Fantasy anemones

I have not been so "productive" lately. Here are some quickly painted fantasy anmones I made a couple a weeks ago, just for the sake to get some colours on the paper! What is quite interesting is that what seems to be a disaster when it is still wet and fresh can turn into something interesting when the pigments have dried.

Today, I received a book I have ordered. It is called "Finding your visual voice" - and I am quite thrilled with the book after having read the first chapter!! As I on a daily basis work as a scientist I am far too used to having to use my left side of the brain and to achieve results after certains standards etc. Here is a quote from the book that is a good reminder for me: "Your visual voice is intuitive, not intellectual or concsiously guided by reason."

The first chapter is about becoming aware of whether you get your inspiration primarily  from your external surroundings or from your internal imaginations, emotions etc. And I have the last half an hour just realised that my source of inspiration is actually internal! I wasn`t aware of that, can you believe!

I think this is a good book for me! I will come back to it later.

Watercolour abstract

Hm. Sometimes - or, honestly, quite often - my mind, i.e. my imagination of possible paintings, and my hand do not cooperate. I feel like I want to achieve far too much, ahead of and above my own capasity when it comes to painting. I have a vague idea of the direction of what I like my own expression to be like.  But I wish I could have a mentor to guide me at regular intervals, which would give a nother continuity than a weekend workshop can offer, that could have helped me identify a direction of my style of painting, which at the moment jump from one to the other. I have no direction of what my own "voice" is. Perhaps I should start searching around and approach artists for the possibility of a mentorship?

Today`s "painting" is an excersise I did to explore transparency. I kind of like the shapes and the colours.

Daffodils in fall

 It has been many weeks since I last painted  - as a couple of bigger events has happened since summer; first, I started in a new job in August, and that took quite some focus. Then, I bought my own apartment!! So the last weeks have been all about packing and moving and unpacking again, and settling in the new apartment. But yesterday, it was time to pull out all my watercolour stuff again.

As allways when I have been out of the painting flow for a while, I need to start easily just to get some paint on the paper. For me, it works well to start off by copying things from other artists to get the brush moving.  I allways get so much inspiration from Jean Haines` books, and this simple picture of daffodils is inspired from one of her paintings.

So - now I hope I am back on track and that more paintings will come along!