 God's beauty is all around us and my goal as an artist is to capture and interpret that beauty on canvas and to take you, the viewer, along with me on this painting journey. Hello and welcome to Painting Journeys. I'm so glad you could join us today. My name is Kitty Lynn Klisch and if you'll remember from our last episode we're in Ireland right now and on our last episode I did a painting of Leap Castle. I sort of blocked it in and it was you know it was it was a pretty good start but it still needed some finish work. So I took the the unfinished painting back to my home studio and I've worked on it a little bit more and brought it more to finish and now I'd like to show you what Leap Castle looks like now. So here it is. This is Leap Castle as you can see. I have intensified the greens and I've given the stone a lot of knife work to make it seem very old and textured and I pretty much did the whole painting with the knife because it just gave such a feel of wildness and abandonment. This is the castle that belongs to a gentleman that he is slowly but and gradually rebuilding this castle, refurnishing refurbishing it or however you would say and but you know it's so large that most of the castle is in ruins and he and his family live in a very small small part of it and but I told you all about all that last last episode so anyway that's that's Leap Castle and now today we are going to go to the Grand Canal. The Grand Canal begins at the River Shannon excuse me it flows from Dublin to the River Shannon and the River Shannon is the longest river in Ireland and it divides the east from the west and because there was no way to for the people in the 1700s to get commerce back and forth across the country from the east to the west they built these canals and so this is considered the Grand Canal believe me it's very tiny little later on I'm going to show you a photo and explain a little more about it but what I what I did this this time is I wanted to bring you something that you really had an idea of where I'm going with it. This scene absolutely touches my heart so much I have such good memories about being there and it just is so so quaint this building over here that we're seeing just a little bit of right here it was a great big block you know building and a little further to the right was where the the lock actually was and this was before the lock was opened and a boat passed through but anyway as you can see here's the boat shed and the fence and then there's this area right here that seems like it's metal covered with metal and then from here down it's all reflection okay and so what I'm going to do you see you can see that there's a lot of things that I haven't really addressed in the painting such as flower pots and flowers and the greenery dripping down in the little blue bobber or I think that hangs there to keep the boat from scraping on the metal on the side there this boat believe it or not is still in use that's why it's tied up right now right here so anyway I'm going to be putting the finishing touches I wanted to I wanted you to understand what it's like for me to finish a painting instead of always starting them for you or working in the middle of them okay so without further ado let me get let me get started here now the first thing I want to do is I want to take my knife and I'm working with a rather limited palette today I don't have all the colors that I usually use out because I wanted to I wanted to try something a little a little different that would maybe be a little more true to life okay I'm going to take this and with my knife and I'm going to put it right here in the corner there and then right along here now remember I'm putting finishing touches on this so it's going to be a matter of of little accents here and there to show what it looks like what it's going to look like completed I do see there's a like a little window or something there let me see if I can make that with my knife okay boom there we go and then I'll take a brush and go back over that and and then I'll put a little light on it and it's just supposed to be a little window or something like right there clean it up a little bit there we go I have to hope I've got the angle going the right way he up in here it seems very light there's some light right there and there seems to be I love to work with knife and brush and there seems to be a little bit of light that is right on the very edge of the roof that red roof that red roof just really does something for me so I'm going to take just a little bit of on my knife here and I'm just going to come along here like so and just bring that up just a little bit there and a little bit right in there okay now I might go back I don't want it to be so bright everywhere there we go that kind of gives that a little bit of oomph all right now then we do have a well while I'm in the red um let me get this metal to look more like metal seems to me that there is some grade part of it here there is a there is a light area there that is there's like a little area there and then I believe that you could walk along right here on that okay and it's there's some greens and things and so okay um trying to get just the right color for that okay now like right here it seems like it's very bright now we don't want to do a whole ton of detail on this because the the part of this that is is um unique is the fact that that we want it to stay rather rustic looking rather than having a real finished now you see I'm jumping from here to here because I want to put this greenery in and have this little blue buoy in there that's going to add just the right note to bring the sky color down into the painting and it'll be echo the sky will be echoed down here in the very bottom of the water a little bit we don't see much of the canal because of the fact that the shadows the cast reflections rather the cast reflections are so light I mean um visible sometimes it's very hard to paint and talk at the same time so if I say something that doesn't make a lot of sense bear with me I'll try to clarify okay now right in here I didn't have the proper size canvas and so I look through my old canvases you know every artist has a ton of old canvases that they have started and not finished so I look through them and lo and behold I found this old canvas that I had painted and I had did not like the way the painting turned out at all and so I took I took the canvas and I scraped all the ridges off and I just painted over it and you can't even tell that that underneath there is another painting and that works really well sometimes now this over in here I'm seeing from where I'm standing I'm seeing a little bit of glare and I think I need a little darker and a little better movement in there of a vertical movement in order to make that go back a wee bit because it's a lot a lot of brush strokes and it seems to want to be coming forward so I'm mist mixing up a really nice dark I'm using my paints gray and my Liz and crimson and I'm gonna take a different brush and come in here and and really dark in this to set that back a little bit for us when I did this preliminary painting I did this in two or three hours I think it was just in my studio as I was getting ready for the show while I was painting it I was remembering the fantastic time that I had while I was in Ireland I had taken about 20 students over painting students I'd let a workshop to Ireland and one of the days we decided to paint at the Grand Canal now as I told you the Grand Canal is about one of the only ways that people that live on the east side of Ireland can get over to the west side to get to Dublin to sell their wares and all of that and so the boats pass through there we're on we were all it must have been about 20 of us we're all on the shore on this side over here okay this what we would be looking at that we're all on the shore and we're painting away and and pretty soon there's a bridge over in this area here that comes off of this house this is like the lockkeeper's house here there's a bridge and people come out and they tell us to get back because there's a boat going to be coming through now you know what we would think in America of a canal and what they have in Ireland and mind you this canal was built in the 1700s okay um what we would have in America and what they have over there is two different things so we're all there painting and then this boat comes and we're all excited and and well let me show you a picture of it you're gonna love this anyway here's a picture of what the canal looked like when uh before the before the boat came okay and you can see that it's quite it seems quite narrow you can see the boat I'm painting there uh in it and you can also see more of the building and anyway and then here is another picture showing what the boat looked like coming through the lock it was amazing because there was barely enough room and so up above on the bridge there were two men and they would call down to this man on the boat he was carrying driftwood or wood of some kind firewood and he was taking it down to the river Shannon so anyway his boat just missed the sides of the lock by inches and when they started to let the water come in as they were emptying it where he was sitting in the lock and they let the water come in there was a lot of roaring and foam and everything and it was really it was really kind of cool really really interesting so anyway as you can see it's it's uh it's pretty tight can you imagine all those people all those years that use that as their only means to get their stuff to market in Dublin it's pretty interesting I think so anyway when I get down here to this water I want to add some of that foam and everything that I saw yeah now let's see here right about here we have something that looks like a little tear in the in the metal there I don't know what that is a lot of these things I don't know really what they are but I'm going to put them on there all right now then I need to refine my my fence here and I'm seeing a nice I'm trying a different color today I'm trying brown matter MADDR it's really kind of a red color kind of a brick red so this is coming here in here and then right about here right about there we have enough paint on the brush here I'll just get a little bit more I don't have to come back in and and fix that I don't want this to be crooked I'm trying to be very careful not to be crooked I have a hunch that because on camera I always paint from the from the the side that I don't get things straight up and down like I should okay so this is going to go right here okay and then right here we have the end of the the fence post and there's a little bit of red there too all right now the fence actually comes down a little bit there's a little bit of a right in here that's showing a little open spot in the fence below and let's see we need to make some texture here on the on this fence let me see here separate those boards and we don't want to do too much we just want to suggest a little bit just just a suggestion there is kind of a dark cast shadow there and there's a dark cast shadow right there and right in there okay now let's see here okay that kind of looks fence like maybe we could have a little bit more blue I see a little bit of a blue gray on these boards just have a little bit of that make them look a little not quite so yellow just a little bit here and there to kind of make them look a little more fence like this is a little too wide we have to narrow that down there that's looking a little more like a fence and as we can see along the top here we have all these little they're like little pickets but I don't want to you know get into doing too much of that so I'm just going to give it a little suggestion I think that's good enough sure the heck anyway so here we are all are and we're painting along the the bank on this side of the and you know we're looking in this direction of the canal and it was a cold day we all had jackets and coats on and well here let me show you a picture of it this is what it looked like and you can see us all along the bank and you can see the one lady down in the left hand corner of the photo and she is it would be your right hand side anyway and she's pretty close to the water she looks like she might be having a little little bit of trouble getting up and down that embankment the embankment was very steep and anyway she decided that she was done with her painting and was going to go to a different area to paint and as she's coming up she fell over backwards and she totally missed the ledge that was there she totally missed that ledge and went right into flipped over backwards right into the canal now the canal the water in the canal was so dirty that it was like just really really really dirty and and you couldn't see anything none of us had any idea of how deep it was and there we were trying to pull the lady out but she had on her coat and a sweater and her clothes were all wet and she kept you know she was naturally very frightened and she was screaming help me help me well we were anywhere near a town or anything and this was after the boat had gone through and so the people there they were they were handy and anyway it was a very very scary situation we did get her out and she did go back to our we were staying at castle daily manner and she did go back to the manner and I don't even believe she came for supper she was one upset lady you know frightened can you imagine being so frightened being on a painting trip and in a foreign country and you have something like that happen to you my gosh so I was so relieved that she was all right I mean I felt so responsible for her you know it's my painting group and my people and I'm trying to watch out for them and and that happens that was a very scary thing very scary but it all turned out okay and she was very happy with her painting when she calmed down a little bit and me I was just thrilled that everything turned out and she was safe and I think that's looking pretty good now we do have some little um they look like little boards that are keeping the building this little boat building standing so let me see here can I put this here like so little it's a little light but I'm going to go back in and tone that down a little bit I just wanted to make sure that I that I have them on there so that we can see what's holding that building up you know I'm glad you joined me today I truly am it's a joy to be here doing what I love and sharing it with you this is going like that and then we have one coming up like that and then there's another little piece coming down like that I might have to clean that up with a brush a little bit and there's a little one coming this one's coming more like that and a little piece coming here okay now I'm going to go back in and tone that down but at least I have an idea of where they are this seems to need to be a little bit lighter this seems to be a need to be a little bit lighter now we'll just take a little bit of that dark and I don't usually paint with such a small brush but you know what I'm doing detail I almost have to in order to in order to get it to be the way that I would like it to be I'll take my wipe out tool and just come right there wipe that out okay I need a little touch of the brighter red over here a little touch of red right in there a little touch of red right here there's some very bright orangey red right in here now um let's see here take this and accentuate this dark that I have right here the edge of that and I may have to take my knife and make a new edge on the roof there so that it shows up the way I want it to there we go yeah that's pretty good okay okay none along in here right here there is this this you see here okay we've got we've got little tiny marks coming down on this too that's coming like that and then there's little fence marks here too and then right in here we have we have some um very dark green that is coming right here and as soon as we start putting that green in right away we can see that it's going to help a lot because we've got the the green on top of the red you know the river Shannon is the longest river in Ireland and it divides the east from the west and it flows from the north down into eventually into the Atlantic ocean this kind of gave me kind of a funny sensation over there like everything was just a little backwards because um you know here in the United States east means the Atlantic ocean over there west means the Atlantic ocean so I kept getting a little turned around with that let's see here let's do a little bit more of that down here too okay well that's looking pretty good this guy here needs to be toned down a little bit that's a little too light you see that he's just to be gray just a little bit right in here right there we'll just gray him down a little bit this needs to be a little grayer underneath here and these fence posts in here okay and then we'll put a little bit of the lighter green and I think we're going to bring a little bit more of that green along in here there's some coming right down here on this one and here so we'll take the dark green you always want to put the dark down first and then we'll just have these you know kind of coming over here and this is coming over this way here is green in here too and where the plants are kind of growing over this one here is coming all the way down here and that's in shadow in there and we'll put some bright on it that's one thing it was a gorgeous gorgeous clear day had very little rain while we were there meals oh my goodness everywhere we went the meals were so spectacular the people were so friendly it was really on our way to this place right here I don't know if I talked to you about that before or not but on the way there we we stopped at this little it's kind of like a general store and I mean it just had like oil and propane and all kinds of things you know all health or skeleton bottles of big big gallons of bottles of water and all this stuff just kind of sitting around the front of it and all these signs on it was a real country like general store and our bus we were traveling in a small little mini bus as we would go from painting site to the different painting sites and our bus driver he stopped there I think he needed maybe to get a drink of water or something like that and he told the owner of this store who we were and what we were there for and the owner of the store sent big a big bag of candy bars and snacks and back out to all of us you know as we were sitting there in the in the bus and that was just so his and then he stood out there and he waved at us you know and he was so cute he was like oh maybe both this tall and kind of round and and he just had this little funny hat on and I guess it's kind of like a little flat hat that they wear over there and he was just so cute so charming it was really really just you know and you feel so special very very special that you're there that you're able to experience these things I remember one day we went into this town and we were doing a little shopping and I was up in this bookstore and here was this darling three little boys and they had the most darling look about them and so I asked them if I could take a picture and first of all he didn't look like he trusted me too much and then he said oh okay you know so I took his picture and then his buddies came up and they kind of said like what are you doing I don't know he must have been maybe eight or nine years old kind of brassy young man and his buddy said what are you doing and he says gonna have me a picture taken gonna go to my picture is gonna go to America and I thought that was really cool he was kind of excited about and I still have that picture in fact um one of these days I'm gonna do a portrait of that young man if I had his address I do the portrait and send it to him he was so adorable his red hair and his and his wild you know red hair and his beautiful humongous blue eyes he was just adorable I want this to stay kind of cool back there and I will put in a couple of those little fence posts though to kind of show that there's something back there it's just supposed to be a little suggestion big moment of silence here as I'm reminiscing and enjoying what I'm doing here I'm gonna work on that tree a little bit here pump that up just a wee bit want it to be so bright boat I love the boat out so much fun I wouldn't ride in it there is no way I would get in that boat no way at all but it's very quaint looking we have a little bit of this cast shadow of course it's a little bit darker now because anything that shows in the water is going to be just a little bit darker and there is that little bit of soft on the bow there we need to see that a little bit better and then of course it is a little bit darker down here I don't think there's a whole lot I'm going to do to the maybe I'll put a little bit of the gold in here for the fence that's above so that we know that that is that fence and this is the building right here that's a reflection of that so I think what I should do is bring that in and put just a little bit of the blue there and not have that be quite so wide there we go and I think I'll put a little bit more of the blue in here you know it needs to be calmed down kitty that's a little too bright I always add a little tiny bit of orange or cad red light to the blue to kind of dull it down a little bit there we go so that's that and this green right here this is this is should be quite a bit darker I think right in here as it's coming down because that's that more of that roof and I'm looking right in this area of the photograph I hope that's not a glare for you right in there it just should be just a little bit darker there okay and so I'm seeing a little bit more dark right behind the boat here and this is where the the water line is right in there and then this is the reflection there again and that's the reflection of the green we have a little we have the little flower pot that's sitting right here and I need a smaller brush to do that now the reason that I really love this little flower pot and it's so opportune that it was there because it helps me to bring the bright reds across over to the other side of the painting of which it is making the painting more cohesive as the red is being echoed in these other places that's very important I want to put a little bit of brightness on it this sun is coming from this direction so I'll put a little bright right here there we go and I need to put a little dark underneath it to sit it down and you know you don't really have to put I don't like to anyway every little thing that's in the photograph don't have to put that in the painting otherwise it's going to get so cluttered I do want to have a little bit of dark down here coming up and there is a little bit in here and that seems to me like it's going in the wrong direction and this back here this seems a little that seems a little too wide there that little bit of a this needs to be a little I think a little more great for the little sidewalk there and you know as my eye darts around and I look at different things I see that this needs this this could be just a little gray or two and this needs to come down just a bit and maybe have a little more grayness to it now this kind of bothers me here I know in my photograph this is coming at an angle and I had it in the angle but I'm not so sure I like that I'm not so sure about that a little bit of yellow back there to yellow ochre to kind of soften that a little bit and maybe a little bit of the of a blue green in here kind of a a bit to kind of cool this down a little bit and cool this down as it's going back into the and the little let me see here this really should be going all the way behind there I think yeah there we go that looks better okay um we need our ropes on our on our boat I want to do that with real thin thin down paint roll my brush and just kind of go like so and so there now this is the sort of thing I made it too high because it's really not tied right there so I have to kind of get rid of that this board right here we have to do something about the board I'm kind of working a little bit faster now because I really did want to be able to finish this for you today okay this is that board that is coming along there it's a little darker in the middle I think comes up like that and then right here we have sort of a dark like bush that's coming over and I think the little ropes are a little darker it should be a little bit browner in here and I think we'll just have a little bit of of business right in here a little bit of this down in here that's rocks right there on the side and then we'll take a little bit of bright yellow green and put on this and make it look like it's a little more like it's a bush or a vine or something like that growing okay and I did want to get there is some lovely little purple flowers right in here let me see here mixing a little bit of my cerulean blue with alizarin crimson to make kind of a violet add a little bit of the red to it to make it more have a little more of a warm feeling I think I'll just put a little a flower bush right in here and then we'll have some I think we'll have some red flowers in that pot growing in that pot there oh that's pretty bright isn't it let's calm that down a little bit we'll put some green leaves in there and that'll fix it and we'll have a little make this look like a little more like a bush here all right now I want to take the the water's pretty well set so what I'm going to take now is I want to make it look like it looked to me when the gate was opening up and the water was gushing in so this is where it's 50 50 chance of a mess or a masterpiece okay so here we go most of the water was coming from this side here maybe a little lighter a little bit more needed to be grayer it was really quite dirty looking water here maybe if I put a little bit of that violet in there that would is that working for us it's not too terribly bad I think I will have to do a feel a little touching up here and there but it's it's not working me it's not looking too terrible at least I hope you don't think it does and put a little bit more on it seems like without the thick paint I don't feel fulfilled isn't that funny that's the truth though I don't have a really well textured thick paint on my on my painting I just I don't know it doesn't knock my socks off and of course I want it to knock my socks off as well as yours and I'm going to put just a little bit more here because this was really like coming around like this and coming down like that all right I think that's looking pretty good only thing I don't like I'm going to take this down a little bit I don't like this right here this is too much so we'll just bring it down and we'll just take a green brush and we'll come in maybe let me see here I don't know where I put it do I have it in my hand no okay oh here it is let's scrape this down there you can see the painting underneath no that's funny okay and we'll just redo that very quickly now because I I hate to say this but we're almost out of time and so we'll just put this like make this like this and you know I really have enjoyed my time with you today I hope that you have enjoyed this trip along the Grand Canal with its narrow passageways and narrow escapes and I hope that you have enjoyed being with me today as much as I have been and I have enjoyed being with you and I want you to be sure and you know catch the next episode where you'll get to see this painting all framed and I might make a few little touches on it but not much maybe I'll just oh I love this look at this just like that we have some little poppies just like that you know you don't have to go by what's in the photograph if it doesn't look nice do something different there I love it what do you think I love it so much maybe I'm not supposed to but I do it satisfies me it makes me feel good I want to thank you so much for being with me today and joining me on painting journeys once again my name is Kitty Lynn Klisch and I do hope that you will join me next time and until then bye bye for now