watercolor 101 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 101 stage 1

2:14 PM: in a first for the two of us, mikela took our morning trail walk by herself. i’m resting my groin area, where i have what i hope is just a sprain and not a tear. drag. as a result i arrived early at the studio and was able to start work on a new one: watercolor 101. really, a hundred watercolors completed? of course they vary in terms of how successful each one is, but there are certainly enough to make a good selection for my carbondale show, which opens in just over 5 weeks. tomorrow we’ll pick up some canvasses at my denver gallery also for carbondale.

today i returned to an image i’ve used two or three times over the past few months, from a photo i had shot a while back at the base of the stupa trail. one reason i keep returning to it is the reflections in the creek that day of the tibetan red and blue flags flying above the water. their reflections caused some delicate stripes of light in the creek water, which almost look like monet painted them there. as well, the rocks in that area of the creek have some white bands running across them, which also look they might have been painted there. the green leaves on the right are taken from a different view of another creek.

i don’t have any more juice for working, so i’ll wait till after we’re back, friday morning, and see how i feel about this one.

WATCH this YouTube video of a chinese grandfather dancing to stayin’ alive with his 2 grand daughters

https://youtu.be/oU276K74zuk

watercolor 100 /  by Philip Tarlow

12:52 PM: i started watercolor 100, but got interrupted by a friend with a medical emergency, and now we have to leave fo an unexpected trip to salida, so that’s it for today. more when we’re back.

6:15 PM: just back from salida, where we picked up the new studio door molding which will be installed tomorrow afternoon. it’s been a cooler than usual day, so salida, generally much warmer than crestone/baca, was pleasant. it may have been a good thing that i was interrupted in my process of painting watercolor 100. it has an interesting boldness/freshness. and a rather daring, for me, combination of colors.

tomorrow morning i’m giving my strained groin a rest to let it heal, and mikela will walk by herself while i bring my watercolors, little table and stool to a spot at the very beginning of the trail, where i’ll paint until she returns. that will give me about 1 1/2 hours; perfect for making a few watercolors. in case the mosquitoes are bothering me, i’ll bring my netted mosqioto jacket. it’s a little awkward, but i’ve done it before.

watercolor 99 continued /  by Philip Tarlow

1:31 PM: tricky day: a 6:45 am trail walk, arrived at the studio 10:30, all kinds of logistics…arranging appointments for our denver trip….and finally, resumed work on watercolor 99. or should it be called watercolor almost 100? the changes are all to the rock and water forms in the middle and on the bottom portion of the composition. i wouldn’t dare touch any of the rest of this watercolor, which emerged yesterday in one breath. the marks indicating leaves were the biggest discovery, i’d say. they are a new way of making leaf shapes which may not be immediately obvious to you. but if you go back and look at how they were made in previous watercolors, you’ll see what i mean.

yesterdays version is BELOW left; todays on the right.

framed watercolor 92 / tweak to watercolor 97 / rediscovered flower watercolor / STARTING WATERCOLOR 99 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 99 10 x 13” stage 1

2:42 PM: in an unusual pt move, i started a new watercolor mid-afternoon; a time when my energy is usually on the downhill and i don’t feel the freshness needed to start dreaming something new. today, for whatever reason, was different. so i started work on stage 1 of watercolor 99, which is almost 100! 100 watercolors? well, i’ve been making one or two a day ever since i began having problems with my shoulder back in march. i’ve made many watercolors in my career, but only now have i discovered the magic of the medium. it allows, as i’ve said many times in this blog, for me to walk the line between representation and abstraction and to observe with increasing accuracy, when my mind is taking over and wanting to pull me down the rabbit hole of slavish adherence to description. in watercolor, the brushstroke is everything. which includes how “loaded” the brush is, meaning how much or little water. the little pans of the medium dry up the next day, and need coaxing with a full brush of water to regain the ideal consistency for painting.

darker shadowy bits need to take place over a lighter wash of color, and that must dry completely before working into it. a good time for a little snack or a look at the future radar to see if thunderstorms are on their way.

some level of planning is required, in other words. but that too is very fluid. an unexpected whim to use a color not normally employed can enter the picture. as can a new way of singing leaf. or rock. and, much like a thunderstorm that was predicted to strike 10 miles further north at 4pm, a bright yellow can unexpectedly appear at that same hour, and with equal power.

2010 watercolor, private collection, denver

1:22 PM: moments ago i was going texting back & forth with a friend in denver. she sent me this image of one of my 2010 watercolors in her collection, which i had completely forgotten about. time to organize my files?

watercolor 98 at 1pm, following a further tweak

12:55 PM: one more tweak to integrate the new rock on the lower right into the composition, and i think we’re there!

it’s all very subjective, but i think i can safely say i didn’t fuck it up! time to start a new one.

12:14 PM: a tweaked watercolor 97, adding a rock on the lower right. jury’s still out on whether or not it was better without that addition. i may need to make a few more changes for it to work. stay tuned….

so about an hour later, i was able to make those final marks, which you see here in the 1pm version and, indeed, the new rock on the lower right is now fully integrated into the whole, and sings along with its brothers and sisters. same tune. same rhythm. not an easy accomplishment, dipping back into that same energy without thinking about it. doing, doing, doing. and that, by the way, is the philosophy underlying our educational product, soon to be introduced into a number of schools here in our valley.

11:48 AM: here’s what the framed watercolor 92 looks like, as it will appear in the carbondale august exhibition.

additions to yesterdays watercolor 98 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 98 at the end of my painting day today

1:35 PM: after gazing at watercolor 98 at the house last night and this morning, i decided it needed more work. staying true to the spirit of the piece, i didn’t do a whole lot. but i do think that the additions i made have resulted in a better painting.

the accents of darker blue and green as well as the outline of a rock on the upper right provide more complexity and variety, without sinking into busyness.

BELOW: yesterdays version is on the left; todays on the right.

watercolors 97 and 98 /  by Philip Tarlow

at work an hour ago on watercolor 98

3:22 PM: nothing like some herring in dill marinade to get you psyched for a second watercolor! so after two or three fork-fulls on crackers, including of course those fabulous onions, i proceeded to watercolor 98.

it started out woth some leaf shapes, and then came the blues and greens. they were initially intended as a base, to be painted into with some richer, stronger colors. but i fell in love with the simplicity of it as it was. and lo, i stopped!

watercolor 98 10 x 13”

before my mind had a chance to get it’s dirty fingers on it, i stopped.

i believe that reading victoria finlay’s the brilliant history of color in art (see the page below) is in part responsible, as is the comment my friend in nyc made (below)

watercolor 97 10x13”

watercolor 97 10x13”

1:12 PM: quote from an email from a dear friend in nyc yesterday:”Today I have one rude question.  Why are you devoted to that long branch- stick thing when it's fucking up your life?”

kinda set me thinking. why, indeed.

so what i just did has no branch-stick things….i like the subtle variety of blues and greens, and where would we be without those bits of yellow and orange?

watercolor 96 /  by Philip Tarlow

at work moments ago on watercolor 96

12:03 PM: yesterdays early stage of watercolor 95 has been put aside. i wasn’t in the right space to continue work on it. so, since i’m my own boss, i started watercolor 96. inspired by how matisse sometimes divides up the picture plane, with something going on in each segment but all interconnected, i divided the paper into 4 areas and am immediately transgressing; letting one bleed into the next/ if my teacher were here she’d be saying “stay inside the lines, philip!”

more a bit later….

3:324pm: ok so obviously i worked all day on this one. of course it should have stayed as it was in the photo uou see above. but it didn’t. i do like the concept, so i may re-do it tomorrow and stop while i’m ahead.

starting watercolor 95 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 95 stage 1

3:35 PM: i was up at 4:45am. i woke mikela at 5:15 and we walked up the trail this morning. now that summer is taking hold, the earlier the better. it was 52F when we started our walk; a refreshingly cool temperature. i don’t know what we’d do if we lived someplace like houston, where it’s 78F at that time of morning!

my flat files following the september studio flood

i started a 13 x 20” watercolor, but didn’t like where it was going. so i flipped the watercolor paper and started watercolor 95 on the other side. this arches paper is pretty heavy, and there’s no indication i was working on the flip side.

as you can see, this is very early stage, so i’ll go back into it tomorrow morning. right now, i’m beat and have to go back to the house and lie down.

i was on the phone with the lumber company in salida this morning, ordering moulding for the new studio door, which replaced the one destroyed by the flood 9 months ago, back in september; the result of a burst pipe. the moulding will seal the door, which is now vulnerable to wind blown water from the west. there’s still some work to be done on the remaining damage from that flood.

on the LEFT: one of the drawers in my flat files just after the flooding.

watercolor 94 continues /  by Philip Tarlow

4:39 PM: i ocntinued work on watercolor 94 today. as much as i loved the spareness of yesterdays version, it needed more work, or at least tha’s what my most current aesthetic dictated. the area of white space, while still playing a major role, are more integrated into the composition as a whole.

BELOW: the 3 stages of watercolor 94 to date. areas worked on today: the rock on the left now has more patterns; in stage; the blue wavy strokes indicating rushing water are new; in stage 2, the small rock formation on the far right was just sketched in, and in the foreground, the 3 rocks with the blue wavy marks are new

next step, watercolor 94 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 94-stage 2 10x13”

DETAIL

11:37 AM: i have to stop early today, so once i found my groove, i did more work on watercolor 94. as it got closer to the time we have to leave for salida, i was overcome by the desire to introduce red marks in the lower half of the watercolor. the rest of the image is rather precise, and the marks on the large centrally situated rock are more interesting and evocative than similar marks in previous watercolors in this series.

i’m out of juice, so we’ll have to wait till tomorrow to see where this goes. right now as i gaze at it, there’s a quality in it’s spareness that i like a lot. is this our beloved crestone creek, or perhaps a sliver of the aegean sea? the fine line i’m walking is between description, abstraction and now, today, dream.

the white spaces in the blue water are inspired by the air bubbles in the creek water, created by the rushing, swirling water flowing down from the high peaks above. however they could be waves in the aegean sea i know so well, and the rocks could be the ones i know and have painted. for example the rocks at piso yialia beach on the island of andros.

this is the first time, in all these 94 watercolors, that something like this has happened. rather than gazing down at the creek, we could be scanning the horizon and feeling the cool aegean breezes…..