Welcome to the Pond, Dragonflies!
Flutter your shimmering wings! Let's make our best art together.
The Creative Pond, a new, cushier home for the newsletter
The newsletter has moved from MailChimp to Substack. I’m calling it “The Creative Pond” because now it’s more than just a newsletter; it’s also a place for us to have a conversation, ask questions and share what we’re working on.
Like anything new, there’s a little learning to do before we can really take advantage of all that Substack offers. But you can also ignore all the new stuff and just read the newsletter like always, if you prefer.
I’m still learning my way around, too, so if you have questions about how Substack works, please start with their Help Center. (At this point, I would just have to go consult the help center and then “translate” to answer most questions, anyway.)
Why move from MailChimp?
MailChimp is expensive! (and cumbersome)
Unfortunately, MailChimp is expensive (and getting more so, rapidly) and isn’t really aimed at newsletters anymore. These days, MailChimp is designed for selling stuff, not sharing information and ideas. It’s rather a pain to put together a newsletter with the MailChimp editor.
Substack, on the other hand, is designed around newsletters. The process of putting together a newsletter in Substack is streamlined for writing and sharing, not selling, so it’s much easier and faster for me to create a newsletter in Substack. Less time wrangling tech is more time for actually sharing useful content, so that’s a plus for both of us. And, Substack doesn’t charge me a cent to send out newsletters.
I encourage you to share your ideas and tips, answer each other’s questions, and offer your viewpoint. Instead of a bunch of one-on-one conversations with me; let’s have a true group discussion. There is a huge amount of experience and wisdom in the Dragonfly community. Please share!
Built-in chat function, with pictures!
There is also an online chat where you'll be able to share, post and talk about the paintings we create. Let’s counteract that silly Instagram illusion that everything we do comes out perfectly. All artists have a lot of duds, experiments that don’t turn out, stuff where we’re stuck and don’t know how to finish. Let’s share our work-in-progress as well as our wins, and help each other make our best art.
Substack gives you a way to support my work offering watercolor tips and tutorials, if you feel moved to do so (coming soon)
If you start looking around Substack, you’ll notice that people offer both free and paid subscriptions to their newsletters.
Substack has a similar business model to Patreon. They don’t make you “pay” for free stuff by bombarding you with ads, and they don’t charge me to mail you newsletters, either. They make money by taking a small portion of any paid subscriptions.
So, does this mean now you have to pay for the newsletter? Nope.
I do plan to eventually offer paid subscriptions for those who’d like to chip in a bit to help me keep offering free tutorials on watercolor and (soon!) acrylic. But nothing will be behind a paywall. If you are willing and able to chip in a bit, I’ll be very grateful for your support.
If your budget doesn’t allow that, or you don’t use my tutorials enough to want to support this work financially, that’s cool, too. You’ll still get access to the same content.
There is a Substack app, if you like to read on your tablet or phone. Or, you can just read on your computer (or in a browser on your tablet or phone), just like the old newsletter.
What are you working on these days?
I’ve caught myself doing entirely too much fussing and fiddling lately, so I’m making a renewed effort to be more mindful and deliberate with my washes, trying to discipline myself to lay a wash or brushstroke and not touch it!! (At least not until it’s completely dry.) And then to make sure at least some of that undisturbed first wash shines through in the finished piece.
Sometimes I run into trouble with a painting because there is a technique I need to learn (or practice).
Sometimes I need to clarify better what I’m trying to express in the painting, so I can make more effective design choices.
But lately, when I wreck a painting, it’s been mostly because of silly things like rushing, cutting corners, and “adjusting” washes and brushstrokes that I should just leave alone.
Sometimes, instead of worrying about new techniques, I need to work on boring stuff like developing habits and mental disciplines that get me to actually do the things I already know I should be doing: reminding myself to relax, breathe, mix up more wash than I think I’ll need, stand up so I can move more freely, reload my brush often to keep a good bead going on big wash . . . and stop fussing and fiddling!
How about you? What is currently holding you back or causing trouble for you in the studio? What are you working on to help you make your best work?
Art Invitation/Creative Challenge:
Everyone asks “How do I paint ________ in watercolor?” Let’s try flipping the question!
After you do some exploring, hop on over to the Chat and share what you discovered or created!
(If you’re new to Substack, here’s a help article on how to use Chat.)
Recommendations
I don’t know about you, but I’m finding that the “recommendations” in apps, media and search these days are just “here’s a bunch more of what you just read/heard/bought”. They’re no help in discovering books, music or products that are really new to me.
This makes me appreciate, more than ever, real recommendations from actual people with wide-ranging interests like my own.
So I thought I’d occasionally share some of my recent “finds” with you.
What I’m Reading for Inspiration:
Creative Authenticity by Ian Roberts. His YouTube Channel is worth checking out, too. He’s an oil painter, but his channel is about design and composition, so it applies just as much to watercolor. He’s a very organized and thorough instructor, who’s thought deeply about composition and how to help painters learn to design better paintings.
A YouTube Channel That Deserves More Views:
Speaking of YouTube, here’s a channel that definitely deserves more views. Check out this demo by Nina Volk of NVFineArtStudio. I had to develop my “one difficulty at a time” method for painting clouds because I can’t pull off the masterful “all in one go” method she’s demonstrating here. But I’m determined to keep watching and studying and trying. Maybe someday!
What I’m Listening To In the Studio:
When I’m painting, I like choose music that makes me feel fluid and free. Lately, that’s been a lot of Alexis Ffrench. Doesn’t this make you want to paint something free and flowing?
That’s it for this time! Hope you found something useful here. Looking forward to hearing from you and seeing what you do with this month’s Art Invitation/Creative Challenge.
Happy painting!
Lynne
Thanks for chiming in, everyone! It's so great to "hear" other artist voices!!
Hi Lynne, I love your painting of the pond and boat. Your tutorials have helped me a lot. I am currently taking a class from the Smithsonian on "Establishing a Sketching Practice" and it's very challenging. But fun. What holds me back with making art is my reluctance to draw (I wear out the paper erasing my lines) and my lack of patience with detail! So I'm learning to be comfortable with those stumbling blocks -- and I try not to be self-critical and just do "me." Landscape tutorials help a lot, and one of my other favorite of yours a while back was the pears. Loved the pears, and mine came out very well under your tutelage. Best to you, and thanks for all of your generous teaching! --Margo