Winter plein air

A couple of days ago I did my first winter plein air. It was 30F and sunny. I was kind of stuck what to paint next, and I should learn from previous experience that taking a walk will inspire me. When I was walking the dog in the woods I stood by this creek for a while. The sun was on my face and it occurred to me that it would actually be a nice spot to paint. I've been a bit of a fair weather plein air painter, not the hardy type that paints in -20F. This day seemed doable. So I went back home to grab my stuff and went back to this spot. I learned some lessons, like how thick the paint is in cold weather. I also accidentally packed ptalo blue instead of the cobalt or ultramarine which I usually use. That made for a different color than my usual paintings, but I like it. After 2 hours my fingers were frozen, but you get so much "in the zone" that you don't realize. I did enjoy being out there and doing this painting, so this encourages me to do this again. And maybe you will see this one in a larger size!

Show

I have exciting news! I will have my first solo show at the Ulysses Philomathic Library in Trumansburg. This all came about very suddenly. First it takes me months to get enough courage together to ask, and then they have an opening right away. So this week I have been scrambling to get everything ready. The exhibit will be February 1 through the end of March, and I will have an Artist Reception on Saturday February 10, 4-6PM.

Save the date!

Art Exhibition Invitation

Landscape Paintings by Annemiek Haralson

Exhibition February 1-March 31

Artist Reception February 10, 4-6PM

Ulysses Philomathic Library

74 E. Main Street

Trumansburg, NY 14886

January Super Moon

On the first day of January we had clear skies while there was a super moon. Even though it was also super cold I stood outside for a while looking at the moon shadows and the contrast of the snow on the dark branches. The light at the neighbor's house added a touch of warm yellow. I just had to paint this feeling of cold beauty. So I painted this over the few days, in the daytime, while cozy in my studio. 

It will be going to a new home soon!

In other news: I've slowly been adding small works to my Daily Paintworks Gallery. I'm excited about this site, and a couple of paintings have gone to new homes!

Snow

 This was today's view from my studio. The dry purple coneflowers look like cotton puff balls.

Under the motto "draw what you see" I did a little sketch of a few of them. It was fun to use the black walnut ink again. I think it is a little hard to see that it is snow on top.
As I was drawing, I suddenly saw some movement on top of the snow. A deer was peeking over the top of the snow mount! Surprise! Too bad I did not have my camera handy, it was so funny to see.

By the time I got upstairs the dogs saw the deer too and scared it away quickly.

Happy New Year!

Wishing you all a happy New Year! I hope this year will be happy and full of creativity for you.

A few years ago a wise woman told me she challenged herself to do some art every day for a year. Some days were hours of painting, other days she could only manage 10 minutes of drawing. Two years ago I challenged myself to do this too. At the time I worked two 12 hour shifts a week, and quickly found out that it was just to much to do anything after that. I did draw or paint the other five days of the week that year though (Ok, I did forget once because of a party). It became such a habit that the day felt incomplete if I had not worked on my art. I believe my drawings and paintings became so much better because of this. There were days I had no idea what to draw next, and decided just to draw what was in front of me. It did not have to be perfect. Just doing something, whatever it was, helped my drawing skills. I try to continue with this habit now as much as I can. 

"When out of drawing ideas wad up paper."

Going large

I've been wanting to do a large painting for a while. I usually do the standard 9x12", 16x20", or mini's. For this one I picked a 36x36" canvas, and since it does not fit on my easel, I attached it to the wall. This is my progress over a few weeks.

I chose to paint a sky picture, since I'm always looking at clouds. I used a couple of my little 6x6" paintings as a reference.
Here it is with the first blocking in of blue sky.

 Next was light grey and darker areas.

 Then some lighter areas, and trying to get that layered look of clouds.
This is about the stage where I start doubting myself if it will go anywhere, the stage to push through and keep going.

That fun stage of making the clouds pop with whites and very light greys. Besides the greys I used a little yellow here and there on the top of the clouds.

 Adding the ocean and beach (too yellow).

The original 6x6" has a person on the beach and nothing else, but I thought for this one it needed just a bit more. The clouds are still the main attraction, but the beach needed something too. So I added some more texture and specks of color, with a couple of seagulls and sailboats in the distance. You have to look close to see them.

I tweaked the clouds a little more; sometimes you can keep picking at a painting endlessly, but that does not make it better so you just have to say 'finished' and not touch it anymore.

This was a lot of fun to do, and it won't be the last large one I do! Working large felt like a little more freedom, specially working with large brushes. None of that tiny work, not until the end anyway. 

Thanks for looking!

Making ink

And just like that, months go by without posting. Plenty of art has been happening, but lets start first with the black walnuts. They were so abundant this year that while walking on the lawn you'd risk twisting your ankles on the dropped walnuts. I got the idea to make ink with them, and did some internet searches on how to do this. There are several websites, this is one of them.

I tried different ways of making the ink. In my first batch I cooked the whole nuts, in which the ink came out kind of light. I could have boiled it down more to concentrate the ink I guess. I also found out there are bugs in the shells, so in the next batch I peeled the blackened shells off and removed the bugs. I boiled the black walnut shells for a few hours, let it sit for a few days and boiled some more. Then I filtered this slurry. First through an old nylon stocking and then through a filter I use for maple syrup. This filter clogged very easy! Next time I will boil the walnut shells in a cloth bag, so I won't have to filter as much (hopefully).
Next I boiled it down to the concentration and darkness I wanted. In my first batch I did not take into account that you have to add alcohol as a preservative, so after the rubbing alcohol was added it was even lighter. So the second batch I boiled down darker than I needed, and when the alcohol was added it was the right color.

Boiling outside in an old pot:

Looks like motor oil!

















Second time filtering, a very slow process!

















I played around a bit using the ink with a brush and with a dip pen. I love using the ink with the dip pen! I also love that after drawing with the dip pen you can take a brush with water and soften some of the edges.

This one was done with a brush only.










In this one I drew the picture in ink with the pen, then went over the lines of the cat with a wet brush, dropping more ink in with the pen to make some parts darker.

A couple of Christmas cards.

If you are going to draw or paint with ink, have fun and experiment away!