The past two months have been a little slow with Tsherin gone on his Vermont artist retreat. I've found a new "habit" for when I get stuck on a painting. I randomly open up
Robert Beer's "Encyclopedia of Tibetan Symbols and Motifs" then copy something from the page. The process seems to help get me started since I don't get as intimidated from the smaller drawings. You lose the feeling that you'll mess up the next step on something that is larger. It's a good practice.
I finished inking my White Tara. Even though my line work has a long way to go, I've noticed myself getting more comfortable with the brush. My hand turns automatically on curves where before I usually had to over think everything. I'm beginning to enjoy the process.
This past week I transferred the inked image onto a larger watercolor paper. That process was daunting. I've never used heavy weight watercolor paper in such a large format before. The paper had a tendency to want to buckle and remain rolled up. I ended up having to improvise so i used an iron with steam to get it to stay. If anyone has a better method of "stretching" watercolor paper please let me know. After cutting and pressing, I ended up with a 24" by 28" piece of paper on a larger backing board.
We use carbon paper to transfer the inked image over to the final paper. This process reminds me of those blind contour drawings that one is forced to do in early drawing courses. Even though you are working with a good image, the end result never looks right. You always have to spend a bunch of time cleaning up the final image again after you perfected it once already. A tribute to impermanence!
