9.19.14 - First official demo

Morning Duo

12x16

Oil on linen on panel

So I've painted in front of people on several occasions, but this past Wednesday Night I got to do my very first demo actually talking about my process as I was painting - the whole way through!  Luckily there were only about 10 people so that helped it feel a lot more relaxing.   

My good friend Carolyn had encouraged me to do 5 practice runs, but I didn't quite get that many in. 

 What did help a lot was to write down some basic areas to discuss, such as my background, materials, exercises I do to combat my bad habits:) and my approach to this particular subject and why I chose it etc., but to then let it all go and trust that I could draw on what I prepared without following a script.

And even though I picked a subject to paint and did 2 run thru's I ended up going with a different reference photo the day of.  I think that's just me....I like a little challenge and I want to paint something I can respond to in a fresh way!

So this is how far I got by the end....still need to add a sky and fine-tune some high-lights, but I was pretty happy with the result:-)....which was surprising -  as both I and some of the audience was wondering how I was going to get thru it all in an hour and a half...lol

The biggest AHA was probably that painting it up-side down, not only helped me focus on shapes - it also created a natural Wooow moments as I turned it back right side up!

Big thank you to Michelle Honles for inviting me to come and demo!!  I really had a great time:-)