Ending Workshlp Trickles into Sunset

With the remaining time at the Journaling Workshop (see previous post), we'd hoped to go outside, but the day is chilly and pretty windy. Luckily we have a wide panoramic window and use it for my next process, my "Awareness Meditation". And although you can't see my beginning contour line drawing, it gave the basis for this rich page. When the contour lines were done, I began painting and coloring in the scene with my watercolors and even writing in tiny text that curved and danced around various shapes created in the drawing. I did later drop in a side view of Yelena, who sat next to me, as she worked in her journal. I can't tell you how happy I am with this page on so many levels. What do you think?

The adjacent page came from one of my Journaling "Clinics" held monthly in my Ashland Art Center Studio. April's focus was "Sunsets". With sunsets and their extreme colors, you really have to be in a bold mood. As usual, I start with a teeny bit of wax crayon (mainly as reminders as to where the different colors end and begin - - and to serve as "fences" which stop one color from flowing into the other), note where I want to save my whites and begin with my yellow (Aureolin). I've wet most of the sky area and jump from yellow, to pink (Quin. Rose), then to orange (Pyrrol) - - using a lot of pigment to water ratio. I do dip into my darker orange (Brown Madder) and some cooler red (Aliz. Crimson) for variety and richness. And while the page was still wet, I began to drop in some blues (Cerulean, Thalo and Indigo) and purples (Thalo Blue and Quin. Rose). When the page was dry I began to add the Indigo Blue landscape silhouette and finally, the delicate tree branches poking into the page from the left. The five seeds window-ing thru at the bottom right were a happy accident that occurred when I worked on the following journal page. You'll have to stay around to hear that story!

When I was finishing up this journal spread, I had to make some adjustments. Because the sunset was so strong and dramatic, I did have to pump up some of the values and colors in the opposite page. But I was happy eventually and deliberately wanted the branches and teeny text from the left page to help you traverse into the tree branches of the right page. The end result . . . a pretty dynamic duo to savor, eh?