DAY 11: UNDER WATER

Welcome to Day 11 of the Painting Challenge!

You now have 10 paintings reminding you of your creative energy, meditative joy and how amazing you are at showing up for yourself.

At this point you may feel good and excited to keep going, or you may think you feel so good that you don’t need to keep going anymore.

No matter how you feel, I want to let you know that I’m proud of you and I’m eager for you to continue. Visualize how amazing you’ll feel when you sign your name on your 16th day of this painting challenge. To experience the gifts of the full Painting Challenge, I encourage you to keep going.

With today’s challenge we’re going under water and paint some blue algae. Now that may seem a bit odd but algae provide much of Earth’s oxygen and serve as the food base for almost all aquatic life and is a fertilizer etc. They are important. Just like you are important.

With this challenge we’re tapping into the gentle movement of the algae, how unfaced the algae is under the water by everything happening around us.

The Painting Practice

Remember to turn off your phone notifications before you start.

  1. Sketch a rectangular the size of either 4×5 or 8×10 inches on your canvas paper.
  2. While looking at your reference photo as your inspiration, you’re going to start painting your background first, the water.
  3. Choose your colors, they can be whatever colors you like.
  4. Grab some water and your brushes, and don’t forget a towel to clean off your wet brush.
  5. Once you’ve painted the background, the water, that’s when you add the darker colored algae. You can continue forming the painting now that all pieces are in place by adding some more darker or lighter colors. Maybe some bright reflections giving the illusion that the sun is peeking through the water surface.
  6. Now, set a gentle timer and paint for 20 minutes for some meditative joy and playful painting. We’re going for fun and not perfection.
  7. Claim your creativity and honor your journey of showing up for yourself by signing your art work.

If you feel called to continue painting past 20 minutes, please do so.

SHARE YOUR CREATION:

Take a photo of your finished challenge and share it on social media (tag #studioeriksdotter so I can see it), and tell me: Let me know how painting this underwater scene made you feel and let’s celebrate your accomplishment when you share your photo.