fairy at night

And I especially like this little person:




















Because when I put down the very loose wet-on-wet washes, this was just a serendipitous blob that intrigued me. I went back into it and started sketching in shapes with sepia ink, fleshing out what would become a tiny fairy of a particular shape.

With these wet-on-wet washes, what I enjoy the most is the happenstance nature of composition. It's almost impossible to mess it up because of this. I've told my students, if this process seems daunting, to look at it like they're seeking out forms in clouds in the sky.

In such a manner can a story be told. Almost without trying.

It makes a strange arrangement on the page -- one minute fairy flying away; the other, larger (older?) fairy gazing pensively in another direction. There were enough ambiguous spaces left that I could have drawn in more fairies to join them, but I chose not to. I liked the dynamic just as it was -- each apparently unaware of the other.

Most importantly, keep in mind I painted most of this while being shackled in toy handcuffs by a belligerent five-year-old who kept insisting I was 1) under arrest and 2) that my name is really Darlene. This might sound amusing. (It wasn't really.)