It is never a waste of time to sit by a stream and paint, even if the painting doesn't look anything like what you are trying to create. Even if the painting makes you laugh out loud. Laughter is good! It tightens the abs! HA HA!Finally, after three (or was it four?) weekly classes of watercolor instruction inside, we were allowed to go outside and paint!
The instructor warned, "It is probably a bad idea to sit at a picnic table because you will be surrounded by people. One of my students was so suddenly surrounded that it frightened her." That kind of statement is like a challenge to someone like me.
As the class spread out over the grounds of the mansion and gardens where the classes are held, and the instructor suggested nice niches for sitting in a foldable soccer mom chair and practicing with paints, I spied an inviting picnic table by a babbling brook. "Aha!" I thought, "I will be able to spread out nicely on this table." And even though the instructor had suggested that we might want to narrow our focus at first to, say, one flower or one tiny area of landscaping, the area beyond the table allowed me to practice painting a stream, a waterfall, a pond, bushes, flowers, leaves -- all the things that we learned in class.
I set out my paintbox and easel and paper and supplies by the peaceful stream and immediately began to wish that I had paid closer attention to the helpful instructions about how to deal with the wind and paintbrushes that dry out too quickly. I began to wish that I had paid more attention to any of the instruction (at all). The other students -- middle aged women like me who had carefully taken notes -- were engrossed in their watercolor studies in cozy, secluded nooks in the color garden.
I began with a study of the brook and then tried to paint some bushes near the brook, bending over my paper to concentrate. Suddenly, I was surrounded. My quiet picnic area was swarming with moms and tots. A mother, grandmother and two small children arrived and, I am not making this up, stood in front of me (between my table and the stream) and took multiple photographs. They even had the children take off their shoes and wade in the stream right in front of me. Then the mother led her children over to the table and said, "Kids." She lowered her voice, "This lady is an artist."
I looked at my page with squiggly white lines that were supposed to be a stream, and a green blob in the corner that I was referring to as a bush. I said, "I am not an artist. I am a person who is taking an art class at Cheekwood." The mother said, "Oh." And the grandmother said, "We'd better go now." She placed her hands on the children's backs and guided them away, looking over her shoulder at me.
The instructor came over. She wondered aloud if the crowds around the picnic table were bothering me. "Oh no," I lied. "I can totally tune them out. I am the mother of three children. In fact, two teen-agers and a college student." Her eyes glazed over. This was getting autobiographical.
She looked at my painting and said, "Hmmmmm. Sometimes it is easier to start with a smaller study." She made suggestions for how to move forward. She didn't smile when I laughed and said, "This is really bad."
She said, "You know it's just as important to do things the wrong way as it is to do them the right way. You have learned something." Whoa. That's profound. Could this watercolor class be about more than just trying to learn to paint with watercolor?
Then I said, "I sort of like this bush that I painted over here." And she said, "That is because you focused on the broad brushstrokes. You have created the shape of the plant and you are allowing the viewer to fill in the details on his own. It is important to allow the viewer to use his or her imagination."
I thought about that statement from Master Yoda the watercolor instructor for the rest of the day. Because good writing does that, too. It provides the reader a framework for the imagination.
Painting with watercolor is one of the hardest things I've ever tried. Signing up for the class was about making a weekly "artist date" with myself. The weekly artist date was suggested by a book I was reading to try to discipline myself to write more, which is what I said I would do when the kids got older and didn't need me as much. This first post is about trying to paint outside on a pretty but windy day by a stream and learning some things about writing. Even though I wasn't paying close attention to instructions, I learned something anyway.
