oozle

English

Noun

oozle (plural oozles)

1. (painting, watercolor) An effect created by dropping clear water onto a painted section before it is dry, forming a burst of color.
   • 1954, AV Guide: The Learning Media Magazine - Volume 33, page 336:

     The painting of foliage is next shown and explained by O'Hara—he blocks out the large areas with a rough brush: labels these areas with marks that characterize the leaves themselves as in the catalpa, horse chestnut. eucalyptus, and other trees from many parts of the country: paints trees in blossom with a trick of his own which he has nicknamed "oozles"; and finally paints a landscape in which some trees are sharply detailed and others blurred in the distance.

   • 1966, Rex Brandt, The artists' sketchbook and its uses, page 85:

     The clusters of Queen Anne's lace are suggested by "oozles," drops of clear water falling on the wash just before it is dry.

   • 1985, Ernest William Watson, Arthur Leighton Guptill, American Artist - Volume 49, page 83:

     Jade distinguished between using what he called "oozles" of clean water to make runs within a painted area and spattering color over an area to create textures.

   • 2001, Barbara Hurd, Stirring the mud: on swamps, bogs, and human imagination, page 43:

     Here you see your life as a watercolorist's work: a fluid smear of selves laid over and shimmering against a blank background, what Buddhists call shunyata, emptiness or basic openness. You hope the artist knows about oozles, can keep the paper wet, feet green, faces half-hidden in the water, vision shifting and kaleidoscopic.

   • 2002, the artist's magazine, page 57:

     Watercolor effects like accidental bursts of color, what Meyer calls “oozles,” are no longer prevented or covered up, but instead have become important parts of the painting.

Verb

oozle (third-person singular simple present oozles, present participle oozling, simple past and past participle oozled)

1. To sneak; to creep or sidle.
   • 1924, Harry Leon Wilson -, Professor how Could You!:

     The woman regarded me closely, I think for the first time. "Why, hello, Jasper! When did you oozle in?"

   • 1971, The Bulletin - Volume 93, Issues 4762-4774, page 43:

     Margaret loses some of her cool and her sing-song voice turns a shade hysterical as a Mudman oozles up beside her.

   • 2012, W. Michael, Kathleen O'Neal Gear, A Searing Wind:

     Blackie started to oozle forward, inching along on his belly.

2. To flow sinuously; to seep or ooze;
   • 1897, The Yale Literary Magazine - Volume 62:

     The Saint lit his long clay pipe and the smoke oozled up around the puffs on his wig and drifted and sank soothingly about his troubled countenance.

   • 1883, Joel Chandler Harris, Nights with Uncle Remus:

     I done fin' out, Brer Wolf, dat w'en you git in a holler tree un somebody sets it a-fier, dat de nat'al honey des oozles out uv it, un mor'n dat, atter you git de honey all over you, 't aint no use ter try ter burn you up, 'kaze de honey will puzzuv you.

   • 1903, Jerome Klapka Jerome, Robert Barr, Arthur Lawrence, The Idler: An Illustrated Monthly Magazine - Volume 22, page 207:

     He smoked a black pipe with a stem two inches long by actual measurement, and he talked through it : the words and smoke seemed to oozle out together.

   • 1931, Harper's Bazaar - Volume 65, page 166:

     For this method is what the Hungarians refer to as "wine-asking", and "wine-asking" it is. inasmuch as after a bite of it the wine oozles down your throat like an opened bottle of ink over a Bokhara rug.

Anagrams

• oozel