New Painting

In order to murder my origami obsession, I made myself go into the studio and paint. I set up this still life yesterday afternoon and after some consideration decided to do it in watercolor. The first session worked out all right except for one area. Rather than let it go, I left it until today when I could see it with a fresh eye. What I saw was pretty much a mess. Too many layers of paint with opacity watercolor was never meant to have. The color was bad, too. I had read yesterday in a magazine about erasing watercolor, so I went to work on it with a big eraser. The result was only marginally successful, but it made me remember the "Magic Eraser" I have used so much in the kitchen.. The thing will remove anything. So was the case with the watercolor. I was able to wash off quite a lot of paint, leaving a sort of ghost. Then I went back into it with transparent layers of pure pigments.The underlying paint gives it a soft, three-dimensional look that watercolor usually lacks. I ended up being happy with it and glad that I went to the trouble to work on it.

Origami

Since I can't do much of anything with my sore shoulders, I have taken up origami. It requires a lot of concentration and no shoulder movement. These are some bugs I managed to bring to a respectable conclusion, but I must say, origami is not child's play. I was hoping to be able to make fabulous, complicated figures, but I now realize how difficult it is. I optimistically ordered three books on the subject, along with some paper. Fortunately one of them is at a pretty basic level, though I can tell you that going beyond a paper airplane is a tremendous challenge. Luckily I have a lot of stubborness and time on my hands. If my interest holds as long as my shoulders ground me, I will conquer it.