Little Steps Poster ©Felipe Adan Lerma
https://fineartamerica.com/featured/little-steps-poster-felipe-adan-lerma.html

New Black Absorbent Ground Watercolor 6x6s from Late April 2020
Dancer in Moonlight

My previous two paintings in this series of 3 watercolor gouache on black absorbent ground, Moonlight Goblet and Nude with Robe Night, both elicited some interesting comments and feedback re my process, which I deeply appreciate! ❤️

Dancer in Moonlight is similar, created with M. Graham white gouache, and applied in varying intensities t create shape and form, and of course, ultimately, effect!

I’d mentioned in Nude in Robe Night that certain areas has a less intense black background, almost a scruffy look, created when altering the original line work. In the work below the same process can be seen around the moon. Originally, much larger, the figure and crescent seemed crowded, competing with each other, so I altered the size.

I would have liked having the dancer looking up at the moon, but it just felt weird turned either as positioned now or flipped horizontally. If I add anything else to this painting, it’d be a few stars to the top right, possibly even the Big Dipper. But I haven’t decided yet 😊

I began by sketching in the raised arm, to get a height to better fill the square 6×6 frame, realized I’d made it too large and fluffy-like, so left it and continued with the rest of the figure to get it down while my impulse to do so felt as strong as it did.

Sometimes nothing carries a painting more (for me) than letting my process flow with my feelings, and then fix things, lol!

Doesn’t always work out well that way, but when it does, it’s “very” hard to replicate the intensity of the combination of the two, feelingS and the visual process-process, “later” after delaying to “fix” something. That’s not always true for me either, ie, doesn’t work out.

But when it does, the memory of the mix of feeling and painting with a “good enough” or “wow” finished product, is extremely satisfying for me ❤️

It’s my true creative fix I believe.

So, when I finished the figure, fairly well, even if more sketchy than Nude in Robe Night, the raised fluffy arm felt like it’d taken wing to me. Outstretched, lifting. I left it, as is.

I still think I need something faint in the top right, some stars or such. Tried three, didn’t like ‘em and erased them with water – easy to do if done right away.

Anyway, that finished my set of 3 of this style, white on black.

I began another piece, also a dancer, in color, on white absorbent ground, a few days ago. Liked it, but tinkered with it a little too much. But it’s ok. I wasn’t happy enough with it, or at least the bottom half. I’ve removed most but not all the legs and gonna give it another go tomorrow or as able and will post it when done – if I don’t totally mess it up & chunk it, lol!

And going back to Dancer in Moonlight before I close, I did want to say I felt I got some of the lift of the dancer in the expressiveness, vs a static raised stand, with the up raised face my favorite portion.

I was tempted, for one brief horrible moment, to “improve” the face, and thank God I didn’t, lol! I just love the way the white gouache settled into the black ground and formed these beautiful features I can image onto 💕 It’s not something consciously done. It was lucky. A happy accident as I’ve heard Bob Ross say on the few videos of his work I’ve seen. And happy it happened ☺️

Stay well everyone! Be hopefully vigilant you are making the right decisions, day by day.

It’s the best we can do, and it’ll have to do till we get a vaccine.

And we will ❤️

Adan

*

Series link – Aging Through Covid-19

Do you have good, positive, useful or encouraging info to share? Please post in the moderated comments below 😊

My Related Posts Here On My Blog

My Related Amazon Affiliate Search Products
https://www.amazon.com/shop/felipeadanlerma

My Latest Posts On My Website!

• December 03, 2021 – I Am Tired, But I Am Happy; I’ve Been Painting, A Lot!December 3, 2021
  The above pic contrasts below with this earlier pic shot shot in November —
• December 02, 2021 – My Minimalist Art Experiment, “Abstract Minimalism 1 (in-progress) Part 2, Major ShiftDecember 2, 2021
  The large blue area (which I loved) had to be muted (or change the other orange/red areas). Blue bottom areas were also muted. The white/yellow glaze over the blue area tinting it into green. But, do I want to do more? Do I need to do more?
• December 01, 2021 – My Minimalist Art Experiment, “Abstract Minimalism 1 (in-progress) Part 1, a BeginningDecember 1, 2021
  A funny thing happened on my way to my newest attempt to correctly ( ie, satisfyingly ) extrapolate a detail shot ( variations of which I’m calling, “Approach” ) of one of my paintings (Autumn Passage) — — during the 2nd lay-in, after applying Light Molding Paste over the canvas, I ended up, when I’d see it from a distance, ie through a door from another room, very much liking its basic look; enough so I decided to try and enhance the current stage of the painting, yet, keep it’s basic minimalism intact 😊
• November 30, 2021 – My Idea for Promoting My WordPress Blog Posts on Twitter (With My Pinned Tweet), Part 4November 30, 2021
  And so far, I’m very pleased with how it’s working. It’s saving me a bit of time, yet also keeping tweets going out promoting my more recent posts. I could probably do with slightly more frequently….
• November 29, 2021 – Fine Art America News : “Easy Morning” and “Walking in Light” Featured in Art Groups + Sold a “If Dads Were” Coffee CupNovember 29, 2021
  Both figures in the painting above and below are watercolors, though, Easy Morning is all watercolor on absorbent ground. Walking in Light’s paint, around the figure below, is acrylic; both the watercolor figure and remainder of my painting done on Golden’s Light Molding Paste. Golden has evidently been at improving acrylics a long time, as I learned in this post (with links to Golden’s article), and I can say that for me, working on their molding paste, in watercolor and acrylic, is a real treat!
• November 28, 2021 – My Most Viewed Image This Past Week @FineArtAmerica, Heart FragmentNovember 28, 2021
  If it was an amazing process to see older photos and artwork show up on my most viewed list last week (and it was 😊) then this batch is incredible! Work from so many years have shown up, and such a variety! It tells me, one can never quite tell what folks might be looking for day to day, week to week, and it’s nice for me to have the inventory assortment, “almost” a historical diary, of my work
• November 27, 2021 – LOL! I Don’t Like It, But I WANT It! : Preparing More Paintings and Applications for Places to Show and Sell!!November 27, 2021
  I squashed together what I could to show a “fair” sampling of my work recently finished or in-progress right now. There’s more, tucked here and there among these, lol! And on another wall! I choose to consider that a good problem 😊 Seeing these together like tis, If I had to choose one thing tying them all together – the impressionist skews, the abstracted slants, the washes, the thick tones, the high key and (nearly) BW work – I’d say it’s….

*
Thanks again, everyone! 😊

Adan

Twitter / Instagram / FB @FelipeAdanLerma
Amazon Author Page – https://amzn.to/2YpgyUf
Fine Art America (FAA, Pixels) – https://felipeadan-lerma.pixels.com/