Little Shiny Shoes

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches
not for sale

I had a great time with this one! What girl doesn't love to wear patent leather at least sometime in her life? These shoes have been worn by two of my girliest grandaughters. Set on pink, we have a painting that's about being a girl. I used two colors not normally in my palette: chromatic black and quinacrodone red...plus T. white and a smidge of cad yellow medium. Using just four colors made it even more fun to paint...and just looking at it makes me happy!

Camellias -sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

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Flowers are a real challenge. Pink flowers in particular seem to have a glowy pink that doesn't come in a paint tube. For this one I tried quinacrodone red and radiant magenta. I liked the dark burnt umber stems contrasting with the pinks.

Under The Tetons -sold

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches
click here to bid
It's SO good to get back to painting! Sorry I was gone for so long. My painting space in the not-so-formal dining room was lost to actual dining (imagine that!) for twelve. It was such a chore to move all my oil stuff out, that I've decided to convert (this week) a bedroom in the house to an oil painting studio. Until I get that set up, I'm carrying my EasyL in from the gargage
to paint in the kitchen or wherever the subject is. I managed to finish the above painting in little snippets of time while doing all this moving around...and..oh yeah...shopping wrapping cooking nurse-maiding babysitting cleaning decorating...but it was ALL GOOD! The best part of this Christmas was that my hubby made it through prostate surgery, is recovering well, and is most likely cancer free. Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers. Men, get your PSA blood test every year, and women, tell the men in your life to get it done. My husband had NO symptoms, but the PSA test caught it early....thus a 95% survival rate. Oh yeah...this is supposed to be about the painting!!! We visited Jackson Hole, Wyoming two summers ago and took a fabulous bike ride winding through Teton Valley. I used a photo reference.

Winter Twig

oil on canvas panel 4x6 inches

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Sorry I went missing for a few days! I'm getting ready for Christmas and on Tuesday my hubby will have major surgery, so for right now painting and posting are put on the back burner. I'll paint and post when I can. In the meantime I offer this humble little painting. Another subject gathered while walking, I plucked this twig right off a bush. The leaves and berries are very very tiny...smaller than peas. It's a quiet little painting.

Fallen

oil on canvas panel 6x4 inches
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The sidewalks in our neighborhood are sprinkled with nature's confetti. I gathered these pieces while walking my dog and placed them on blue linen. The burnt umber against the clean blue got me right away. On the linen the objects seem important...worth more than just a glance. Then I noticed there was a cross in the linen. How fitting...as I painted I thought about falling leaves, the cycle of regeneration, and how Christ came to offer us spiritual regeneration. I like this little painting.

Grapes & Clementines -sold

oil on canvas panel 4x6 inches
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Red and orange again...I can't stop myself! This time I went with blue instead of violet. Painting translucent grapes is a blast. Sorry about the spots of glare on the photo.
The Randy Higbee's "6 Squared" show in Costa Mesa is fabulous! We had a great time at the opening on Saturday night. It was so exciting to see the work of some daily painters I've been following for a few years such as Michael Naples, Justin Clayton, and Carol Marine. It was great fun meeting fellow Fresh Painter Dana Cooper and seeing her beautiful work in person . The show will hang until Dec.23rd. Don't miss it if you're in the area!

Floral Persimmons -sold

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

click here to bid

The red, violet and orange color combo of a couple days ago was so fun I thought why not keep that going, but with more objects? This time I added a flower stem with large leaves and for small shapes, a couple of little leaves from the front yard.

Ruthie

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

not for sale

This chihuahua with her unusual markings belongs to a dear friend of mine. She's named after the Baby Ruth candy bar and attracts attention wherever she goes. My friend worked hard at socializing and training her. As a result, she is a little sweetie-pie. I hope I captured her sweetness.

6" Squared Exhibition & Sale

SALAD STUFF oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches


FUJI-COLOR oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

FAKE oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

This week has been crazy and it's only Wednesday! Sadly, no time to paint... but I am very happy to announce that my three paintings above have been accepted into The Randy Higbee Gallery's 6" Squared Show in Costa Mesa, CA. The show features over 300 6x6" paintings from artists across U.S. and runs from Dec.4-23rd. Randy introduced himself to me at the Tustin Plein Air event in October. Besides having a huge gallery, I think he's the king behind King Of Frame...a great source for plein air frames!

For purchase information on paintings above, contact Randy Higbee Gallery 714-546-2156.

Persimmons & Grapes

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

click here to bid

The purple, orange and red were SOOO luscious together! This painting looks SOOOO much better in person! I say that a lot, but really it does.

Persimmons & Pussywillows

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

not for sale

This painting was done before the Thanksgiving holiday (hope you had a good one), but I've been unable to post because we lost internet service for four days! The arrangement is particularly pleasing to me because it has the elements I've mentioned before in my blog: areas, dots and lines.

Old Stapler

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches
click here to bid
Why are so many of us fascinated with old stuff? I don't know. This old stapler came home a long time ago from my husband's office having been replaced by sleek shiny ones that I bet don't work as well. Anyway, I love the texture of the metal filled with dust and yellowed somehow. I love the still shiny black smasher thingy. I added the mail for an interesting small object (stamp) with the same yellow ochre. When it was almost finished, it needed that paper scrap for balance. I really like how this one turned out.

Three Little Bottles SOLD

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

Glass is appealing to me as a subject because of it's obvious sparkle and shine. In this set up I also liked the way the bottles infuenced each other's color....and then there's the light coming from behind between them. Fun to paint.

African Violets II

oil on canvas panel 6x8 inches
sold
Our recent rainstorms have prevented me from photographing and posting, but not from painting. I was glady holed-up inside over the weekend with my bookworm hubby, my fluffy assistant and my paints. These kitchen violets were painted on a pink ground to complement the greens and retain the clean blossom color. A lavender background gives it an airy feel.

Farm House, Chino Hills-sold

oil on canvas panel 9x12 inches

My new plein air buddy and I met at one of the few farms left in the area. She painted the horse and barn and I painted the house. I liked the way the morning sun filtered through the trees and shone on the windows. We had a great time!

Hummingbird & Lantana

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

sold

The hummingbird commission is done after just some very minor finishing touches: correct the shape of the beak, add darks and lights in the greenery. This is somebody's Christmas present. Hope it gives them a sunny feeling in their cold, snowy winter.

Hummingbird Commission

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches
sold but not quite finished
I prefer to paint from life, but a few months ago I cut back my gigantic lantana bush until it looked like locust had come. So with no fresh lantana, I used my two little paintings of lantana as reference. Couldn't get the hummingbird to hold still, so I used a teeny tiny calendar picture. I'll post the finished version tomorrow.

Pear In Silver-sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches
click here to bid
This was a tricky one, but lots of fun. The silver mirrored just about everything in the immediate vicinity, including light coming through windowblinds, me and the back of my easel. Simplifying the reflections into large shapes helped maintain the pear as the focal point.

Bloomin' Babytoes -sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches
click here to bid
One of my favorite cactuses surprised me yesterday with blooms! Yes, the common name for this variety is "Babytoes". Looks a lot like those delicious little piggies!
In other news, I recently EBay listed "Untitled Floral" as "Sunflowers With Red" (scroll down to see). Thanks for all your great comments. I took your advice and called it finished. I appreciate your feedback so much!

Prado Study

Here's the follow-up to yesterday's post. Wondering how my landscape would improve if I took a more academic approach, the next day at home


I did several value studies on paper with markers. #3 was my favorite.


Next, I did a 6x8 block in referring to my #3 value study and painting (posted yesterday).

This is the completed 6x8 study. It was a great excercise for me, but I think yesterday's work was more successful when I was just havin' fun outdoors painting what I see!

Prado Plein Air

oil on canvas panel 9x12 inches
Our weather has been beautiful lately, so yesterday I ventured over to Prado Regional Park just a mile or two from home. Standing in the middle of a huge grassy field, I looked out beyond the park's borders to this scene. The alternating rows of road and bush was what interested me most. I'm happy with the feeling of light, but I have numerous criticisms. Instead of sleeping, at 2:00 am I was asking these questions: What if I changed the green? What if I had...toned the canvas...left out more trees...done thumbnails...a value study...blocked in like you're "supposed to"...paid more attention to values??? What if I had stayed home and done a still life? Answers tomorrow. :-)

Sunflower In Blue-sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches
sold
This indigo blue cup is one of my favorites for staging reflections. The orangy-yellow flower and deep blue made a strong complementary color scheme. A bit of impasto helps convey the light on flower petals. When I photographed the painting, I ended up with little shadows where the paint is thick.

Sunflowers With Red SOLD

oil on canvas panel 9x12 inches

Here's my demo from last night at Family Fun Night, Fontana. The event was a great evening of music and art. The best part for me was meeting a fellow painter, Lisa, who lives just a couple of miles from me. She's a fabulous plein air painter, and we look forward to painting outdoors together in our neck of the woods---a painting partner...YAY!

Salt & Pepper--and Fontana Show-sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches
click here to bid
I'm having a lot of fun working with these grays. Below is the flyer for my show in Fontana in the Steelworkers' Auditorium. Tonight I'll be demonstrating at the Fontana Art Depot Gallery. Got to go pack up!

click on the flyer for more info

Salt & Light-sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches
click here to bid
Painting glass in my last few paintings inspired me to try one that is mostly about the light on glass. This was a great excercise in values. The yellow reflections are from something in the immediate surroundings...maybe my EasyL easel. Inspired by another Fresh Paint blogger who recently forced herself to use bigger brushes, I did this one with a #8 Silver Bristlon Flat.

Tomorrow night, November 5th I'll demonstrate at Fontana's Family Fun Night at the Art Depot Gallery. It's free and open to the public. Some of my paintings are on display until Nov. 26th in Fontana's Steelworkers' Auditorium. For more information, click here.

Yellow Roses SOLD

oil on canvas panel 6x8 inches

Those little buds from yesterday popped open and were even prettier...and much much harder to paint, let me tell you! Floribunda roses grow on short stems in clusters with a very different petal pattern than regular roses. I haven't painted roses much. It figures I'd start with the hardest ones...duh!

Yellow Rosebuds

oil on canvas panel 6x8 inches
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A simple painting of a not-so-simple flower. These are small roses in my favorite thrift store square glass thingy.

Lone Gazania-sold

oil on canvas panel 8x6 inches

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Enough already with the pumkins and squash. Must...paint...flower. In my backyard this was the only one I could find. Even my geraniums are taking a break. This is my favorite of the gazania varieties.

Plein Air At Amy's Farm SOLD

oil on canvas panel 12x9 inches

Just around the corner from us some long time friends own and run "Amy's Farm". They offer field trip farm experiences for young children and grow organic vegetables. This morning it was just too beautiful to paint inside, so I headed over to the farm. In the garden, the light was hitting the tops of fence boards, planted rows, and that lone discarded pumpkin...so I turned it into a painting. (The painting is better than the photo!) Turns out I had painted the compost pile! Farmer Randy liked it and bought it as a birthday gift for someone who lives and works on the farm, and rightfully so. She adds goat manure to the compost pile all the time. Thank you to Amy's Farm for welcoming kids, teachers, families and artists.

Window Sill Pumpkin SOLD

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

Duane Keiser (credited with having started the Daily Painting movement), does a lot of beautiful window sill paintings. Here's my first...from my front room window. I rather liked painting in my not-so-formal living room. It turned out to be a great exercise in values...the white that isn't really white. I wiped out the first and started over, then just barely spared this one from the wipe. I think I'm done with pumpkins!

Fall Quartet -sold

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

click here to bid

Just two days of painting little tiny candies on little tiny canvases got me a bit itchy and twitchy, so here are some bigger shapes. Sometimes I configure my set up with a small color wheel in my hand and for this one I did. I wanted to experiment with an analogous color scheme, and here you have it. Red, orange, yellow and yellow green are all next to each other on the color wheel. Where the focal point is I have no clue! Your eye kinda roams around enjoying the saturated color and shine...(a least I hope your eye enjoys!)

Candy, Caramel, Apple -sold

oil on canvas panel 4x6 inches
click here to bid
Similar to yesterday's, but with caramels added...my husband's idea. They were hard to pull off. Maybe his best idea was to eat the caramels.

Candy, Apple SOLD

oil on canvas panel 4x6 inches

This was my first painting on canvas this small. It was lots of fun, especially the candy corn coming in and out of shadow. The apple is a braeburn and it really was this bright red.

I have good news! The Tustin Art Walk and Plein Air Contest was a great event. Very well organized, and the visitors were plenty, nice and friendly. I sold a few paintings which is always helpful! The best news is I received a Third Place award for my painting "Warm Inside"!!! This is my first time competing with other plein air painters (35). On top of that, the painting was purchased on the spot! With the week of rain and all the excitement I neglected to take a good photo of the painting. (Go to my post on Oct. 20th to see the lousy photo!) I really enjoyed painting outside and hope to do much more of it in the future.

Tustin "Storybook House"

oil on canvas panel 9x12 inches
not for sale
It was cloudy skies over Tustin again today. When I started the above painting there was no sunlight except what was diffused through thick clouds. I used colors only from the cool side of my palette. I edited out the hedge because it lacked the organic quality of the rest of the foliage. I started at 11:00 am and took the picture below at 2:30 when I finished, so you can see the sun had started to come out by then. What a charming little "storybook house." Kinda reminds me of pea soup...I could have used some, it was a little chilly! I'd like to come back and paint it again on a sunny day.

Pumpkins, Squash & Wheat-sold

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches
click here to bid
Fall decor is so festive and makes for great painting subjects. This painting is from a few days ago---a dark rainy day I spent all cozy inside with my paint and brushes, happy as can be! The color caught my eye of course, as did the shiny spots and varying sizes. With all round shapes I needed line so I added the stalk of wheat which really gave me a challenge. I wanted to indicate the pattern of grains but not be fussy about it. Though I wiped out the wheat three times, the final result is just what I had in mind. The deep dark greens in the back squash were so fun....thalo green and alizarin...what a rich powerful combo! Tomorrow I'm off to Tustin Plein Air again. Yipee!

Under Gray Skies

"Warm Inside"
oil on canvas panel 9x12 inches
Awarded Third Place, Tustin Plein Air Contest, October 23, 2010
SOLD
Chances of rain today: 60%. I decided to go on the other 40% for no rain, but just in case I set up right under the open hatchback of my car with my painting umbrella up too. Not a drop fell! With very gray skies, the warmly lit interior of this little "oldest building" in Tustin made for a nice subject. The photo of my painting is terrible. It seems that gray skies gray down everything...even paintings I try to photograph outside. On a sunny day, I'll get a good shot and post it later. I had a great time painting and talking to the few people who stopped by.

Pueblos

oil on canvas panel 16x20 inches

A few years ago Hubby and I visited Sedona and Santa Fe. Somewhere along the road this awesome scene said "Paint me, paint me, paint me!" We pulled into a turnout and took lots of photos. There was so much there already: repetition of shapes, contrast of warm and cool colors, light and shadow...patterns! I thought about leaving out the poles and pipes, but I like verticals for stability. I've "finished" it several times, but this is the final finish. It will be included in my upcoming month long exhibit at the Fontana Steelworkers Auditorium. More info on that later.

I'm framing and packing up for the Old Town Tustin Art Walk and Plein Air Competition. I'll be painting on the streets this Wednesday and Friday, then on Saturday will be selling my work. If you're within driving distance, I hope you'll come out and say hi. There are 35 plein air painters competing! Wish me luck!

Father, Daughter

oil on canvas panel 8x6 inches

not for sale

The pendelum has swung from the silly (yesterday) to the sentimental. My dad was an accomplished sign painter. He could letter beautifully with brush and enamel in any style on "show cards", cars, trucks, boats and billboards...you name it. For the most part, a lost art now. This is one of his mahl sticks, complete with enamel blotches and years of grime from his talented hands. I love to run my hands along the grime. I miss him. When I started college, he took my Grumbacher brushes to his shop and cut the ends off so they would fit in my paint box. The coating is peeling off, so I don't use them, but I've painted them several times now. I kept the composition very simple here to maintain the importance of the objects.

Cactus Monster

watercolor on Arches paper 10x14 inches
click here to bid
Every Tuesday night I get to paint with some artist friends. Yay! It's a good opportunity for me to play with watercolor...nothing serious, just mess around. I get a kick out of making cactus needles with masking fluid and have done a few prickley paintings this way. Some pretty pink pricklies are previously posted. (Couldn't resist.) This one appeared as a monster.

Old Glory 2 SOLD

oil on 8x8 inch gallery wrapped canvas
Carrying the design around the sides was a lot of fun and adds a lot to the painting. I couldn't get a photo of that because handling it while all sides were wet was very tricky. Next week I'll participate in the Old Town Tustin Art Walk and Plein Air Competition. This painting will be included it my work for sale...if it's dry enough!

Flag In Progress

Flag painting in progress on my easel
I took the photo right where I paint...in my "not-so-formal" dining room next to a sunny window. My second painting session was of necessity a short one, but tomorrow I'll have more time. I'm working section by section bringing it up to a near finished level as I go. This allows me to manipulate edges and blend while the paint is still wet.

In Progress

Painting "Old Glory" (see my Sept. 18th post) was so enjoyable for me, I've begun another flag painting. This one, 8x8 inches is on gallery wrap canvas with the design carried around to the sides. I'm going to take my time. So far the canvas being a bit rougher than what I normally use lends itself well to keeping the flag's cotton texture an important part of the painting. My ground is burnt umber.


This is the result of my first painting session. I'll keep posting as it progresses, and hope everybody finds it interesting and informative.

Pear With Black Grapes SOLD

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

This is the last in my pear series...at least for now. In my previous painting, "Just Fruit", the values are all pretty close, so I wanted to try a light surface with those lovely purply black grapes to punch up the contrast of light and dark...so here we have a loosely cruciform composition involving complementaries yellow and purple. I may make some changes to the pear, but I'm happy with the grapes.