Lost and Found class results

I saw some wonderful work starting to happen today at class. My demo was done in gouache, working upright on the easel, which I don't do at home. It felt fairly awkward! I didn't finish but I think it showed the basics of massing values and finding or losing edges. Everyone wanted to see how I would paint that wire whisk, so I threw it in there using a few strokes and painting the negative shapes.

gouache, 9x7"

The most important thing to keep in mind when doing this kind of a study is to mass values. We started with some sketches like these:

 

Then my talented students launched out using all kinds of objects, looking at the shadows, overlapping things, seeing the hard edges and looking for the soft transitions. We massed a lotta values today, and played with paint and pastels.

Above, Catherine found the afternoon sunlight inspiring. I wish I had gotten a shot of the painting near the end of the class! Beautiful colors...

And this one is Barbara Clark's pastel, early in the process, showing the persimmons and lime she used, as well as the stage.

And here is a later shot, still not finished, but quite striking:

I worked on another piece, just to keep the brushes wet. You can see the leaf on black paper and my painting on Somerset Black Velvet paper. It's still unfinished, and was wet when I shot this:

It was a fun day, taking a few into new realms of drawing and painting the still life.

Good work, gang! Keep going...
Deborah