Student's first still life in oil. Started with a bistre of raw umber. Then fully rendering the pitcher with a raw umber and white tonal scale. A simple limited color palette was used for the apple using cad. red, alizaron, cad. yellow and ultramarine. 

Check out these amazing pastel drawings from my teen drawing class! Pastel on black paper, students focused on tone and finding subtle color in the white feathers.

Having a great time teaching through color mixology!

My teen drawing class at Olive Tree in Fort Collins is learning all about tone, chiaroscuro and sfumato! Here are a couple of their drawings of a sphere and a ten step tone chart.

Great start to my student Marilyn's pastel drawing of a flamingo! She started off using Conte and CarbOthello pastel pencils to carefully map out basic color and texture and then started using Unison, Sennelier and Rembrandt pastels to add more saturated pigment and vibrancy. 

Intermediate watercolor class working on ocean waves, learning how to successfully use masking fluid to preserve lights!

Here is a great start to a new pastel portrait by student Jenny Gomez, a continuation of her new series "Disney Princess Pinups"...Love it!

Finished charcoal still life from my intermediate drawing class!

Since fall is upon us, I thought I would share my student Marilyn's work in progress oil painting of changing aspen trees!

This week in class students began to glaze transparent color into the darks of their dry bistre (underpainting). After covering all of the darks with a glaze, we mixed up a semi-transparent color string for the sky, clouds and lighter reflections in the water. These mixes were painted more directly, but allowing the bistre to shine through in areas in order to keep the layers luminous. Next week we will tackle more semi-transparent layers in the mountains, rocks and trees!