Carol Carter Workshop, Cincinnati

I was able to attend the Carol Carter Workshop that was sponsored by the Greater Cincinnati Watercolor Society over the weekend.  Let me begin with I have followed Carol through her blog and Facebook for 5 or 6 years. I love her colors and how vibrant her watercolor paintings are. I enjoy following Carol's fun spirit as she teaches workshops all over the world and creates beautiful series/body of work.

When my friend Rhonda Carpenter posted that the Watercolor Society was bringing Carol to town, I jumped for joy when I saw that it was going to be a weekend! Taking off three days of work would not have been an option. I was thrilled when Rhonda let me know that there was an opening. Which all brought me to this weekend of fun.

This weekend was fun meeting Carol and it was fun meeting new people. There were 4 of us that were not members of the GCWS. Laura Starrett, from New Jersey, and all the ladies were so nice and fun to get to know. It was wonderful to catch up with Deb Ward and her friend Sharon.

Carol has a relaxed step by step approach. She gives us the tools and allows us to discover and make the techniques she taught us our own.
                                                                                   
On day one we worked on the principal that less is more by using only the primary colors to create a painting. Carol showed us how wetting the paper was important. She then saturated her brush with color and applied it with fluid strokes. Carol showed us how to make the object glow.
To the right is my interpretation of that days exercise.










On day two Carol stepped her lesson up a notch by showing us how to use masking tape and liquid mask to cover a large area when we did a gradated wash for the background for our silhouette of flowers.


Carol talked about the importance of good brushes, such as, a 2 inch sable to create a gradated wash without streaks. Unfortunately, I do not have one. (*Note to self to get one)

After the wash dried we took off the the tape and mask. Carol showed us how to work from back to front to make the lighter areas stand out.
On the left is Carol's version of this exercise and the right is mine.  I obviously did not get the flow like her, but I did get some good wet-n-wet areas in the flower petals.

After class half of us met with Carol for dinner. It was a wonderful evening getting to know Carol and others in the class. Lots of good conversation.



Day three brought us to our final exercise of a bike and shadow. Today Carol showed us again to start with the background and move forward in the painting. She showed us, today and throughout the weekend, that it is a dance of back and forth to different areas of the painting to allow areas to dry before you worked on the spot next to it. At again, saturation of color on the brush is key when creating dark values. Carol stressed that value was the key even though color got all the credit.

I feel very blessed to have been able to have A) meet Carol personally after so many years of chatting on FB; B) learn some of her techniques and C) meet some interesting and fun ladies.

Thanks Rhonda for organizing this fun weekend!

Gaylynn

Class Work from the Carol Carter Workshop
















Comments

debwardart said…
Excellent and concise description of the weekend! So wonderful seeing you again. (PS - the books were requested this morning!)
laura said…
Hi Gaylynn. Nice wrap-up.
It was a great weekend: lots of fun and learning.
Enjoyed meeting you!
Gaylynn said…
Deb, hahahaha I love that you teased Mike! Thank him for letting me look at them. I learned a lot in one evening.

Laura, I enjoyed meeting and getting to know you. I won't be able to look at a book without wondering if you were apart of the process. I have already added you to my blog role to check in now and again.
RH Carpenter said…
A great post about the workshop and your paintings have the glow! Thanks for being my painting buddy for the 3 days. Always fun to see you!
I hope you're conquering your allergy gremlins :)