Carrasco Studio

Journey to Far Cathay

 

Journey to Far Cathay (maybe)                                         ©Jennifer M. Carrasco 2008

 

I painted this on a panel for a door to a little girl's bedroom.  Of course I made up a story for it.

The princess is sailing for Far Cathay to be married to a barbarian prince.  Hence the pensive attitude. 

She is accompanied by her duenna, the old crow in the bow, and an unreliable crew of flighty birds.  She may never arrive in Cathay. 

Who knows, the sailor birds may lose their compass and sail to Tasmania. Or drop off the edge of the world.

©Jennifer M. Carrasco 9/17/09  All blog entries on this site, visual or intellectual, are the property of Jennifer M. Carrasco (unless stated otherwise) and cannot be reproduced or used without her written permission.

Watercolor Lesson 6, CandP Coffee House..Water, Reflections and Inspirations

Lesson 6  Water, Reflections and Inspirations CandP class.
 
Winslow Homer   Bermuda sloop

1.  Take a look at the Homer painting.....can you see the reflection AND the shadow.  Using color swatches from the paint store, see if you can match values and hues.

  John Singer Sargeant                                       Capri waters

John Singer Sargeant

John Singer Sargeant          Valdosta Stream

Show Sargent and Thulow water paintings....how do they do it. (I'm pretty sure that the Valdosta painting by Sargeant is an oil, but it could be a lovely watercolor as well....the man had staggering abilities).

START WITH A WASH first....drop in some warmer colors. 1. Many times, you need WAIT until dry before applying the next layer. 2. Do not scrub. 3. Start with a big brush.(I think these are the three main problems)..and show that a lot of white isn’t really white..can be too “jumpy”. Try toning all of paper down down with a pale wash first....LET DRY BEFORE APPLYING ANY MASKOID.

Thulow           Water Mill

2.  Demo wave examples.........show paintings....different types of marks...squiggly, subtle, choppy.....all of them have the attribute of being  more or less horizantal to the viewer. (HORIZON) (Varies, depending on the choppiness or  how the water is traveling...i.e, waterfalls, rapids, rollers and waves,  stormy weather at sea, etc.) Show smooth waves and more choppy.  Take a look at the Winslow Homer examples below.

3. Practice brush strokes.....rollers, smooth waves, choppy. patterns for warm up....then work on your own painting.

4. My heartfelt thanks to Brian Neher at http://www.portraitartist.com/neher (on Facebook) for his wonderful compendium of artists from the past.  Not only has his site been a wonderful source for teaching, but he has given artists a  huge compilation of inspiration and pleasure....I have spent hours looking at the examples he has selected for his albums.  Check out his site....and enjoy...and admire Brian's own work as a very accomplished painter and portraitist in his own right.

So Long for Awhile!  Paint in the Rain, Paint in the Sun....each mistake, each improvement moves you along. You have achieve Long Strides in the world of Watercolor.  Remember, make big shadows!   Your Admiring Teach.  JC

A Stone, A Leaf, An Unfound Door: Drawing Class # 5, Perspective and Negative Space

                                              Interior by Vilhem Hammershoei  1905

...a stone, a leaf, an unfound door: of a stone, a leaf, a door.  And of all the forgotten faces.....O lost, and by the wind grieved, ghost, come back again.                                                                                                                                 Thomas Wolfe....Look Homeward Angel.

In my first semester of college, I was placed in a class where my job was To Read Books.  I was in bliss. I was so low in my math skills that I barely qualified for bonehead math, but I was able to sidle into a higher level English class where all I had to do was  read books and write about what I read.  One of these books was Thomas Wolfe's, "Look Homeward Angel", and it was perfect for an 18 year old in love with literature.  I would clutch the book under my arm to class, to dinner (if I could get away with it...formal dinners were expected even in the dorms at that time) and on my way back from the library in the evening.  My campus was snowbound and cold in the winter, and I would slip and fall, and the book would skitter across the ice and stop in a snowbank.  I loved the book, still have the tattered copy with me, and its forward has haunted me ever since.

That metaphor of the open door, opening upon door upon door..... An enfilade into more mysteries and experience. Like Thomas Wolfe's book, like art, like drawing, .... a journey far too prolix and more than a little mad.

1  Discuss Chapter 7....Pass out Temple Grande page on the conflict between verbal and visual information.

2.  Show Tony Ryder’s method of blocking in.... .Relationships    Basic unit...figure...often the length and width of the head.
 


3. Basic Unit.....review. pg. 126.. the correct Basic unit controls the rest of your drawing....Remember Tony Ryder......boat...vertical unit, for me, is easier....use the horizontal and vertical of paper format to check angles.  Draw angles of Hopper painting...each shape...start with largest and get smaller and smaller. 

Choose the main vertical as your basic unit.  What direction should you have in your format?  No shading, just contour ....can use ruler if you like.


5. Drawing a stepladder.  Hold up viewfinder so the stepladder touches at least three edges of the viewfinder.  Keep the viewfinder in the same position and close one eye.    Focus on negative spaces around stepladder....first draw negative spaces around viewfinder.  Check the angles and lengths with a basic unit and the verticals and horizontals of the paper format.  Then start on the interior negative spaces....again, check the angles and lengths.

Assignment...Draw the Ballerina....negative space.......shared edges between the positive and negative..  Double check angles and curves with horizontal and vertical edges of the paper.  Come up with your definition of art....Read chapter 8

.......And watch for negative and positive confusions.....

 

Monkey Men                                               MC Escher                                   

"....If the red slayer think he slays,

Of if the slain think he is slain,

They know not well the subtle ways

I keep,  and pass, and turn again."

                                                        Ralph Waldo Emerson, from Brahma                                                                                                              

Water Reflections and Shadows Lesson 5, Watercolor

                                               Shojin Lake by Mount Fuji, 1934                                       Koitsu Tsuchiya  

No, alas, I did not do this lovely wood block print.  But I have stood on the shores of this lake. and one time when I took the bullet train from Iwakuni to Tokyo, an Australian business man sitting next to me swore that the CEO's of Sony and Panasonic lived in the clouds in the summit of Fuji.  " Economic Gods,"  he added in case I didn't catch the joke.

This print could drive you crazy if you give it much thought.  I mean, which came first, the mountain or the sailboat....in the reflection.   Not only is this a beautiful piece of art, but it also calls our attention to the surface, the horizontal plane of the water, and how objects are  reflected in long or short  narrow horizontal shapes on that plane.  And how did the sailboat end up sailing on top of the mountain, anyhow?

1.  Look at assignments.....compare light or dark with value strip.  Adding yellow?  (doesn’t brighten)...cobalts are lighter than pthalos,  some quinacridrones are lighter  than their bluish tones suggest.  Value= tone.

2. A reflection is not a shadow. A shadow appears as an absence of reflection...a whole shape in still water,
a broken shape in disturbed water (as with a reflction). A shadow will let you see below to an undefined or defined undersurface.               
4.  Hand out Patricia Seligman’s printout and discuss. Weak light, pale shadows, strong light, strong shadows.
“Shadows are cast away from the light. As long as there is light in the sky, the reflection of the tree will always come toward you.  The shadow, though is cast away from the light, only coming toward you if the tree is backlit.”  Patricial Seligman...How to Paint Water
5. Paint work on your waterscape and boat(s) or try painting the boat and shadow sample from P. Seligman’s book.. ...or a waterscape from one of my books.

6. Assignment: Read page 68 to 69.

And I spent a very pleasant hour, albeit a gray and rather damp one, doing some small gray and rather damp sketches of Elliot Bay and Seattle.  We were on Alki Point, and it was soooooo peaceful.  Our big thrills were the waves stirred up by ferry.  A couple of times I thought I was giving my precious Da Vinci brush to the fishes.

Gurgle and Slosh...Watercolor lesson 4

I must apologize for the quality of these photos...it was evening in my studio, and I was painting and photographing at the same time!

Watercolor Lesson 4...Fall class...CandP

Read these directions all the way through before you start. (up to “Assignment”)  Sequence is important because of drying time!!!!!

 Washes.  Prepare and tape two pieces of paper.

     1. prepare an intense dark value of blue.  Then mix your primaries for a warm dark         brown neutral. Have   enough of all these in your sauce cups or wells for two                     paintings.  Don’t be stingy.   
    2.  Wet all of 1st  paper with your big soft brush.

    3.   With the blue value paint, start painting with your big brush at the top of your 1st paper, catching the   “lip” of the color as you go down, adding water as you go and fade out to no color about 1/3 way down   the paper.Wet second paper and do the same.

       4.Pick up some clouds with your brush or paper towel.  Do this for both.

  5.  Turn your papers upside down, re-wet your paper if you need to, and do the same with your warm umber...fading to no color about 1/3 toward the middle of the paper.

4.  Examine some of the possiblities  of images in my photos for your “tide pools”  make some quick sketches. Don’t spend more than 15 minutes at this. (time yourself!)

5. Painting the images.  With the warm umber, paint in your rocks....start in the ‘‘back”  or 1/3 up from the bottom of the paper, adding rocks down to the bottom, getting darker in value  as you reach the bottom.  Remember, relative size (smaller=far away) as well as lighter value =farther away.

LIGHTLY sketch in some tidal critters....shells, fish, coral, kelp, crab, etc etc. and paint them with colors of your choosing.  Use stains, if you can, since you don't want to lift the images when you glaze over them.

HAVE SOME FUN....DON’T BE WORRIED ABOUT MAKING THINGS LOOK TOO “ REAL”  Just, for each color remember....lighter values can appear farther away, and smaller relative shape (Big Dark Shark vs. small light shark) can create a feeling of distance.

6.  Masking fluid can be fun...you can block out shapes you want to remain white.

7. Decide where you want your horizon line......you can tape it if you want.  From that line, do a wash of greenish blue.  Cobalts are great for this, but use what you have. (It will be hard to remove stains)  Start with your big soft brush and  intense color at the horizon line , like you did for the sky and let it fade to nothing by about 1/4 down at the bottom of the paper.  Wash over your critters lightly . Don’t stroke too much and lift the paint!   Come to the water’s edge (1/4 left! ) let it dry. )

At the bottom of the paper, define the wet edge of the sand and water with some intense fading umber (Wet the edge first), perhaps going around a few shells and rocks.        Let it dry.  Work on your other painting.

Come back to the first painting when it is dry and paint in some ripples and swells and little waves by either adding or subtracting paint. Soften the horizon edge a bit with a damp stiff brush.  Remove some paint to include the sail of the sailboat on the horizon.  Add some darker values for the rocks or seal or whatever poking above the waterline.

Assignment: Read  pgs 86 to 87 and 122 to 123   and finish your second painting and bring to class.  Come to class with  two taped pieces  of 1/8 size paper

Valentines and the Perils of True Romance

 
Happy Valentine's to all of you!  These Valentines are about the dangers and thrills of true romance.  In this Valentine, Cupid is winching up the Ship of Love through perilous waters and contrary winds, not to mention raging tigers and lions in the jungles.  However, safe harbor is in sight.

 This Valentine has somewhat the same message.  Beware of ravenous fish, crepuscular
crocidiles and sneering giraffes (cynics are the worst).  Just sail toward the sun.

Love, Jennifer

The Romance of Flying Fish

In 1966 my girlfriend Norma and I flew with some other Peace Corps friends to Zamboanga, Mindanao, and then on to Jolo in the Sulu Sea via a smuggler’s boat.  We left at night with a case of San Miguel beer and not much more than a promise from a cute guy I met on the plane that this boat would get us to Jolo and maybe beyond, if we so desired.  Beyond was Borneo, which we seriously considered.  The boundaries of the Philippines and Borneo were so permeable as to be nonexistent, and if we had decided to go on to that Sultanate we might even now be at the bottom of the Sulu Sea or languishing in some harem, or more likely, as slaves in a house of prostitution. Since we had to be back at our school to teach in two weeks, the mundane trumped the glamorous, and I am here to tell my story.

It has to do with memories of flying fish, called up by this sumptuous illustration of the creature  by Aldovandi (1522-1605).

Our Jolo trip has stories within stories, but this memory is about a full moon shining on a glassy sea, and the boat churning out phosphorous in the rear.....and  flying fish, leaping and gliding along our boat like small winged dolphins. They would rise, sparkle silver in the moonlight and fall like swords into the sea, except for the few that thumped onto the deck. Norma and I gathered around one fish to watch it as its colors, rainbow at first, faded to blue and then dark grey. A shawled Muslim woman came up silently behind us and picked up the fish from the deck, deftly filleted it with a sharp knife she carried in her belt, and motioned to us to come with her down into the hold.  There was a small box of sand  on the floor with a brazier with charcoal, and she lit the charcoal with a twist of paper and roasted the fish.  It was cooked in minutes, and we shared a flying fish snack.  Chewy (all muscle, this fish!), without seasoning, but certainly fresh.

Later, full of beer and worn out from the excitement, I crawled into one of the wooden bunks to sleep in the captain’s cabin. The captain, while polite, paid me little attention as he steered the boat through the shining sea. Mild breezes came in through the open doors and windows and while the bunks had no mattresses or pillows, I was grateful for a place to sleep.  Twenty-five and exhausted, I slept dreamlessly until sunrise, and  woke to the sound of the captain singing a minor song, a high ululation in an unfamiliar dialect.  Rising on my elbows, I saw that we were sailing through a pink fog where flying fish were arching in gleaming loops of mercury, slip, curve and shatter.

 It was so splendid and strange. For a half hour I dangled my legs over the edge of the bunk and looked out at a gauzy apricot world flashing with our glittering winged armada. The captain sang, the fish flew, and  I almost forgot to breathe.

 

Princess Boatrides Painting and Sailing in General

I did this as a demo piece for some trade shows and it sails sedately in the back part of my studio now.

The princess is from far Cathay, but her crew are mercenaries, and not at all reliable, in spite of the vigilant old crow duenna. (with umbrella)  The dolphins, of course, take nothing seriously, and don't care a whit about princesses nor destinations.  So, the princess dreams on (about her lover? chocolates? unbinding her feet?) and willy-nilly, sails to a distant unknown port.

I love sailing as a metaphor, but get bored with the actual process. Also, I am a little vague about directional issues, so lee and port and aft confuse me.

 After I got out of Peace Corps Philippines in 1967, I went to Manila and taught in a little nursery kindergarten....art and music, two shifts a day. During that time  I tied in with the two Bello brothers, Walden and Dennis, and started going out to their island home in the middle of Laguna de Bay, a huge freshwater lake about an hour out of Manila.  I would take a jeepney out of town to the town of Cardona and walk down to the end of the dock to the fisherman's tavern and ask someone to row me over to the Bello island (which they named Ceilito Lindo).  It would be dark by then, but in the 15 minutes it took to get to the island, one of the brothers would see our light, and I could watch them swinging their own light as they stepped down the long stairway that led up from their dock to their stone house . Dennis would tie up the boat, and we would trot back up and up to the very tip of the island and the house. That night I would sleep under starched white sheets and look out an open window down onto the lake, and see the fisherman's sailing boats ...."armadahans", they called them, silently drift in the moonlight across the great silver lake like ghostly moths...their two sails swelling in the night wind.

Later, Walden and I and another friend, Dick Ng, went together on  commissioning our own armadahan, and Dennis supervised the building of it.  We picked out the proper keel in the keel making barrio (the knot holes had to be in the proper place since they were the eyes and the heart (corazon) of the boat) and when it was done, we sailed it for 2 years. 

As I mentioned, I am an indifferent sailor and the boom kept knocking me in the water, so the guys tied a rope on me so they could drag me out of the drink easily, dazed or not.

Here's a picture (damaged) of our boat, and one of me doing my main job....going out on the outrigger to balance the boat.