It was amazing. I'd never done a class like that before so I decided to go with the flow. She had done a lot of prep before hand, chosen the reference photos and worked up a finished painting so we knew what we were aiming for.
We spent a lot of time gathered around her easel watching her demo, then back to our own work, then back to demo, back to ours, etc. a section at a time.
Here's the thing. When you take a class like this from a gifted artist and teacher, she brings out the best in you. I do not paint as well as I painted in this class, yet every pencil mark, every puddle and brush stroke in these paintings is really mine. I painted these...and was stunned afterward that I did.
We painted this one the first day. There are some things I'd like to fix, but I tried a bunch of new stuff and it looks pretty OK. I was really happy with it. [And truthfully, the best thing about this is the rust on the silo. I invented that rust - it wasn't in the reference photo. I love that rust.]
The second day, we did the white house on the curve [above]. A bunch of stuff clicked and I was amazed at how successful that piece is.
Here's the other thing. Now I'm kind of scared that I won't be able to do my own stuff that well. Yeah. So I've pinned these up in my space to remind me of what we did. I have my class notes out and open so I can refer back when I need to. And I'm going to keep on painting.
