inspiration Archives - Page 3 of 17

June 7, 2021October 17, 2024

Style, subject, techniques: change is inevitable

Tree and poppies, textured acrylic painting

Paint features for interesting techniques

Acrylic paint is extremely versatile and it can be applied in numerous ways and using countless techniques. It’s water-soluble, has hardly any smell. It consists of pigment particles dispersed in an acrylic polymer emulsion. When it dries, it becomes hard and changes color. Paints which contain more fillers and binders, but less pigments, become darker. However, properties of this paint make it possible to use many layers and it could be used as a glue. All these features are perfect for creating very textured art, sometimes, it can be described even as sculpted.

Textured art

I created the first textured paintings around 2007. Since then, there have been so many from very large 6 feet by 4 feet to small ones, just 12 x 10 in. They sometimes sold very swiftly. I do not have any pictures of some. I didn’t try to showcase very textured paintings on my website, too, because pictures never looked right. As you could imagine: the highest areas of textured surface capture light more and camera creates a total disbalance of colors and contrast, therefore, these pictures are always off. In reality, however, they are extremely attractive and impressive works of art.

Old tree painting, textured painting — The old tree, 14 x 11 in or 36 x 28 cm

Vintage frames for impressive art

I went through my inventory recently since I have more time before live art classes resume. I added a new protective layer, so they are as bright and neat as brand new, not to mention removing some dust from corners and frames. The vintage frames which will be visible in some pictures are really old, but they make any art look like real art. I didn’t restore them to the extent they’d lose the feel of being old. The imperfections help them look more authentic.

Pears still life painting — Pears still life, 12 x 10 in or 30.5 x 20.5 cm

Poppy painting, textured painting — Textured poppies, 12 x 10 in or 30.5 x 20.5 cm

Distinctive creative periods

As I go through all my collections and create new products for sale pages, I cannot help but notice how each creative period is distinct with the use of specific color palette or subject. I’ve had the warm, earthy color period, the many shades of grey painting chapter, vivid blue and green landscape phase, as well as passion period for white, pink and red floral art, and then there are series of still life, birches and snow scenes. Reflecting on creative path from a distance of almost 20 recent years clearly reveals how I liked or disliked some colors and subjects over time.

Welcoming change

I wouldn’t say that paintings from 2010 are better than the ones from 2015, or the recent ones are the best. They are different, and each period of my creative journey emphases the dominant vision of that particular time span. We as humans change, and imagine the boredom if we as artists wouldn’t step off the beaten path! In fact, the greater the challenge, the more I love my new creations whether that refers to techniques, materials, subject or color palette. The pictures show art created around 2008 and up to 2015.

Time-consuming, yet, gorgeous

I used to paint everything as pairs of the same subject, quite frequently. I still continue that way, not with every single artwork, but there are many “twins” in my collections. The nicest feature is they work as series right away and look extraordinary great on the wall. Textured paintings are usually abstract by nature. While I am creating the texture layer, there is no outline, color or value. These are added later with layers of paint. Colors of textured art change depending on light and its placement. Photos capture some moments in time in a light which was present, and it might be that these images are able to convey the context and thought within the actual painting.

Art for sale, textured acrylic paintings

I hope this post inspires you to paint and create, as well as there might be somebody who loves the current featured paintings. I’d like to mention, that this is the first time images of these particular paintings are published. I will add them to art deals page soon, as well:

All other acrylic paintings can be seen here:

Shop original acrylic paintings

Thanks for reading!

April 11, 2021October 17, 2024

Isolation or not, life goes on, art gets created

How to paint apple blossoms in watercolor

Creativity drives life in isolation

I think I’ve seen thousands of articles by now where somebody says how bad they feel about isolation and how they have lost the sparkle of creativity and inspiration. Well, maybe they didn’t have any creative ideas already before the pandemic because as I see it, creativity keeps flowing and life goes on no matter what. Especially during isolation, we are more creative with everything, aren’t we? There is also so much advice what to do. Sometimes, I feel like everybody wants to give me some advice. The truth is our situations are so different that what works for that particular person, is often meaningless for me. We are all smart now, and we should be aware what works best for us. I personally prefer reading more about experiences.

Switching tasks

Generally speaking, I’ll do what I have intended anyway, or I won’t engage in what I believe is a pointless action. I don’t really need encouragement or push: when the time is right, everything will happen. I’ve been painting here and there, just as I always do. The weather has turned very spring-like, therefore, I’ve been busy with garden works: digging soil, removing waste. I didn’t have the right mood to publish anything, – heavy physical work can be very tiring. My idea was to continue with the series I just started and share drawings, but I ended up working on a few watercolors which were started probably 4 or 5 years ago. I had reference drawings, but none of them seemed to be exactly of these paintings, therefore, I just worked from imagination.

Isolation art, apple blossoms — Watercolor painting of apple blossoms, I am trying to show the size in my studio corner.

Painting progress with steps

I found this painting with light washes on the background and just one watercolor paint layer on apple blossoms and buds. Normally, the first step means to transfer the drawing onto watercolor painting, adjust it and make sure there are no strong pencil lines. After that, we start adding watercolor paint as we see fit. I usually add the first layer of paint on areas with the potentially strongest values.

Supply shortages

The first months of spring season always feel like a new beginning, a fresh breath. Except this year, we are again in a complete lockdown in Ontario, just like the year before. That doesn’t affect what I do too much, but there is a shortage of supplies. When I was at the art store last time, shelves were very empty. My favorite brands were pretty much absent, that included colors which are used more frequently for acrylic painting: artist grade Titanium white, Burnt Sienna, Burnt Umber, Golden Ochre, Carmine Red, different shades of yellow were not available. I use preferably Lamp black, that wasn’t available either. I ordered paints online once and the waiting was 6 weeks, therefore, I’m not doing that again.

Apple blossoms, watercolor painting — This is the ready watercolor painting of apple blossoms. Its size is 15.5 x 20.5 in or 39 x 51 cm I hope your device shows correct colors and contrast because they differ from device to device.

Accepted into spring art show “Roots of art”

I just received an email notification that my paintings have been accepted into a virtual annual art show. Before pandemic, this was a live, real, very busy and well-attended art show. The show is local and that fits me well. Since I hope more traffic will come toward my website, I’ll need to spend more hours updating everything. It’s a time-consuming task and requires attention, therefore, that is my priority for a while. Including portfolio would be difficult because of all media options I use and various subjects. There is so much art in each category! I have currently 3 pages which display my available art. Acrylic paintings need the quickest update, however.

Inese’s original watercolor paintings

Inese’s original acrylic paintings

Special featured art, originals

You are very welcome to check out and see the progress of these pages.

As always, have a look at greeting cards, puzzles, coffee mugs, notebooks and art prints with numerous framing options:

Art collections by Inese Poga

Thanks for reading, stopping by and leaving a comment if you have time! Have great springtime!

March 4, 2021October 17, 2024

Landscapes which live in my memory

Places where I have spent most part of my life, do not stand out with spectacular landscapes. I don’t usually paint mountains, oceans, seaside or waves. I’ve seen them, but I have hard times recalling such views in detail which is necessary for creation of painting from memory. Many of these paintings were also started a long time ago just as a demo for my live art classes. That means, I’ve spent very limited time painting them during the class. My main focus was what students learned from each process and less an attempt to create a masterpiece.

Therefore, I had to change some parts, add finishing touches, increase strong values, add strong highlights, refine some details and mask out some other parts. These landscapes are views from my memory and imagination, they might or might not exist, but I usually want the subject to be recognizable without long explanations. I suppose, I’ve said it quite a few times that I’m not thrilled about small size, like 16 x 20 in or 41 x 51 cm paintings of complex views and detailed subject. For me personally, the most comfortable size for acrylic is approximately 30 x 24 in or 76 x 61 cm and for watercolor: full sheet which is most often 30 x 22 in or 76 x 56 cm. Such size allows implementing aspects which are very important in painting: decent values, decent size subject, powerful color switches and a few outstanding details.

Acrylic painting, country barn with daffodils — Country barn with daffodils is an acrylic painting on 20 x 16 or 51 x 41 cm canvas

The current trend of displaying paintings in clusters is a great one. Even when painting is large, it takes a lot of design skill to make it rather become a part of space than dominate it or disappear in it. Clusters of paintings suit any taste and allow using paintings of small and medium size, too. They do change the mood in room, they can take you to any season or make feel happier in your space. I am not allowed to hang much on walls in my rented space. We tried strips and some of bigger paintings fell down. I didn’t even attempt hanging the huge and large watercolor paintings that way.

Spring creek, acrylic painting — Spring at creek, acrylic painting on 20 x 16 in or 51 x 41 cm canvas

The history and story behind these paintings is the same, but some are pretty much painted from new. You can do that in acrylic, no problem. In fact, I think acrylic looks better with numerous layers, – the more, the better. Colors become intense and also change in different light settings, the most dramatic parts become textured and that looks really adorable. These paintings have taken weeks to accomplish letting dry between layers. I know how little of that is visible in an online image, but the presence is still there.

Acrylic painting, spring creek — Along the spring creek is a multilayer acrylic painting on 20 x 16 in or 51 x 41 cm canvas

Painting spring in acrylic — I use fairly limited number of paints, black, white, burnt umber, warm and cold yellow and blue

Since I spent 46 years in Latvia and it’s not even twenty in Canada yet, the subject of my painted landscapes is associated most often with Latvian countryside, Latvian country roads, gardens and plants, as well as with nature in Latvia. The area around Ajax where I live now is similar, but I would never paint the local box-like boring buildings which really offend one’s esthetic principles. That’s why we have imagination and can travel back in memories to any season, any place and any emotion that provoked.

Acrylic painting techniques, creating a book — The image contains painting detail and some color reference for along the spring creek painting

Other than that, I’m finally working on compiling a book of acrylic painting techniques for landscapes, still life and floral art. It is a slow process, and it probably will take numerous hours for creating more pictures, describing tools and efficient process steps, as well as basic principles of painting in any medium since most of them are the same. Creating art should never be struggle, that’s why I will also keep teaching live art classes when we reopen. That might be in July, or August, or September.

Thanks for reading, enjoy!

My art store is not coming along swiftly as I hoped, so for prints, please, go to Fine Art America:

Art collections by Inese Poga

February 8, 2021October 17, 2024

I’d love to take you for a walk in spring forest

Virtual walk in a spring forest

I’d really love to take you outdoors for a walk in a sunny spring forest. Imagine birds chirping, warm air, wild flowers opening buds and trees have gotten their new leaves. Spring forest has green color, and green color is the one which brings hope and calm. Walk in a spring forest would be so great taking into account the double-digit minus degrees in Ontario right now. Painting something which isn’t possible is the best part of creation.

Romantic subjects

A few years ago, we were painting numerous nature scenes in art classes. Students didn’t want to paint abstracts, and I didn’t either. Therefore, we painted numerous birches, flower fields, forest paths and rivers. One might think, it’s kind of too naturalistic way of painting, but it does exactly what I mentioned before: it takes you to places where you cannot be or sometimes – where you’ll never be. Such places might exist only in our imagination, too, but that’s ok.

Mellow-yellow or blue

You will notice how huge the difference is assuming you’re using a color-sensitive device for viewing content of this blog. One picture is blurry to a small extent, but it has practically true colors, cold and warm. It’s taken by the old camera. The other picture is done with iPhone 11 Max Pro and it has wrong warm colors all over it, especially, this mellow-yellow main tone. This phone has so many automated features that one shouldn’t ever hope to get a realistic look.

Spring forest with bluebells,, acrylic painting

Spring forest with blue flowers

Let’s return to the updated spring forest now because that’s where the joy is. I can certainly tell you about colors and you can believe me or not, but the one true thing is these spring paintings look great when looking at them in reality. I have surrounded myself with spring paintings currently to survive winter easier until we get outdoors again. I think I simply need green color. I’m a gardener also, and nothing makes me happier than seeing the first green spouts in the backyard. Spring forest with blue flowers is quite large, too, 20 x 24 in or 51 x 61 cm.

Color discrepancy

The discrepancy of true colors becomes huge issue when publishing pictures of paintings. There is editing, but editing affects the image globally, so the improvement is none or just somewhat acceptable. Realistic, semi-realistic or imagined realism uses both types of color: warm colors and cold colors to make the image work. Now, my iPhone 11 Max Pro doesn’t understand that. I do adjust exposure and switch between lenses, I change the backgrounds and settings, but the outcome is the same. None of my pictures show my paintings as they are.

Visual content

My blog is mainly visual as it should be. After all, I’m a visual artist creating paintings and dealing with images. Painting is ok, but ever since I delegated picture taking to iPhone and the big camera became outdated, I was in trouble. Apart from absurd perspectives, automatic zoom, too strong contrast and deviations from reality, the worst is color deviation. All my painting images have mostly yellow-purple gloom on them, or they look very blue. I later understood that the automated settings can capture only warm colors or only cold colors which is not what art has.

Lost likes and outdated pictures

I am trying to take new pictures and update images on old posts. Pictures from 9 years ago look blurry. I started this website on May 29, 2011. At that time, it was a blog, WordPress dotcom. Moving my extensive blog to a website in 2017 was quite an event. I lost half of images, everything was more or less misplaced. If you go through posts, you will notice how posts before 2017 have many comments, but no likes. Well, you cannot transfer likes. Many followers disappear also. I had to literary rework every single post, and I also deleted many. I’d love to maybe install a new theme, but when I think about images not lining up again and some things looking awkward, I put it off. Too much work.

So, definitely, take a virtual walk and enjoy!

Art prints:

Art collections by Inese Poga

January 25, 2021October 17, 2024

Seasons in art, seasons in life and nature

Living by seasons

I live by seasons, and seasons make me do, want or pursue something specific just like people who lived thousand years ago. I live in expectations of spring during the winter months. I look at trees not that far away, just behind the window glass. Deep down the roots of a tree are alive, and the tree is just collecting and accumulating energy for the big blast of blossoms and buds when the time is right. It’s a very good time to keep refining my skills because we always must go forward. When we believe there is nothing more to learn, we stop moving ahead. The progress ends, and we become old. Who wants that? Nobody!

White forest anemones is a square acrylic painting. This subject has been always very attractive to me.

Lovely green when it’s grey outside

Many artists are genuinely afraid of using green color because it makes painting look abusively green, because nobody likes green on their wall, it is a bad taste and because there are so many colors in the rainbow. Classy art is supposed to have lots of grey, earthy colors, blue shades and different white tones. No green, or at least green with purple neutralizing undertones, red or burnt sienna injections and aqua colors. When I got my first acrylic paints in 2007, I was very fond of them. I come from watercolor and pastel drawing, and I loved the extremely beneficial opportunity to effortlessly create volume with acrylic paints.

My personalized realism

Ever since that first time I got to use acrylic paints, I’ve been extremely happy that I can create anything which looks exactly as I like. People sometimes want to squeeze me in all kinds of categories, and none of them actually fits. I don’t paint realism if we think realism as art genre. The reason for that is I rarely use photographic reference as the base for my painting. I check out parts of my nature views, but I usually have a certain color palette in my mind and I can picture it on the blank canvas. That takes me somewhere, to an imagined landscape or still life components which I visualize. Tackling memorized and imagined views is more difficult than tracing and copying a photo. However, I frequently receive comments in art groups how people can place themselves in my paintings, how they can recall some particular site or place, or feel they are surrounded by my painting.

Spring, forest anemones. This picture was taken with my old Canon camera, and it displays great colors.

Adjusting process

My painting process is simply longer. I go over some areas many times, and I try to achieve exactly what I feel should be there. The difference is, when repainting a photo, you know where what is. I don’t know that because I improvise. I’m usually happy with the result. Then there is picture taking. You have painted a great acrylic or watercolor, you take pictures in different settings with all kinds of backgrounds. Then, you download these hundreds of pictures and it can happen so that not even one is exactly as painting. We can edit pictures, sure, but the changes are global. If the device has added more strong contrast in dark areas and lightened more the light areas, there are just more abnormalities after such editing. Somebody said on their blog (I don’t think they were artist; they just teach artists) that pictures always look better than paintings and that is just not true. I have the opposite experience: paintings look better.

Playing on emotions

So, here you have it: I don’t paint reality except for watercolor still life and some watercolor floral paintings. It isn’t abstract art also because I like my subject to be recognizable, yet, I introduce abstract areas in any painting a lot. I love color and art to impress, but it isn’t impressionism. I love precision of a few details and let go undefined other parts. I stop painting when there is nothing more to say because my art isn’t a demo of technicalities. I always want it to work on the emotional level. Therefore, I cannot say what color I have used on any part, but I can name a few colors which started the painting. I mix these few colors in all possible ways and that unites the painting in one organic bundle. Harmony and balance matter to me a lot, and I do everything in order the view had flowing lines and smooth color transitions.

Artistic spring starts in January

Continuing my long-time tradition, I always paint spring and flowers in winter. These images were supposed to be presented in two posts, but I run out of time, and it’s one post now. I decided to show steps and reveal small painting secrets in PDFs for download. They will come, I’m just a bit too busy at the moment.

I always paint around edges of canvas, thus, extending the image. This allows using painting without a frame.

Healing art

Creativity and necessity to create something new never stop, never go away or cease. 3 things stronger than pain for my own conditions have been drawing and painting, taking care of garden, plants and room plants, as well as reading. It’s been a year we have been struggling with COVID-19, and we have the second complete lockdown here in Ontario. I don’t feel like painting masks on faces or injection needles. There’s already too much of that. The main healer for me is creating something at my own pace. Stay safe! Thanks for reading!

Art prints are available here: Many choices of my paintings

Category: inspiration

Style, subject, techniques: change is inevitable

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Isolation or not, life goes on, art gets created

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Landscapes which live in my memory

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I’d love to take you for a walk in spring forest

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Seasons in art, seasons in life and nature

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If you care, share!

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