Have you ever suddenly discovered a simple act that makes your life immensely easier?
A  no-brainer that you should have figured out years ago?

Ink is much less likely to spill if it is taped to the table. Especially when I’m experimenting like with this owl in flight.

For instance, when I finally figured out (after YEARS of working with pen and ink with students  of all ages) that if I used a little masking tape to secure  the ink cups to the table they were less likely to spill.

Duh!

Another example:  covering my studio and classroom tables with cheap brown paper from a roll made life so much easier that it was well worth the expense. Especially since students love to draw right on the paper.  You can see the brown paper under the owl.

(I recycle the paper using both sides until it practically shredded).

I used to begin my paintings with elaborate under-paintings of composition and subject matter, laying out the composition and color. Then when I decided on changes I had to paint out whole sections. and add more with paint, which then had to be painted over again if that  didn’t work.

This made it really hard to work with layers of transparent color as a background, which I do all the time now. The spontaneous color washes were difficult to match.

Then one day Warren Kimble was visiting my studio and he made a BRILLIANT suggestion. It’s so simple it is almost  embarrassing. He suggested that I use chalk on a dark image or charcoal on a light image for the layout drawing.

Mega-duh! Why had I never thought of that?

However, I discovered that using charcoal on top of the layer of self leveling clear gel cut right through the gel and made marks that were impossible to remove.  But the chalk works well. Hurrah!

Chalk on dark, charcoal on light. Soft charcoal works better.

It helps for making further organizational decisions too… like on this new version of Corn Dance I’m working on for a collector of my work.

Do you work with chalk and charcoal to lay out your compositions?

Am I the last artist on the planet to have learned how useful that method can be?