Dot Courson Fine Art Blog

I recently taught a workshop on landscapes and wanted to share a few slides with you...   I LOVE teaching! I taught here in Pontotoc in January.The group was great and we had fun. Thank you to all the attendees.  Jackie helped me welcome 14 artists form TN, AL and MS. My next workshop is in Greenville in May with the Delta Art Association. Hope you get to come! Here is a link to details. Here are a few tips straight out of my workshop handbook that I use when I teach. I love to share, but all images are my paintings, and therefore are copyrighted ©2013  Dot Courson Workshops. So feel free to use and share these- I encourage it as a matter of fact! -  but I require you attribute the painting and slide images and painting to me please. : ) Value planes. ©2013 Dot Courson Arial perspective. ©2013 Dot Courson Movement in painting. ©2013Dot Courson Please leave comments below. I love hearing from you!  Happy Painting! ...

Getting ready to go teach a workshop in Greenville with the Delta Arts Association this week. I love teaching! When I paint outside en plein air, I start massing in the values any way I can... with any color. I work fast. I've found that the sun does not stay still and wait for me to get it down, so I admit that I start messy and tighten up as I go.  Another thing that I do: I generally put some warmth into green foliage as it helps show the green up - and to me it just looks better.  Here is the start of a recent plein air painting in my backyard: Progress: Final painting: Another Backyard Plein Air 12x16 Oil: Another Backyard - Plein Air . Oil ©2013 Dot Courson Update:   This painting was judged into the Cumberland Society National Juried Exhibition. The judge was artist Peggy Kroll Roberts. Thrilled and blessed that it won an Honorable Mention- the Omega Frames award of $500 !  Here it is hanging at the show at Richland Fine Art in Nas...

About the studio space: When we purchased our home around 10 years it had a nice large space upstairs to use as an art studio: a large room about 20 x 24 feet with  8' ceilings. It did not have any north side windows but I paint a lot at night anyway. It had a large western window looking over our back yard. One side had only 5' tall walls. That is where we installed new cabinets that Jackie my husband just recently built for me. A few years ago I had painted the room a light grayed beige color -and painted the sloped part of the ceiling almost the same color of the wall color but in a lighter value  because an overhanging slope in a ceiling painted the same color of a wall will not match! A sloped area will look darker - so I painted it lighter to give the illusion of the same color and made it visually more spacious looking. Early on, Jackie made me a nice oak 4 x 8 work table- 36" high,open underneath for canvas storage. We placed in th...