8 x 24″ Acrylic and ink on paper
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
Connected beams
One atop another
Building their way up
To the sky
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8 x 10″ Watercolor and ink on paper
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
After spending countless hours drawing umpteen lines, she reached for her scissors and began to cut. The strips of paper falling below made her think of pasta. Homemade pasta.
She imagined a plump Italian grandma rolling out dough. With ease she would create perfect, uniform noodles the girl was sure came only with time and age.
Later the entire family would come to grandma’s to share in her creation – enjoying stories and laughter over a bottle of wine.
The girl continued cutting her imperfect strips. Time and age, she thought.
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
It is hard to believe that it has been four months since I decided making art everyday and blogging about it was a good idea. Do I still think the decision was a wise one? Heck yeah, I do! Here are a few reasons why:
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
They had time on their hands. A lot of it. So they spent it being productive – evaluating, the looks, actions, dress,and speech of those around them. It wasn’t like they were being mean. Just pointing out the obvious.
Perfection comes from recognizing faults, they thought.
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
Grasshopper:
Lawn mower
Noise maker
Delicacy
Farm resident
Cat’s entertainment
Feel like your life would be better/happier/more colorful if this little guy were in it? You can buy it here.
Big daddy: 42 x 72″. For those of you who don’t like division 3.5 x 6′
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
Three or four years back I switched from painting with oils to using acrylics. I had painted with oils for years, and in fact loved them. I loved the way they could be manipulated and pulled across a canvas. I loved that mistakes could quickly be wiped off and new attempts made. I loved their rich color and their unique smell. But as I became more prolific (or at least semi-prolific) with painting, I realized that while that smell was great in small doses, all of the chemicals, oils, and varnishes were too much for my allergies to take. So I made the switch.
It took a bit of time to adjust but after finding good thick paints and some great slow drying mediums, I decided that acrylics are really pretty fantastic. I’ll admit that they seem to be slightly less forgiving, but if medium is added you can work with them long enough to make changes and do some good blending. Good paints and mediums also seem to give acrylics a richness, not as great, but similar to oils. And the biggest perk to acrylics is that if no medium is added, their drying time is super-fast. This means that a person as impatient as myself does not have to wait long to build up color. Needless to say I am an acrylic convert.
There has only been one area in which I have wondered whether painting with acrylics would work as well as painting with oils- and that is on a large scale canvas. Because of the quicker drying time, I worried that creating the blended washes I love so much may not be possible. I decided that I’d set out to see on a 42 x 72” canvas.
Verdict: It can be done. I realized quickly that it takes a TON of medium to make it happen. But a nice blended wash is possible. (I completely forgot to get a pic of the initial background, so my half painted, taken with my camera phone piece below will have to suffice.)
With the blended orange and yellow as my background, I quickly built up my design on top and I’m pretty pleased with the result.
4.75 x 4.75″ Watercolor on paper
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
Soft fuzzy wrapper
Preserving sweet goodness
A superstar of summer
Juices run down your hand
If you want to buy this lovely little watercolor, you can do so here.
11 x 14″ Ink, Hoya flowers and stems
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
As some of you may know, we jetted (actually trucked) off to the mountains of Wyoming this past weekend for a wedding. Our friends Mary and Nathan were nice enough to let us stay at their house Friday night, which is always a treat.
Mary has a bit of a green thumb and so I often check out her plants. She has a crazy amount of them that all magically seem to be thriving. As I was looking at her collection of greenery, I noticed this amazing plant called a hoya. It had waxy green leaves and spectacular bundles of flowers that were attached to long penducles (stems).
One of the rounded bundles had died, but was still attached to the plant. Mary pulled the dead flowers and stems off and turned to me knowing this was something I could use. I was pretty excited about the new treasure, as was the boyfriend – “Thanks Mary, more trash.”
Yesterday I used the dried stems and flowers along with some ink to create a somewhat deconstructed version of the hoya. Enjoy!
7 x 9.5″ Ink on paper
He’d had enough of the fervent outbursts and daily monologues. As a pet, Flash was his owner’s sole audience. And there was only so much of the endless, irrational commentaries on life and politics he could tolerate.
He had attempted to bury his head under pillows in order to drown out the sound, but in the middle of summer that can be hot. He’d feigned sleeping, but that didn’t seem to stop things either.
Even his last attempt – clever as it was – to communicate his feelings was ignored.
Flash sighed and thought, “You can’t choose your owner.”
If you think this drawing is awesome, you can purchase a print here.
4.75 x 4.75″ Watercolor and ink on paper
Goal: To create one piece of art each day for 365 consecutive days
Solid footing on wrungs
A win in sight
Serpentine shoots thwart forward motion backward
Roll again
This little piece is available for purchase here.
Micah Richardson 