The other day, I just decided that I was going to start just making the art I wanted to again and for no reason other than I feel good making it. I had been missing my watercolors, something that I had used a little in the past and loved. It is an unexpected feeling, because now, a few days later, I just want to sit and paint all day. I have to tell myself to stop.
Watercolors was a medium I loved, but honestly wasn’t sure if it was going to love me. A few years ago I started with a flower, then a tree and then I painted Stonehenge for a friend and a piece of my family history. I have only been working with them for a few years but I love what they have taught me about my art.
Wreath, April 2020
Photography allows me to wander and explore so many new and familiar places. I find the little details that speak to me and many. I let myself look through the lens and see the world around me from within that frame, it may sound limiting, but for me its sets a story for what about to unfold.
When I paint with acrylics, I am given my trees, I don’t know exactly why I am drawn so much to trees, but I am and painting with the boldness that acrylics give me its like breathing to me. Acrylics give me that bold feeling, I like to paint in bold colors, block-like patterns and I let my imagination go free.
What watercolors bring to my art is peace and patience, I learned that I could not rush myself, with my other art, I could in a way. When I show my work, I create for that show coming up, so with other mediums I work with, I either have work on hand or have things I could paint quickly, but sometimes rushing through art isn’t what is needed and isn’t what I am feeling now.
Creating doesn’t have a time limit, a piece could take a half an hour or it could take all day to a week. With watercolor, I watch the piece grow, its a build up, it can’t be rushed and I need patience. I have lost many good pieces to rushing.
This was a GROWTH I never saw coming. I am still a little nervous when I work with the paints, I still know I have so much to learn, I still want to learn so much, I want to play again, like I would if I was at school, and I love this feeling.
Wreath, 2020
And this is the little unexpected that life gives us sometimes, I have been working wreaths for about a week now, my little pieces and the heart one was a new little idea, and I can’t stop with them. I am practicing patience and control all while my imagination is exploding with new ideas, it’s wonderful.
Have you found your unexpected?
Music Heart, 2020
When Daniele Wanders 