I cannot believe it is already my 50th episode of ArtVentures in Learning! This time I am sharing a challenge made byTrayci in Art Tribe.
First published June 15, 2024: I joined Art Tribe in April, and I am so happy I did! The content is just what I was looking for to improve my art practice. There are classes on everything from how to frame your work to loosening up your paintings (whether you are an abstract painter or not).
Each month there is a challenge, and I have taken the challenge three times now. June’s challenge was especially fun. We had to blindly choose (from a list provided) four colors of paint, one subject matter, and four tools to use on what ever substrate we wanted. My colors turned out to be ochre, pink, aqua and black. I was a bit nervous since I use a lot of white in my work, but these picks forced me to use the paper for my white. The subject I picked from the pile was “trees”. And the four tools I (again, blindly) picked to use were credit card, sponge, stick and roller. So, no brushes. Hmmm. Ok.
In these monthly challenges there have not been any demos or sample works. So we have to use our imagination (which I was born with too much of), and find or own inspirations. My main obstacle was making a tree I was happy with. I have been struggling with trees for years now, and so I decided to work around my deficit by not thinking about leaves — only limbs, and abstract limbs, at that. I decided my trees would be black.
I used watercolor paper because once I gesso it the surface takes just about any medium, and I knew I wanted to use some oil pastels at some point. So I painted two different versions: One with a fairly simple tree, and another featuring the tree’s roots, which I did by using a stick in India Ink. Here are my two paintings:
The top one was actually landscape oriented, but the left side bored me, and when I took a matte and positioned it as above, it looked much better. Good lesson for me, to feel free to chop off the extraneous parts!
I hope you will take a look at Art Tribe, if you are serious about improving your art practice. There are a lot of classes our there, but it can be a crapshoot finding a good presenter. Art Tribe utilizes its members as well as Louise Fletcher and Trayci Tompkins for its content. So you are actually getting the opportunity to learn from literally thousands of artists.
In the meantime, as I look back on my 50 experiences learning from other artists, I find that this past year has made a huge difference in artistic approach. I am not as concerned about selling, for on thing. I am more concerned with making art that pleases me. I am less fearful of trying new things, knowing that I can just trash it or paint over it. Nothing I do in my art is precious. It took me a year to learn that, and I think these 50 tutorial reviews will make the lesson stick!
I hope you have enjoyed them. I am considering moving onto something new, since I honestly think that the 50 people I focused on over the last year are the best of the lot. Let me know if you disagree. If you know of an artist who is teaching something new and exciting that I haven’t covered, I would love to hear about them.
Happy Arting this week!