Beginning of the New Year always pushes me to look back and summarize the past. At the beginning of 2014, I published my first art book on demand, with selected paintings from 2012 and 2013: “Paws and Claws” is accessible for online view, or for order, from: http://www.blurb.com/books/4984018-paws-and-claws

I would like to share with you, my major watercolor influences through 2014. I found online, many great artists and creative people who have influenced my “creative being” in the sense of colors, lights, format of artwork, etc. Hence, I am writing this post to highlight three of these inspiring artists.

The first “virtual mentorship” I would dedicate to a contemporary watercolorist – Endre Penovac. I like Endre’s way of abstraction of the subjects – whatever they are: cats, nudes partially covered with spots, water sports, tractors, anything. Endre abstracts the core of his subjects and paints only their character. If you’re wondering what the character of a tractor could be, you must visit his webpage: http://www.penovacendre.com/

Picture

Endre Penovac
(source: http://penovacendre.com/node/35?titles=off)
Talking about cats, there is another watercolor artists from Japan, Yutaka Murakami, who’s doing even softer and more colorful, wet-in-wet cats. Comparing with Endre’s cats, which are mainly painted in ink or combining watercolors and inks, Yutaka Murakami is a pure watercolorist. Murakami’s facebook page presents his latest artworks: https://www.facebook.com/yutaka.murakami.3994

Picture

Yutaka Murakami
(source: http://on.fb.me/1KfHv1L)
Both Endre Penovac and Yutaka Murakami helped me in developing my own skills, especially when painting the fur of animals. For example, “Mr. Hardy”, “Mr. Laurel”, and “Two Old Friends” (see three paintings below) are painted using this wet-in-wet technique influenced by Yutaka Murakami. One detail that I discovered as a big joy to me is drawing over the dry painting using white or black watercolor pencil. To me, watercolor pencil creates an artist’s signature, and I love it endlessly.
The third big discovery of 2014 was the English figurative painter Graham Dean, http://grahamdean.com/. I’m speechless about Graham’s large scale paintings full of beautifully created glazes that dance with the colors and their contrasts. Watch the trailer from Graham’s new film ‘Waterproof’, celebrating his 40 years of working as an internationally-recognized artist.
A big “Thank You” to each of them for their “virtual mentorship”!
🙂