Watermelon
acrylic on birch plywood
2010
The original has been sold.
Prints are available here
Happy 4th of July to those in the USA. I thought this painting went well with the holiday theme today.
Mixed Media Artist - daily painter of portraits, flowers, abstracts and birds
Oil portrait
work in progress
It’s such a shame that artists tend to blog about a painting once or twice, and the post is soon buried under a hundred other posts, never to be seen or looked at again.
#ThrowbackThursday
This happens to be one of my favorite paintings, so I thought why not bring it back to the top of my blog posts in TBT style.
Hey girl, hey! It’s nice to see you again. 🙂
The Swimmer
6×6 oil portrait painting on hardboard panel
Available here
I’m thinking of mixing things up a bit for the summer, and making a new weekly habit out of digging through my 20+ year archive to see what I can dust off, and re-post. So look for some Wayback Wednesday (personal art: photo stories, poems, art journal pages) and Throwback Thursday (older paintings) posts next week.
Every Friday I’ll have a new video up on both of my YT channels. I hope you’ll check it out, and subscribe.
Portrait channel – tomorrow I’ll be flipping through one of my art journals, and sharing it with you. Plus, I’ll be posting a new pink and gray abstract painting on my palette knife channel.
So, it’s almost the weekend, and it feels like summer is just around the corner. We’ve finally been having some beautiful warm weather. The rain has stopped, and the rivers and creeks are no longer flooding. At least I don’t think so..I don’t watch the local news (or any news..I have way less anxiety, fear, and anger to deal with this way) unless the weather is bad.
I’ve been trying to get some quality Chewy time in every morning. He’s been cooped up indoors for weeks, so we’ve been going for a 30 to 45 minute walk. We live within walking distance of a few different parks now, which is really cool.
Cutting Chewy’s hair
Looks like there was a whole ‘nother Chewy hiding in there.
😀
I want to hear about your weekend plans. Doing anything fun? What did you get accomplished this week in your studio? Let me know in the comments. 🙂
I’ve been working on this painting for about a month now, on and off. I got to this point and thought it was finished. It laid on my table for a few days, waiting for me to photograph, and list it. The more I looked at it, tho, the more I thought the bird was too big, so last weekend, I revised it.
The key to everything is patience.
You get the chicken by hatching the egg,
not by smashing it open.
– Arnold H. Glasgow
I filmed the process, so if you’re interested in seeing how I made the bird smaller, it will be coming out on my YT channel sometime next month.
Once I had adjusted the bird’s size, I thought I’d like it, but I was still dissatisfied with the painting. There was something about her face I didn’t like. I worked on it all day, and this is the result..
Better Together
girl and bird painting on 9×12 flat panel
painted with palette knives and brushes
Available here
Turns out, a complete facelift was required to get the painting to where it is today. I had to reshape her head, which meant blocking it out, and starting over again. I’m happy I sat with the painting for a few days, and took the time to figure out what was bugging me about it.
How do you decide when a painting is finished? Let me know in the comments below.
Let thy step be slow and steady, that thou stumble not.
Tokugawa Ieyasu
She’s Got the Receipts painting video
I’m going to leave you with this video of my oil portrait painting titled She’s Got the Receipts. It’s available for purchase here.
I finished my daily YT video challenge for May. 31 videos have been uploaded between my two channels. Whew! I had hoped to continue filming last month, and have videos ready for June, but that didn’t happen. As with every daily challenge I’ve done, the days came at me fast. Somehow I lost track of time as the days whizzed by. I need to catch my breath, and regroup a bit. Going forward, I’m going to shoot for one video a week on both of my channels. I think Friday is going to be my uploading day, for now. Once I get some videos stockpiled again, I hope to add more to the schedule. Right now, I have other work that I need to get done, so my focus needs to shift a bit.
You know me, when I find something good, I have to share. I bought these two books yesterday, and I’m almost done with both of them. I highly recommend reading Shane’s stories. I laughed, cried, and now see the world through his eyes in a whole new light. Click the images to read the descriptions. Also, you can subscribe to their youtube channel here. I must say, they’ve quickly moved to the top of my favorite vloggers. Can’t get enough of Squirmy and Grubs!
Blue or green? What Color You See Says A Lot About How Your Brain Works
oil portrait painting
wip
The sum of wisdom is that
time is never lost that is devoted to work.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Devoted to work” stuck out to me in this quote. Since I moved, my normal dedication to my work has been seriously lacking. I mean, I’ve got two custom portraits almost finished, but other than that, I haven’t been painting much. As I wrote before, I’ve got sooo much work hanging over my head. Stuff that needs to get done, but I put it off another day, and then another. I keep thinking I need to crack open one of my art journals, and play. It will get the ball rolling, and I’ll be back to work in no time. There’s still so much I need to get done around the house before I can concentrate on creating again, tho. I haven’t even found time to locate an art journal, let alone play in one.
I know I’m sounding like a broken record now, but my days are being eaten alive with trying to get moved in (still), unpacking boxes, throwing crap away that I should have tossed before the move. Plus, I’ve been doing house repairs/upkeep, and I’m in the middle of painting my new kitchen cabinets. What is it with me and kitchen cabinets that need painting? Ugh. I just painted the cabinets at my other house a year ago, and now these. It’s taking 3 coats of white to cover up the green paint underneath, but I’m getting there slowly.
Harold sat there for the longest time,
admiring the new kitchen curtains I hung up.
🙂
That’s my wittle Mama’s boy!
The colors in this house don’t exactly match or suit my taste at all, so I’ll be painting over the living room (blue), bedroom (purple), and kitchen (green cabinets & trim, purple shelving). I’m also going to stain the untreated butcher block because every little water spill seeps quickly into the drawers below it. I didn’t realize how useless butcher block truly is..like, you’re not suppose to cut food on it because you’ll scratch it. I mean, seriously?? Whut? Good thing I didn’t toss out my wooden cutting boards, and plastic cutting mats, eh? I’m so practical that every time I look at the countertops I think, what a waste. It irks me to have an entire room full of something not useful to me. I guess butcher block is suppose to be pretty to look at, but I don’t find unfinished wood pleasing to the eye like some people do. I’d love to paint the countertops white, but I’m thinking of resale value, and will probably settle on staining it walnut to match the hardwood floors throughout the house.
These paintings were priced at $85, but I’ve lowered them to only $35. I need to make room for new paintings this year, so my loss is your gain. You can find them here in my new Art Under $50 category.
It’s kinda funny that I’ve said a few hundred times here on my blog that purple is my least favorite (or most hated) color, and now I live in a purple house. lol Karma will bite you in the ass, I swear. Be careful what you say. The universe heard me say “purple purple purple”, and it said “here’s a purple house for you. Now shut up, and have fun re-painting it.” hahaha
The first couple days of living here, I felt a bit depressed opening my eyes to see purple bedroom walls, AND (I kid you not) ceiling. It felt like I was living inside a bad bruise. Purple is such a sad, dreary, ugly color to me..so sorry to those who like it, especially the previous owner of this house. I don’t mean to offend anyone (it is just a color, after all, and we can’t control what we find most pleasing to the eye..if we could, I’d start to like purple. Think of all the work it would save me), but I can’t wait to brighten up the room, and make it mine. Can you guess what color I’ll be using?
New!!
Bags,
notebooks,
greeting cards,
and pillows
available in my Etsy shop
Chewy loves playing in the snow
I think I’m going to wait a couple months until it warms up before I start painting the walls, tho. We’re having a real winter here this year, and man oh, man, the past couple weeks have been real alright. Lots of snow, freezing rain, and strong WIND. I normally like this kind of weather, but lately it hasn’t been doing much for me. I’ve been considering flipping my favorite season back to spring/summer. As much as I despise being too hot, I’m also starting to dislike the cold. It’s below zero right now, and it’s like a drafty icebox in here, even with the furnace coming on every 10 to 15 mins. Brr..not a good painting day when I can’t feel my fingers. There is a light at the end of the tunnel, however. Tomorrow is suppose to be 43F, so I’ll be outside basking in the sunshine..and by that I mean, I’ll be moving more boxes out to my shed. Oh, yeah. lol
One last thing before I rush off to make some lemon ginger tea, so I can warm my icy fingers against the mug.. if you like doing jigsaw puzzles, Jigidi is a fun little site. I personally don’t have the patience it takes to do a jigsaw puzzle, but I love to share my art on this site. People are so appreciative, and leave me lovely comments sometimes. You will find my puzzles here. Don’t forget to follow me, so you’ll know when I update. 🙂 You can try to beat Suegorgo’s time of only 3 mins, 19 seconds..wow! Good luck!! I can’t even get the pieces spread out and sorted in that amount of time.
If you like what you see here on my blog, you can also find me on IG, FB, Twitter, Youtube, and Pinterest.
Revising Halloween paintings
Work in progress
Those who have followed me for a while know
I used to paint a lot of masquerade mask portrait paintings,
like, a lot, a lot.
And then I stopped.
Because, nothing lasts forever,
y’know?
Over my summer hiatus I found a stash
of 4×4 miniatures
hanging out behind the scenes.
Because I painted them so long ago,
all were in desperate need of
revision. So I figured,
why not?
Once these are finished,
it’s hard to say if or when I’ll paint more.
I’m trying to hurry,
so I can
get them revised, photographed,
and listed here in my shop before Halloween.
I’m also listing them in my Etsy shop
so these are time sensitive,
and might not last long.
First come, first serve basis.
I’ll be adding more as I finish them,
but these are
one of a kind original paintings.
If you see one you like,
get it while you can.
© Katie Jeanne Wood
Oil portrait painting
daily painting: 364 day art project
Day 361
If you realized how powerful your thoughts are, you would never think a negative thought.
Peace Pilgrim
People have told me they don’t paint because they can’t draw. My advice is always this: you don’t have to be good at drawing to be an artist/painter. You actually don’t have to draw at all. Not today or any day. I know plenty of artists who don’t start their paintings by drawing first.
© Katie Jeanne Wood
WIP
Oil portrait painting
daily painting: 364 day art project
Day 362
While I greatly admire the work of artists who draw well, I hate to draw, myself. Well, maybe not hate hate, but it’s not how I like to spend my time. I’ve heard it relaxes some artists, but it gives me great anxiety for some reason..probably because I know I’m not good at it. I don’t even like to doodle. If left alone with a pencil and paper, I prefer to write, not draw. This is why I keep my line drawings simple. I don’t shade or get fancy with crosshatching. It’s just not my thing, and yet somehow I’ve survived as an artist for many years now.
It takes a great deal of patience to make a good drawing, and I have zero. I figure I’m going to cover up the drawing with paint anyway, so why work that hard? I don’t like to waste time or energy, and I’m incredibly lazy when it comes to things I don’t like doing.
© Katie Jeanne Wood
Oil portrait painting
WIP
daily painting: 364 day art project
Day 363
That said, I’m also not comfortable staring at a blank canvas for hours or days, wondering what I’m going to paint or how to begin, so that’s why I do a quick contour line drawing to get the ball moving. I don’t spend much time on these drawings, maybe 2 or 3 minutes tops. I use the lines as a jumping off point only, which is subject to change as I move forward with the painting.
A tip for line drawing: Use watercolor pencils because you can easily erase lines with a tiny bit of water, no eraser needed. When I use a No 2 pencil, as I did in this drawing, I always get black smudge lines when I erase, which you can see in the first photo.
When you’re painting with oils, as I did, the oil tends to smear the pencil lines and the smudges created with the eraser react with the paint. This painting got pretty ugly, and I had to wipe the oil off her chin a couple times because it was black smeared mess. If you’re painting an oil portrait, it’s better to use a red watercolor pencil in your line drawing because it blends in better with the paint.
Some links I found about line drawing:
Line drawing: a guide for students
Art never seems to make me peaceful or pure.
Willem de Kooning
© Katie Jeanne Wood
Peculiar, Frustrating and Strange
Oil portrait painting
WIP
daily painting: 365 day art project
Day 357
I started revising these abstract paintings last week. I painted them sometime in the past year, but I was never all that thrilled with them. Too loud, and colorful for my taste. I prefer toned down colors, so I’m not sure why I left these like this. I think basically I was pressed for time, and had to pump out something for the daily painting project. I also think I was coming to the end of painting abstracts for a solid month, so I was burnt out. I know I switched back to painting portraits right after I painted these, which is always a sign of fatigue or boredom for me..when I switch my subject matter.
Resemblance
6×6 acrylic abstract painting
They all look sloppy to me, and they have to go. As the listings on Etsy are expiring, I’m snagging the paintings out of storage, and they’re getting revised. These are more my style.
Freedom
6×6 acrylic abstract painting
Resemblance, and Freedom have already been revised, re-photographed, and re-listed. Free shipping within the USA in both of my Etsy shops.
© Katie Jeanne Wood
Oil portrait painting sketch
WIP
daily painting: 365 day art project
Day 354
When things become peculiar, frustrating and strange, I think it’s a good time to start painting.
James Rosenquist
© Katie Jeanne Wood
Oil portrait painting
WIP
daily painting: 365 day art project
Day 355
© Katie Jeanne Wood
Oil portrait painting
WIP
daily painting: 365 day art project
Day 356