Creating Hope – Artist’s Mission
This week, I show three small paintings and talk about my mission of creating hope.
Even if we have had some winter wonderland sceneries recently, the weather hasn’t been so great in Finland – icy roads, rain, darkness … And now, the horrendous news came about the war in Ukraine.
But this post is not about war, but the opposite. Namely, a long time ago, I realized that my word is “hope”. Here’s the story:
I visited a hospital to see my old ant, and another old woman grabbed my hand. She wanted me to say something that would take her pain away.
I still remember her desperate eyes begging for consolation.
We discussed shortly but then I ended the conversation by saying that I am quite young and I don’t have all the wisdom. She nodded, turning off the glimpse of hope she had got when I entered the room. At that moment, I knew that I wanted to do more of that hope thing, but how.
Nowadays, I try to transfer hope to every painting, and to every class as well. Yesterday I dug out small canvases that looked quite hopeless. I had started them last year and used leftover paint from bigger paintings. Then they had looked just ugly paintings that might not ever get finished. But now, all they missed was some hope!
So I painted hope: saturated colors over muted ones, light glow over heavy shapes, rising wings on the top of descending petals – signs of life.
I wanted to remove the harshness and replace it with gentleness.
I also added the much-needed drop of utopia as well.
After leaving the hospital, I cursed myself for not giving the old woman what I called false hope. But now I think that the correct word is fantasy.
We all need fantasy to keep going.
Fantasy didn’t come to my young engineer’s mind, and it would have required the kind of bravery I didn’t have. But now, when I paint, I can do brave too.
The qualities that don’t seem to be a part of me, can still exist in my art.
It gives me hope as a human.
Whether I use oils and canvases or colored pencils in a journal, all I create is hope. A gift that was initiated by a stranger in a hospital bed.
I am looking for March when the new class will begin!
Layering Colored Pencils – Magical Effects Step by Step
This week, I have a new spread for my colored pencil journal, and it’s based on layering colored pencils. I share detailed photos so that you can try this too!
This coloring technique creates magical looseness, even if it begins with very stiff shapes. Because layering the colored pencils is the key here, it’s important to keep the layers light because paper can’t hold color endlessly.
Step 1 – Set Atmosphere
Choose a color that sets the mood for the image. My choice was pink.
Color the background lightly, but leave some blank areas near the edges and where you want the focal point to be. The heart is my focal point.
The blank parts will allow you to include lovely color variations in the last layers. Color softly and avoid outlines so that the overall feel is magical from the first layer.
Step 2 – Add Pattern
Stick with the same pencil and continue the monotone look by coloring rings on the colored area.
Make sure that the rings are different in size and spread a little unevenly so that the result looks natural and interesting. Think about fabrics but not the easiest polka dots, but a bit more intricate design.
Here’s a closeup of my rings. Again, I don’t use outlines but color them with short strokes that go in many directions.
Step 3 – Destroy
This step could be called “destruction” because now we color random shapes that don’t follow the previous layers at all. Bring in new bright colors. Color stripes, rectangles, random shapes, and lines freely.
You can go over the blank parts too but keep the focal point a little less untouched.
The idea is not to cover previous layers fully but to destroy their rhythm.
Here’s a closeup of my work. The new shapes and lines have taken over, and the rings are not so well visible anymore.
Step 4 – Discover
Keep coloring, but now bring in darker tones too. Keep the layers light and shapes soft, but when you discover something that you like, highlight its edges with a darker color.
I didn’t use any green pencils in my spread, but it does have some green shades. Mixing black and yellow makes lovely olive green.
Now it’s also the time to bring some rings back to the foreground!
These rings remind me of perennial Bellis flowers!
Here’s a closeup of digging out the rings – now flowers – with dark colors.
I don’t bring up all the rings, just some! This makes the layered look: some elements are covered and located further in the background, some come up to the foreground. The stiffness of the background pattern looks attractive when it’s combined with looser coloring.
Step 5 – Finish with Message
Your work will be finished when it delivers a message. The focal point, the heart in my case, is essential for achieving this. I like to work intuitively so that I don’t try to define the message right from the beginning but let the insight grow with the coloring. Here, I left the heart light and made it look icy and magical.
First, I thought about this winter, how tough it has been to walk the dogs on icy roads, and how much I want spring to come. And then it hit me how ice must mourn when its life is coming to an ending. How between the first flowers, there’s a little block of ice, looking around, feeling isolated.
This little frozen heart is like a rare unicorn – reflecting the surroundings, introvertedly, like we all do when we are creating.
I find this kind of pondering an important part of art-making. That’s why I always try to end with a message even if viewers can freely find their explanations as well.
Fun Botanicum – Sign up Now!
From March 15 to May 15, 2022, I run an online class for us who are inspired by nature and fantasy and love plants. The class is called Fun Botanicum and we will draw fantasy plants by scribbling, doodling, and layering with colored pencils. Join us!
The early-bird sale ends soon! Early-bird price: 59 EUR, now 49 EUR. >> Sign Up Now!
The sale ends on Feb 20, 2022, at midnight PST.
Intuitive Coloring Explained + Extended Black Friday Sale!
This week, I have a new free video for you, inspiration from my drawing classes, and there’s also an extended Black Friday Sale going on! Exciting!
Extended Black Friday Sale – Shop Here!
All classes are 25% OFF!
Now is the time to get the classes you have been thinking about!
>> Shop Here!
The sale ends on Nov 29, midnight PST.
Intuitive Coloring Explained – Watch the Video!
This video is an excerpt of the live speech that I gave for my art community Bloom and Fly this month. It introduces a fresh way to think about drawing and coloring. Lots of art-making inspiration is packed into this 6-minute video!
The classes mentioned in the video – Intuitive Coloring, Inspirational Drawing, Animal Inkdom, and Magical Inkdom, as well as all my painting classes – are 25% OFF during the extended Black Friday Sale. >> Shop Here!
More Inspiration from My Drawing Classes
The longer I draw, the more things come together. Not only so that I find more inspiration from the individual previous pieces, but also so that they describe a world that’s lively and ever-expanding. I also feel that my classes are like doorways to building a world of your own.
In Intuitive Coloring, we travel from one meadow to another lesson by lesson and play on the way.
In Animal Inkdom, we start with little creatures and the animals get bigger lesson by lesson.
Insects and butterflies are simple to draw, but decoration makes them look fantastic!
Animal Inkdom is one of my most popular classes, maybe because it’s so playful! I had to edit out some of the laughs and smiles because I had so much fun drawing these that it would be a bit disturbing! And after Animal Inkdom, I couldn’t stop, but made an independent sequel – Magical Inkdom!
Art is a journey, so combining previous work with the new one, has often made me see new possibilities.
Inspirational Drawing is based on doodling and creating meshes from lines, but also on picking inspiration from images. I still collect inspirational images and use them indirectly in this way.
All Classes Are 25% OFF!
Now is the time to get the classes you have been thinking about!
>> Shop Here!
The sale ends on Nov 29, midnight PST.
Life in a Colored Pencil Diary
Recently, my life has not been a life of a middle-aged woman, but of a female tiger. With a new puppy, we have tried to find a balance in the family, and it has felt like a fight sometimes.
At some point in every evening, I become exhausted and demand my herd to calm down. It’s usually 21:34 exactly, so it seems that we run an accurate schedule.
But there’s not much else accurate in our life, because the puppy requires us – like my husband kindly puts it – to go with the flow. We are not talking about a flow state here, but a flow of random things that keep the puppy either awake or asleep.
I feel that the puppy is like a peacock which my husband, I, and our older beagle Stella stare at – the central character of our zoo who makes us happy or miserable, and often both at the same time.
We have had stress. Stella got ill and my oldest budgie Bonneville died, both sudden events.
But when Stella got back from the hospital, I began to think that we will survive. That the peacock sometimes looks like a dove, and that the rest of us can just admire its flight through the youth.
But that would be another page for my colored pencil diary!
P.S. For more colored pencil inspiration, remember to sign up for Intuitive Coloring!