rock Winery

Pheasant Ridge Winery

La Diosa Cellars located in the Depot Entertainment District

Other blogs where I post:

· http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com/
· http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com/
· http://myspace.com/nancystandlee
· TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com/
· Eat Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often

Carla O'Connor Workshop, Day 1, October 8, 2007 ~ Lubbock, TX ~ Art Blog

Carla O'Connor

Nancy's first day effort 11 x 15 Seated Lady Watercolor and Gouache on Hot Press Paper

I am loving this first day of the Carla O’Connor Workshop. I put down my $50 deposit last year while in Lubbock for the George James workshop. I’d seen Carla’s work online and in art magazines, admired it, and decided if there was a way possible I wanted to take from her. It happened that it was back to back with the Robert Burridge in Mendocino, Ca. and I arrived home from that one Saturday afternoon, stayed up until 1:00 a.m. getting ready, and left Sunday for this one, but I’ve made it and didn’t fall asleep in class today.
I left Arlington about 8:30 a.m. Sunday and put on the cruise and drove like a mad woman to get unloaded and to the 3:00 demo which was about a five hour drive. I couldn’t help but compare the California twisty, turn signs I’d seen the previous week to the strait as an arrow ones I saw on Sunday. The most curved one was a slight curved arrow when the interstate narrowed down to one lane for road construction. The landscape didn’t change much from open land and ranches, with lots of oaks and mesquites, until after Abilene. On into west Texas, cotton was growing and oil wells began to pop into view. One farm had harvested the cotton and it was stacked and looked like giant loaves of bread with a silver covering over the tops. I made it with one gas stop, cheese crackers for lunch and not near enough coffee. I kept listening to country music and writing down possible painting titles from the lyrics.
Because of some miscommunication Carla didn’t make it on Sunday for the demo but we enjoyed one of the WTWS society member’s demo. Carla will demo Tuesday night instead. She is a delight. She said this was a first for her to miss a demo but as of late she’s been having some “firsts”…well, join the club.
Our class runs from 9-4 and is sponsored by the WTWS. They have a converted fire house for a meeting room and it is wonderful. We had a clothed model this morning in the center of the room and all of our tables were around the model stand in a circle and there was room enough for Carla to walk by for mini critiques. I would say this is one of Carla’s strengths. She gives a thorough explanation of the exercise and then is on the move constantly seeing each student’s work and speaking with them. She’d given us a handout about principles and elements of design and we tackled the first on the list today. It was all about SHAPES. She said, “I’ll give you about 10X more information than you can handle until another workshop with me next year”. I hope. I wish. She promises to tell a good “joke” after lunch to encourage people to get back on time. Carla says she is not a big colorist and likes grays and what do you expect as “I live in Seattle”.
She stressed to forget about the figure and look for shapes. I don’t think I did that very well during the painting session the last 1 ½ hours of the class, I see her my lady's arm needs more work. She told us not to pull it back to realism and I did and I'll try to follow directions better on Tuesday.
The first drawing exercise was something I’ve never done – short gesture drawing BUT we couldn’t change our sheet of paper. We kept working on that one sheet and overlapping the shapes. Finally, we changed sheets and drew some figures and divided it into 4 sections to look for possible figures for paintings. She cautions us to put your mark down with authority. We are creating the skeleton of the painting and you want your bones to be strong. I highlighted this statement after I didn’t do it “Resist the urge to make it REAL. Make a DESIGN.” We did exercises like the “raisin head”, no curved lines, “brain strain” and “dead body” and later we painted on quarter sheets in the afternoon.
After lunch, we had a group meeting to discuss some painting techniques with her admonition “All paint is the same, just different binders and use the fuzzy end of the stick”. All I can say is that Carla has certainly learned how to use the fuzzy end of the stick. Her palette is another story. Her arrangement was given by “I put reds on one end and blues on the other.” Yes, she’s a joy. She saved her old paint in the lid to use as a wonderful gray “Mother color” and she is not continually wiping it clean. Many of her paintings are done with a gold gesso ground on hot press paper. They have a beautiful glow. She prefers round brushes and less water for the gouache paints.
Creative Catalyst has made a dvd of her watercolor instruction but it is not available yet. You can always email them to be notified when it is available.

Other blogs where I post:

· http://artistfoodnetwork.blogspot.com
· http://canvasbycanvas.blogspot.com
· http://myspace.com/nancystandlee
· TO VIEW MORE PAINTINGS OR PURCHASE: Go to Paypal on http://nancystandlee.blogspot.com
· Eat Well ~ Paint Your Food ~ Laugh Often