Watercolor and Mixed Media Paintings

Maybe I should have subtitled this capsule The Journey of an Aspiring Artist though I do feel like an artist at heart.  I think if I hadn't gone into acting I would have become a painter... But the good thing about life is new roads are just around the corner so who knows?

On that note, since I started studying interior design I felt like I wanted to improve my artistic skills and hence started taking classes at the local VHS (Volkshochschule ) which is basically a fancy term for Adult Education here in Germany.

I'm especially fascinated with watercolors although I was not attracted to them for years.  Though I think this had more to do with my perception of watercolors being "washed out" and too soft.  Once I started researching the best mediums to work in for interior design illustration I began to realize what a vibrant and versitile medium watercolors actually are.  I especially like mixing them with opaque paints for contrast.

The above painting is of a man named Martin who is in my class with me.  I painted him while he painted his own picture. 

This painting is a mixed media of mostly watercolor and colored pencils. I painted it for an assignment on texture for my Design class. For the most part, I'm happy with the way it turned out though I think it could have been even more effective if I had played more with a reflection off the table.

I had a lot of help with this picture mainly from the below two books.

This is another painting I did for my Design class. This time the theme was balance - I tried to show that the weight of 2 red peppers was equal to 3 yellow peppers because red is the stronger and therefore heavier color.

This would actually be an example of asymetrical balance because both sides are physically uneven - though visually they even each other out.

I painted these radishes last summer using liquid frisket to mask the white areas.  Actually, I was using one of the frisket pens and found that I couldn't quite get some of the lines thin enough (for the little hair like thingies on the radishes) and had to go back in an paint over them.  Next time I would use a paint brush.