Monday, January 10, 2011

Art Project A Day #10

When I was in grade school, I had a best friend named Jane. We spent hours drawing together; at my house, or sitting on a stone wall surrounding a beautiful oak tree in her front yard. I looked for her on the internet for years, and this year, I found two of her children on Facebook.

Thirty years ago, she signed her artwork with the name Bleuej. Her children told me that she passed away about 17 years ago. So, this 10 x 12 inch watercolor is done in honor of her birthday today, and I call it "Remembering Bleuej".

She flew off to heaven, and we'll see her again

5 comments:

  1. This is a very thoughtful tribute Jayne. I'm certain Mom would enjoy it and that she'd really appreciate your kind friendship. I can just imagine her in those years enjoying a carefree summer day with her best friend. The two Jayne's/Jane's.
    The vivid blue's in the Blue Jay are really done well. What sort of paint are you using?

    Thank you for remembering her Jayne.

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  2. what a beautiful way to remember her. what an interesting story of memory and recovering lost connections...

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  3. Thanks, Marty. It was my pleasure to remember my dear friend.

    To answer your question; I usually use Prang kids' watercolors, but when I did the painting of my daughters, I ran out of black. I remembered that I had bought some watercolor paint at a yard sale, so I found the bag and "Yes!" there was some black. I was amazed by the depth of color in the Grumbacher watercolor paint.

    So, when I started working on the blue jay, I looked in the bag, and found a tube of Grumbacher Cerulean Blue, which seemed like just the right color. I mixed the blue in graduating shades with some black.

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  4. Thanks for telling me Jayne, I'll try some if I take up watercolor again some time. Grumbacher makes a decent oil paint as well although if you get a chance i wonder if you'd try Holbein it's got a German name, but its made in Japan and has deep pigments and is just wonderful paint.

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  5. I will definitely look for Holbein next time I run out of watercolor paint. I am beginning to see the error of my ways with children's watercolors. I don't get the depth of color with them. But, the good thing is it's easy to correct mistakes with them, because they usually come right off with just a little water. I guess I need to use better paint, and make fewer mistakes so I don't need to remove paint. lol

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