January Art Planning and Review

Posted on January 11, 2021 by janellmithani

Happy New Year! January is always a fun month for me as I start the year off with a new planner and I set time aside to plan paintings for the new year. Do you do any type of planning in January?

I begin the process with a review of the paintings I created the year before. I always ;earn from this and am often surprised at how much and what I have created. Reflecting on why I chose to create certain pieces always inspires me, too. I do some commissions every year, but I created the rest of my art based on what inspires and interests me. I was surprised by the amount of paintings I created, 2020 was very productive! It seems being at home so much this past year did have one benefit! 🙂

I usually start this process by going through my pictures on my phone. I try to take professional photographs of each painting with my Canon 20D, but sometimes I am rushing to get the piece to my collector, so I only get a quick photo on my phone. I have also started using an art inventory system to better track my artwork.

Here are a few grids I made from the 2020 paintings.

These are some of my paintings on my recycled tea bags. I am really enjoying this memory series and I’ve recently started exploring collaging multiple teabags into one painting and increasing my canvas size. I love texture and the tea bags mixed with heavy body acrylics is giving me some interesting backgrounds.

These are some sweet animal paintings I created for an exhibit I had in February, before the pandemic. It was the only in-person exhibit I was able to have in 2020.

This grouping is a mix of floral commissions and other paintings I sold last year.

I am off to plan what painting I want to create this year. I hope you are off to a great start for the new year and I would love to hear about your planning process.

Have a wonderful, creative, and joyful day, Janell

New Tea Bag Dress Paintings

Posted on November 22, 2020 by janellmithani

I have two new tea bag paintings I wanted to share with you.

“Kate,” 4″ x 4″ acrylic, recycled tea bag on canvas.

A gold and white dress painted on a tea bag, My process on this painting was painting on the teabag and then collaging it into the painted canvas.

gold and white dress painting on recycled tea bag — “Goldie,” 4″ x 4,” acrylic, recycled tea bag, on canvas.

On this painting I collaged multiple tea bags in layers as I painted on the canvas. Then I painted the dress over the entire canvas.

If you are interested, I have added these paintings to my online gallery store.

About my Tea Bag Paintings:
I love tea. My mother-in-law taught me to drink tea shortly after I met her. I usually have a cup as soon as I wake up and an afternoon cup between 3 and 5 pm. And maybe a few in between…:) I also love to recycle, so about a year ago I started saving my tea bags to use in my art.

Shortly after my mom passed away, I started painting a tea bag a day as a relaxing therapy in the mornings. Once I painted one, I was totally hooked! My subjects are mini dresses in “Every size, shape, color, and age,” fairy dresses, and other whimsical subjects that move me. My dress paintings are named in honor of strong women in my life who made an impression me and suffragettes. Once I have finished the tea bag painting, I paint a canvas to match, including all four sides of the canvas, and add the tea bag. All my paintings have a final UV protective coating. Each painting comes with an easel or you can easily hang it on the wall for display.

Thanks so much for your support and interest in my art.

Have a wonderful, creative day filled with joy, Janell

Green, Trees, Painting, a Few of My Favorite Things…

Posted on November 7, 2017 by janellmithani

I love green! I suppose then, it is natural that the color green just seems to appear in most of my paintings. In this painting, I was feeling the need to escape and relax. I love trees and painting them relaxes me.

The title of this painting is “LUSH” 10″ x 10″, acrylic on canvas. Thanks for stopping by my blog, I appreciate you taking the time to look at my art.

Have a wonderful, creative, day, Janell

A Self Portrait Painting

Posted on July 10, 2017 by janellmithani

A couple of weeks ago, I taught a “Self Portrait Painting” workshop. This is my sample painting.

Actually, it’s my first painted self-portrait. I’ve done a few self-portrait photographs when I needed to update my headshot, but never a painting.

I worked with a limited color palette that was influenced by the beautiful paintings by Leonardo Da Vinci. It was a bit different approach than my usual colorful palette.

We had a great time in the workshop and it was so fun to see all the different paintings.

Have you worked with a limited palette lately?

Or created a self-portrait?

Have a wonderful, creative, day, Janell

Two Timing My Easel

Posted on February 13, 2017 by janellmithani

The sun is finally shining this week and it has motivated me to not only work on one painting, but to do two paintings at once. Actually, I do this often. It is a creative process I enjoy. I like to work on a large painting and a smaller painting at the same time. I have a floor easel that is my main easel and a smaller table easel that I put on a pedestal next to it to work on smaller canvases.

working on two paintings in the studio by janell Mithani

It is fun for me to hop between the two and also practical to work on one when I am waiting for the other to dry or if I need to take a break and, you know… think! 🙂

Do you ever work on two projects at once? Does this type of process work for you? I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Have a wonderful, creative day, Janell

Angel Paintings

Posted on November 16, 2016 by janellmithani

I’ve been thinking of angels a lot lately, so I created a couple of paintings with sweet little angels. 🙂 I hope you enjoy them!

painting of sweet angel

This one reminds me of a sweet little red-headed doll that my grandmother gave me when I was a little girl. And I still have the doll. 🙂

painting of angel by Janell Mithani

The next couple of weeks are going to be super busy with the holiday and spending time with family, so I want to wish you all a Happy Thanksgiving and hope you all have a wonderful week. I am truly thankful for all of you who take the time to read my blog. Hugs across the miles to you!

Have a wonderful, creative, day! –Janell

A Blue and Yellow Watercolor Flower Painting

Posted on September 7, 2016 by janellmithani

A lovely little daisy just called to me and said…Paint me! 🙂

blue and yellow painting of daisy by Janell Mithani
Actually, I’ve been creating a few dramatic watercolor flowers for my upcoming “Expressive Flower Painting in Watercolor” workshop. A fun introductory workshop to free style watercolor painting that I am teaching at the end of the month.

daisy painting in sketchbook by Janell MIthani

This summer was pretty wild, I taught quite a variety of workshops to people of just about every age!

I had a lot of fun, but I am looking forward to getting back to my Fall schedule of painting workshops, private art lessons and spending more time creating art in my studio. I sat down and made a “To Paint” list the other day… from flipping through my sketchbook, it seems I have quite a few sketches that are ready for painting. 🙂

So I am off to paint!

Have a wonderful, creative, day, Janell

Violet and Grey, A New Painting

Posted on August 31, 2016 by janellmithani

I finished another painting in my ‘Wildish Spirit’ series. This painting is in honor of my daughter and her love of horses and I titled it “Violet and Grey.” She took a lot of horseback riding lessons when she was young, so when I decided to paint one of my FAE characters based on her, I felt a wild horse needed to be part of the painting.

painting Violet and grey by janell Mithani

She left a couple of weeks ago, returning to college. I miss her SO MUCH! I used her favorite color palette — purple, grey and black. It is a very cool toned palette and very different from my usual warm tones. I did give her bangs and a bit of a wild hair-do to go with the horse’s wild mane. I plan to hang the painting in her room, so when I walk by and glance in, I will see her in the painting, instead of her empty bedroom.

Of course, I am counting the days until Christmas break and I get to hug her again! 🙂

This is a close up picture to show the details of their faces.

Violet and grey painting detail by Janell Mithani

I didn’t do a sketch this time, I just worked from photographs I took of her in the garden last December. And the horse is a merging of about 4 different horses I looked at as reference, definitely a fantasy breed… with my usual big eyes. 🙂

Here are a few pictures of my process…

VioletNGreyInProcess1W

I painted the background in and then did a charcoal sketch on top of it.

VioletNGreyInProcess4w

Here is a picture from the side of the gallery wrapped canvas. I don’t think I have shared the sides of my paintings before on my blog. It’s a little hard to see in the picture below, but I painted the name of the painting along the thick edge of the wrapped canvas.
VioletNGreyInProcess2W

I hope you have a wonderful, creative, day, Janell

Finished Painting, “DANCING” and My Painting Process

Posted on July 13, 2016 by janellmithani

This week I finished the dancing Fae painting that I have been working on for a few months. She is dancing among the mushrooms. Being a big fan of one word titles, I named this painting, “Dancing.”

DANCING, 30″ x 20″, Acrylic on canvas.

I had a lot of fun painting a curvy redhead. I wasn’t sure what color her hair was going to be when I began the painting, but as I painted, her hair just got redder and redder. Hmm… wonder if I was looking in the mirror. 🙂

This is the original drawing from my sketchbook.

Flirty fairy sketch by janell mithani

Here are a few pictures of the progress of the painting.

In process shots of dancing painting by janell Mithani

And this is about 3/4 of the way finished, on my easel during the Open Studios Tour, June 3rd-4th.

Dancing painting by Janell Mithani, in process

Oh! And I have my comments turned back on. Thank you fellow blogger Susan for sending me an email to remind me! If you don’t already follow her, You can check out her blog about her special Narnia room for her grandkids at https://mimiswardrobe.wordpress.com/ and her adventures at Zephyr Hill Farms at https://zephyrhillfarm.blogspot.com/.

Have a wonderful, creative, day, Janell

FAWN Painting – A Fairy Holding a Baby Deer

Posted on March 30, 2016 by janellmithani

I just finished a new painting in my Fae Series. This painting is titled “FAWN.”

FAWN, Acrylic on canvas, 30″ x 24″

She is the little sister of “DOE”, who I finished painting in January. Here is DOE.

DOE, Acrylic on Canvas, 30″ x 24″

I thought it was very fitting that I name her FAWN since she had “spots,” too. I created the sketch last summer. You can see my original post from last summer with the original sketch here.

Fawn8x10ListingEtsywlogo

I created the sketch for DOE this past fall and then added the fawns to both of the sketches and began planning the paintings.

Next, I enlarged the sketch to the size of my canvas so I could transfer my drawing. I wanted the painting to be big, 30″ x 24,” so I had to copy sections onto different pieces of paper and then tape them together. I transferred a soft outline of the drawing to the canvas once I had painted the background by rubbing charcoal on the back of the enlarged photocopy and tracing over my sketch.

Enlarged sketch of Fawn painting by Janell Mithani