Category Archives: Cacti & Succulents

Days 16 & 17 Of 30

Day 16, Mixed Media on 5 x 7 Canvas Board. © 2021 Sheila Delgado.

Day 17, Mixed Media on 5 x 7 Canvas Board. © 2021 Sheila Delgado.

Everything that could go wrong, did. Haha. I worked all night trying to fix this and that. And just when I thought I was done. Another problem. I picked a white, that turned out to be a satin. Nope. Looked sticky. Sticky paint? Haha. Well, no worries. Decided white wasn’t right. OK. Time for bed.

Starting today, right after breakfast no less! (First for the month.) I mixed a buff and sand color for the background. Yes, that will work. Changed the terra cotta pots to a desert rose. Added a glaze to the leaves. This helped to tone down the mess of a yellow paint pen that I had used to outline the forms. DIdn’t realize that was glossy paint.

I left the yellow on the snake plant, top. Felt it worked as the golden stripes some of the leaves have. Added a subtle pattern. Bubble wrap. Too subtle. May go back in and bring it out just a bit more. But that means repainting the entire background and then applying the pattern.

Had added texture and scratch marks, hoping to add the aged effect I had in the Blue vase pieces. There is a dark blue base and I tried sanding some top layer away to reveal it. Just didn’t work. I revealed the white gesso instead. Haha.

Happy enough with them now. That Kiwi green is a little too neon. But it keeps them from being too muted. The board lent itself to a postcard layout. So I thought I would create something clean and graphic, for just that.

Thanks so much for taking the time to visit me here, and to let me know you stopped by. Happy creating to you!

You don’t drown by falling in the water.
You drown by staying there.
Robert G. Allen

Intelligence is not to make no mistakes,
but quickly to see how to make them good.
Bertolt Brecht

What we call experience is
often a dreadful list of ghastly mistakes.
J. Chalmers da Costa

Day Three, Oh My, Oh Me!

4 Replies

Day 3, Mixed Media on 8 x 8 Paper. © 2021 Sheila Delgado.

I plumb forgot the pot. I made a mental note that I needed to add it back in. But I didn’t remember until the final check. Duh. I couldn’t decide on a color to use to fill the pot, so I just left it. I like it. The bump in the pot is a pure mistake. But I decided to leave that in too. Haha.

The higher up you go, the more mistakes you are allowed.
Right at the top, if you make enough of them,
it’s considered to be your style.
Fred Astaire

So Glad To Be Spending Day Two With You!

8 Replies

Day 2, Mixed Media on 8 x 8 Paper. © 2021 Sheila Delgado.

My original idea with these was more in the direction of Bob Burridge abstracts. I have painted in that style before. Still, I am enjoying the process. I continue to be puzzled with seeing values. I get it, what they are, how to make them. In watercolor at least. But I still somehow think that lighter colors are lighter values. And that is not always true.

Take a look at this painting with the colors taken out, below. Now I would think that the bright turquoise is a light value, the same perhaps as the container. But it isn’t. It is a mid-tone.

Right?

Now going back to the painting, I can see that the turquoise section of the leaf is clearly darker than the container. But my eyes fool me. Or is it my warped color logic? Haha.