And The Beat Goes On!

I will try to add to my blog once a week. I work full time as a dental hygienist in Portland, Oregon. I love what I do as a hygienist, helping people has always been part of me. I have to admit that it is hard work, and my career is starting to wreak havoc on my body. I don't really know how much longer I can continue as a dental hygienist. Please don't take my realistic view negatively, it's just a time in my life when one door is closing and another opening. Here is my plan for the future....This! My art is not only a joy and a need to create, but hopefully it can be my career when dental hygiene is no longer an option.

Back to my art journey... After I picked up my art again after many years, I soon saw the need for some instruction. Like I said in the last blog, I was totally self taught and I could see my art was okay, nothing special, I needed some instruction. I found a local art school and started classes. In the beginning I learned a few new skills, a new medium (charcoal), and a place to commit me to practice. I was there about 6 months and started realizing that I was not learning anything that really improved my skill as an artist. I still didn't know the basics like tone, color theory, composition, so my work often turned out flat and lifeless. The art school was aimed mostly for homeschool children, which is awesome for the kids, not so great for an aspiring artist.

I then found an online pastel course. I finally learned what had been missing from my work thus far. I took that course for about 1 year. You can see some of my work from that class under the Other Works tab on my home page. I can't say I am only self taught, but I feel I am mostly self taught. I am very grateful for Pastelacademyonline.com for teaching me the basics. My work really changed after that!

I am teaching myself about watercolor. You can see some of my works with watercolor here or visit my Facebook page at www.facebook/AmHahnart. I have been painting mostly blank greeting cards to help me learn watercolor. Recently I just finished a painting that is a completely different style for me, but I love it! I am working on a pair for this painting, I was playing around with commentary colors. The next painting will be warm colors against a cool colored background. Come back to check it out!

I even made a very short time lapsed video of this painting. I want to start doing that for all my art work. The videos will get better as I do more and finish finding the best app. I think it takes a bit of research to find the one for me. I also just started a TikTok account, check it out! I'll be posting the rest of my art videos on there, and a few on my Facebook account. I can't seem to figure out how to post videos on here....beside the fact that they use up a lot of my space on here. If you want to see my videos please visit my TicTok or Facebook accounts.

I guess that's all for today! Thanks for visiting me!