magnolia painting Archives - INESE'S ART STUDIO

January 8, 2021October 17, 2024

Good addition to my watercolor flower collection

Watercolor flower collection, flower paintings

My watercolor flower collection grew noticeably

Previous year, while it was not good in many health- and business-related aspects, was a very good year for creating art. I added to my watercolor flower collection quite many paintings. I cannot share all in just one post. I also painted quite a few watercolor roses and still life art. Some of these painting have been published in previous posts, and some I will publish when time is right. I have a habit of painting flowers and spring landscapes from January to approximately end of May. Then, I move to still life, and I get to fall paintings in July and August. Painting flowers and spring in winter is a good habit because it shortens cold and chilly winter days during the dark months.

Addition to my watercolor flower collection: white trillium blossoms on dark background

Missing giving art classes

I was missing the live art classes and interaction with my students. While everything is available online, I think live art classes are the most beneficial. Just ask school kids and teachers, -everybody will tell you that serious and decent learning happens only in person. Art is an easy subject to put online, but there are very many things which you need to touch, to see close-up, to check with your own eyes. I don’t want to make large investments in equipment at the moment, but that’s what I would need to teach online. Space is one more issue. It might be so that I like the live classes too much.

These are spring flower watercolor paintings, fantastic addition to my watercolor flower collection! Magnolia, trillium, wild anemone and daffodils

Daffodils are a fantastic subject for spring flower painting. This is the close-up version.

Not abstract, not photo-realism

Very many artists paint abstracts nowadays, really many. Therefore, I’m glad I’m doing something different. Sometimes I’ve told, I should make my art more realistic, but I don’t intend to. I’m mostly painting what I can see. What I can see is not what camera captures and one can enlarge until every ant on a grass stem is visible. It’s just my opinion, but I don’t want to go into tiny photographic detail and use computer. My art is done by simply using sketch or real flower, or real still life as reference most often. As you know, I can draw anything and do it fast. I would sometimes add a little bit of extras from imagination, like water drops on pansy. So, it’s my own realism with touch of imagination.

Watercolor paintings, fmagnolia painting, pansy painting

Magnolia, pansy Purple variety apples. and trillium and the fantastic purple pansy.

Watercolor painting, purple pansy watercolor

Personalized use of color

White is a good background for flowers, and dark background colors make white flowers pop. I personally do not like black with watercolor, that suits oils or acrylic more, I believe, and makes watercolor too heavy, but that’s just my personal preference. When I was very young and at school, my art teacher told I should never use black watercolor paint. I have followed her advice. I never use black watercolor paint. I took one more advice to never premix watercolor paint, but add color as I go and use it as I see fit. I actually do the same with acrylic: I use paint without previously mixing it, unless it’s for extra-large area or under-painting.

Watercolor painting, pansy, trillium and petunia painting

Decided to leave my website as is

I spent about 3 or even more previous weeks trying to figure out how I could change my website. I tried different things, considered new themes and tested them, asked advice from very well-established artists, who have excellent online presence and whom I know personally. They all told their websites were done by web designers or specifically created for their needs. Most of them have also social media and online representation specialists, video editors and filming teams, etc. Therefore, I decided to leave my website as is. I’m the only one for every single task and I’m doing anything that comes my way. However, I cannot spend all time just editing social media posts and website. I want to paint, draw and create also. Therefore, I prioritized creativity over online perfection. That’s just what works for me right now. I hope you like my flower collection and it inspires you to create flower paintings, too.

Stay safe, healthy and thanks for reading!

Original watercolor paintings for sale

May 10, 2020October 17, 2024

Great art for great occasion

Mother’s Day flowers, great art for this special day

It doesn’t feel like it in Ontario, but it’s Mother’s Day. We have February weather, but we are keeping our hearts warm and we celebrate Mother’s Day. I do not celebrate in particular, however, my daughter sent me be-well-have-a-happy-Mother’s-Day card early in the morning. We have to admit, whatever the situation, our mother always deserves the best, respect, love and recognition. I assume it’s a fantastic occasion to post great floral art.

Late with posting, happy with outcome

I am a bit late with publishing the brand-new floral paintings because they certainly suit the occasion and the purpose. I might sell them next year or next season. I am happy how these paintings came out. I love white color and strong contrast, too. Floral paintings allow implementing exactly that, especially when painting white flowers.

Original floral paintings by Inese Poga — White magnolia, 12 x 12 in

Mothers love floral art

If my mom were still around, she’d definitely love these paintings. I do know that acrylic paint isn’t oil paint, and every step which takes a few minutes in oils, can take hours painting with acrylic. Daffodil charm painting took 4 full workdays and the White magnolia elegance took almost 3 full days. That is because of layers and need to allow painting to dry naturally between layers.

Enjoy, paint your own or purchase

I noticed that my paintings work really well together. It’s almost as if any painting goes with any other painting. That refers to many years ago painted art and the new art which was painted just recently. I have step-by-step images for daffodils and magnolia. I intend to post them later on project’s page which is in progress. Please, let me know, if you would be interested.

Enjoy and purchase if you love flower paintings.

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Art collections by Inese Poga

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January 7, 2020October 17, 2024

How to create better art and flower paintings

Watercolor painting of rose, rose painting

Create better art without getting lost in advice

We can learn painting and create better art using many tools and sources nowadays. Internet is huge and numerous sites offer tutorials, art classes and online and live workshops. I would like to share a few observations which stood out after talking to students and seeing how they learn. I’m convinced also that successful painting is a combination of many aspects. The other notable matter is that anything we want to be of high quality and value takes time, efforts and practice, and there is no other way to master a skill. I have listed below assumptions and factors which do not result in good art.

Copying colors and image will do it

Lots of people use color charts or try to recreate the exact colors of a photo. With current numerous brands and very wide range in art supply quality, the most important part is not what the photo has, but what works for your painting. Photography has different tools to create impressive image. Drawing, watercolor, pastel, acrylic and oil painting use completely different tools. Only copying colors and image won’t result in great art because that is the input of artist which makes art great. Outline drawing is important, but artist makes it alive with the use of artistic tools and paints.

Using exactly the same colors and drawing will create the same image

Using exactly the same colors and drawing won’t result in the same painting because it is usually not possible to repeat original artwork even by the artist who painted it. Ambient temperature, flow of paint, sloppy or targeted brushstroke, light conditions, air humidity in room or outdoors, inspiration, mood of artist, surge of energy or tiredness are all significant factors. It’s also not important what colors somebody else used because the differences between the same name colors can be huge with different brands. Therefore, the most important part is to test what you have and to see what your paints can do.

Color is secondary, value is primary or otherwise black and white paintings or monochromatic paintings would not make sense. They do, so, value is the aspect that provides image and subject with volume and dimension. If in doubt, you can always create a tonal or value sketch. I do that for complex paintings in watercolor going large scale or exactly the same size what my painting is.

I can paint knowing nothing about color mixing and paint features

You can paint knowing nothing about color mixing and paint features. Most likely, it will take time and many experiments to get to where you want to be. Eventually, you will arrive at all creation-related discoveries, it just might be a time-consuming process. I am talking about years, not hours. Simply, there will be good, mediocre or not satisfying result at first. Initially, all good results come from happy painting accidents, and we get what we get as opposed to what we intend to.

I will learn painting just watching others paint

No, that is not true. Art instructors or people, who demonstrate painting, know what they are doing or at least they should. Quite frequently people, who watch it, have no idea what, where and why is applied. The personal features and ability to apply paint and correct color matter, too. If the art is somewhat realistic, it is very important to be able to draw. We sketch with brush at first, and then we follow with brushstrokes to create volume, shadows, negative spaces and so on. If you can draw, you know better where to apply paint.

What, where and why

In the painting process, we have to answer these questions at any point of painting process. It is very useful to know why you are doing something. Why do you want the background dark or light? Why do you want to place some accent in the middle or in front? Why do you want distant parts cool and the front part warm? Why do you want to use black, purple or blue for grey color? Why do you paint the focal point in the most striking color? And so on. All of these answers impact your painting, later series of paintings, and they eventually create your style.

Paint night or sipping and painting

Many believe that paint night or sipping and painting will teach how to paint. These are entertaining events with a brush and paint, not art classes. The goal of such events isn’t teaching you composition, color theory, values or brush stroke. The goal is to entertain and painting is just an addition to mood, drink or food. I have mentioned many times before how important focus and decision making is for creation of art. Paint night or sipping and painting do not contain the most important learning aspects, such as reasoning, decision making or using your personalized approach.

Everything is art

Everything isn’t art and it shouldn’t be. While many people might refer to a canvas covered with some paint as art, it isn’t always art. You can hang it on the wall and it becomes wall filler. However, you can also look at it after it has dried and canvas fabric has become visible (too less paint coverage!) and try to create something decent on top of it. I wrote in my previous article that calling framed wallpaper art does not make it art. It is a decorative piece, just as an empty frame is.

Aimless splashing with paint

The reality of nowadays is such that we want everything right away, right this moment and even better yet, without much or any effort. Art has never been just brushing around or aimlessly splashing with paint. Art always involves thinking, concept, idea and the execution thereof with adequate artistic tools. Aimless splashing and brushing of paint results in nothing really. One uses a lot of paint and time with no result. I have seen over years people, who picked up art effortlessly, and I have also seen people, who had to spend years to learn. An art class is no different from a regular school class: some students learn fast, some are perfectionists, some are free-spirited, some are not that interested and some simply do not focus or pay attention.

Perfectionism and perfect skill

Perfectionism is disturbing and limiting when it comes to learning. Why? It is disturbing since there is no such thing as a perfect attempt, a perfect error or a perfect search for a new technique and skill. Perfectionism is the opposite of artistic freedom and it has nothing to do with the quality of result in learning process. I hear this often: I am a perfectionist. That is fine, but it does not apply to learning new things. One cannot be perfect with what they cannot do or do not know. Developing perfect skills is more like it, but perfect skill is a result while learning is a process. Learning process involves making errors and being mistaken. Learning process involves searching for the best or most suitable solution in the current situation.

Preparing my solo show

I am working on preparation of my solo art show next month. It opens on February 13. I just finished a few watercolor paintings which I started for November and December classes. Pink color is not a coincidence. It is a very attractive, soothing color which has also big impact and is gentle at the same time. Less people attend shows or art events nowadays since everything is on the internet. I would like to still emphasize that nothing compares to seeing art in person. There are so many devices between the real painting and its image on the internet! Any of these devices totally change the look of painting, so some things get lost along the way. Anyway, enjoy the new paintings!

The elegant pink rose, watercolor on 20 x 16 inches or 51 x 41 cm watercolor paper, the white background enhances the softness and attraction of color in the rose flower

Pink winter orchids,, watercolor on paper, 20 x 16 in or 51 x 41 cm

Magnolia blooms on white, watercolor, 18 x 14 inches or 46 x 36 cm

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Copyright notice: Copyright of displayed paintings, drawings, images of work in progress and images of finished paintings belong to artist Inese Poga. Use of painting and drawing images is prohibited on any website or otherwise if I have not issued a written permission. No pinning on Pinterest!