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My Encore Excursions

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  • Color of Bird Feathers

    Color of Bird Feathers

    As I continue lessons in watercolor painting of Shorebirds with Ian de Hoog, our bird subjects these past weeks brings color of feathers to mind. The colors in the feathers of a bird are formed in two different ways, from either pigments or from light refraction caused by the structure of the feather. www.allaboutbirds.org Of […]

    MSRitzman

    November 2, 2022
    2022 Color
    color choices, Color week, Ian de Hoog, shorebirds, watercolor birds, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Birds Eye

    Birds Eye

    I am back in class with Ian de Hoog painting birds, specifically Shore Birds. I have found that Ian’s unrelenting focus in his bird painting process – on the bird head and specifically the birds ‘eye’ makes this class a wonderful learning platform for watercolor techniques.

    MSRitzman

    October 22, 2022
    2022 Color
    Arches Cold Press Rough, color choices, Color week, heron, Ian de Hoog, killdeer, watercolor birds, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
  • More Landscape Color

    More Landscape Color

    Progress has been made in my understanding of successful watercolor landscape. Sarah Hansen has kept us on track in learning techniques for sky, mid-ground, fore-ground and today total composition. Included are

    MSRitzman

    September 27, 2022
    2022 Color
    color choices, Color week, Sarah Hansen, watercolor landscape, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Landscape Color

    Landscape Color

    Is watercolor landscape really that difficult? … YES! I am taking a class with Sarah Hansen- Watercolor Landscapes Deconstructed online via Winslow Art Center. Check our Sarah’s work here or Instagram here. My comment after the first session on clouds was that it’s going to take 1000 hours of practice to achieve that fresh painterly […]

    MSRitzman

    September 21, 2022
    2022 Color
    color choices, Color week, landscape watercolor, Sarah Hansen, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com, www.sarahhansen.com
  • Vegetable Color Wheel

    Vegetable Color Wheel

    This week’s watercolor sketching subjects quickly became a healthy meal. Before becoming a meal, the vegetables were a great way to revisit basic color mixing and elementary, easily overlooked watercolor practices – Keep your water clean. Keep your colors clean. Keep your highlights. The veggie motivation came courtesy of a Jean Mackay class via Winslow […]

    MSRitzman

    August 30, 2022
    2022 Color
    color choices, Color week, Jean Mackay, vegetable color, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
  • The Color of Maps

    The Color of Maps

    The next few posts are going to include how color was introduced to the genre of maps and charts. The earliest maps were used for storytelling and wayfinding on land and at sea. Military planning and plant hunting were specialized areas using early colored maps. In the 1780s the profession of ‘topographic artist’ was introduced. […]

    MSRitzman

    August 2, 2022
    2022 Color
    Color week, Jean Mackay, maps, watercolor maps, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Getting Started

    Getting Started

    When starting the watercolor sketch for this post it was to explore the three watercolors that made it onto my palette when I first started watercolor. The plant I chose to sketch is – Akebia quinata or 5-Leaf Vine. Synchronicity set in … it was 5 years ago that I took my first ‘encore’ / […]

    MSRitzman

    July 8, 2022
    2022 Color
    color choices, Color week, Cynthia Armstrong, Ian de Hoog, jane barton, Jean Mackay, kathleen Mckeenan, lisa snow lady, Shari Blaukopf, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Around The Table

    Around The Table

    The Art of Painting Food is a class I recently completed with Jane Barton.  Barton took us through sketchbook exercises to examine our food likes/dislikes, a favorite memory of food and we took a dive into food archeology. Great class with fellow food sketchers!

    MSRitzman

    June 8, 2022
    2022 Color
    color choices, foodie art, jane barton, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Something Different

    Something Different

    Introducing a new way to look at getting an artistic idea on to the page is my message this week. My preference is watercolor and pen but occasionally I step boldly into trying new techniques and media to see what happens and what I can learn [and remember]. Two classes have helped me try Something […]

    MSRitzman

    June 1, 2022
    2022 Color
    foodie art, jane barton, mark making, tara will, torn paper, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Lettering Lesson

    Lettering Lesson

    Adding words to a sketch is a good practice to understand so Jean Mackay provided us with a few tips for hand-lettering during the Nature Sketching workshop in Italy. I am not much for adding phrases into my work but some simple steps for making lettering look polished were welcome. We spent about 20 minutes […]

    MSRitzman

    May 22, 2022
    2022 Color
    color choices, hand-lettering, Jean Mackay, jeanmackayart.com, lettering basics, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Lessons Learned

    Lessons Learned

    After a week of staying at a stunning castle in Italy with the camaraderie of a dozen like minded watercolor sketchers now is a good time to reflect on lessons learned… and to imprint those lessons into my daily sketch routine. This was a Winslow Arts Center workshop; Nature Sketching in Italy with Jean Mackay. […]

    MSRitzman

    May 15, 2022
    2022 Color
    castello di petroia, color, color choices, color combination, Color value, Jean Mackay, watercolor values, Winslowartcenter.com
  • Italian Earth Colors

    Italian Earth Colors

    Raw Sienna. Burnt Sienna. These earth colors are associated with the Italian landscape and essential for a palette used for nature sketching in Italy – our color topic today. Jean Mackay is leading a Winslow Art Center workshop in Italy where I hope to up my skills in composition and page refinement while sketching outdoors.

    MSRitzman

    April 26, 2022
    2022 Color, Travel & Tours
    color choices, Color week, Italian colors, Jean Mackay, watercolor practice, Winslowartcenter.com
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