Kent Island Art Association-negative Painting Class

Here are some of the great pictures from the Kent Island Art Association Class on Monday.  I hope that this taste of negative painting will be helpful to everyone that attended and add a spark of mystery to paintings yet to be created!  The  house above is the art center. It is located in Stevensville, Maryland --over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. Go to http://www.kifaevents.org for information on classes.

Georgette is an acrylic painter and was able to do a beautiful job with the  project in watercolor.  See our fall leaves above.

This is me explaining the importance of the under painting. This is the foundation of a great negative design.

This is a close up of the first layer underway. Many negative paintings are built up with many transparent layers  of paint. Understanding color is very important.

Jane's Color Clock Secret For Artists

 I have put my popular color theory  into a small book. I am dedicating it to my students who have asked me for this for years. If you have struggled with color, this book will  show  you how to look at color differently.

If you click the link below the book it will take you to Blurb.com and you can order your own copy.

Hibiscus To The Point

If you like this painting you will love my workshop at Maryland Hall in Annapolis. Maryland May 12 and 19 called  Painting Outside The Lines  with a Focus on Design. You can sign up by going to www.marylandhall.org

This is a tricky painting. Notice the change from positive painting to negative painting in the blue triangles. If you let you attention slip you'll lose your place.   I love this type of painting because it is almost like solving a puzzle.

Vermont October

This one of my favorite fall scenes. As  I   created the wet in wet underpainting, I scraped out some birch trees with a palette knife. It is a small painting but a real gem. The reflection of the orange tree in the water leads the eye into the trees. It all happened in a spontaneous way.   I tell my students to let the water and paint do their own thing and step aside. This is hard to do. Life is a little bit like this. Sometimes letting go and realizing everything will fall into place and take its own course is the best way to live.

Exercising the right side of the brain in a big way!

This is the under-painting with the exception of the rocks. I went over the rocks with additional paint and a palette knife.  As a negative painter, I try to have an idea in my mind, or a photo reference to use as a guide when i loosely lay down the shapes and color. This is what I call my road map.  

The final picture above is above is carefully created by carving out shapes. I think trees and bushes but my shapes are made in an intuitive manner without the support of a drawing.

Intuitive negative painting

I usually work from an established drawing before I lay down the under-painting in most of my work. In these two watercolors I did a dry on wet under-painting and then let my intuitive side see a scene and create it. The under-painting will lead you in a particular direction. It looks easy but it is very hard to get the perfect first layer. It helps to use paint right out of the tube and make sure both sides of the paper are thoroughly wet.   This is really the most sophisticated level of negative painting and if you want to give the right brain a work-out try it!  

I have two workshops coming up all about negative painting. Go to my web-site at www.paintpencil.com  and look under classes.

Playing around with unusual backgrounds

 I like the combination of hard geometric edges up against the soft flowing lines of a flower. This was painted today as I celebrated another new  year ahead.   If I do it again I will change the center which is too symetrical.

Visit my other new blog-- veggiefoodie.blogspot.com . This is a blog I am writing with my sister Susan. We are both vegetarians. I am a gluten free vegetarian leaning Vegan. My sister is the real cook. I would rather paint!     Happy New Year!!!!   Jane