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Just add paint!


      It’s just that simple when painting with watercolor. This is how I start my day in the studio. Open to a new page, fill a brush with sparkling clean water, and fill the page or pages. Then, add watercolor paint and let it do its thing. 
    
       The daily studio routine is this:  clock in at 9 and paint that page in my journal. 


     I realize that the painting on this page could become a beautiful fabric design, a batiked collage, or an amazing painted wall hanging. But my POINT is that I start my studio day with water on a page and go from there. 
  
      As far as the illustrated journal, yes it’s true. Any thing done on these hallowed pages could become some great masterpiece someday. But that’s clearly not the intent. The journal is the place to play, to experiment, to express,  to answer the question “what if ?” It’s about the inspiring and refreshing place my mind enters once that water on the page turns to color. It’s where it starts. Does it matter that the marker I wrote with wasn’t permanent and so it blurred? No that’s actually part of the fun of it. 
     
      Last summer I had the unforgettable opportunity to visit Bavaria for 2 weeks with my best friend and husband of 40 years. One of the unexpected highlights of the trip was finding out that the tap water is better than bottled water because it comes from the Alps. Once we were told that by our host, I just kept my plastic water bottle and refilled it everywhere we went. Truly, that Bavarian water had the most refreshing and pure taste, even when it came out of the tap of a public restroom in a medieval walled city. It was right up there with Bavarian chocolate.

      Another highlight of the time away was filling up a journal with paintings, sketches and written down thoughts and memories.  I always wanted to be that person sitting at an outdoor cafe or coffee shop, writing in a little journal and then whipping out a tiny palette of watercolors and adding color. 
And that’s exactly what I did. In fact, the little palette sketched on this page is one and the same  as the one in the photo! That little palette is now a seasoned traveller. 

         I am a mixed media collage artist, which is great because mixed media includes any medium or use of material.  The process is not limited to watercolor, acrylic, crayons, sharpies, colored pencils or ink. Actually it takes all the above mentioned, but that’s another blog topic. 

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