Native Hen: Capturing Subtle Colors of Life by the River
Postcard No 14: Life by the River I'm always fascinated by birds. They're so interesting in their individual species quirkiness and I'm constantly aware of their songs as I garden, walk through the bush or hang out at the beach. We're lucky to hav…
I'm always fascinated by birds. They're so interesting in their individual species quirkiness and I'm constantly aware of their songs as I garden, walk through the bush or hang out at the beach.
We're lucky to have so many different birds along the Huon River so I get to see herons, gulls, pelicans, white bellied sea eagles, coots, black swans, ducks, cormorants, geese, native hens, crows as well as the regular garden visitors: sparrows, honeyeaters, robins, plovers, blackbirds, and blue wrens.
They all bring me pleasure but the ubiquitous native hen is the winner when it comes to amusing me. Their hurried gait , the little black puffball chicks darting around, the turbo chook run to protect the chicks or drive off an unwelcome visitor and let's not forget their piercing red eyes!
What I also like about the ever present native hen is the lovely , muted plummage. Nothing ostentatious but lots of subtle colours that glint and shine in the sunlight.In today's postcard I tried to capture those subtle greens, greys and warmer browns.
After a quick prelim pencil sketch I laid out titanium white, cobalt blue, deep yellow, burnt sienna and lamp black and then mixed colours as I went. The acrylic gouache dries much quicker than my regular Artelier Interactive acrylics so I mix as I go to avoid piles of dried colour.
I used a single 5mm flat brush. A small round might have been useful for the eye but I'm trying to keep my equipment very simple for this project and have decided to stick to the one brush for them all.
I choose this stance because I wanted to give a sense of movement. The raised back leg lets you feel the forward movement as the bird gets ready to take their next step. I also decided to have just the bird and shadow with no background because I like the warm tone of the paper and the simplicity of the sketch as is.
As always, my advice is paint what interests you...don't worry if anyone else loves the native hen ( or whatever it is that you love to paint) like you do, just celebrate it's uniqueness and enjoy the process and this will show in the art. We can all get excited by a glorious sunset, verdant landscape, perfect roses, and crashing waves and with all that perfection we might not have to work so hard to create a pleasing picture.
Painting ordinary moments and objects helps to develop our storytelling and design skills as we attempt to engage the viewer and help them see the subject in a new and interesting light. Try spending some time sketching and painting ordinary objects in your studio or home and I guarantee you'll be looking at the ordinary with new eyes...an artist's eyes.
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