Summer and watercolors are inseparable

Summer and watercolor, paint more

A simple way of using watercolor

Summer and watercolor: that is such an artistic combination! Watercolor sketch, pen and watercolor or purely watercolor are excellent ways to paint summer scenes, summer flowers, summer landscapes and simply enjoy the outdoors and beauty. The easiest way to practice painting with watercolors is using pen and watercolor wash.

That enables us creating great composition and not caring too much about pencil lines and perfect application of watercolor.

I said it once and I would love to repeat it: pen and watercolor wash is a great technique for beginning watercolorists. Some like it so much that they stick to this technique and turn it into their personal style.

watercolor painting
Many of watercolor paintings take origin in imagination and do not require a reference.

Save time, paint effortlessly

If you are afraid of drawing with pen, do the initial drawing with pencil. Afterwards, you can draw over with pen and delete everything else. Therefore, we have a beautiful and clean drawing in black ink, and the watercolor paper is not damaged.

The most excited part is adding watercolor washes, as well as more detailed areas with more concentrated paint. We can create a wonderful painting in less time this way because we do not need multi-step drawing transfer onto watercolor paper and it is much easier to know where to use paint because the black outline clearly identifies that.

Real objects make good painting

Summer is definitely a very suitable time for practicing plants, flowers, blooms, vegetables, fruit and all kinds of landscapes and garden scenes.

I find that implementing fence or corner of a building adds additional impact. White or grey fence looks great with flowers and leaves.

What to do with the background?

There are no strict rules about backgrounds and additional details. Very frequently, less is more. Whenever we can, we should simplify our scene and subject. Whether to include a detail of our subject or leave it out usually depends on our style, intention and skill level. Minimalist paintings look as great as maximum realistic paintings; there is no such a thing as mandatory inclusion of detail in a painting. Many beginning artists wonder: what should they do with the background: leave it as is, white, make it dark or add background shapes and colors? That, too, will depend on how you have captured the subject.

watercolor painting, flower painting, poppies
Summer poppies, 12 x 16 in or 30.5 x 40.5 cm

Less can be more

My personal point always is: let the painting or drawing tell you what else to do. It usually does when you look at it carefully and from some distance. Realistically, you should always look at your creation from some distance since being too close to it all the time makes us not notice flaws and strange areas which require improvement. Certainly, step back and have a look. If it is all flat and lacks any dark spots, add some.

Don’t be afraid of darks spots in painting

I find that beginning artists are afraid of dark colors. Even when painting with acrylic where there is no threat of painting something too dark because you can always paint over the first layers and make it noticeably lighter, new artists use no dark color. Having absolutely no dark spots reduces our ability to add volume, impact and impression.

Patience and practice

We all want our art to be great and impressive. However, if you are new to some medium or absolutely new to drawing and painting, you have to bear in mind: nothing happens right away and with the first brush stroke. I have had absolute beginners who were somewhat disappointed that their first piece of art wasn’t a masterpiece. Every skill takes time, efforts and work. However, not being satisfied with the first few drawings and sketches, is no reason to give up painting or drawing. You might be surprised how much better one becomes after a while.

Focus on potential

Focusing on perfection right away will cause you to be disappointed. Any artist will tell you that they have damaged, and thrown out lots and lots of initial sketches, painted over initial scenes, changed the layout and composition completely, switched to a different color or tools: they have done many things before they have gotten to one good painting. Not every drawing or painting is or should be a masterwork. It should be a stepping stone on our way to better us, to better art which we have created.  We use our errors as a way of discovering how to achieve what we want and have intended.

Watercolor paintings by Inese Poga

If you love it, go for it

It doesn’t matter what somebody says about your drawing or painting. They might not be the best critics or they might also praise it too much.  Practice is practice, we have to spend time learning until we get where we want to be. Regardless of how somebody looks at your creation, regardless of how much they praise or criticize it, you have to be realistic and admit what is wrong and what is great to yourself. That will help keeping things that come out great and avoiding or getting rid of things that do not work. Do what you are good at. I hear frequently: I am very bad with whatever, I need to do that. Leave that for later when you have more experience. We should do everything we like and love, at least in art.

Application for art classes: Art classes

Copyright notice: Copyrights of displayed paintings, drawings, images of work in progress and images of finished paintings belong to artist Inese Poga. The use of painting and drawing images is prohibited if I have not issued a written permission. That includes no pinning policy.

Celebrate in style: the best way to get into Christmas mood

Christmas mood, small paintings

Robins, cardinals, fun and Christmas mood

Christmas mood must be intentionally created. Original art has a special attraction, energy and flare to it, therefore, it really helps. I don’t think there can be too much art on any walls. I have usually some 200 works of art on display in my studio gallery, and it does not feel overwhelming or crowded. I rotate my art depending on demand and season. It feels very appropriate to have snow scenes and winter villages on display when Christmas is around the corner, and it is very obvious that spring flowers blossom around the gallery in spring.

Christmas mood: Bird paintings

Fantastic small bird paintings

I have a special love to small birds. I preferred them to any other creatures already as a kid. I assume that one should only paint what they know. I watch these birds during any season, and I have hundreds of sketches which I can turn into artworks later. I painted this particular painting “Robins, winter” last year. I painted 6 bird paintings. As it frequently happens, I felt I wanted to improve the color balance. So, I added a few more layers of paint to this painting. I believe it became better and birds are more bird-like, as well. The entire scene is lovely and welcoming and speaks for itself – it works very well for Christmas mood.

Christmas mood: robins

Robins, winter, 16 x 20 in (41 cm x 51 cm) acrylic painting on canvas, sold

Festive gift painting workshop

I  invite everybody to participate in a festive workshop at the beginning of December to try out how nice of an adventure it is to create something heart-warming and cheerful. We can choose the image, and some people usually prefer winter scenes, some illustration or wall decoration type of art, as well as some might go for birds. We also paint poinsettias almost every winter. I must admit, that is a subject which always works well on canvas and paper and looks great.

Christmas mood: Bird paintings in acrylic

Create the mood, create the gift

The best way to get into Christmas mood is to create art that suits the season. Let us celebrate in style with original art this year! Please let me know if you like “Robins, winter” painting and whether you’d love me to ship it to you!

Wall Art

Art prints and other artistic products are available from Fine Art America., just click on image.

Celebrate in style, Christmas gifts

My favorite from all products with this particular painting is the spiral notebook. It looks unbelievably good! Mugs also look impressive, so do actually lots of my art products and art prints.

Here is how you get to purchase many fantastic prints and similar artsy things at very attractive prices: Art collections by Inese Poga

Christmas mood

Celebrate in style and have a wonderful Christmas mood!

Celebrate in style: art that suits any taste, first featured painting

Celebrate in style

Celebrate in style

Celebrate in style includes my creations which I will post as frequently as I can taking into account that every painting takes between 6-8 hours a day. I also create decorations for display at store front. Plenty of very attractive three-dimensional paintings and gift paintings are available every holiday season from my art studio.

Celebrate in style

Winter trees under snow: great subject

Such art can be a great gift or a fantastic decoration. Winter trees are so adorable, and when the first snow is falling  getting into the holiday and Christmas spirit is easy. Having this simple, yet beautiful tree on a wall is also a pleasure. I finished painting this tree image set and I could not stop enjoying and looking at it.

Celebrate in style

Idea and its implementation

The idea comes from the internet. I saw somebody had painted simple outlines and text on the wood, and I really liked the idea of creating such beautiful look. I just had to figure out how to achieve this without wood. I simply did not have any, especially suitable pieces. Well, I usually create what I do not have. The wood textures are painted on a regular canvas panel. This painting has  touchable and visible texture, it even feels like wood.

Celebrate in style

December painting workshops

We will have workshop on December 9th. If you are not that far and reside in Durham region, Ontario, you certainly could take part and paint something similar for your own pleasure. Please apply here:  Art classes

Rustic and cozy style

This time, I am featuring a rustic Christmas tree painting that goes well with rustic style. This painting is acrylic and texture medium on 20 x 16 in canvas (or 51 x 41 cm). The background imitates wood, and it is also painted around the edges, so it does not need any frame. Extra textured tree with beautiful snowflakes, I hope you love it!

Celebrate in style

Let us celebrate in style this year! It is nice to have something original on the wall. It is absolutely ok to create something when we cannot buy it. Enjoy and let me know if I can ship this wonderful rustic tree painting to you!

Art is created in a different dimension

Art is even more than meditation. It transfers us to a different place, it happens in a different dimension and it results in a completely different experience. Just like most of us, I need to shut off the world here and there: to recharge, regain energy and clean my internal vision.

Painting takes away from any troubles and transfers us into the work we are creating, into another dimension. It is totally possible to forget to eat, to forget what the weather outdoors is; what day it is and whether there are some urgent chores to be done. The funny thing is that everybody can get into it. I certainly would advise to experience a moment when everything else disappears, but art is all that matters.

art dimension

“Love veggies” painting is available from studio and this website

art dimension

Ash berries or rowan berries, watercolor

art dimension

Sunflower sketch

art dimension

I also got better pictures of sunflower sketch and ash berries. I am in the middle of a creative uplifting swing. I hope it takes me somewhere to higher grounds. Thanks for reading!

Different approach to art class: focus on relaxing and stress-free creativity

Watercolor paints

Creativity for an art class

As the fall of 2017 is approaching, my new art class focus on stress-free environment and creative techniques. Students can learn, paint and relax letting all concerns and problems go. The key to creativity is being relaxed and not expecting miracles, but creating them: one small miracle at a time. I noticed that some students were taking art classes way too seriously, and being worried does not allow achieving great results.

Forget concerns and technical perfection

I want this to be a welcoming stress-free environment for creation so that purely technical goals become secondary. Traditional art instruction pays too much attention to the technical execution leaving the emotional and mental side neglected. That is why some artists go for big lengths: trace and copy photos, repaint everything which is in digitally adjusted photo. What about creativity? Going for photographic perfection frequently lacks the emotional aspect. I’d like to emphasize: the creative process is the most valuable part of the artistic journey.

Country barn, spring, art class subject

Don’t limit yourself

Perfection in art is not the best goal because it simply prevents from unfolding our creative potential and limits the range of tools and techniques we apply. I hear this quite frequently: I’m not touching this painting anymore because I do not want to damage it. Well, leaving work unfinished isn’t good either. Limitless creativity takes us much further. You will learn effortless and, thus, stress-free techniques to avoid leaving work unfinished in my art class.

Live versus online art class

I also wanted to make an art class which is impossible to replicate online. The content of this art class rests on the presence and the interaction between me, group and everybody as an individual. The live art class allows me seeing and noticing why something does not work and why students cannot achieve the result they are looking for.

Watercolor, abstract leaves, painted in art class

Artistic experience

I will gear everything towards a great, interesting, amazing and positive experience. That means learning about oneself and art, and learning to be creative without the annoying pressure which some teaching venues want to impose on somebody who is looking for a new skill and ability.

Watercolor reflection painting for art class

Painted images diary

We will use blocks of paper, so that at the end of this  positive painting session  everybody will have an image diary and will be able to continue adding creations. Inspiration and immersion in calm, creative environment is what one can find engaging in art.

Backyard watercolor painting, art class

Emotional satisfaction

I believe, this type of art class where experience and activity flow together creating emotional satisfaction, thus, being stress-free and providing with a new perspective on the bothersome issues in one’s life, will be appreciated. It’s interesting that I was away and did not do any advertising so far, but people were applying already, in fact, a lot of people. That included the new daytime watercolor painting class.

Wash paintings without drawing

I am adding as illustration brushstroke and wash only painting. We use only watercolor paint and water, and we watch what happens and how our thoughts and ideas look on paper. Watercolor paintings without drawing:  it is fun, relaxing brushing and interesting flow of pigment:

Stress-free painting - maple leaf sketch

Choose your own subject

Participants will have a lot of choice: they can draw, they can use pen or they can also do very abstract or semi-abstract art for their image diary. That’s why it’s called: stress relief with color and line. Art classes are for everybody because we will be using only our personal preferences with colors, subjects and the way they look.

Sign up here: Art classes

Find out more: Inese’s blog