According to her website, Carol Marine was showing in 7 galleries, but still not making a living on her artwork. In addition, since art school she thought paintings had to be big, and that was causing her a lot of misery. After adopting her baby son, she had no time for painting, but when her son was a year and a half old, she read about daily painting.
“The idea was to do one small painting each day, post it on a blog, and sell it in auction. I started painting during Jacob’s naps, and quickly fell in love with the process! I slowly built up a following and started selling my daily paintings. I was finally making a living with my art!”
I like her paintings the most when she’s playing with light, reflection, and shadow.
These still lifes aren’t catching the sunlight, or moonlight (below). Marine uses a shadow box and controlled light source to set up her studies. (Image and text below from her blog.)
Here are a couple process pics posted by a student at her workshop. Marine starts by toning her panel with burnt umber, then draws with burnt umber. She always uses a viewfinder to find and crop her composition. After the drawing is done, local color is applied quickly.
While Merrow-Smith and Keiser use philberts to give the brushstrokes an organic look, Marine uses flats. This is part of what gives her paintings a modern look with straight cut edges. Notice too how the forms are not outlined, closed, or hard edged. This allows for more movement and flow.
Carol Marine’s favorite brush: Silver Bristlon brights
“I have (Silver Bristlon brights) in most sizes, and use a small filbert of the same brand for drawing out my compositions. It should to be firm enough, with a flat edge, but also soft enough for the smooth surface I use to paint on. ”
“I wash my brushes with Murphy’s Oil Soap. I love this stuff because it leaves my brushes soft and conditioned. It’s also great if I accidentally leave my brushes out overnight and the paint dries on them. In that case I put them in a jar of Murphy’s for 24 hours and then wash them like normal. All the paint comes right out like magic. I am told this also works for acrylic paint!”
“I use a paper palette pad for my paint. At the end of the day I simply leave it as is. The next day, I carefully peel off the top sheet of paper, transfer all my big piles of paint to the next sheet, and throw the top sheet away.”
“I love Ampersand Gessobord, but it took me a while to get used to them. (…) I didn’t like them at first. But then I tried them again a few months later and just fell in love. What I found was that, because they are much smoother than canvas, a stiff brush takes off more paint than it puts on. So I started looking for softer brushes, and this is when I found the Silver Bristlons. They are the perfect brush for these panels.”
“In this photo you can see the little panel holder my husband invented for me. It has a very simple way of holding the panel using friction so that I can paint off of every edge with nothing in the way.”
Marine’s limited palette (Gamblin Oil Paints) :
Titanium White
Cadmium Yellow
Cadmium Red
Alizarin Crimson
Ultramarine Blue
Phthalo Blue
Burnt Umber
Tips to beginners who want to start painting with oil?
“I recommend painting small and as often as possible. Choose a simple subject that you are excited about, and paint it a few times, trying small changes each time. Then choose a new subject and do it again. Along the way, try lots of different brushes, panels, paint, etc., so you can find the combination that works for you. Experiment. Have fun!”
A note about all this blogging…
Like Duane Keiser and Julian Merrow-Smith, these daily paintings are great for building skill at quick alla-prima painting processes, and the blogging-auction format gives an artist immediate feedback on what subjects appeal most to viewers and buyers. Daily blogs and auctions are fantastic for an art business in which the subject matter is neat, colorful, and sellable. If this suits you, I suggest you give it a try. Start with 30 days. If this doesn’t suit you, let it go. While daily creative time can be great artistic discipline, blogging and online art auctions isn’t for everyone. In addition to a lot of online work, this is not an appropriate framework for artists who are doing more personal, exploratory, or experimental work. Receiving instant feedback on your work means you are potentially inviting the viewer into your creative space, allowing them to suggest you paint more brightly colored thingy-bops in this or that particular way, and allowing the masses to unsubtly suggest that perhaps you paint fewer of those other new, uncomfortable, or not-quite-formed ideas they didn’t like so much. Since my reasons for painting are less simple, my ideas take time to gestate, and my motivations are more private, daily posts wouldn’t be a good idea for me. If you do paint pretty things in rapid fire, don’t mind the computer, and love the feedback, go for it! It’s a great business model for the times. The internet is your… um… oyster and I support you 100%. But for the rest of us, we’ll keep fumbling around in the dark for that illusive other thing.
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Daily Painters: Carol Marine
“The idea was to do one small painting each day, post it on a blog, and sell it in auction. I started painting during Jacob’s naps, and quickly fell in love with the process! I slowly built up a following and started selling my daily paintings. I was finally making a living with my art!”
Now Carol Marine and her husband run a Daily Paintworks online gallery for artists, she has created several books and instructionals, and she teaches all over the country. Check out her book: Daily Painting: Paint Small and Often To Become a More Creative, Productive, and Successful Artist.
I like her paintings the most when she’s playing with light, reflection, and shadow.
These still lifes aren’t catching the sunlight, or moonlight (below). Marine uses a shadow box and controlled light source to set up her studies. (Image and text below from her blog.)
Here are a couple process pics posted by a student at her workshop. Marine starts by toning her panel with burnt umber, then draws with burnt umber. She always uses a viewfinder to find and crop her composition. After the drawing is done, local color is applied quickly.
I found some more helpful process notes on parkablog’s interview of Carol Marine:
While Merrow-Smith and Keiser use philberts to give the brushstrokes an organic look, Marine uses flats. This is part of what gives her paintings a modern look with straight cut edges. Notice too how the forms are not outlined, closed, or hard edged. This allows for more movement and flow.
Carol Marine’s favorite brush: Silver Bristlon brights
“I have (Silver Bristlon brights) in most sizes, and use a small filbert of the same brand for drawing out my compositions. It should to be firm enough, with a flat edge, but also soft enough for the smooth surface I use to paint on. ”
“I wash my brushes with Murphy’s Oil Soap. I love this stuff because it leaves my brushes soft and conditioned. It’s also great if I accidentally leave my brushes out overnight and the paint dries on them. In that case I put them in a jar of Murphy’s for 24 hours and then wash them like normal. All the paint comes right out like magic. I am told this also works for acrylic paint!”
“I use a paper palette pad for my paint. At the end of the day I simply leave it as is. The next day, I carefully peel off the top sheet of paper, transfer all my big piles of paint to the next sheet, and throw the top sheet away.”
“I love Ampersand Gessobord, but it took me a while to get used to them. (…) I didn’t like them at first. But then I tried them again a few months later and just fell in love. What I found was that, because they are much smoother than canvas, a stiff brush takes off more paint than it puts on. So I started looking for softer brushes, and this is when I found the Silver Bristlons. They are the perfect brush for these panels.”
“In this photo you can see the little panel holder my husband invented for me. It has a very simple way of holding the panel using friction so that I can paint off of every edge with nothing in the way.”
“I recommend painting small and as often as possible. Choose a simple subject that you are excited about, and paint it a few times, trying small changes each time. Then choose a new subject and do it again. Along the way, try lots of different brushes, panels, paint, etc., so you can find the combination that works for you. Experiment. Have fun!”
Like Duane Keiser and Julian Merrow-Smith, these daily paintings are great for building skill at quick alla-prima painting processes, and the blogging-auction format gives an artist immediate feedback on what subjects appeal most to viewers and buyers. Daily blogs and auctions are fantastic for an art business in which the subject matter is neat, colorful, and sellable. If this suits you, I suggest you give it a try. Start with 30 days. If this doesn’t suit you, let it go. While daily creative time can be great artistic discipline, blogging and online art auctions isn’t for everyone. In addition to a lot of online work, this is not an appropriate framework for artists who are doing more personal, exploratory, or experimental work. Receiving instant feedback on your work means you are potentially inviting the viewer into your creative space, allowing them to suggest you paint more brightly colored thingy-bops in this or that particular way, and allowing the masses to unsubtly suggest that perhaps you paint fewer of those other new, uncomfortable, or not-quite-formed ideas they didn’t like so much. Since my reasons for painting are less simple, my ideas take time to gestate, and my motivations are more private, daily posts wouldn’t be a good idea for me. If you do paint pretty things in rapid fire, don’t mind the computer, and love the feedback, go for it! It’s a great business model for the times. The internet is your… um… oyster and I support you 100%. But for the rest of us, we’ll keep fumbling around in the dark for that illusive other thing.
[caption id=”attachment_11812″ align=”aligncenter” width=”419
(For Charlotte)
Critiques Class: Read this and tell me what you think of the writer’s assessment.
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