A few of my favorite things

 One thing you should know about me- I love, I mean LOVE mixing colors. It may be my favorite part of painting. Rarely do I ever use a color just straight out of the tube. So, now and again I'm going to tell you about some of my favorite colors and how I use them.
My mentor, Dori DeCamillis, taught me that when laying out your palette you should put out all, or almost all, your color whether you think you need them or not. The reason nothing is truly only the color you think you see. For example, what color are these apples?

Greenish yellow, right? So you only get out your green and yellow paints. Look again.

Do you see it? There are so many other colors in there. Pinks in the skin, dark grayish blue in the shadows, white in the highlights. I even see a little light blue in the highlight on the top of the apple to the left. So don't be scared of wasting paint and go ahead and get it all out. You may surprise yourself. Oh, and my color tip for the day? Try a little caucasian flesh tone mixed with blue for that funny little color you see around the base of the stem. 

Do any of you have any tips or favorite color combos you'd like to share? I'd love to learn from you. 

The problem with realism...

"Blessed are they who see beautiful things in humble places where other people see nothing," Camille Pissarro


(Below: Details from "Shine")

www.ErinHardinArt.com

(from "Shine")

Artistically, I'm a realist. It's probably the only area of my life in which I am even remotely detail oriented. However, this is a bad time to be a realist. I believe that many artists who are not realists either felt disinterested in or pinned down by realism when they were young and now that they are older (and in a position to teach) the pendulum has swung in the other  direction so that now in some art circles realists are sneered at for lack of imagination. This is a problem. Not because I think that everyone should be realists-definitely not! But simply because every person has a different style and a different way of viewing the world and they are all necessary and important. I have found since becoming an artist and truly realizing my style, that I can no more change my style that I can my eye color. Sure I could wear color contacts and pretend to be different than I am, but it would always be pretend. 

I love to notice little details of the world around me that often get overlooked and recreate them in such a way that makes people stop and notice them. For example, the shine on a polished chrome faucet(left). 

For me, the purpose of my art is to make me people look at the world around me. For some people, it's to bring to life the funny little characters that live in their head (Theo Ellsworth) or to simply to make people happy (Sunny Carvalho) or even just to explore the use of line and color. Whatever the style, the artist is giving his or her viewers a glimpse into how he or she sees the world and that's valuable. It's a big world- there's room for all of us.

www.ErinHardinArt.com