Winter vacation is finally here, thank the unknowable powers that be.  "Chameleon Carapace" is nearly done, and so is "The Garden's Guardian":

I have mixed feelings about this one--I think this work was more of a learning exercise than anything else.  This canvas is quite old--I've probably had it since high school.  It was a horrid, unfinished painting I'd started years and years ago, so when I found it I just started sloshing greens, blues and yellows on it without any particular idea in mind.  While there are a lot of things I do like about it, planning it out beforehand would have helped a great deal, and clearly I need to work on painting foliage.

Anyway, time to move on to other things:

This is the concept sketch for "L'escargot aux yeux écarquillés".  In the end, I decided to go big for the painting, minimizing background.  I intend on doing a drawing with a detailed background, though, in addition to the painting.  Canvas sketch in progress:

And now for the wash and first darks:

Happy holidays, and until next time...!

I've had a stressful few weeks, but the painting is coming along:

Last week:

This week:

As with every painting I do, this has been a huge learning process.  The transition from a painting's beginning to its completion never fails to surprise me--it never ends up exactly how I had envisioned it would!

I started out with a rather lighthearted, whimsical idea and ended up with a colossal chameleon-snail floating on a restless sea under a brooding sky.  Now it seems almost morose, no?  My mood must be over-influencing my work...

Welcome to my painting journal--I hope you enjoy following the progress of my work!

I just started last night what I'm calling "Chameleon Carapace"--I've always thought of myself as both a shy, prudent snail and a capricious, unpredictable chameleon.  They sound incongruous, don't they?  So, I thought--wouldn't it be cool to bring those two ideas together in a painting?

Here's the concept sketch:

Here's the sketch put to canvas and a glimpse of my workspace, which is...uh...cluttered.

Here is the first stage of the painting.  It all worked out in the end, but I learned that it is unwise to do a wash in a undependable color like purple and also don't use any linseed oil...

Until next time!

P.S. Will try to get better at photographing my work...  :\