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This blog is going to be shorter today because I am going to try something new in the studio, and I can’t wait to get going!

OK…. So maybe you have decided to try something new… a new medium, a new support, new subject matter… the list goes on. But now what? What can you do with what is new to you? First, let me give you a little background about myself.

I have loved color since I was a small child. I was good are remembering colors and knowing how to combine color combinations. This came in handy for my parents when they were shopping for clothes when I was a child, since I could remember the colors in their wardrobes at home. In high school, I would sketch pictures of the outfits that I wanted, and then color them to figure out the most combinations to give me the greatest variety of outfits. I knew the colors in my closet, so I knew what to create with colors in my drawings.

When I started designing soft pastel paintings, I was excited to find out that I could use pure colors already made in a wide variety of pencils or sticks. Layering colors was something with which I was well acquainted, but I had to approach it in a different way in pastel. This was new and really caught my attention.  I had painted impressionistically before, but now when I was doing so in some of my pastel paintings, I left part of the paper untouched by pastel, as well. This was a new concept for me, and it intrigued me. I had also started trying my hand at abstracts, another “new” for me, which for this realist was stimulating. How would it be try a conceptual piece in pastel? That would certainly be new for me, and I couldn’t wait to get started.

Looking at photographs of my paintings on the computer, one in particular caught my eye. I opened up the pastel that I painted called, “Attitude”. You can see this painting on my website. In particular, the eye of the bull really appealed to me. Putting the painted image in editing mode, I zeroed in on the eye, moving the guidelines until I had a composition that I liked.  Several options are given in edit mode, one of which is for adjusting color. I played around with the color, pushing it to extremes, until I had several possibilities. I had never tried playing with color in the photo-editing mode to this level. A great big “new” for me!  Using this modification only as a guide, I created my painting, making changes where I thought it was needed.  The painting in this blog, “Bull’s Eye”, is the first in a series that I plan on creating using this method.

If you feel stuck in a rut, try taking a photo of one of your paintings, resizing it to target a very small portion, and then push the colors to a different level, and create something new!