Becoming a Student Again

Hello Friends, family, Angela Gair book_edited-1 Water Landsccape_edited-1 Green landscape_edited-1 New Painitng, sky scape_edited-1 Autumn landsape_edited-1 White and blue study_edited-1 and fans,

I have been taking a break from blogging after teaching two classes back to back in Classic Drawing and in Pastel at Frederick Community College. An unexpected side effect of teaching others art has been learning that I have room to improve my own art-making skills. Lately, I have been dissatisfied with my artwork, especially a poetry illustration series that I can’t seem to finish. I think my drawing and my painting skills need more refinement.

To that end, I have been scheduling in-studio days, in which I work on drawing from sketchbook prompts and also from oil painting tutorial books. The one I have been working with most recently is a text by Angela Gair, entitled, A Step-by-step Course in Oil Painting. I have learned a lot about color mixing, drawing with my brush and working in the landscape. I have a bad habit of being mean with the paint and I want to start adding more texture, which I am glad to see appearing in these new paintings. My drawing sessions are showing me that I need to slow and really observe my subject. I want to be the best teacher I can and so I think I need to start nurturing the artist in me so I will have more to give others and remember what inspired me to teach art in the first place.