The Creative Life - Barbara Trovillo

“A painting that is well composed is half finished.” – Pierre Bonnard   Have you ever started a creative project that was difficult to finish? This happened to me recently.   One evening, there were very unusual pink clouds in the sky out front.  Often, people ask me if I have really seen the colorful skies in my paintings so I decided to paint them. There is a beautiful ceramic birdbath in the yard I wanted to include. I positioned the hedge to allow space for that.   I put in the sky area, the mountains, hedge and grassy foreground.  I enjoyed painting the red mountains. The [...]

Last week I shared a painting failure with you. This week I worked hard to put into practice some of what I learned.    I followed the advice I set out for myself:                                     My Reference Photo                                                     A Notan Sketch                                                    [...]

"A creative artist works on his next composition because he was not satisfied with his previous one." Dmitri Shostakovich   When I have an idea for a painting, I am anxious to begin. I have been taught to make a plan. Sketch it out.... do a notan to establish values. Too often, I jump right into the work hoping to figure it out as I go along.  Sometimes, I get away with it, but definitely, not this time. This is the story of a painting fail.                                         [...]