Bekkerz

I got a new box of oil pastels and I was super excited.  I ripped the box open before I even had my desk cleaned off and created this blending joy while holding my notebook on my lap.  I’ve been calling this ‘The Flame’. 

Ramble:

How many colors,

Can one fire be?

I’ve seen yellow,

Orange red and blue.

I’ve seen green a time or two.

I hear they can burn purple

That may be a rumor though.

Every fire is combusting.

Every car is slowly rusting.

Eating, feeding, and depleting.

It will slowly stop my heart from beating.

Burning on and on and on..

Built it up to watch it fall.

Grew the trees to burn them all.

Make the meal to watch it rot,

It’s like we all just forgot.

FIN

Materials

• Sakura XLP50 50-Piece Cray-Pas Expressionist Assorted Color Oil Pastel Set
• Mix Media Paper Pad, 7 x 10 Inch
• Mod Podge Clear Acrylic Sealer (12-Ounce), 1470 Gloss
  

Inspiration

I think I was just inspired by the new colors I got.  This may be a boring inspiration section.

I like fire.  Watching it burn is a good past time, at least for me.

I love blending.  I wanted to see how the warm colors blended together and outward.

I started with the red swatch and decided it looked like fire.  I just continued on from their experimenting with the different shades.

Once I was done laying down color I used my fingers to blend out into the white section on the right edge of the page.

Closing Thoughts

I really enjoy how this one turned out.  I like the blending on the far right the most.

I am also glad I left the edge of the paper attached for the scan.  I feel like it gives the piece a funkier feel overall.  There is also some cool shading effects that you wouldn’t normally get on a plain flat sheet.

I guess I could have finished coloring the rest of the paper once I removed it from my notebook.  But I did not.  Oh well!

I want to do a bunch more of these pieces based on flames. But with this abstract style, nothing to realistic.  It’s not that I’m not impressed by realism, it just doesn’t make me happy to chase perfection in my art anymore.

I just like color and the process of getting it on the page these days.  It makes me happy.

I really like bright colors, that’s the most important aspect lately.

Something about a dark piece of work with bright spots is nice too.

The flame is all about being super bright though.  Nothing too dark in this piece.

Next time I hope to incorporate some blue and yellow together and somehow avoid green if I can.

I’m not entirely sure that is possible but I am going to give it the old college try.

Please check out The Leaf if you are enjoying the flame!

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Peace and pieces my friends.

♡ Bekkerz

PS: Check out another art post here.

 

I have created this oil pastel painting for you entitled “Fall Maples”.  This piece was loads of fun to make!  Keep reading for a poem inspired by the piece, the video that inspired the painting, and some backstory on the piece.

Poem:

Trees are very solemn.

They never have much to say.

They just sit in the breeze and gently sway.

Trees never hurt anyone.

Unless they are hurt themselves.

They don’t complain and they refrain

from annoying anyone else.

They make good homes for animals.

They make good homes for us.

We take them for granted far too much.

When it’s a chilly cold wet day,

You can hear it in the trees.

When the wind is far too strong,

they groan and bend and try to hold on.

This is my ode to trees.

Specifically fall maples.

Keep on standing tall.

Materials:

• Sakura XLP50 50-Piece Cray-Pas Expressionist Assorted Color Oil Pastel Set
• Mix Media Paper Pad, 7 x 10 Inch
• Mod Podge Clear Acrylic Sealer (12-Ounce), 1470 Gloss
  

Inspiration:

I decided that I wanted to start using oil pastels to bring some much needed color blending into my life.

I haven’t touched an oil pastel since I was in middle school I believe.

I was never able to take an art class in high school because I was so focused on taking music courses.

I love using crayons however they don’t have good color coverage and they don’t blend at all really.

I had been daydreaming about using oil pastels for the last few months before I finally broke down and bought some from the local craft store.

I really want to get decent at lighting effects, even if I am not going for photo-realism, it’s much more appealing to have a consistant light angle throughout a piece of art.  At least that is what I think.

A seriously trained artist may disagree with me, maybe lighting isn’t all the important – but I think it is.

I was inspired by a great artist on youtube to make this piece.  They used paint, so it’s a bit of a different style.

See the video below to be inspired to create your own golden fall maples style piece.

Closing Thoughts:

If I was going to redo this piece, I probably wouldn’t.  It’s more simplistic than the inspiration video.  But that is what I was going for.

I wanted to see how smoothly I could blend out the lighting and what kind of an effect I could get.

I would like to do something similar with some other colors, it was a lot of fun to get the oranges and yellows perfect before adding the trees.

Maybe I will do this with a strange blue to green affect.

I would like to do some surrealist paintings, it’s probably my most favorite type of art and I have never made any of it myself.

Maybe I will paint a strange scene with a green sky blending out into a desert.  Something about deserts always seems surreal.

Perhaps I will take some inspiration from the Dark Tower books and create a scene from my imagination of Roland taking off after the man in black in the desert.  His world was dying and there were decaying robots wondering around.

I may not win points for being completely original, but I think that would make a sweet piece of art.

Peace and pieces my good friends.

♡ Bekkerz

P.S. Check out another cool art piece here!

The lion is a color pencil and marker cartoon created for a friend.  Keep reading for a story about the lion, the materials I used and some backstory on the piece!

Story

One morning the lion formally known as Leonardo was walking around the wide open savanna looking for some shade to have a nice long lazy nap in.

After what seemed like a fortnight the sleepy lion found himself a nice big tree that was throwing a giant shadowy spot on the ground.

The lion walked in two circles, plopped himself down in the middle of the shadow spot, then promptly fell fast asleep.

The sun slowly crept across the sky, moving the shadowy spot until it was no longer covering the lion and he began to bake in the hot African sun.

Waking up hot and flustered, the lion was annoyed.  He walked to the center of the now smaller shadowy spot and walked in two circles, then laid down and quickly fell back to sleep.

The sun continued to slowly creep across the sky until it was underneath the tree completely.  The lion awoke hot and bothered that his shade spot had mysteriously moved again.

“This tree keeps on moving” the lion thought to itself.  He decided to solve the problem once and for all.

He got up, yawned and walked to the tree.  He crouched down and sprung straight up into the highest branches.

Curling up on the branch awkwardly, and somehow with the utmost comfort – as cats do, the lion fell asleep again.

Surrounded by the leafy green canopy of the tree, the shade around the lion was perfect and he did not have to worry about the pesky tree moving without him any longer.

This is the story of why lions sleep in trees.

Materials

• Sharpie Extreme Permanent Markers
• Prismacolor Colored Pencils
• Mix Media Paper Pad, 7 x 10 Inch

Process

This color pencil cartoon was first drawn using the fade resistant Sharpies.  The color was layered on using orange and yellow Prismacolor pencils.

Inspiration

This piece was inspired by a friend I had just started hanging out with again at the time I created it.

The lion is an interesting creature.

Most of the time they just laze around enjoying life; sleeping and cleaning themselves like most cats.

Then they turn into brutal beasts, wreaking havoc on weaker species.

This piece shows the more lackadaisical side of the lion.

Closing Thoughts

I like drawing cartoons because they are completely unprofessional.  Anyone who holds me to high standards for my cartoon making is talking nonsense.

This is actually a step up from my crayon loving days!  Not that there is anything wrong with crayons, however they are not considered fine art by most people.

If I were to redo this piece I would probably use oil pastels and build it up a bit more.

I do enjoy the line effects of the colored pencils but I have recently become obsessed with the how much color and depth you can get using oil pastels.

I wish I had made this on a canvas or something more sturdy then a 5 by 7 inch piece of paper.  It probably will not hold up well over time, which is why I am glad I have this digitized copy.

All the best to you and yours!

♡ Bekkerz

PS: Check out another art post here.