Watercolour a Day Challenge

I don't know why I did this at such a busy time of the year, but last week I joined a "Watercolour a Day" challenge on Facebook. Maybe it was because I felt it would help me get back to my sketching. Work in my sketchbooks lately has been lacking because of other creative ventures.

To get started I selected a Moleskine watercolour book, and organised my painting materials making ready for a quick sketch. A poinsettia tree decoration was chosen for my subject. I set my iPhone timer for 15 minutes, and then I started to work.

When the phone told me the time was up, it was an effort to keep from "fixing" the sketch, but I left it alone. I hope to do something everyday this way no matter how insignificant the subject may be. Hmmm, I am wondering how my poinsettia drawing would turn out if I painted it over and over again, like Cezanne did with his mountain? What do you think about this idea?

This 15 minute sketch was done this past weekend. Although my subject was lit by a direct light source on the left side, there were shadows there as well. I found this quite strange but I painted them in anyway. The paper in my Moleskine watercolour sketchbook allows the colours to stain the paper right away so there is no correcting of edges once this happens. It is fun working with these quick sketches though.

"Red, yellow and blue" - a sketch made this morning - December 2, 2013