Speedy Roses.

I'd really kind of like it if my window wasn't placed in such a way that everything I set up ends up being very softly back lit. I mean, I'm sure it's really great for helping me see subtlety and all, but sometimes I'd just like a big old drastic shadow, you know? Anyway, I don't mean to complain. It's a very nice window and I'm glad I have it. I'm very fortunate to be one of the few humans in this world who have the means to paint at all.

I decided to use a limited palette for this mini sketch session (50 minutes for both roses). So I had white, black, naphthol red, and yellow ochre on my palette. It's kind of cool to see what that simple color combo can do. Not that this was a very complex subject as far as color goes. But it does somewhat simplify your color decisions to have just a few piles of paint on the palette.

Painting is so stinking hard. It's something I realize more and more each time I try. But someday I'll be almost good at it! What, you don't believe me after looking at this painting? Well, just you watch ;) ;) On a separate note, at another point in my life it would have been sort of nice to know that even really good artists churned out the occasional turkey. I didn't know that. That's why I don't shy away from sharing the bad along with the good (at this point, usually more of the former than latter). 

I don't think it should be a secret that creating art is hard, and that no one hits it out of the park every time (especially when they're starting out). They just don't--and, well, I don't either--in case you hadn't figured that out already ;) Not that I think these sketches are exceedingly terrible or anything--I tend to build up too much paint too quickly, and there could definitely be some more effective middle grayed reds, but you know, they were really quick, so I'm okay with some mistakes. At this point, I'm just trying to build up my knowledge of color mixing and value matching and such and I'm sure each attempt helps me along that path.