rue jacob

I have been busy with a commercial design lately. I am doing a test sketch for a company that does custom wall coverings and art. It’s been fun. I love doing stuff like this. We’ll see what comes of it.

I thrive amongst the seemingly chaotic mess of tools and materials in my workspace.

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We had some interesting clouds yesterday afternoon. I adore clouds.

They remind me that all life is constant change, and that that’s ok.

Here’s what happened to my failed painting. I used it as a test bed for some ideas I had rolling around in my head:

I tried drips from eye droppers, drawing with eye droppers, and some pencil work that you can’t see here. It was fun. I didn’t feel bad about trashing $15 worth of good paper! Afterward, I decided to flip it over and did this quick painting:

I laid some branches on the paper and traced the shadows from them. Then painted it with a mix of burnt sienna and black. Here are the branches:

As you can see, I don’t keep the neatest studio. It’s the “primordial soup” from which my art arises!

The painting that I was feeling so good about failed this weekend. I tried to push things a bit too far. I learned some valuable things though. Like failure has a good side! I discovered some technical things I can use later on. Time to start a new painting…

Here’s more of the new watercolor in process. It’s about 40 x 50 inches. I took some shots while working today:

New palette, new techniques. So far so good. The main thing is that I am having fun. I am always surprised by what comes out when I paint. The medium is magic, alchemy, mystery. I just love the process.

Casey visited yesterday and asked if I was going to draw a bottle of champagne to share with everyone, since I just started up this blog this week. Here it is:

It’s ink on Post-It note. You can tell I really labored over this! I do love drawing on Post-It notes. No need for frames-just stick them anywhere.

Here’s a shot of the new painting I am working on.

I am doing wet into wet, which is new to me. I paint a segment with clean water, blot it lightly, and then paint over it with watercolor.

Thanks for stopping by. I hope you enjoyed the champagne!

Just finished this one a couple of days ago. It’s watercolor and graphite on 154 lb. Arches hot press watercolor paper, 39 x 51 inches:

I am not sure what to call it yet. My first thought was Prometheus; maybe the blue and red areas are his liver that gets eaten by an eagle and then regenerated each day. Or call it Mitosis, since it looks like a cell in the process of dividing. We’ll see. I am very happy with this painting.

I have a new one going, same size but a little different in palette. More to come. If you want to see what I have been doing in the last six months, go here.

I have been testing out some stuff with my watercolors-different colors and techniques. Here is my well-organized drawing table:

Kong is quite the taskmaster, but he’s good company.

I have had this blog for awhile, but haven’t used it. It is time to start it up.

Here’s my to do list for today: Get teenagers off to school. Keep wife who is home sick from cleaning house. Finish watercolor painting. Work on artists statement. Post office.

I have accomplished them all. It’s easy to do if you write the list after you have done the stuff and leave off the things you haven’t gotten to yet!