I Couldn't Think Of A Better Way To Spend 45 Minutes Of My Time ..

With set up and paint testing, I probably spent more like an hour to an hour and 15 minutes. But I don’t like to figure that sort of time into my paintings and less I’m trying to figure out a price when selling them. Anyhow, it was time well spent being that it improved my mood and outlook that has been a bit miserable lately.

Art Has A Way Of Improving Ones Mood ..

My mood has been blah and I won’t reiterate what I said in my last post, because frankly people get tired of hearing other people complain about what ails them. I don’t want to do that so I’m not going to. What I am going to tell you is that I should always trust my instinct and my heart when it tells me to do something I enjoy and that will in turn improve my mood and outlook on life. The same may be true for you, but maybe your hobby or your 'Thing' that you do is different than mine.

I went out on a limb and tried something new. Probably not the best idea when it comes to trying to improve one’s mood, but I did it anyway. Why I say it’s not the best idea is because if I were to fail, or in my eyes fail, it would make my mood worse rather than better. Who wants to fail or feel like a failure? Not too many I would guess. Good for me that it didn’t work out in that direction and I would consider this "Trying Something New" a success, and I have this better happier mood to prove it.

The Art ..

Let's get to it shall we? Let's get to this new art piece I speak of. It’s a watercolor painting of three Koi fish. I decided to call the piece 'Koi Fish' for now. I know it’s a little bit predictable, but until I decide I am painting a series of these, I am sticking with 'Koi Fish'.

Don’t ask me where I got the idea or inkling to create this painting. It was out of sheer spontaneity. I am not considered a very spontaneous type person, but sometimes I surprise myself. This is one of those times. I just picked up the brush, grabbed a square piece of watercolor paper, taped it to my working board/workspace, and drew what came to my mind. I have no idea why coif fish came to my mind except that we have a fish tank at work and I have been enjoying watching those fish as they gently move around their environment. There’s something calming about watching fish. It’s sort of eases the soul if you know what I mean.

I can’t help but remember the good old days.. when my wife and I built a Koi pond in our backyard. It was a really nice one if I do say so myself. It’s not often I pat myself on the back for a creation well executed, but that pond really brought us a lot of joy for many many years. We eventually had to give the fish away and fill in the pond due to insurance reasons when we moved and rented that place out.

This is the only photo I could find quickly.. This is the great late Pepper and Patches. Patches was another one of our furbabies that was lost way too soon. We miss these pup's every single day. Anyhow.. This is the posnd I was talking about.

This painting brings back some great memories of watching those fish swim back-and-forth through the greenish blue waters. As I mentioned above I started off by taping a piece of square 140 pound watercolor paper to my workspace. I taped in about two eights of an inch to give a nice white border to my finish painting.

Then I sketched out to for Koi fish and one partial fish. In the end I didn’t quite care for this bright yellow fish because it was a little bit too curvy for me. I’ll correct that on my next painting. For now I’m OK with it because overall the painting came out fantastic.

Next I applied water to all areas around the fish with one brush then added in my blues and Veridian greens with another. Having the areas wet around the fish but not within the lines of the fish, keeps the colors from seeping into those areas.

After I had the majority of the water how I wanted it, I moved to painting the fish. One of the time I added paint to the fish, then went back and added additional details. I wasn’t working from any photographs so I was strictly going by what I remembered them looking like. Next time I’ll take a look at some photos for a better representation of Koi.

In this last photo I’m just about done. I added some additional shading and touches here and there, as well as some touchups in the water itself. It didn’t take long for me to complete the painting, just about 30 minutes in total. There’s not much to discuss as far as technique. I’m not an expert on watercolors so I really don’t know the terminology either. I would be doing the art world and injustice by making something up, that’s for sure!

After I signed the piece and I felt it was complete, and mostly dry, I remove the tape carefully by pulling outward. Once the tape was off the painting could continue to dry over the next hour or so. If I want to I can use a towel and an iron on low heat to smooth the paper back out into more of a flat piece. The water curls the edges slightly and that can be taken away with the iron.

And there we have it!

I finished painting that worked wonders on improving my mood. It didn’t hurt that it brought back some good memories and good times spent in our first home. painting new things is always a challenge, but I felt I matched it well and came up with a pretty good piece. I may even try selling this on Etsy.

Here Is The Summary Shot ..

I would like to paint a few more pieces so I can create sort of a series on quick fish. We’ll see how far I get with that. Wish me luck!

See.. Art Does Improve Life. It Starts With One Mood At A Time!

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