Painting a Loggerhead Sea Turtle--Part II

A fun painting to create, but also one that offered some challenges.  For one thing, I didn't know I would be away from it for an entire month and failed to write down the pigments I had initially chosen.  The second was my unfamiliarity with creating sea foam on the beach--uncharted territory.

The pigment challenge I resolved fairly quickly, glancing over my palette and selecting my likely choices (listed at the end of post).  The beach foam was a journey of trial and error, an exploration into suggestion, knowing that I had my scrub brush and gouache to back me up.  I did not create a separate sketch which would have been a good exploration alternative.  Sometimes I like to just jump in and move through confusion until what I want to see begins to emerge.

A first attempt at creating the sand beneath the sea foam

Life seems to be like this sometimes, new experiences push us to reach beyond what we know.  In the process we learn something new, often with gratifying results.  And its not always that the outcome is beautiful, its that we did it despite uncertainty.  I tackle many things this way, but I also turn to books for suggestions and practice.  Not only did I order a seascapes art book, prompted by this painting (that hasn't arrived yet), but I also bought Blair Witherington's gorgeous book, Sea Turtles, An Extraordinary Natural History of Some Uncommon Turtles.  Unfortunately, this book is out of print, but can be found on the secondary market (with patience) at affordable prices and in my case, brand new condition.

While I described researching new anatomy terminology in Part I of this painting series, Blair's book brought me the beauty, heart and elegance of this mysterious creature, a species that has its roots in the Cretaceous period, 110 to 65 million years ago.  True ancients.

Above I've turned to my scrub to smooth out the hard edges and reduce the clutter in the sand.  The turtle is where I want the eye to go and since I want to enhance her detail, I want the sea and sand to stay smooth and suggestive rather than detailed and distracting.

In the two images immediately above, you see the results of me thinking about and playing around with the beach and foam.  I'm moving back and forth between the turtle's shell and the beach, both requiring a bit of thinking and building.  The turtle's back is partially covered with sand, slung by her flippers as she covered her egg chamber.  By moving back and forth, from one area to the other, I relieve my tension while I'm working on an area of uncertainty.  But it also has a painterly purpose.  It allows me to keep an eye on the unity of colors as I watch the emphasis on the subject change with each color application to the background.

Above, I've added more detail to the turtle's back and sandy areas in the sea.  I laid an initial variegated wash of gray using a mixture of ultramarine and burnt sienna to form the background of sand above the turtle. As I added more details to the turtles body, I realized her golden and rust features would be better enhanced with a bluer shade of gray.  Below, after the area was completely dry, I used a large flat brush to glaze over the top of the painting with a light application of a bluer shade of gray.   To my pleasure, this had the dual affect of enhancing the turtle's shell and popping out the area of light yellow that brings the eye to the center of interest, her face.

To complete the painting, I softened some of the edges of the foam with my scrub brush, used a little white gouache to lighten foamy areas, enriched the appearance of sand on her back with paint splatter using a toothbrush, and darkened shadow details.

And some of the new fun things I learned about sea turtles, sparked by the curiosity that painting this one stirred?  Each species of sea turtle, seven altogether, has a characteristic number of large scutes (shell plates) on their hard carapace (shell), as well as a characteristic arrangement of scales on their head.  They have more flexible shells than land turtles, with the carapace and plastron (under shell) being joined by a bridge of supple cartilage, allowing for more speed and maneuverability as they navigate through many miles at sea.

Watercolor on 9 x 12" Arches 140# cold pressed paper.  Pigments used:  WN French Ultramarine, WN New Gamboge (yellow), WN Van Dyke Brown, WN Burnt Sienna, a touch of DVP Permanent Rose as needed, and WN Permanent White Gouache.  Most of my grays are a mix of ultramarine and burnt sienna.

Ruby-throated Hummingbirds and Sea Turtles

It has been such a joy to watch the hummingbirds that have come to my feeders this summer.  Those that live in northern breeding territories in Canada and the northern USA began their migration journey's in July, progressing southward approximately 18 miles per day.  In the southeastern USA where I live, in Tennessee, our birds have begun migration as well, the males departing earliest, leaving females with late fledglings and vigilant juveniles guarding nectar sources.  

All this activity has been an incredible thing to watch.  The more time I spend sitting near the feeders, the more I understand the necessity of all that chirping and diving and chasing that takes place.  In a few hours of observation, I may see a male define his territory with an incredible high-speed dive, a tentative fledgling at the feeder with his 'baby' gape still apparent, and two juveniles sparing in spiraling flight so ferociously that they both land on the ground.  The juxtaposition of so many aspects of their lives unfolding in front of me gives me deep pause.

And while I sketch these juveniles, internalizing every feather, the shape of their beaks, the position of their wings, their expression, I feel more and more connected to them, more and more hopeful that they will each survive their migration journey.  My art inspires my love for what I'm painting, just as surely as the nature I encounter inspires my art.

I experimented with salt in this painting, sprinkling a little too much, in my opinion, in a couple of places to suggest the sparkling of light in the trees.  While I waited for the paint to dry, I sketched a loggerhead sea turtle.  This was my first sketch of a turtle of any kind.  And as my pencil gave it shape, I fell in love with it all over again, bringing it even deeper into my heart, if that's possible.

Standing on a dark beach in the light of a full moon with the sound of the surf breaking while watching a sea turtle lay her eggs was quite enough to fortify my love for these giant marvels forever.  And while I'm sketching, I internalize what I know about them even more, see more deeply, and feel more deeply.  Painting is a meditation of sorts, and during that meditation I am one with this turtle, enjoying her beauty, the shape of her head, the sheer size of her body, those deep ancient eyes.  Every aspect of what I see and feel about her moves through me and forms the image I create on paper.

And when I paint hummingbirds, I'm one with their high-speed world, filled with a fledgling's uncertainty and mindful of the power and speed of that mature male.  I marvel at what they show me and how nature has put it all together.  Art and nature, nature and art.  They make my world a richer place.