Creative Jumpstarts: Jamming With Your Brush

This will be a great way to warm up and possibly paint some fabulous very expressive and unique pieces of work.  It will require that you have lots of fresh paint on your palette, some of your favorite brushes, make sure you have a wide range of brushes handy big wash ones and skinny liners because we are really going to air it out. I also want you to listens of really great rhythmic music, no sad syrupy muzak.  As I have said in other lessons I am a sucker for loud rock and roll, and alternative country, my band du jour is “Reckless Kelly”.

Wet the paper in spots get a feeling on movement going even with the wetting of the paper.  In most cases I will begin by splattering paint to create a textural under painting and then apply a few bold washes to tie the textures together and create some preliminary drama.  I try not to think too much about what I am painting but I am just tying to develop a feeling of oneness with the brush.  I want the brush to reflect my artistic intentions, to be an extension of my inner creative impulses.  If you are really doing this lesson you will become lost in the process and lose the concerns about doing it right.  You will develop a sense of feeling the brush marks.

Vary your colors, your brushes and the thickness of your paint, splatter, drip, and pull the paint.  Learn to be expressive and break down some doors. 18 x 24 I used a Robert Simmons Sky Flow 1.5 in brush and a number 16 silver black velvet round

22 x 30 watercolor Here I didn’t run a big wash I began by splattering paint then went to work with the #8 Scripts Liner from Silver Brush Company.  Oh and just so you know I was listening to Ike and Tina Turner Live at the Apollo, “Rolling Down the River”22 x 30 watercolor I began by wetting the paper, and then spattering yellows and reds and then using the darkest mix I could come up with indigo, black, and no water to make the mixture for the outside shape.  Then I spattered with a sumie style brush, lots of pigment no water, and then used the scripts liner to make the curvilinear marks.  This was a signature piece for my “Creation of the Earth Series”22 x 30 watercolor, Splatters to begin, a bold swatches of indigo and cobalt blue to make the dark passages