Art & Craft – Late Blooms

**Water supports all our endeavors, from the simple task of making paint flow, to sustaining life. It is the common denominator that all humanity shares. (Sharon Crosbie)**

July is World Watercolor Month. I read this in a magazine at Indigo sometime in June and it inspired me to buy some watercolours. At the very end of this post, I will give the History of World Watercolour Month as I found it on the internet. There was a secondary motivation coming into play to get down to this project of trying to watercolour. My friend and former neighbour of many years, who is an accomplished artist, invited me to go to Tuscany for a week in September to paint. She went last year with a group and is herself one of the organizers this year. While this was very appealing, it occured to me that I could have Tuscany right here in Toronto. Why wait for a week in Tuscany to paint?

Someone was sitting in front of a sunflower, watching the sunflower, a cup of sun, and so I tried it too. It was wonderful; I felt the whole universe in the sunflower. That was my experience. Sunflower meditation. A wonderful confidence appeared. You can see the whole universe in a flower. (Shunryu Suzuki)

As someone dabbling in watercolour for the first time, it’s a medium that brings playfulness and freeness to one’s soul and spirit – not to mention one’s hands. It’s so much fun to not just see the colours but to actually do something with them. From the cradle to the grave, we are always involved in acts of creating. Whether we bake a simple cake or grow flowers in a garden, colour a picture or do a watercolour painting, we are expressing ourselves in some way. I’ve always been fascinated with the dream-catchers I see in stores and below you can see my watercolour dream-catcher. I called it “Boho Dreams.”

**All human beings are also dream beings. Dreaming ties all mankind together. Jack Kerouac**

My next watercolour painting came about because I wanted to paint something with clouds and sun imagery – the idea of a new day is dawning over a tepee village. I called this “Welcome Morning, Welcome Sun.”

“Ô, Sunlight! The most precious gold to be found on Earth.” ― Roman Payne — **“Ô, Sunlight! The most precious gold to be found on Earth.”**
**― Roman Payne**

Bright colours always give my spirit a lift and so too do butterflies and flowers. As you can see in this painting, both are combined here. I really wanted the colours of the paint to blend here and for the paint to drip down and this is an experiment with doing just that. I called this “A Splash of Colour.”

Just living is not enough," said the butterfly, "one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower." -Hans Christian Andersen — **Just living is not enough,” said the butterfly, “one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower.”**
**-Hans Christian Andersen**

My father’s poem “Oh Beauteous Rose” was the inspiration for this painting. It was also a time to try out using my watercolour pencils – that’s how I got all the colour around the edge of the circle.

"Just remember, during the winter, far beneath the bitter snow, that there's a seed that with the sun's love in the spring becomes a rose." ~ Leanne Rhimes — **“Just remember, during the winter, far beneath the bitter snow, that there’s a seed that with the sun’s love in the spring becomes a rose.”**
**~ Leanne Rhimes**

Masks are fascinating in more than one way. There are the masks we all wear that we don’t see and there are the masks that we wear as costume or for fun. In this painting, I was trying out many techniques at the same time. I blended the background paper and was pleased with the outcome. My fascination with mandalas brought about my wanting to create my own mandala. I wanted to try some Eastern printing and what you see there happens to be Javanese. The printing in the right-hand corner means “Peace,” I believe. I used a very thin brush. This rendition is really a hodgepodge of different techniques on the same canvas. It’s mainly watercolour but could also be called mixed media because I used some gold metallic paint to decorate the mask.

**The mask is torn off, while the reality remains. (Titus Lucretius Carus (c.94-55 BC, Roman poet)**

While the challenge in the magazine I read for World Watercolor Month was one watercolour picture a day, I did a lot less than that. However, it’s a start and I’m looking forward to doing lots more exploratory painting and honing new skills. I had once said to myself that I couldn’t paint and voiced it many times. “If you hear a voice within you say you cannot paint, then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced.” (Vincent van Gogh) I’m listening to van Gogh.

Watercolour Dancers

As promised, here is the information from the internet about World Watercolor Month.

History of World Watercolor Month
World Watercolor Month was founded by Charlie O’Shields, creator of Doodlewash®. He realized after looking at the yearly calendar that of all the forms of art that had a day or month dedicated to them, watercolor was just plain left out!

Through his efforts, July was established as World Watercolor Month once and for all! Watercolor painting has a history stretching back to pre-history, with the earliest examples gracing the cave walls where ancient man used to live. Since that time art has played an important role in our society, bringing us together, inspiring us, and lifting our hearts during our darkest days.

It has also played an important part in education, serving to help bring equality to areas and topics typically impacted by socioeconomic boundaries. How odd is it then that art classes are one of the first sacrifices when budget cuts come along for our educational institutions?

Doodlewash turned its efforts to combating this trend by partnering with The Dreaming Zebra Foundation to provide awareness to those young men and women who may otherwise not be able to develop their artistic creativity. Even better Dreaming Zebra has created a whole new type of recycling, art & music supply recycling! They gather up gently used art and music supplies and return them to people in need.