I never know when to quit

by Kathy Garvey

I was in the mood to paint, so I did. But I seldom call a painting finished because I don't know when to quit. This is my process for the past few days. Did I go too far? Not far enough? I never know!

So, I had some good watercolor paper and didn't want to just doodle on it. When I'm ready to paint and have no plan, I browse through my sketchbook. I decided to use this idea from November of last year based on one of my photos from May of the prior year. (I'm a hoarder when it comes to photos of flowers.)

I've also been having fun again with those so called calligraphy pens - The Elegant Writer. It bleeds...and in color...so it's no good for spending hours on a nice piece of calligraphy. But for painting, it's sort of a joy and surprise every time.

First you draw with the pen, then you wet it and it bleeds color. I like to also add additional watercolors to my brush as I paint over the pen. This was my first result.

Not enough. Added more, studied it, added more, studied it. That's my problem. It always seems to need more.

Now it needs something more still...a butterfly, lady bug, bumble bee. Yes, that's it. A bumble bee! I sketched one out and played with its position before adding it in.

Am I done? I don't want to mess it up, but I feel like it needs something else. I take it into Photoshop to experiment. Lots of experimenting later, I like the look of the oil paint filter and some watercolory washes around the edges.

Back to the painting and this is where I'm at. 

Did I go too far? Am I done? It's not signed yet. So, it's not done! And that's where most of my watercolors stand.

Painting Florals with the Elegant Writer Calligraphy Pen
by Kathy Garvey

On a recent residency at the beautiful Wildacres in North Carolina I photographed hundreds of plants, trees and bugs for future projects. Last week I did a stylized version of one of the plants I found there called an Evening Lychnis in watercolor. While it was drying, I did a quick stylized version of it using an Elegant Writer pen and watercolor. The two are shown side by side below with the Elegant Writer pen version on the left.

This reminded me that I get darker darks when I use the Elegant Writers. And since they're so fast and easy to use, I decided to have a little more fun with them. They're touted as calligraphy pens but I find it hard to believe anyone would want to do calligraphy with something that runs when wet. However, artists have discovered that they not only run when wet, they drip and spread greens, pinks and blues! 

I use either a 1.3 or 2 size and just draw on good watercolor paper.

 Then, if you want, you can release all of the fun colors by spraying the image with water. Dabbing with a paper towel while it's still wet brings out more of the pinks. See all of the random colors spreading in the example below.

Then color in with whatever is your favorite media. I'm using watercolors in the examples below.

I like the darker darks, but it's also the unpredictability of it that makes it fun to me.

If you want a little more control, paint with watercolor where you want color, being careful to touch the edge so that it bleeds the pen's colors into the watercolor. Here's an example where I didn't spray in advance.

I like how rich some of my watercolors get when the colors from the pen mix in with them.

Once an area has been wet, it won't run again. But if any areas have not been wet, a quick spray will release the colors, even days later.

To find out more about these fun pens, search for "Elegant Writer Calligraphy Pens." They can be found in most art supply stores including Jo-Ann Fabrics and Michael's. 

There are plenty of tutorials online about these pens. My favorite tutorial on You Tube is this one: How To Use the Elegant Writer Calligraphy Marker with Artist Karlyn Holman.

Not Elegant, but Definitely Fun

In August someone shared a video of Karlyn Holman demonstrating how to use the "Elegant Writer" calligraphy marker made by  Speedball. Karlyn is a fantastic artist and creates demos for Cheap Joes Art Stuff - a widely popular store for artists' supplies frequented by the Pieces of 8 if we are in their neighborhood  -  Asheville, Boone or Charlotte, NC! (They once loaded us up with some free supplies because they asked if we were there to paint - of course we were - but they meant to paint in their class that people had paid for. We can be so naive. And appreciative!)

Anyway, the artist was so good, as was the video, that I decided to give these markers a try. They come in sets of four or you can buy them individually. I bought one, the 1.3 mm tip and started drawing with it at one of our Pieces of 8 weekly meetings at Ralph's Art Supply. We were drawing cups! The magic of this marker is that if you wet what you've drawn with it, it oozes (yes it oozes) all kinds of marvelous colors. Totally beautiful blues, pinks and greens. That makes it awful and totally non-elegant if you worked hours on some beautiful calligraphy piece only to splash a drop of water on it. But, if as in the video, you wanted to wet it, then all kinds of FUN happens.

I love all the little squiggles happening on their own and the pretty mauve and blue shadows.

I made three more small  8x10s using the pen and wetting my paper afterwards. I realized why they were popular with people who make those pre-painted brightly colored journals. Stored the pen away with my colored pencils for journaling and got on with other things.

But, thinking they would be fun for the Pieces of 8 to experiment with in 2016 (we like to experiment but we call it a "challenge"), I ordered sets through Ralph's Art Supply that I was going to give them all today at our annual Christmas party. Which, unfortunately, I had to miss due to a bad cold. So, this is their notice, sets are waiting for you.  

Hope you will all have FUN experimenting. Here's is what I learned...

First of all, they only run when first "activated" by painting over them with water. Once a spot has spread, it doesn't spread again. It's really great for creating a background by painting around your object. Here's the start of one after activating, at the end I've put the final version of this in. (I deliberately left the center of the flowers blank so that I could put some pure yellow in and draw the stamens with a marker that doesn't bleed.)

You can sprinkle salt into any wet area for a grainy effect - shown above.

Then there's the fact that you can lightly spray your piece to get all sorts of lovely "bleeds" running every which way, especially if you tip and turn your paper.

You can carefully go over fine areas with a thin brush to keep them from spreading later. This is vital if you want to keep areas for pure color later. And I love how the colors that run are perfect for leaves!

And that's another great thing, you can paint or color over them. I've used gouache for all of these, but watercolor, acrylic, inks, colored pencils and markers will all work.

And you can go back and add new areas and bleed them. (Here I went back and added some background leaves with a Micron and others with the Elegant Writer. Then I sprayed water on it to get all the little spreading splotches.)

Or, in my case, where I want detail to not get all fun and wonky, I use a Micron pen over top. They don't bleed - ever! Below, the final centers on the lilies were drawn with a Micron pen.

Here's a link to that inspiring video if you've got 25 minutes to spare.

How to really paint well with an Elegant Writer Pen

And my dear Pieces - I missed you all greatly today! Hope to see you all before next year!