Kate Cooke

Aventures à la gouache : techniques de peinture et de création de motifs

Oh my goodness this is fantastic! Love your use of shadow for the depth. Great work!

Karen, your gouache work is superb. You might have steered from the patterns being taught in this class, but you show what a terrific artist you are. Like many others said, your paintings look like graphics. There is no right or wrong in art, only what our mind guides our hands to create. This is how you envisioned your work and it truly is fantastic. You added designs to realism and it worked :)

Holy guacamole! This is gorgeous! I love how you approached this project, even your shadows are amazing! Well done Karen!

Thanks  so much, Mel! I learned so much in this class. Kate Cooke is an amazing teacher! I’ve learned even more in her other classes and am in the midst of trying to tackle another. I still seem to get myself into the same quagmire every time and she helps simplify all my detail every time! I am sooooooo grateful to her!

Love your work, Karen! Thanks so much for sharing!

Thanks Krystal, I’m taking another wonderful class with Kate right now candy am running into similar issues. It’s good to see what I had learned and put it to use again. This pattern stuff is tough for me!

I love your work! the shadows are really cool!

Your work is consistently beautiful. Beautiful patterns.

Thank you! I’ve started a few different sketchbooks: Patterns, Shapes, Mark Making, Anatomy, Quikies (3 minute sketches) and Waterbase Experiments. It keeps me busy and where I’m heading…I just don’t know yet, but I’d love to give up my day job!

I absolutely adore everything about this project. The colors, the mix of realism and stylized graphism, and the patterns! Makes me want to take this class for sure.

This class was wonderful and really took me out of my comfort zone, with good results. This may be good to revisit, it helped me use a limited palette and pattern, which may help me in our workshop!

I love your addition of shadows, just brilliant!

These are great, you have a lovely style!

really well done. The texture is very good.

Thanks so much! I learned a lot in this class. But I still struggle with letting go of realism!

Beautiful design, composition and rendering!

I love the crispness of the top 2 pictures, did you use Procreate ?

I’m much better by hand with gouache! I don’t think I could do that in Procreate...maybe I should give it a try!

That is remarkable, what an achievement! I really thought you touched up on something like procreate! N I was thinking I so have to learn how to do that, but I think I’ll just keep practicing my skills instead! Well done you !

Yeah, I’m old school...Procreate is another animal...but I’m trying. I hear it the way of the future!

Wow! I love this style. These objects are really jumping off the page. I think they wonderfully walk the line between realism and graphic design.

Thank you! This is all new to me, I usually work in oils or charcoal. My style is typically surrealistic, mostly storytelling with symbolism. If you’d like, check out my website, and you’ll see why this is so challenging for me:
<a target="_blank" rel="noopener external nofollow" href="http://www.karensilvestro.com">www.karensilvestro.com</a>

I am browsing through your projects as they are all so outstanding! Makes me want to take these classes too, but I am not sure I would be able to achieve equal results! :)

Stunning compositions!! And the shadows make it sublime!

Gosh I just love this - I love all your pieces but especially the second go at the leaves. There is something just so stylish about it! I love the shadows, that is a fab addition to Kate’s suggested techniques. I wanted to paint in the shadows and do some colour blending and found that super tough too lol

It’s fun isn’t it? I love taking classes that I chose to take - unlike the enforced ones from my school days ;)

Thanks for saying I have a style!!! That’s  where I feel challenged, but so many of these Skillshare classes are getting me closer!

love your work its really inspiring Karen

Thank you Cathy. That’s encouraging. I really am trying to see more pattern and less realism but it’s not coming naturally. I can see it more and have fun creating patterns on swatches...I’m keeping a book with them...but transferring them onto a still life is still a challenge.

These are absolutely beautiful! I want to take this class after seeing this. I looked back at your "realistic" version and it is equally beautiful! I also struggle with trying to create these cool graphic looks but I end up adding shading and realistic aspects. I love all of these, sketches and all!

This is lovely Karen, your brushwork is incredibly precise! What size is the original piece? I really like the colour choices and the two-tone shadows. Wow!

Thank you! I can’t seem to help myself with the tightness. I know using different brushes and faster strokes would probably make it freer. I guess I’m wound too tight! For me this was very challenging. I thank Kate for pushing me to take it further! I’m not done with this class yet!!! It’s 11x14ish

Kate, I tried again to add more pattern. I changed some of the colors as well. Thank you for following up with me!

This is beautiful, love the shadows it gives a really interesting style to your composition. I can see you have tried to control and stylise your technique so I wouldn't say you've gone wrong at all... although I love some of the patterns you've used in your sketchbook so it might have been good to see more of them in your finished art work, but maybe next time! There is a big difference in this and your first project which was much more realistic so you're on the right track- keep painting! Kate

I’ll give it another whirl! Why is it I can do patterns on leaves but not when they’re in a real set up? I’ve got to get over it looking recognizable and just have fun with the patterns. Back to the drawing board!!! Thanks for the feedback, it helps a lot!

These look great Karen, like illustrations from a book! I didn't realize they were gouache, thought they were digital illustrations. Well done.

Thank you! I’m really trying to figure it out.

Okay, I finally had the opportunity to take another shot at using the gouache and making my set up with a more developed pattern instead of a realistic approach.

Thanks so much for checking me out! I really am trying to simplify...

Hi Karen, thanks for sharing your beautiful paintings. Please don't think you went wrong though- you are clearly a very accomplished painter as the paintings you've produced are fabulous. However if you really wanted to stick with the style I was trying to get across then its a case of less is more! I love your pattern experiments and what a great idea to do them all as leaves... to be honest that excites me the most... but I am obsessed with pattern, these are truly gorgeous! Maybe next time try to think of what's in front of you more in terms of pattern, don't get too involved with the realistic, I can see you were getting closer to that in your shell composition, I really like the coral. I think I want to get my students thinking more outside the box a bit and do some stylisation. You could try using a colour palette that isn't anything to do with what you are painting and that way it might break you out of the realistic habit... just an idea! Happy painting x

Thank you, great advice! I’ll try and look at them more like they are made of fabric. I will try again because I LOVE gouache and really liked your style and teaching. I’m going to give it another go.

I am going to try again, to use your suggestion again! I wish this came more naturally to me. I see pattern but as soon as it’s an object I fallback on realism…and it annoys me!

<img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/8879b29b.jpeg" alt="Gouache - image 1 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/8879b29b.jpeg 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/8879b29b.jpeg 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/bb6d599a.jpeg" alt="Gouache - image 2 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/bb6d599a.jpeg 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/bb6d599a.jpeg 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/4e86e1e9.jpeg" alt="Gouache - image 3 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/4e86e1e9.jpeg 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/4e86e1e9.jpeg 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy">I think I got too realistic even though I played with patterns and limited palettes...but once I went for the big project it looks like I forgot what I learned. I really did try to not blend and just use the straight colors...where did I go wrong?<img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/b55c6bd9" alt="Gouache - image 4 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/b55c6bd9 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/b55c6bd9 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/3cb98b42" alt="Gouache - image 5 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/3cb98b42 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/3cb98b42 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/44820b8b" alt="Gouache - image 6 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/44820b8b 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/44820b8b 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/bc82d7d2" alt="Gouache - image 7 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/bc82d7d2 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/bc82d7d2 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img style="margin-left:auto;margin-right:auto;" src="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/f162b8aa" alt="Gouache - image 8 - student project" srcset="https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=600,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/f162b8aa 600w, https://static.skillshare.com/cdn-cgi/image/quality=80,width=1000,format=auto/uploads/project/f143693e74bc2043e35f279be374f27b/f162b8aa 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy">

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