Top 5 Adventures of 2013....My AHA Moment

'Magic in the Air'            8x10           pastel         ©Karen Margulis
Click here to purchase $125

There is nothing better than when something clicks.  When it all comes together for a moment.  When you find yourself in the zone and your paintings are working. When the struggles and experiments start to make sense and you are finally finding your voice.

I experienced something like this a couple of months ago. It might have been the inspiring surroundings. Maybe it was coming back to Crow Creek.  It surely was helped by the instruction of Stan Sperlak. (I was at his Crow Creek workshop)  But whatever it was it felt good!

If you have been a regular reader of my blog then you may have noticed the changes my work went through over the summer.  After my Southwest Adventure I turned to a bolder more graphic approach to my paintings. I used bold black charcoal lines. I used flat areas of color.  I joked that it was due to the Vortexes in Sedona and surely it was the clear bold desert colors that was influencing my work. Here is one of my summer paintings.

Zion National Park          8x10        pastel 

But not everyone was a fan of this new style. I laughed when my mom told me she liked my older paintings better. I didn't have control over these new paintings. It is hard to describe but they just wanted to come out.  Some wrote and told me preferred  my softer more lyrical style.  I wondered if I would ever paint that way again.

It was at the Crow Creek workshop that it seemed to come together.  When I was out in the marsh painting in the wind with the clouds in living color....I painted with my heart. I didn't give though to technique or style. I just tried to capture the beauty and how I was feeling about it.  The paintings came quickly and with ease.  And I noticed something.....they were expressive but still soft. Yet there was an edge....an underlying boldness.  I felt then that my summer experiments with a bolder style had come full circle. This was how I want to paint!  (for the moment that is!)

This was my AHA moment for 2013. I look forward to many more moments in 2014.

Today's Painting was done from one of my plein air studies done at the Crow Creek workshop. It is on Multimedia pastel board. Which allows for a build up of texture.