procreate Archives - Peony and Parakeet

Kaunosielu – Painting and Drawing Sensitivity

Posted on June 21, 2023June 22, 2023Posted in Digital, Flowers & Plants, History, Portraits & Faces, Processing IdeasTagged canvas, oil paints, procreate, soft pastels12 Comments

Kaunosielu is a Finnish word for which I don’t know an English equivalent. It means a dreamer who loves beauty, but the word has an ironic undertone. This romantic soul, alienated from everyday life, cares little about taking care of practical matters and frequently stops to admire the beauty around her.

I’ve been thinking about people’s yards in my neighborhood a lot lately. The new houses have a small lawn area, a wooden patio, and a row of white cedars. These homes are advertised as “easy-to-maintain yards” in real estate ads. And yet, it often happens that when time passes, a few violets or a peony bush appear. It makes me believe that we all are “kaunosielu people” who have a sensitive heart and eye for beauty.

So my Kaunosielu painting is dedicated to that part of you who stops after seeing something beautiful. This topic was challenging for me because I usually express movement. Here, however, it’s all about staying rather than leaving and looking rather than running away.

Inspiration from Pastel Drawings

I am making a series of paintings for an exhibition called “In the Mood of Albert Edelfelt” and I have browsed a lot of Albert Edelfelt’s (1854-1905) works. Surprisingly, his pastel drawings fascinate me the most. Look at this woman, for example – or rather – her dress!

Albert Edelfelt, Dalinin kevätlaulu. Pastels on paper. — Dalinin kevätlaulu – Dalin’s Spring Song by Albert Edelfelt

I see a similarity with flowers in old portraits. The outfits are pleated like the petals of flowers and the lines form interesting patterns.

I also started using chalk brushes in the ProCreate app. Here is a digital pastel drawing: peonies and strawberries.

A digital pastel drawing created in ProCreate. By Paivi Eerola, Finland.

I have done oil pastel work for the course Innovative Portraits, but now I dug out the soft pastels.

Soft pastels are more chalky than oil pastels and maybe a bit more difficult too because, unlike oil pastels, soft pastels also need fixative.

A pastel drawing in a sketchbook. Floral abstract by Paivi Eerola.

This is just a small notebook and a small piece but I like to practice between bigger paintings.

Kaunosielu on Canvas

My painting Kaunosielu is painted in oil, but it is close to pastel artworks in terms of color scheme and the use of lines.

Päivi Eerola and her painting Kaunosielu

The painting is inspired by a lovely pastel drawing by Albert Edelfelt called “At the Window.” I was lucky enough to see this work authentically in the Albert Edelt exhibition of the Ateneum Art Museum. This piece is 68 x 62 cm, so it’s quite large for a work drawn on paper. And look at that frame!

Albert Edelfelt, At the Window, pastel on paper.

I was especially fascinated by the composition, and as soon as I started my painting, I felt that now it was coming: Kaunosielu! I had been planning to do a piece called that for a long time.

I wanted to incorporate haziness and vagueness into this painting, but at the same time use strong variations in darkness. With the big differences in color value, I wanted to create a sense of presence similar to Albert Edelfelt’s paintings.

Abstract floral oil painting called Kaunosielu in progress.

When I took this photo in the morning sun, it felt like the moment stopped and two Kaunosielus came into the picture.

Paivi Eerola and her painting Kaunosielu.

This photo shows so well how darkness and light go hand in hand.

This Week’s Challenges for Your Art-Making

Empathize with the kaunosielu personality: Examine what it means to be an impractical but sensitive sielu – soul!
Examine old portrait paintings. Dind the similarities between flowers and luxurious dresses.
Be bolder with contrasts. Enhance your expression by combining pastel colors with really dark blues and browns.
Experiment with soft pastels or oil pastels or mimic their effects with other art supplies.

I hope all these tips inspire you to start creating!

Get Creative in Drawing Ornaments!

Posted on May 5, 2023May 5, 2023Posted in Digital, History, Paper Collage, Processing IdeasTagged drawing pen, procreate4 Comments

This month, the focus is on art history. Art history is often talked about in a very serious tone, but let’s examine it through imagination and start by drawing ornaments!

Ornament Tells a Story from Childhood

It’s fascinating that even if the ornaments are stiff and organized compositions, one can express a whole story.

Strawberries and whipped cream, an illustrative ornament by Päivi Eerola, Finland.

The background of this drawing is a funny story from my childhood. When the school asked each student’s favorite food, I answered “Mansikoita ja kermavaahtoa!” – Strawberries and whipped cream” while the others listed macaroni dishes or meatballs. Both the teacher and the students were quite shocked by the answer, but I wondered how anyone would prefer to eat something so modest and usual.

This story tells a lot about how I’ve always wanted to get away from the mundane. I still want to draw things so that they look like a luxurious celebration rather than a gray everyday life. I like drawing jewels, lace, floral motifs, and swirls, and you can have a lot of those on the ornaments.

A closeup of an ornament, drawn in ProCreate by Paivi Eerola.

I often want to include people or animals too. For example here, I wanted to make the whisk half-human, and draw two fairies that enjoy the dessert.

The method that I teach for human poses in the course Doll World was very helpful here.

Inspiration from Antiques, Old Buildings, and Paintings

There are plenty of ornaments in my photo archive. When I visit old buildings, I go through doors, ceilings, wall panels, and floors, looking for nice ornaments.

Ornaments of the doors in Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy. — From Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy.

I also love to examine antiques closely.

Items from the antique collection of the Turku castle. — From the collection of the Turku castle, Finland.

Old paintings often have lovely frames. Whenever I photograph one, I always try to include the frame in the picture.

Pietro Perugino's painting and the beautiful frame. Uffizi gallery, Florence, Italy. — Pietà by Pietro Perugino, oil on wood, 1493-1494, photographed in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy.

This frame is like an ornament representing a palace!

Lots of Simple Shapes

The decorative appearance of the ornaments can mislead you into overestimating their complexity. When an ornament is taken apart, the shapes can be quite simple.

Ornamental frame, a detail. — Ornamental frame from Sinebrychoff Art Museum, Helsinki

I love this kind of sophistication based on quantity and repetition, with which you can express anything – humorous subjects …

Smileys, an ornamental illustration by Paivi Eerola.

… or more serious.

Peace, an illustration by Paivi Eerola. Two fairies form an ornament.

This example shows well that you can also express light when drawing ornaments.

Ornaments Can Both Hide and Reveal

I am fascinated by the fact that although the subject can be drowned in decorative forms, it can also be brought out more directly and more concisely than in a regular drawing. Time travel to the past can become surreal when the horizon disappears and the items are arranged as part of a floating structure.

Combining ornament and imagination. A black and white line drawing by Paivi Eerola.

Ornaments as Collage Art

If drawing the whole ornament in one go feels too demanding, remember that the ornaments can also be collage art. You can glue individual elements so that they form a decorative tree or medallion. I have put together many kinds of ornaments from hand-drawn animals and hand-decorated papers.

Collage art in an art journal. — From one of my art journals.

You can also scan or photograph the drawings and assemble the ornament digitally with an image processing program. Here are animal figures and flowers from the course Animal Inkdom and a teacup from the course Magical Inkdom.

A digital collage of hand-drawn elements, a fun ornament with animals. By Paivi Eerola of Peony and Parakeet. — Digital collage composed in Photoshop from hand-drawn items.

Drawing Ornaments is Expressing the World

After working with ornaments for a while, you begin to realize that the world is largely based on them. Surface patterns are everywhere. The beauty of organic forms can be found in all living things.

A drawing full of ornaments. By Paivi Eerola, Finland.

Ornaments build a bridge between the living and the non-living. They make the living an object and the object alive.

Hidden Love for Ornaments and How it Shows

I think that many of us have an innate need to design ornaments. Maybe you dream about designing fabrics or have a huge stash of them. Maybe you collect jewelry or save photos of them. Maybe you feel that something is lacking if you only draw or paint complete images and are not able to rearrange the composition so that it’s something more stylish and less representational.

I only realized this tendency of mine when I made ornaments as part of the illustration for a children’s book. Back then, I used transparent marker paper to design the symmetry, and my desk was full of different versions.

One day when picking the pen, I suddenly felt happy and meaningful: “I should do this more!” Since then, I have not underestimated even the smallest encounters with ornaments.

Drawing Ornaments Inspired by Embroidery

I relax from my work as an artist by doing cross-stitch and those projects also inspired me to draw ornaments.

Drawing an embroidery inspired ornament.

See here how to draw and color an embroidery-inspired ornament – Doodler’s Sampler Step by Step!

Drawing Ornaments without Perfect Symmetry

I drew the last ornament with the ProCreate app. The good things about it are that the background can be kept separate so that the background colors can be varied and it is easy to create symmetry. However, I think completely symmetrical ornaments are a bit too stiff and boring, so I also made quite a lot of asymmetry for this ornament.

Strawberries and whipped cream, an ornamental illustration by Paivi Eerola, Finland.

I hope you will start drawing ornaments right away whatever technique you choose!

Related Courses

Doll World – drawing human poses – Buy here!
Animal Inkdom – drawing animals – Buy here!
Magical Inkdom – drawing fantasy – Buy here!
Collageland – inspired by embroidery – Buy here!

Discovering a Character by Drawing

Posted on August 18, 2022August 19, 2022Posted in Animals, Digital, Fantasy, Portraits & Faces, Self-TalkTagged apple pencil, colored pencils, graphite pencils, procreate10 Comments

This week is about illustrating characters and discovering those that feel personal.

Country Girl illustration by Päivi Eerola.

Have you ever wanted to draw a face or a figure that would really touch your heart? I don’t only mean something that looks pretty on paper but someone that begins to speak to you when your eyes meet.

Starting from an Animal Figure

In the class Magical Inkdom, I mention the word “kissanukke” when we are drawing cats. Kissanukke is “cat doll” in English, but somehow I think it’s much funnier in Finnish. Say: kissanukke! The word is just hilarious.

Last week, I wondered why I think about that word so often. Maybe it’s a hint I should draw cats again. So, I picked a big smooth watercolor paper and a pencil to sketch a huge cat. I wanted to go big because I wanted the cat’s face to be large enough for working on facial features. I adjusted them for a long time with a pencil, and then with colored pencils. I wanted this kissanukke to be more than a doll – a living thing that speaks to me.

Drawing an animal character with colored pencils.

I love to use thick and smooth watercolor paper with colored pencils even when I don’t use water for the drawing.

When the paper is big, it’s easy to dive deep into details and let them make the drawing more whimsical than the original sketch.

What’s Behind the Animal?

Story Hunter - a fairytale character by Paivi Eerola. Read more about discovering a character by drawing!

When Kissanukke was born, I asked her: “Who are you?” She said: “I am a hunter, and I can bring you anything you want!” I smiled at her: “What a magical cat you are, with the golden egg and all!” “I had two,” she said, “but the other one got missing when I tried to catch the geese. And I am no cat but a lion!”

Of course, she is a lion – how did I not see that before! I used to be a big fan of Joy Adamson and her lion Elsa as a child. No wonder my inner child has kept asking for cats!

Discovering Through a Different Pose

So, I thought, let’s draw another leijonanukke – lion doll – for the child. This time, I changed the pose so that the character would only need to glance sideways and wished that a shyer creature would appear.

Drawing with colored pencils. Whimsical colored pencil art in progress.

“Are you a hunter too?” I asked when discovering the new character. “No, I am an orchid whisperer! Shhh!”

Orchid Whisperer - an illustration by Paivi Eerola. Read more about discovering characters by drawing!

One of my orchids just stopped blooming, and I am eagerly waiting another to bloom. So, there’s a need for her too!

Illustrating characters with colored pencils. By Paivi Eerola of Peony and Parakeet.

Whisperer is smaller than Hunter. The small size also makes her look less finished in the pics. If you need to provide a hand drawing in a digital form, always draw larger than the asked size. The result looks neater that way.

Discovering a Human Character

This week, I went to the studio and gathered all the courage I got. “Hunter,” I said, “could you bring me a human that really touches my heart.”

And that’s how this little country girl came out – a true nature child!

A detail of the illustration Country Girl. By Paivi Eerola.

I didn’t use any references when drawing the girl and the cats. A reference can help us draw what’s expected but not what comes out naturally. References are great practice, and during the years, I have been practicing with them too. For example, in the class Innovative Portraits, we draw faces and use references creatively. But when discovering a character that feels like a soul mate, references become disturbing. Then it’s all about the connection with your inner self, traveling back in time for inspiration and forward in imagination.

Digital Pencil Work

I drew the girl on my iPad with Apple Pencil and the program called Procreate. I got these fancy tools as a birthday gift from my husband in February but have been waiting for the right moment to get to know them.

Drawing characters freely in Procreate using the Peppermint brush.

So far, I have mostly been using a simple digital brush called “Peppermint” that imitates a graphite pencil.

I will blog more about Procreate later, so it would be interesting to hear if you have used it. Also, if you have any questions, please let me know! However, if you are not into digital tools, don’t worry, I will keep on drawing with real pencils too!

Color the Emotion

Tag: procreate