Art tip for the day...That Dirty Little Devil-the TANGENT!

So, yesterday my sister, Carrie, and I worked on fixing her blog to bring it up to professional standards (we're just learning and trying so hard). Her blog, in case you're interested, is foryourrromsonly2.blogspot.com (they do faux painting, murals and general painting). Anyway, the object was to get a nice picture of her and her husband on there. We found an older one that was just perfect except for the fact that it looked like a balloon was growing out of her head when we cut off a lot of unnecessary junk on the side of the image. We decided that it would be better to leave the balloon there and Photoshop out the other distracting stuff because they balloons are fun in it. The point of this whole long drawn out story is: tangents. A tangent is something that is comical or just awful/icky feeling in a composition. You know. Haven't you all seen a picture where it looks like someone has a hat on their head but it's really the light fixture up above? Or it could be just that someone's hand is right next to the edge of the picture and it creates tension. It would have been better if the hand would have either gone off the edge of the image or pulled back away from the edge. Sometimes these tangents can be so subtle that you really have to hunt for them. But they can ruin a lovely painting because they make the viewer uncomfortable. They probably wouldn't pick that as the culprit of their uneasiness but something is definitely not quite right about it. If you have a composition that's just not working look to see if you have a tangent somewhere.

I've included a few of our family treasures in this post. We have an ongoing joke at our house. It's the "Bad Picture Album". My mom and I started it years ago. It's a collection of the worst photos that we or others (we take contributions but we are very strict about them being truly bad) have taken. There are some lulus in there. The 2 featured today are definitely tangents. The first is of my mother (she has a lot of the pictures in the album) taken by my stepfather. At first glance it looks like she has a Hitler mustache but we realize that it's really the plant. The other picture taken at Yellowstone looks like the deer is carrying her baby in her mouth. These are not purposely taken. They just happened to work out that way. I bet you have some of them yourselves. Okay, so they're the comical kind, right? I can think of one picture of mine that has a tangent but it's not a crucial problem. Look on the left of "Grace-Afternoon Nap". See her hand? Her knuckle is right on the edge. I decided that it wasn't that big of a deal and didn't warrant me redoing anything (which would have been a nightmare) and it's been a very popular painting. The tangent really only happens when it's in a frame-like at my house-so you won't see it....nanny nanny na na.

Okay, get my point here? Paintings not working? Paintings not selling? Could be the tangent's fault.

Now I really really have to get to my studying. I have a midterm next Monday and I want to study during the day because I love watching the Olympics at night and don't want to miss. By the way....Zacke Lund in the Skeleton is one of my best friend's nephew. Root for him, okay? He was the one that was kicked out of the 2002 Olympics when he was at the top of his game because of using Rogaine. That was awful and very unjust. He is a gem.

Oh, by the way. That really is an awful picture of my mother besides the tangent. She really is a pretty older women. Sorry, Mom but she's 93 and won't really know. Actually I think she would think it's funny.

Daily Art Tip...Underpaintings Can Make Life a lot Easier!

All of you that are terrified of a white canvas...I'm talking about all of us that are artists. We've all been there in the studio or at school (even scarier) and sat for the longest time without thinking of a thing to paint. They should play the Jaws theme while we're looking at it. Don't do this to yourself! Put an underpainting on it first. It can be almost any color. I like to use brilliant colors and usually the complimentary ones. This does take bravery as it's hard to visualize what to do with it and makes it a bit tricky to paint over. If you aren't that brave put down a pastel of that or do like the masters and use a brown underpainting. Just get something on there right away. Now-no subject matter? How about the doodles? What have we been talking about these past few days? The doodles can give you the best and most original ideas.

Art tip for the day...Turn that Painting UPSIDE DOWN!

Well, this is a real life saver sometimes. If you're painting isn't working out or just doesn't have pizazz-turn it upside down and you will be able to see what's not working. Are the colors presented in a consistent way, is the composition too dominant in one area, is it top heavy, etc.? You will be able to see it almost every time. Also, you know how it's hard to get something right sometimes. If you look at it in a totally different way you'll see it. A face turned upside down isn't really processed in our brains as that. Our brain sees shapes. So paint or draw the shapes around the troubled area. Then when you turn it around you'll be so surprised to see that it looks so much better and maybe, even, just right.

So, see this painting up above? Well, it's just half of it. I couldn't for the life of me figure out what was bugging me about the feet. When I turned it around I realized that the feet were just right but the color wasn't. The black boots blend into the shadows too much and it makes the feet look too big. I tried to lighten the boots to no avail. So, I realize now that I need to change the color. I'm thinking red or light blue. The red would be good (but kind of unrealistic, don't you think?) as it's a warm color and would stand out from the cool shadows. Although the light blue might work out just as well because it would lighten it up. Grrrrr. These types of problems can really be a challenge. This painting was a prize winner (I think I got second place in the Murray art show) but didn't make it to the top. It could be that one thing that's just not right-the shoes. I'm going to talk about the "one wrong thing" another day.

By the way-these are my sons, Charlie, Kip, and Cliff. Actually it was really 3 strange men that I took a picture of at the closing ceremonies for the 2002 Olympics here in Utah. They were so cute but I got to thinking that the painting would mean more if I put someone in it that I know. These are not perfect portraits, by the way, as I wasn't going for that.

Art tip for the day...It's Okay to Give Up but Reconfigure if you can!

It's OKAY to throw away your painting if you don't like it. As artists we always hate to do that. It's like you have to chop off our arm to part with one. This is another tip from my art teacher, Robert Rumel. I learned how to do this. In fact there are probably some garbage men with some of my paintings that I put on top of the trash (or they may have squished them and called it good). My sister was working on a painting of a swamp in the south and got sick of it. She put it out for trash but changed her mind. When she went out there it was gone! But you do have to be careful. Consider whether you can cut it down and save some of the good elements. If it's canvas it can always be re stretched. Back to the garbage men's paintings-There's one that I did of my husband in high school with his old Rocket car. I wish I could get it back and save that part. It was just the scenery we didn't like.

Another thing you can do is cut it up into smaller pieces and use what you've done as underpainting. That works out quite well because you will get some elements that you like and you might want to include them in your new painting. Or you can just paint over the whole thing but you have to be careful if you do. You can't paint over acrylics with oils. It will peel off. So, you would have to continue with oils (you can paint over acrylic with oils just fine as long as they are a nonslick finish type).

Tomorrow I'll tell you about one painting I did resurrect. That will be my tip of the day as it includes some new ideas.

Today's Art Tip...Always Think of Yourself as an Aritist!

Always consider yourself an artist. Don't doubt as to whether you are or not. You create, don't you? My best teacher, Robert Rumel, always had us start our art class with a blank piece of paper. On it we had to write "I am an artist" 10 times. Then do circles all over it in a conscious way. This was called our affirmations. It affirmed that we are, indeed, artists. Sometimes it needs to be drilled into our heads-by ourselves-our worst critic.

Today's Art Tip...Doodle and Sketch!

Hi every creative person out there. I just thought as I was an art teacher for 11 years I should share some of my wisdom...daily, if I can.

Try to sketch as much as possible. Keep the sketches (even the ones that you do in the phone book) if they are cool ones. They're so fun to look back on and they will give you ideas for other projects. I used to bribe my young art students to bring their "doodles". I put an envelope in the back of their sketch books so they could save them. The prize was chintzy, candy, but they loved it. It also was a good way to measure how they were feeling-I cared a lot about them. I hope they still have those sketch books as they will be treasures....plus there are a lot of great drawing exercises that we did.

Oh, the type of pen I use is one that will sketch. Don't use a heavy duty gel pen. Don't use a pencil because it forces you to draw freely and that way your sketches won't look overworked.

Do you have any great art tips? I'D LOVE TO HEAR FROM YOU! So would other artists who are always searching for the right ideas to improve their art. These tips could be for any type-such as painting, photography, sculpture, etc. You get the idea, right?

What I do in church when I should be listening (I am I am)

So, here you go. Here's what I do to help myself listen better. Honestly I really do pay attention a lot better this way as I don't fall asleep. Plus I have these nifty little pics in my sketch book (that Cliff gave me....thank you very much, Cliff). I've been working on my painting downstairs in the dungeon but here's something new to all of you guys-even though some of these are actually fairly old.

Oh, I need to add that these are not perfect perspective and resemblance wise either as they are what they are....SKETCHES...get it?