Sunday, March 15, 2009

Painting From A Sketch


'Benwick River' -Mixed Media 9x11" -©Anita Davies

Six years into my art journey and I am still having 'firsts'. This is the first time I have ever completed a painting from one of my own sketches...no photos, no references of any kind, just the ink sketch below.
What fun!


"Benwick River" - Ink Study in sketchbook ©Anita Davies

Now I know that I strayed a little, some parts of that worked well, others did not. The composition works better in my sketch, I made too much of the road in my painting and split the composition into equal thirds, which I think makes each third compete a little for attention. The river sweeps more in my sketch, which I prefer, as do the trees along the back right. The bank looks more like a hedge in my painting and the jetty looks more like a table with the back leg I added.

However, none of this matters because I painted it all from my very own sketch and THAT alone makes this painting a personal success.
I enjoyed selecting colours and creating texture with my new 1" hake and I loved being all loose and artsy. I was in my glory slopping watercolour about, then dipping my fingers into my pastel box, grabbing my ink filled waterbrush, then gouache and generally being unrestricted in my choices of media.

I am going to have such fun with this project!


"Benwick River" WIP - ©Anita Davies

12 comments:

RH Carpenter said...

Boy, you were so critical of the painting vs the sketch at first, I'm glad you ended by saying none of it matters because you painted this from your own sketch :) Both are lovely in their own ways and it was a leap to get from pen and ink sketch to watermedia painting and I like it!

Anita Davies said...

LOL...Glad you like it Rhonda, I certainly enjoyed painting it!

I think it is important to critique your own work quite fiercely but just as important to recognise leaps of courage and spurts of progress, this painting contained both for me. ;)

Joan Sandford-Cook said...

I agree with Rhonda - how critical can you get. The sketch surely is only the inspiration for another piece of art and we can alter it anyway we feel (unless its a commission of the actual scene) - which I think is a great result. I might have to do a similar thing soon as I've been invited to put work into a scarecrow festival and I have a sketch in my village sketchbook of one at the local allotment.

Been missing you despite being busy with the Rising Sun Easter opening, wish we had a date to meet up!!!?????

Unknown said...

Love the painting Anita. I agree with you that the composition works better in the sketch and I think it's down to the landscape format of the sketch.
Love to see more work like this.

Nothing to See said...

Anita, the painting is fabulous as is the sketch. You are being too hard on yourself. It is wonderful that you painted from your own sketch, and it is perfectly acceptable to take artistic license with your work. If you look back at the old masters you will see that they did lots of sketches and sometimes made paintings from their sketches. The paintings are never exact replicas of the sketch. Yet, they work very well.

Congratulations!

:)

Ana

Joan said...

You are embracing this with such gusto!!!! Congrats on a painting that is so very much your own!!!!

Marva Plummer-Bruno said...

Anita - this is beautiful! I wouldn't have even have noticed about the thirds... Marva

Anetka said...

It's great you've taken another step and moved your sketch to painting.
I found that's the best way to improve our own work, dare to take step forward.
Great sketch and amazing painting Anita. Congrats!!

Sandy Maudlin said...

Way to go! It looks like it was fun and fascinating to paint, too. I agree with John about the horizontal format working really well in the original sketch. Many more to come, I'm sure.

Sydney Harper said...

Congrats! I love the painting. For me, the nice thing about painting from a sketch is that I tend to ad lib a bit more. I think that's a good thing, even if it doesn't always work out.

Sarah Ketelaars said...

Lovely painting Anita and great that you are still learning even though you are such a talented and experienced artist...

Anonymous said...

Anita! I LOVE this painting. And I really appreciate your critique as well as it addressed technical aspects that plague all of us. I drank in your painting and then read the critique and then went back to the painting with new eyes and information and it was really helpful (to me!)...;) And in the end I have to say that I agree with you....none of it matters....you experienced joy in the making....and I felt that joy in the viewing.....if beauty is in the eye of the beholder...than this beholder thinks this is beautiful. Thank you for sharing the joy!!.......deni........;)