The Principle of Dynamic Contrasts
This simple principle will add power to your art: If you have one area that is complex, keep the other areas relatively simple.

For Instance:

• When the face in a portrait is complex - keep the background and clothing simple
• If your landscape is complex - then keep the sky simple
• If the sky is filled with drama - keep the landscape simple
• If your vase full of flowers is complex - keep the background, table top, etc… simple

Notice how Picasso in his ‘Still Life with Skull, Leeks and Pitcher’, uses this principle. His simple background creates a foil for the complex subject matter.

Smart guy, eh?

Remember this SIMPLE FORMULA:

Focal Area = Complexity
Everything Else = Simplicity

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Photo Credit: Thanks *clarity*!

Practice Comparing
. . . and I don’t mean practice comparing your art to others art - especially to a professional’s. In my classes I teach that you should only be comparing the art you create today, to your previous creations. This way you see how you’ve grown rather than beating yourself up for not being ‘perfect’. There is no perfect or right way in art.

Compare Relationships
The comparing I’m talking about is the comparing of relationships.
Relationships of:

• Values
• Colors
• Shapes
• Textures
• Movement
• Position
• and Light

Your eye will become more and more sensitive to all the delicious, delicate relationships as you increase your powers of observation - thus increasing your skills in your art.

Yup - this was a trick. Practicing Comparing is still Practicing Seeing.

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Photo Credit: Thank you *clarity*!

“When Everyone is Shouting, No ONE is Heard”
I learned this from one of my college art instructors and I pass if forward to all of my students. Truer words were never spoken!

If all of your colors are intense and bright (screaming), then no one AREA stands out. You have no focal point and your viewer doesn’t know where to look. If all you have is chaos, your viewers’ eye will run away screaming.

Offer Resting Areas
Kind of like a roller coaster, if you don’t have some slower, resting areas, there is no thrill for the BEST part. Bright color stands out best against grayed colors. Grayed colors are your resting areas. So save the intensity for your focal point.

Nuff said.

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Photo Credit: Thank you Express Monorail!

Gargoyle Commission
In 2005 I was commissioned to create this Gargoyle in watercolors and I usually take photos during the progression of a painting to share with the client.

My students often ask to watch me paint - I have a sneaking suspicion that they learn a great deal from the observation . . .  Their asking triggered the idea of creating this slide to share with you. Although it does not show me actually painting, it will give you some idea of how I develop a watercolor.

Watercolor Technique
My style of watercolor painting is different than the ‘norm’ and I credit this to my most favorite instructor, Kathy Sutherland. She is a genius, a wonderful mentor, and beloved friend who I was blessed to have studied under.

Gargoyle was created on 300# Arches watercolor paper, is 22″ x 30″and took approximately one month to complete. Although the original is in a private collection, limited edition giclees are available upon request.

Predictable + Repetitious = Monotonous
Does your family “ooh and aah” over your art - but no one else is purchasing? Perhaps your artwork has the blahs.

Many people leave their success to chance by focusing only on technique - hoping and praying that all those niggly details will make their art great.

But Great Art is a complex accumulation of knowledge that focuses more upon COMPOSITION rather than technique alone.

Rules of Composition
One of those FIRST Rules of Composition deals with the subject of Variety. Variety is one of hundreds of ways to add interest to your Art. So how do you add variety?

1. Vary the spaces between the objects depicted
2. Vary the dimension of the shapes
3. Vary their placement
4. Vary the visual weight of areas
5. Vary the energy of things
6. Vary their weight, height, length and angle
7. Vary orientation
8. Vary the complexity of areas
9. Vary the complexity subjects
10. Vary the values (light & shadow) in good balance

A Word of Caution
Too much variety invites visual chaos. Getting the right balance requires practice.

How to Beat the Blahs
Practicing on your own is good, but going it alone takes discipline, dedication and years testing and searching. Practicing via classes and great instructors is liberating and will yield far greater results much quicker. Artists who continue to take classes tend to be the ones who grow the most and excel the most.

A good instructor doesn’t just give guidance and feedback, but fuels your passion, inspires your confidence and elevates you closer to the joy of creating by helping you to ‘see with the eyes of an artist‘.

In the Beginning
The other day my 17 year old son was busy in the kitchen nuking a whole platter of frozen burritos - as a snack.

He did a big smile when he saw me, “Know what I’m going to give my sister for Christmas this year?” he said. “They’ve got these super-huge stuffed teddy bears for sale at work and I gonna pick one up this afternoon.”

Now mind you, his older sister lives about 400 miles north of us in a teeny-tiny apartment and I happen to know… detests stuffed animals.

“How are you going to get it to her?” I maneuver.

“Isn’t she coming down for Christmas?”

“Nope, and even if she were, she drives a super small car. How would she to fit the bear into it?”

“Oh.”

Gnawing his lip a little, he begins listing other things that I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t be interested in either. So like a good Mom, I tactfully shoot them all down until cross-eyed he blows out a sigh, “Well, what do you think she would like?”

“I know she needs money…” I tell him.

This gets me to pondering my gift list and I ask him what he would like for Christmas.

With a toothy grin he raises one eyebrow and replies, “Money!” and I start thinking, “Yeah, me too…”

That’s When I Get Hit
… with this Brilliant Idea and I say to him, “Hey, how about I give you $500 for Christmas?”

His eyes go wide, “Yeah?!” Then he leans his elbows on the table and his face goes all dreamy.

“Then you send your sister $500…” I notice his spine stiffen and his eyes narrow in suspicion.

“And she can send me $500!” I see his mind doing a “Huh?”

Then he pivots and reading my thoughts, a major grin splits his face.

This is how screwy the artistic mind can be. My kids are use to it. In fact, they’ve inherited my crazy thought processes.

This is Great!
We all get a warm Christmas Spirit glow from giving an especially generous gift. We get that joyful feeling when we receive a windfall, and the best part? It’s way easy on the pocket!

I can just hear the conversations now… “What’d you get for Christmas?”

“Me?” I shrug, “I got 500 bucks!”

“No way, man! - I wish someone would give me $500 for Christmas!”

Go For It
Now You can, ’cause you know the plan! To heck with the economy, no more shopping ‘n crowds, no more wondering if you’ve found the perfect gift. Just rotate this through your whole gift chain. You know they’ll love what you give and your gonna love what you get too! It’s a win-win.

Now go forth and and have yourself that Merry Little Christmas we’re all dreamin’ about. And when the bills come in after the Holidays, you can sit back, put your feet up with a cup’o hot cocoa and toast the New Year with abandon - no Holiday bills for you!

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Photo Credit: Thank you Loren Javier!

Practice Seeing
As you go about your day, practice seeing. You practice seeing when you draw and paint anyway, now do it all the time and with purpose.

Observe the movement of nature, people and animals. Study how the changing light affects and defines the objects around you. Squint to simplify shapes and to limit the values that you see. Notice all the subtle differences of color within one leaf, a worn shoe, a shadow or that ‘gray’ cloud overhead.

The more that you do this, the better your art skills will become… without lifting a finger.

Side Effects include a calming feeling, a closeness to nature and often, a gentle euphoria at success!

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Photo Credit: by Petr Kratochvil

Squint to Simplify
Squinting allows you to view your subject with less detail thus increases your sensitivity to value changes and color variations. It simplifies shapes, values and color by reducing distraction details.

By including a few squints, you can concentrate on large, basic, overall shapes. Squinting reduces colors to values and simplifies them into highlights and shadow masses because it eliminates much of the middle values.

This simplification of your shapes and values will help to unify your art and will compel you to focus on your composition rather than on the details.

If you wear glasses, take them off to blur your focus.

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Photo Credit: supehua

Left Over Paint
What do you do with all the oil paint left on your palette when you’ve completed a painting or a painting session?

Pull it all into one pile and mix it up. This will result in a batch of gray that can be useful for your next painting session. Use it for gray areas and use it for knocking back the intensity of a color.

Can you say, Sweet Savings?

For Faster Warm-ups
Usually I recommend doing some preliminary sketching or blind contours to get yourself warmed up. However, there is another method that you can use.

Begin your drawing by sketching in an area that is less important. This gets your pencil moving and allows you to warm-up before moving on to those areas that are more important and finally to your main focal point.