Whew!

After a brief hiatus, enjoying sun, sand, surf and Scuba in the Florida Keys, I decided that when I got home, I was going to quit whining and procrastinating, and challenge myself.  (Is it legal to put that many commas in a single sentence?)  I based it on Katharine Cartwright's Twenty Minute Challenge.  I won't be submitting this one to the challenge, however, because...well.....I cheated.  Usually I get lost in a painting;  planning, drawing, painting then painting again, tweaking and fussing, doing and re-doing.  I never put myself under a time restraint before, so I decided to give myself some wiggle room on the first one. I did do a starting sketch, rather than just jumping into the painting (I don't trust my drawing skills to produce something recognizable in that short a period of time), and I gave myself thirty minutes instead of twenty to complete the painting.

The time constraint really made me think about what I was going to do before I put brush to paper.  Plan the colors, plan the procedure (ok...background first, then foreground, then shadow, then shoe, and finally the laces), get ready, get set.....GO!

I wasn't going to name these little exercise pieces, but I couldn't help being a smart aleck with the title. :-P

Up Chuck

7" X 5", acrylic on Canson paper

© 2009, Lisa Walsh

I gotta admit, it was fun.  The paint had to go on quick, thick and opaque to cover the black gesso background.  No muss, no fuss, no smoothing or blending or glazing, just lots o' paint from palette to paper, as fast as my little half-inch brush could pick it up.  Under normal circumstances, would I still be fiddling with this?  You betcha.  But I'm liking the lessons learned from this little study, so there will be more in the coming days.

My Muse is wiping sweat from my brow.  To brevity, and beyond!