JOSHUA ELEK: WATERCOLORS

Category: Landscape

  • Canton Museum of Art Watercolor Class: Week 1

    Canton Museum of Art Watercolor Class: Week 1

    I enrolled in a watercolor class at the Canton Museum of Art. Last week was the first class. In that session, we covered a lot of the basics about what materials are used to paint in watercolor, why those materials are used, and a little bit about some of the techniques you can use to […]

  • Winter Brook: Rick Surowicz Tutorial

    Winter Brook: Rick Surowicz Tutorial

    This is a painting I did, following along with a YouTube tutorial by Rick Surowicz. If you haven’t checked him out, you should. I really value his pedagogy. My version doesn’t look exactly like his, but that’s ok. Maybe I’m starting to see a little bit of a style of my own – with those […]

  • Hills, Rocks and Streams

    Hills, Rocks and Streams

    Here is a great example of an awful painting that I made. I make a lot of terrible paintings, and I try to post them even when they are awful. More and more often, these paintings are so discouraging that I can’t stomach the thought of posting them, but I need to. Paintings like this […]

  • Farm Road: End of Year Four

    Farm Road: End of Year Four

    This year I posted fewer paintings than any of my previous years. There are a few reasons for this. First, I painted less. I spent a good bit of effort this year on practicing drawing. I tried learning more about perspective in particular, because I want to be able to depict the things I’m trying […]

  • Appalachia #1

    Appalachia #1

    Firstly: it’s pronounced ”apple-LATCH-uh” not “apple-LAY-shuh.” I didn’t know this until I moved to Wheeling, West Virginia. Appalachia is named after the Native American tribe that Spanish explorers met in the mountains north of Florida in the 1600s (if I remember correctly.) For that reason, I think pronouncing it correctly is important. The US was […]

  • Proko Challenge: Landscape #5

    Proko Challenge: Landscape #5

    I wanted to write up each Landscape thumbnail that I painted, but I ended up needing to dedicate the time to the challenge itself in order to finish on time. I am very pleased with the results that I got from doing this, and I think I’ll be working thumbnails like this into my workflow […]

  • Proko Challenge: Landscape Thumbnails #2

    Proko Challenge: Landscape Thumbnails #2

    This is the second post about the Proko Landscape Thumbnails challenge. The challenge was to submit five landscape paintings, each 2 inches wide by 2 inches tall. I started this painting off wanting to paint trees in the distance using wet-in-wet. I tend to do this often, but in my mind, there is this technique […]

  • Proko Challenge Landscape Thumbnails: #1

    Proko Challenge Landscape Thumbnails: #1

    Proko has a challenge going right now, and I decided I would try to enter. I hope I can finish in time. The challenge is to paint 5 thumbnail landscapes. They can be painted in any medium, but they must be 2” x 2” large. The biggest focus of the challenge is to learn how […]

  • Edge of the Woods: #4

    Edge of the Woods: #4

    Two days ago, I wanted to Practice painting clouds. I painted this: I liked it in general, but felt like the bottoms of the clouds got over worked. So I tried again. I like this one more than the first, and decided to try to paint clouds again, with a more definite focus on the […]

  • Barn: #1

    Barn: #1

    December is nuts. Thanksgiving, then three birthdays, then Christmas… it’s busy. And my favorite time of year. But that means I don’t have much time to dedicate to writing these posts. Tonight, I finished a painting I’m pretty proud of, so I figured I would post it. This is my attempt to put into practice […]

  • Nimishillen Creek: #5

    Nimishillen Creek: #5

    I drive through Spiker Park three times a week, to take Norah to swim, or Winnie to dance. The West Branch of Nimishillen Creek goes through Spiker Park, and I drive over it on the way. Almost every time I do, I am struck by the strong contrast in the reflections on the water. When […]

  • Farm Road: End of Year 3

    Farm Road: End of Year 3

    Well, I’ve been painting for three years now. It’s time for me to do my little progress check. When I first started painting, I decided to try to paint the same thing every day for one month. It was the first watercolor painting I had ever really tried, and I figured painting it over and […]

  • Lobelia Cardinalis: #1

    Lobelia Cardinalis: #1

    This painting has been haunting my mind for years: This is by Oleg Kozak, a Ukrainian watercolor artist who unfortunately passed away in November, 2017. This man had the ability to capture light in a way that I haven’t seen in many other painters. I decided to try to look deeper into his paintings to […]

  • Ray Hendershot Exercise: Lighthouse #1

    Ray Hendershot Exercise: Lighthouse #1

    I have been absolutely stuck for the past few weeks. Every time I sit down to paint, nothing comes to mind. Nothing inspires me, I have no intention. But, just as an act of discipline, I paint anyway. The results are nothing to write about. It’s all very ugly, muddy, cliche… just nothing that I’m […]

  • Crappie Weather: #1

    Crappie Weather: #1

    I have been wanting to get out and go fishing for quite a long time, and this past weekend, I finally did. The ice has thawed, and they are letting Nimisilla fill with the ice melt. So, on Saturday, I dropped my kayak from the ceiling, loaded it on the car, and drove to the […]

  • Buttermilk Falls: #3

    Buttermilk Falls: #3

    I hate this painting. No… I loathe this painting. This painting actually made me mad at it when I was finished last night, because I knew it was ruined as soon as I laid down the first wash in the sky. I kept going likes dummy, hoping it would somehow fix itself. It didn’t. I […]

  • Buttermilk Falls: #1

    Buttermilk Falls: #1

    When I think about the past, everything is either polluted with a frenetic purple anxiety, or it’s a soft marigold mist of peaceful contentment. There doesn’t seem to be any in-between. I don’t know if this is peculiar to me, or if everyone has such a bipolar memory, but for me it seems all the […]

  • One Pigment Challenge: #1

    One Pigment Challenge: #1

    I decided to challenge myself to paint something with just one pigment. If you want to join me, here’s the challenge: use one pigment, and one pigment only. That means the paint you choose must be a single pigment paint. You can use water, ox gall, masking fluid, whatever, but when you are finished there […]

  • Market Heights: #1

    Market Heights: #1

    Hey guys! I’m proud of a painting! I have been feeling pretty down about my paintings lately, because I’m not able to produce the paintings that I have in my mind. But… I keep moving. And tonight, the blind squirrel found a nut. Before I get into that, I guess I should show you the […]

  • Back Yard: #1

    Back Yard: #1

    I am regularly looking for something new to paint. When I want a new subject, it’s pretty common for me to get in the car, and drive out to look for something interesting. I end up in the rural areas around me, or at one of the reservoirs where I like to fish. The problem […]