Build A Portrait | Workshop

In 2005 I took my first watercolor class. Since then I've just been painting and while at OCAC some of my figure drawing teachers did mini demos of gouache and watercolors. Other than that I haven't had a specific watercolor class since starting .... until now.

The past week I took a "Build A Portrait" watercolor workshop from Chris Stubbs at Menucha in Corbett, Oregon. She uses A LOT of color in her portraits. I learned about new colors and how to create warm and deep shadows. I had fun. I connected with other artists (and they connected with me). I really want to be a full time artist someday. I spent 6 hours painting in class and then went home and drafted ideas for the next day of class and after the last day of class I'm sitting at home working on a river otter painting. But there is yet work to be done before I make a change to becoming a full-time artist.

We worked on drawing eyes and then drawing and painting eyes. The double portrait is of my niece and husband. I made use of the light table and my reference photos and traced a rough outline so that I focus my time on the color. And the main portrait of the cowboy is 15" x 22" and the photo is used with permission from Celia Moyer. I took my time and worked a lot on looking and mixing the right colors. 

The way I painted reminded me of what I learned from Annie Heisey, one of my art teachers art OCAC. The use of heightened color: bright, bold, and alive. This workshop reminded me of how much I like to just draw. In figure drawing classes I used to draw not just the model, but sometimes my classmates, too. I don't mind going back to the drawing board. Hehehe ...

And here are some photos of all of the students 

(22!) and Chris plus the building at Menucha we worked in. And the food was AMAZING! Luckily I only signed up for lunches because if I ate all three meals there, I'd need to buy some new pants. ;-)