2025 was a good art making year for me. It didn’t feel like it as the year progressed because there were stretches where I didn’t make any art at all. But when I went to review what I’d made since January, my pile-o-art was fairly tall.
Yay!
It was a year of painting while I traveled, sketch outings with friends, and LOTS of classes.
(For me, art and writing classes are like art supplies. I want them all!)
Also, there were more pieces in the pile that I felt good about than I thought there would be. Sometimes I forget, but my art always looks better after I’ve put it away for a while.
True that many of the pieces didn’t quite turn out the way I wanted, but most had segments or aspects—like textures and techniques—that I definitely learned from. Which means that even some of the hot messes were wins.
So overall, a very good year.
2025 Highlights*
*These are some of the pieces that I’m most happy about. I’m not sharing the hot messes.
In January, we went to Costa Rica where I took a painting workshop with artist Claire Desjardins.
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After the workshop, I did some sketching on my own. I made some super-fast pencil sketches of the beach and palm trees while standing and walking. The goal was to capture the feel of my surroundings without depicting the exact scene or worrying about perspective, proportions, or details.
I also made some more traditional sketches.
Next, I took an online class, Filter and Focus, from the amazing women at Art Fuel. The topic was using differences in value, hue, and saturation to make stronger art.
When we visited Ireland, I experimented with creating less literal landscapes. (I know, too many l-words in a row!) Over the course of the week, my brush strokes got bolder and wider—which, it turns out, is a really fun way to paint.
Over the summer, I took a class from Jeanette Phillips. Using interesting textures we encountered out in the world—like peeling paint and rusty street lamps—as inspiration, we experimented with all sorts of tools and techniques to create textures of our own.
(In class we used black, white and gray tones only because taking color out of the equation makes it easier to focus on value, texture, and composition.)
Outside of class, I spent time outdoors creating plain air landscape sketches with ink wash, Art Graf, and graphite. After the ink dried, I colored over the areas I didn’t like with pastel.
In July, I joined Scottish artist Sam Boughton’s art membership.
The first set of exercises focused on plants and foliage—once again limited to black, white, and gray tones.
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I was learning so much not using color, that I stayed with black, white, and gray tones only for the rest of the year.
When we visited Maine, I sketched a lot of coastal views. My goal was to say as much as possible with as few marks as possible.
It was interesting to watch my work evolve over the course of the week. At first my sketches were far too literal, but, as time passed, I was able to simplify more and more.
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In between, I went on outings with my local sketch group. It’s not a formal organization, just half-a-dozen of us who get together every few weeks to have coffee and sketch.
What’s up next? Re-introducing color into my work. The Art Fuel people are doing a course about mixing and working with color starting in January. Susan and
Terri at ArtFuel do such a great job with their classes. I’m really looking forward to it.
If you’re a visual artist, please consider joining me.
If I had to come up with one big takeaway for the year, it would be that painting is the most fun, for me, when it’s done with wide brushes and big, fast—even wild—strokes. I think it’s the physicality of using more of my body that I like—I use my arm, rather than fine motor skills, to create the marks.
Body instead of mind.
…So that’s what I plan to experiment with in 2026!