September 18, 2021 – Dapple Light, My Creative Conundrum and Caldron

My regular readers know I’ve been more and more attracted to the idea of being able to paint dappled light, consciously, and hopefully, eventually more spontaneously.

I titled my post to include both “conundrum” – which I kept misspelling til I looked it up 😊 – and “caldron” – which I keep feeling my creative heart and mind are swimming in (over their heads) lol!

I’ve viewed a few videos, read a few articles, and scratched out a few studies – but – realized the other night I was pursuing too haphazardly.

I realized I need to do more than dabble with something so dappled 😏 — so I saved a chunk of YouTube videos to a category folder I named “dappled light”, created an image album of samples images I like (also named “dappled light”, and started searching for articles.

Among the things I’ve noticed are —

• Some artists used a lot of the same size same shape dapples – which is fine of course
• The medium the artist uses can deeply affect the intensity and shapes of dapples
• Mixtures of soft and hard edge dapples won’t in themselves ruin or hurt an image
• If the light/shadow dappling source, ie, manmade things (power lines, fences etc) or trees or clouds is not visible, there’s a certain magic for what makes the dappled light on the ground or person or building etc actually work
• Whether the artist is realist (even hyper-realist), impressionist, or strongly expressionist does not seem to affect the effect of the dappled light, except within that art style itself and how it affects the viewer and his or her preferences
• Even abstract art can have its own sense of dappled-ness! (See tweet further below)
• And, it’s much easier for me to “see” dappled light and capture it photographically, than it is for me to paint (see image further below), and I want to change that, balance it out much more, even if impressionistically vs photo-realist (the latter never being something I did, never having the patience and skill set).

My goal for now, though more focussedly ( if such a word 😊 ) is to continue studying, continue building a body of line drawings to practice upon, and start to more steadily ( that’s a word ☺️ ) share what I learn as I learn it.

Like cooking (at least with me, lol!) some creations will be really good, and some’ll be a huge mess!

But if I really want to learn how “I” want to do dappled light, this is my only way.

I couldn’t decide, from all the list above, where to start –

So I went back to a blog post about one of my watercolors on paper I’d titled, “Figureshttps://felipeadanlerma.com/2021/09/07/september-04-2021-figures-in-a-landscape-study-im-calling-it-done-but-i-know-its-not/ in a Landscape Study” – I’m Calling it Done! (but I know it’s not) – knowing it wasn’t the right size figures for the light variations I wanted, but the easiest thing I could get to, and just dig into it making it more what I’d like with all these “dappled” thoughts in my head, lol!

And that’s the header image above.

Question is, do I think it’s finished now – uh, no, lol!

I seeing some things though I think I can use more of to bring it to closure, I hope 😊

Meanwhile, here’s two samples below illustrating ideas from my list top of the post (abstract-dappled art & photo-dappled art) —

It’s not much of an iron clad plan, as a path through the beautiful forest of art around me.

I can deal with that – heck, I think I’ll love that! ❤️

Stay well everyone! 💕

Adan

My Related Posts Here On My Blog

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

My Amazon search for “dappled light, in books” didn’t bring up what I’d hoped (books with pics of dappled light) but did bring up lots of choices of books where dappled light figured in the title and probably the story or poetry choices offered, kinda nice – tweeted an example below 😊
https://amzn.to/3k78YMi

My Latest Posts On My Website!

• Follow-up blog post after my 1st blog post since August 2025 earlier this week – Definitely like starting new!December 20, 2025
  “The relinquishing of one’s art, my art, to myself, is sometimes more scary than gearing my productivity to outside expectations”
• My 1st blog post since August this year (2025) – Like starting new!December 18, 2025
  “My plan, my hope, is to keep this, my original layin, produce a new 2nd similar layin but add a content color layin; keep it; then repeat the steps with the two formative layers and see what finished product I might produce – 3 works total”
• Poetry and Art 2025 : 1st Wings 2025 8×10 – by Adan – @SaatchiArt 😊August 10, 2025
  Excerpt from my original poem for 1st Wings — “teasing smiles from her wide eyes as trembles  aches stretched sweet like taffy….” – Adan –
• Poetry and Art 2025 : Scratches Made Whole 11×14 2025 – by Adan – @SaatchiArt 😊June 28, 2025
  “she felt herself in pieces gathered her sharp edges slowly – – her smoother edge moments gingerly in a dance of yes and no” – Adan –
• Thrust 2025 11×14 Fearless, With Hope, Through the Chaos – by Adan – @SaatchiArt 😊May 17, 2025
  “Ancient earth tones touched her feet swam underneath her skirt brushed her skin with raw silk cells” – Adan –
• Poetry and Painting – Thrust 2025 24×36 Into the Void – by Adan – @SaatchiArt 😊April 27, 2025
  “Leaping thrusting herself into the void of life’s light” – Adan –
• Poetry and Painting – Thrust 2025 24×36 Whispering – by Adan – @SaatchiArt 😊March 30, 2025
  “Leaping thrusting herself into the void of life’s light” – Adan –

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Thanks again, everyone! 😊

Adan

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