Transcripts
1. Introduction to Creative Exploration: Hello, there We are
about to step into a very meaningful and
intentional space as somebody with
a very busy mind, which I'm sure that
a lot of us can relate to as creative people. I believe this is going
to deeply resonate. It can be really easy to
put pressure on ourselves, especially in the society and day and age that we live in. And I want to help you quiet
those racing thoughts. I want to help you
release that pressure. In this class, you are going to be able to
really break through some of those walls
that you're met with each and every day. Just by infusing a few exercises into your creative practice. These exercises are
some that I personally visit almost every time that I sit down to
create anything. And it's because it
conquers a blank page. You don't have any sort of holdup when you look at one and it's no longer intimidating. I'm really excited
for you for that. I know that one of
these things will insert itself into your
regular creative practice too. I'm Peggy Dean and
I am an artist and author and most
importantly an educator. That is where my heart lies. There's nothing in the
world that brings me more joy than being able
to facilitate this. Other people who are
passionate, creative. In this class, you are
going to immediately conquered the blank
page and you're going to create a story
simply by pulling from the exercises that we
will be doing together. When I first began and fusing
these creative practices right into my
projects beforehand, I felt that at the end I was much more proud
of the results. I felt empowered. I felt excited about
it and all in all, just more grounded and
a lot more relaxed. So I want that for you. So let's conquer
this blank page.
2. Start a Creative Ritual: So excited that we will be spending some time
together in this class, I really want to extend
a warm welcome to you as we set our intention for
what we're about to cover. Now, I am very affected
by my surroundings, which I'm sure that
a lot of us are. And what is out of my
sight is out of my sight. But what is right here
with me is going to affect the energy that's infused
into my creative process. So for that reason, I really like to set up, for lack of better words like a creative ritual where
I bring in items, smells, anything that's going to really make me feel
grounded and more connected. And this can take form in
a lot of different ways. It might be lighting a candle
with your favorite smell. I am lighting some
handmade taper candles that will be
in brass holders. And for me that leaves a
little bit of mystery, but also elegance to Myspace. That's how I'm feeling from it, but it's also still grounding with its organic
handmade properties. I do this with T having a
nice comforting black tea. What I love to do, I
love Powell soothing it is to have a warm hug. The other thing that I love
so much is to bring in birth. I have a ton of plans that are
surrounding me everywhere. And sometimes that
takes the form of actually painting
with earth pigments. Today that is going
to be taking form in, bringing in some found in nature items that
bring me a lot of joy. Maybe that special
item to you is a vintage piece that came from a relative or maybe
it's your favorite book, something that you
can have nearby that just brings you connect. This could be in sound and maybe you open a window
and hear the birds sing. Maybe you turn on
some relaxing music. This could be a
perfect time to go outside and be in the elements. So before we get started
into our lessons, I want you to take a moment
and find something to add to your space that is going to really enhance
your experience. When that's in place,
we are ready to go.
3. Materials: Alright, let's look at
materials for this class. We will be painting
with watercolors. So you do need watercolors. Now, the first
thing I want to say about that is that
I know that it's really easy to get hung up
on following along to a T, but I don't want you to
do that in this class. And the reason for that
is because I want this to pull from the vibe
that you feel today. So for me, I feel really
connected to Earth colors. So I'm going to be bringing
in some greens and some ochres and maybe some
browns and reds of some kind. You might feel a lot more
fluid and connected to the ocean or the sky
and in that free space. So maybe you will integrate
some blues and teal. Maybe you're feeling playful
yet soft and you want to play with pinks and blush tones. Maybe lavender is whatever
was calling to you. That's what I really
want you to focus on as we explore these projects. Now when it comes
to paint brushes, you can use any type of
paintbrush that you want. I'm going to primarily stick to a round number eight and around number four
or six, we'll see, I love these brushes because they give you the ability to go both broad stroke and very thin stroke because
of their pointed tip. Now you can also go
and use a flat brush. Those are also a lot of fun because you can really get a
lot of coverage with them. So while we will be walking
through specific exercises, you can absolutely apply them in different ways that
you feel called to. I probably won't be using
a wash a wash brush, but use what you
feel like using. You'll also want a jar of water. If you want to get real
fancy, you can have two jars, one for cool colors and
one for warm colors. What that will do is allow
you to rinse your brush, warm colors and warm and
cool colors and cool to prevent having to
constantly change your water, you're still going
to have to change your water quite a bit
with what we're doing. But it will decrease the amount of times that you'll
need to because it won't blend the
warm and cool tones together to create mud. Lastly, you'll just
need watercolor paper. I'm using a sketchbook. It's not my favorite one. I ran out of my favourite one. So I'm not going to tell
you which one it is, but I will tell you that
my absolute favorite is the Strathmore series. I love that it has this
soft cover that ends up bringing along
all of the story and all the dense and
basically everything in your bag or something
you've sat on it. It just tells its story
right on the cover. And I think that
that's really special. Because everywhere you
went and everything you did during the time that you use that sketch book is
captured here in texture. I think that's pretty cool. That's all we need
to get started. So I promise you
now it's go time.
4. Break the Ice: In this lesson, we are
going to be crushing the idea that limited time is not enough time
to be creative. This particular
exercise allows you to really understand your paint, the pigment, special
qualities to it, and how it interacts with other pigments and
even water alone. One of my favorite exercises
stemmed from a day that I really wanted to be
creative and had no idea what to create. And I ended up using two colors and just
swatch them down a page. Halfway through, I ended up taking this really
shaky video of it. Ever since I have found that
I create these kinds of swatches all the time now
for multiple reasons. First of all, I
think it helps me unlock my creativity a bit more in the sense that
I'm doing something mindless and allowing
myself to play. And when that starts, it's like opening
the door to what's going to come next without
even really thinking about it. So that's how we're
going to start. And the first thing
I want to recommend is choosing an isolated
color palette. While I will be using
particular colors, they are not necessary
to follow along with. I really want to
encourage you to draw the colors that
you're feeling today. I think that's a
really important part of the mindfulness process. For example, I'm feeling very earthy and very grounded today. And so I'll be
working with a lot of greens and browns, ochres. But you might be feeling
connected to water and the sky. And you have a lot of blue
and calming presence today. So maybe you'll be working
with blues and lavender is. So please don't get hung up with particular colors
that I'm using. I love color, but when I
started actually being really intentional
with the color choices that I was Selecting, I just loved my
work so much more, even if they are just swatches. I'm really drawn to
these earthy colors as we have established. And so I'm going to
stick with them. And this is going to look like a nice beige or cream
or tan with some greens, with maybe some ochres,
some golden yellows, and maybe a punch of like
a potter's pink color. What I'm focusing
on here as having a decent amount of
paint and water on my brush and simply painting
a single stroke on my page. While that is still wet, I grab another color. I paint right next to it to
where it does make contact. That could be in the
middle of the stroke. It could be at the top
or the bottom or both, or the whole way down. And I'm just letting
my paint flow. It's going to bleed
into each other. Some areas may get muddy. Some areas might be
almost flooded with color or too much water
or really anything. And what we are doing
is we're releasing any expectations and we're just allowing ourselves to play. As we do this, we start to
harmonize and our minds, and we start to
see patterns that pop up without even
thinking about it. And then we think, oh, well, I want to add balance. I'm going to bring this
color over to this side, or I'm going to jump
down below where I'm painting and I'm going
to put some balance. And right here, for example, I am painting these
strokes underneath because I see that my strokes are about to dry and I want
there to be some bleed in-between the top
and the bottom as well. So I don't need to
do that the whole way through what I can do it to where I kinda jump around my
page a little bit to keep that generosity of water and
paint flowing throughout. As we progress
through this course, we will be going over plenty of little odds and ends
and tidbits and all the little terms
that you can use to add little details
and interests. But this first lesson, I just really want
us to focus on being present and enjoying
this process. So I am going to allow
some space for that. So feel free to
paint along with me as we fill up this entire page.
5. Abstract Mark Making: There are a few
different concepts that we can run with
in this lesson. And we'll do a quick
example first of each one. Basically we'll start off with a larger shape and
then bring that into, simplify it a bit. But I wanted to give
you both options because it can be really fun to do essentially what
we just did with swatching, but keep them in smaller shapes and then
work within those shapes. It will require
you to work fast, as I'm sure, you know, based off of what we just did. Because not only are you
putting these shapes down, but you're also working
inside of them. That said there are
a lot less of them. So it's not something that
you need to really overthink, but we'll jump into it. And I encourage you to
continue to explore past this lesson
with this technique. I'm going to keep this off to the side so that we can
use it as reference. Both of these, we'll start here. The first thing that I want
to do is to create a shape. I'm actually going to move
over to this side, okay? So I'm going to
create a shape and I want to really make sure that
my brush is full of water. So I'm taking my
water and putting my brush in and rolling it on its side so that
it's nice and moist. And I'm just going
to paint with water. Just a circle. And that might be
hard for you to see, but you just want to make sure
that you have that Shean. When you pick up your
paper at an angle, you'll be able to see
that for yourself. You don't want it possibly, but you want to have that Xin. Now I can start to
add some water. And what I like about
doing this way is that because you're just working
with a slight sheen. It's not unless you
add enough pigment, it's not going to
cover everything. It's going to leave a
lot of this open space. So I'm going to choose
a color and feeling green today as we know. And I'm just going to go along the edges here and allow
that to start to bleed. I go along. There we go. And remember that
while it might seem tempting to push it right away, wait until it starts
to do its thing. And then you can always
go back in and give it a little encouragement. I'm just going to let
that sit for a second. This is where I would start
to build everything up before I start adding
those additional marks. So we can do another
one of those so that we can see how
that plays together. And I'm just going to do
another circle next to it. I'm not going to have it
touched yet until I am ready. I'm going to drop
another green in. Just along the edges. I'm going to grab
a different shade. Couple of different shades just to keep things interesting. Okay. And then when that's done, you see how it's
starting to bleed now as it's the sheen has
kinda starting to dry. So I'm actually going
to bring that in now and connect the
two before it dries completely and then allow that
to make its little magic. I'm just it was a
little too dry, so I'm just going to work it
back to life. There we go. Alright. Now that that's done, I have a little bit of pooling right here and that's because the opposite side of my page made it so that
this warped a little bit. Which is why I'm using this
page as my practice page. If that happens, I
can just kinda tilt it a little bit so that it spreads to
where I want it to go. Or in this case, I am making it so it's
not stuck in a pool. I could also use less water. But that said, I'm going to
start to add little marks. And so black is one of
my favorites to add, or even a dark brown. I'm just going to grab
a dark color here. And I'm just going
to set my brush down in certain areas that
I know for sure I have a sheen so I'm I don't
want to set it where it's partially I just want to set it to where it has a sheen to it. So for example, if I
set it right here, it's going to start to bleed. You see this gene right here starts to bleed and I'm going to
continue doing this. You'll notice that
the wetter it is, the more it will
start to bloom out. Whereas as it starts to get dry, well, that's too
dry right there. But as it starts to get dry, I'm just going to
wet this area so that it starts to spread out. It won't spread as much in
those dry areas unless you have a ton of water
on your brush to re-wet that area.
But that's Flynn. I like to let this part
dry for a bit and then I'll go back in and
just around it. I can add a few more. See how right here,
it's totally dry, which I'm fine with because I think that that's pretty too. But I think that
it adds a lot of interests to have that bloom. I'm going to continue doing that in areas that I know are
still just a little bit wet. I can even if I wanted to, I could just drag it down. Along the whole side to see
the effects that it creates. I can go along the edge
and just barely touch those two marks and see how it's caught
the water right here. So I barely touch it
and it starts to pull. That's just going to add
some more interests to. Then when I get mostly
dry or all the way dry, I can add little
marks like this. This was added when it was mostly dry so you can see
a little bit of blooming. But for the most part
it's really isolated. I'm gonna do that with
a dark, dark green. I'm going to make sure that it's a spot that is a
little tiny bit wet. Hopefully this works
out to my benefit. Okay. That's more
than a tiny bit wet. It's also not a dark green. I grabbed the wrong color,
but I actually like it. So I'm going to add to it. I'm going to add more of that. Why not? Happy little accident. Okay. Okay. So now I'm going
to let that dry a lot more and then I'll
add that deep green in. So this is pretty
dry right here. It may or may not. But either way, just doing little marks like this is
going to look really pretty. So some of this
area might bloom a little bit and some
of it might not. And that's okay. This one I know that I
added water a little after. It's probably going to
bleed quite a bit more. Yep. It's not quite
ready right there, but let's try over on this part. Yeah, we have some
blooming happening and some parts where
it's not so much. So that's gonna be really
interesting to see. It grabbed some and not others. It almost looks like this
little cluster kinda took off. I'm holding my paper like
this so that I can see where it's shiny and when
it's where it's not. But yeah, that adds for some
really great interests. This one is pretty dry
all the way through. I'm not going to probably not going to see a lot
of blooming on that one. But that's also part
of the experimentation that just makes it really fun. Okay, so now that,
that part is done, Let's talk about
different types of mark-making that you
can do within these. Obviously, you can
set these down for colors and work with
a limited color palette, but you can also do the same thing and apply it to something much smaller scale. That's what we will be
covering in the next lesson. For now, go ahead and complete a page of these larger ovals. And remember to keep your
experimentation hat on. I recommend doing
nine on a page, so three across three down and just see where it takes you.
6. Less Can Be More: Now we're going to move into smaller versions of
what we just did. These are simplified versions, but while they are simplified, they actually add
so much interests because of the way that
they're laid out on the page, do small techniques
within each one. And what I like to do with color is play with something that's either like on
the analogous spectrum. So basically colors that are
really close to each other on the color wheel or
a complete opposites. The thing about that though, is when you start
to layer opposites, it turns into the mud color. It's like brown because
it neutralizes the color. I would recommend
doing something more on the analogous spectrum, or monochromatic would be really pretty because you
can also build up watercolor just
by transparencies. So I'm in agreement. We're going green for me. I'm going to grab
a smaller brush. So I'm going to now be using around six before I was
using around eight. And this is just going to
allow for finer points for. So when I want to make
these little marks like this, I mean, obviously I can make
them with the eight, but this is going to make it
a little bit easier for me. So I know this is still wet and I'm
doing a big no-no by setting this down,
but that's okay. Alright, so to start these, you can see that these
swatches are playful. So I have some that
have whitespace. I've got some that
are misshapen. I've got some that are
more perfectly circle, that's not perfect, but
you get what I'm saying. So what I'm gonna do is first, the first thing I'll
try is I will lay down some water and that's it. And then I'll lay down a color. So I'm going to
grab a green that I know isn't like hyper pigmented, but it's going to grab the wrong when a guy so
many greens in my palette. That's all I'm gonna
do and I'm going to allow that to kinda spread. The second one I'm going to do is just color it in like this. Then the next one, I'm going to be a
little more deliberate. And I'm just going to do like 123 strokes and
they're not perfect. That's really light. So I'll show you
with more color. I don't want to put
too much color in, but basically it connects these two areas and then it just has one that's a little bit, or it has a little stroke
that's a little bit lower. And it just makes it playful. I'll do the same thing that
I just did here with water. But this time I'm going to
just do a scribble and note that each time I'm
getting my brush wet, again, I'm going to pick
my secondary color here. Obviously this is not analogous color because this is like a peachy beige color. But I know that it's
going to is this. I know that it's going
to want to pick that up. There we go. Complement everything else. So it's not going
to detract from it or blend wrong or anything. Then I'll do another
one where I pick up. Actually I'm going to
have to start getting started on these
because this one dried. So I'm just gonna go
over the whole thing again to make sure that I
have it covered and it's wet. And then I'll look
at this Sheen. This one's perfect for those little dots that
I drop in like this. So I'm going to grab the exact
same pigment that I had. And then I'm going to
just set it down and make some dots that are going to bloom out but not like fully. And then I'll put
maybe two over here. So I don't like them
to be too symmetrical, but I still like to have
interest in balance. And then it's also fun
to kinda bring them off. Maybe just a couple
tad interests. Okay. This one I'm going to drop in since I had to
make it darker, I'm going to drop in some black. So on these edges. And that's all I'm
gonna do to that one. So see how it's just
like focusing on these like basically just the basics. I'm not going to do
anything too fancy. This one I'm going to drop in that lighter color and see how that blends
with everything. Then I might bring some
of this for St green in here too and
just do a couple of little blooms in area
that's still wet. You'll find that as you do this, some areas are a lot
wetter than others. And like as far as across
the board as you're working, that actually just
adds to the interests. So if you're intending
to do something, I want you to let
that go right now, because this is all
about experimentation. You're just you're letting
yourself play this dried. That's okay. You want to let
it dry completely and then you can go over it again on the areas that
you need with water. And it's not going to
mix that same color in, but it will re-wet
it so that you can add something new on top of it. That's going to give the
effect that we're going for. So I'm going to just
drop in some of this bluish green color and see how this is actually
really interesting. What happened here? It has this really cool area, like it concentrated
and then it blossomed out and left some open space. So let's continue this process
and see where it takes us. This is an example
of when you get too little bit, I
don't even know. Yeah, there we go. Like at the very sides because that's when the perfect
blooms will happen, but they'll still
maintain the dots. They'll just start to do
a little bit of this. But I don't want to those
next to each other. So I'm actually going
to spread this out. A sign stayed wet
quite a long time, but I can start adding a little bit of color in and I might just do only one little small
spot like that. I think I like the way that looks because it's simplified. You can see a lot of
the swatches on here, or actually a lot more simple than what we're
doing over here. So I can go in and just have some pigment on my brush.
And that can be it. Or I can go in with
a little bit more of the same color right away
and have that bleed. That wasn't even the same
color but you get what I mean? Where like if I get
most of this off my brush and then
I have this color, I can come back in with the same one and deepen it right away in just one
spot and see what happens. But you can also come in with just this one tone and call it good and
don't do anything else. So I'm gonna do that actually throughout and a few places. Because I like to have a little
bit of balance where it's not like overtaking with all the details in
the world, you know? And then if something
looks too simple, I can always come back, Let's see, Row, row, row. I can always come back and
add stuff to the side, or just a few dots maybe over
here to do that balance. But that way I'm not
losing the integrity of my ensuring that there
is a balance in here. I want you to fill out
an entire page of this and just play and then
see where it takes you.
7. Layered Cascading Leaves: In this lesson, we're going
to start seeing some form. We will apply the
techniques that we have used so far in a little bit
of a different way while also doing some layering and
building out so that we have a beautiful final
result that really shows some depth
can also be used. I mean, it could be
a project in its own because it's so beautiful. That is making
beautiful cascading leaves that basically
flow into the page. So let's jump in. Now what I actually
end up doing most of the time for this is flipping
my page upside down. That is because I
feel like I have more control with fine lines. If I pull away from myself, some of you may feel better
pulling toward yourself. Neither is right or wrong, you do whatever makes sense. But keep in mind, basically, what we're about to create is a, from the corner a cascading, draping, if you will, of really beautiful,
elegant leaves. So if I flip this upside down, bring it from this
corner or this corner. But I just keep in
mind like, okay, they're all coming
in and then I have this space open and I'm
focusing primarily here. So that being said,
let's get started. The first thing
that I want to do is build up the back layer. So we're not going to do as
much wet on wet for this. But we are going to incorporate some additional
colors within our leaves. But we want the first layer, the background to be
more translucent. And this applies
to anything that you want to make buildable. So I'm gonna get just a little bit of
pigment on my brush. And if it's too much, It's not the end of the world. I'll show you how I'm inevitably
going to do that too. So I'll show you how
we can fix that. But I'm, I'm creating the same
stems that we did before, curving this way and then
turning into leaves. Some of these stems
will be longer and some will be shorter. And in this slight curve. And then I'm going to
press the whole way down on my brush and
bring it up to a point. And then I'm going to
do the same thing, press full pressure and
bring it to a point. I could add more pigment if I
wanted to make that darker, but I don't because
it is the background. I'm just gonna do the
same thing again. And these can be on
their own stems, but you can also have
them coming off of the main stem of
anything that you paint. Notice it's going in
the same direction. It's just an extension. And then I'm gonna make sure
I have water on my brush and see how in just one fluid motion I apply pressure and then lift, lift, lift, lift, lift. Into that point. I'm going to build this up. And I'm careful to, to see where my ends, where the stem ends. Because if it's right
here, I'm going to have two leaves in the
exact same spot. So I'm going to bring that
a little bit longer that I don't have them stacked. If you additionally, I
will do the same thing. Shorter to make sure I have some leaves that
are really cropped. In fact, I even want some that are just kinda peak
of booing down. And it's okay if they
are pretty dang current, transparent because your
background should be, because you're gonna
go over all of this with the same thing
with more pigment. So don't fret. If it's not looking like bold, it's not supposed to yet. Then as we build, so I can continue adding these, so that's too much pigment. So I'm just taking some water and going through and then I'm going to pull this pigment. So I just cleaned off my brush. I have only water. I paint that in and you know
that how we do the bleed. So I'm going to encourage this, push it, push it, push it, push it into the leaf itself and see how
it lightens setup. Additionally, you can create another leaf or stem coming off of that and
see how it's pulling all that pigment through and
making it quite transparent. So a little trick you can do. And then as you build, you don't have to pull
everything from the top. You can actually have
it pull from behind. So you just have a slight bit of a stem off of
one of the leaves, like it's tucked back there. Then I'm just going to keep
building up this space. And I want it to be thinking about your
composition as you're going. So I feel like that's maybe
a little further down, but that's basically where
I wanna be and then have this take up this space here. So I can have some coming from. The side of my page, make sure I have enough
water on my brush to really pull that
pigment through. I'm gonna do the same
thing next to it. Pulled up through. This one's pretty transparent. Again, that's totally fine because it's our,
it's our background. They don't have to
look perfect ever, but especially not right
now because they have they are they're gonna be like
basically faded back here, not a focus, just enough. So you can see how
this is layering up. I might add one closer here, but notice I'm still curving. What will be downwards? I'm upside down right now. And I'll put a little
more pigment on this one. There we go. And I'll have some here, but I'm not going to
bring them down as far because I want it to kind of start to fade up
this way off the page. So that's just a
composition thing. See that's way, way,
way too much water. So I'm going to completely rinse my brush so I have
nothing but water. And then I'm going to do the
next stroke of that leaf, which will hopefully
soak up a good amount. So see, it's getting better, but it's not quite right. So from here I can make a stem coming off of that
and then another leaf. And even if it's
not pulling yet, That's where we can
push that color into, pick up some of that
color and push it into the one next to it. And that helps a lot. Another thing that you
can do is just completely rinse your brush and then dry it a bit and pit like pickup, basically paint on your page and then it will soak
up some of that color, which is nice little
trick without having to dab your paper with a
paper towel or something. Alright, so I'm gonna
do a few more of these in some of these spaces. I kinda like my background too. So when this is right-side, I kinda like it to come down a little further than my prominent leaves
that are on top. There they are. Okay,
So that's pretty, but now it's time to really
refine and get a little more structured on our form of these leaves to
make them really pop. And I'm going to do that with more pigment
over the top of these and you don't have to
worry about filling in the spaces because they are
going to actually overlap. So you can draw the same colors and just have more pigment. Or you can grab different
colors because I love green. I'm gonna go ahead and
throw in some other tones. And I'm going to start deep. So I think what I'll do is start here and I'm going to try to make these
lines even thinner. So something that
helps me is if I hover over my page
doing this until it makes contact and then I know what that pressure
should be to get that effect that I had to get the thickness of the
stroke that I want. Then I will apply
full pressure on my brush pole as at a
C curve and then go, go, go, go into a nice tip. Then I'm going to load
my brush up again. Do the same thing
to the other side. If there's too much whitespace
like it's fine if there's a little bit for the vein
in the middle of the leaf, but I wouldn't do
it on all of them. I also like it's okay
to go in and fill that. So it's not super super open
because if they're too open, you just doesn't look right. So keep that in mind. But basically now is when I fill see how the overlapping is
starting to come together, it looks really pretty. I do that color again. Actually, I'm going to
try to work from here to here so I don't
drive my hand there. You might be able
to see this leaf is a little bit of a hot mess. So I can keep that
in there while showing the tone and the depth, but I can do it with a leaf
that's hovering over it. So these are a lot sharper. There are more
intentional and that's another thing I love about
this exercise first, because it's going to
allow you practice time. And it's also just plain fun. Alright, so I'm gonna
have one coming up here and then maybe. Yeah. And I grabbed a
different tone of green that's a little bit more, has like a dirtier
vibe, more earthy. And then I also want to make sure that I don't
just have a bunch of STEMI areas because
I also want them to peekaboo in like this, but even even less than
that would be good. So like if I just kinda form to the tip and then it looks
like it truly is flowing in. Alright, so let's play
with this wet on wet, like I said, like I promised. So what I'm gonna do is grab probably equal amounts
of paint and water. This was a little more
paint than water. But now I have
Yeah, there we go. I've got some transparency here. I think I grabbed
even more water than paint, but transparency here. And then I'm gonna
go in and grab a cool color because
I have a warm, warmer color and I'm going to drag that on the side
just like we did with our other exercise is other exercises and set that
down and allow it to bleed. And you can sort of see it
starting to happen right here, but we'll give it a second. And then I'm gonna
do the same thing. Here. Need more pigment. And this is just into like integrating different
tones and see how that, this one's a little
wetter so you can really see the bleed start
to happen right away. I love putting different colors at the tips of leaves too. Okay, So we'll do that
again coming this way. This one I'll just do transparent ish and drop
in a lot more pigment. So it has more of that
effect altogether. So we'll see how that bleeds. And then you can see
this one already is mixing and making some
really pretty marks. But these ones, since this one has less saturation
to begin with, it will have more contrast.
Same with this one. And watch them because
as you can see, the bloom is starting to happen, but it's starting
to dry right there. And I actually want it to be a little smoother before it dries. That's where I can
go in and tweak it. And that's also I could
have prevented that had I had the perfect amount of
water and paint ratio. But that's not really
something that is always predictable because
all pigments are different. Sometimes you score and sometimes you make it work
and it continue doing this. Now, notice that I am, my stem is lower than these two, so I have this nice stack. This one is nice and pigmented. And then sometimes what I like
to do is grab another tone and come off of
it and kinda drag out from the pigment
that I just laid. And let that bleed
into that as well. It's just a fun
thing to play with. This is like the
perfect exercise when you aren't really
sure what to create. Because you're making something
that's really pretty, but you're experimenting
like every step of the way. You're experimenting
with composition. You're experimenting with paint to water ratio with
different types of pigments. Like I grabbed just as much
pigment here as I did here, but it's a different color and
so it just acts different. I can drop in some
pigment and watch how that cool tone
really gets grabbed in. And how I like having a cool, how I like or dislike having
that cool tone in there. I get to practice forming
or like reshaping things. If I don't like the way
something is shaped, There's just so much
opportunity to explore. You can also try
different brush sizes. I could come in with
a smaller brush or a much larger brush and have
different shapes of leaves. Or I might want to reshape
and have skinnier leaves, or I can have shorter leaves. There's a lot of different
options to play with here. But see how the darker I get, like, that's what your
attention is pulled to. Not darker but more pigment
and less, less transparent. But this one C is like so faded. And then we're going
over everything so that we can have that depth. Okay, So I'm gonna
pull a lot from this side and then speed this part up just a bit so you don't have
to watch this long. Like we see it with new eyes
to look at how pretty it is. It's so pretty. And we basically did the
same thing we've been doing. We just focused on form also. Alright, I will see you
in the next lesson.
8. Your Class Project: You now have tricks
that are going to allow you to break through that mindset that's resistance in actually starting
to create something. What you're going
to do now is take the exercises that
you learned in this class and apply
them to a trio. So three pages with each of those pages being different
with a common thread. So this might be in the color
palette that you choose. It might be in your
subject matter, you might be in
your mark making. The creative part of this
is yours to run with. And by creating a trio, it's allowing us to make
something that is very, very simple and
elevate it to create a really beautiful
collection of art. Some might call
that abstract art. That's up to you to decide. But the main takeaway
from this is to allow yourself to connect
whatever you decide to do. I invite you to
share your project. I want to see it more than you. Now. I want to see the
colors that you chose. I want to see how you
made these exercises come to life and
your own unique way. Because even if it
doesn't feel unique, it is because it was your
hand that created it. And that's something
very, very special. Also, share what
you did in order to establish a creative
ritual for yourself, if you will, or maybe just
a more relaxing space. What did you surround
yourself with? Or did you wear your favorite sweatpants or
have some music playing? What is it that with
being in that moment, whether we intend
on it to be or not, the energy that surrounds
us is infused in our art. And I would love to see how
that translates for you. Now all that being said, I would love to
see you some more. Be sure to check out
my other classes. I have got so many
and I also have so many resources on my website at the
pigeon letters.com, we have regular tutorials that
go up on the vlog weekly. And I just want you to
be able to dive into the passion of creativity as
much as you possibly can. So I can't wait to see what you created and I will see you soon.
Peggy Dean, Top Teacher | The Pigeon Letters
