The Usual Suspects

Tomorrow I'll be out at the third annual Chino Art Festival. For you locals, it's at City Hall from 10am 'till 4pm. Come out and enjoy the amazing performances, art and lots of crafts. I'll be working on my painting for the day while showing (and hopefully selling!) my oils and watercolors. My friend, Laura Barnes will be demonstrating linoleum cutting and have her block prints and acrylic paintings on display. The festival is put on by the Chino Cultural Center Corporation, a non-profit dedicated to building a Cultural Arts Center in Chino. If you live in the area, I hope you'll come out just for the fun of it, and also to show your support for the arts in our community.

oil on canvas panel 6x8 inches

click here to bid

Blue Mugs

It's amazing to me how quickly I get "rusty" after not painting much. It only takes a few days of other activities to make me lose my momentum and start fussing when I do paint. Here's an example! I do like the backlit quality and the yellow with blue. The mug on the right is one of my favorites.

oil on canvas panel 6x8 inches

click here to bid

Rosalie SOLD

This little Yorkie is the third of five dog portraits commissioned by a dear friend of mine. You might remember the first two, "Ruthie" and "Abigail". I'm having so much fun painting these tiny little sweethearts!

Apple, Grapes and Greens

There's a lot of color appeal in this one for me. I'm pretty sure it would be considered a double (?) split complementary, but I used instinct more than theory. I just like those yellow greens with the deep purples and the blue with red. That's a shriveled up asparagus spear, in case you're wondering.

oil on canvas panel 6x8 inches

click here to bid

Geranium Deja-vu

The day after painting "Four O'clock Geraniums" the flowers were still fresh, and I loved the entire set-up, so why not paint the whole thing? My favorite parts are the arching stems and fallen petals and bits. I'd be interested to know which one you like best, yesterday's or today's. By the way, if I spelled deja-vu wrong, please tell me. I looked it up in my 1970 pocket dictionary, and it wasn't there. Imagine that!

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

click here to bid

Four O'Clock Geraniums

You might ask what does a clock have to do with a jar of flowers? I don't know, but I liked the combo of colors, the glass face with the glass jar and other stuff. It may be a bit odd to have it down in the corner, but maybe it makes the painting interesting being obviously part of a larger scene. We have a heavy cloud cover here today so the photo is not the best, and a bit blurry too.

Two of my favorite subjects here, that old clock and flowers.

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

click here to bid

Fruit Snack SOLD

More fruit. What can I say? I just love the color.

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

Citrus Light And Shadow-sold

There are several daily painters I admire who often use a wooden box in their still life set-ups. Thought I'd give it a try. It was hard! There was a lot of color in the woodgrain, and you could see the saw marks on that vertical edge. I wanted to make it read "old worn wood" in a suggestive rather than photo-realistic way. Not one of my favorites, but it was good practice.

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

click here to bid

Serving Sunshine SOLD

While working on this one I had an unexpected aromatherapy session! I was transported back to when I was a young girl pushing whole cloves into the rind of an orange to make a fragrant pomander. Sometimes they were rolled in cinnamon as well, and hung in a closet making everything smell wonderful while they dried and shrank. The fragrant clove oil in my paint had joined the orange smell to bring back this memory. I hadn't thought about those pomanders in years! The therapy session produced a painting I'm quite happy with!

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

German Road- DPW Challenge SOLD

I'm a bit slow in getting to this one, the Daily Paintworks Challenge for last week. Carol Marine proposed taking any liberties we wanted with her photo from Germany. Put a photo in my hand (or on my laptop), and I become a slave to the photo! This is why I try to paint mostly from life. Anyway, although I included ALL the objects, I did try to punch up the morning light in the back to draw the viewer down that road, and added color notes on the structures for interest.

oil on canvas panel 4x6 inches

Citrus & Steel -sold

My little stainless steel bowl was lost in the garage for a while. So glad to have found it so I could paint those fun reflections again. The surface color is bluer than the photo shows.

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

click here to bid

Apple Outnumbered

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

click here to bid

This painting reminds me of the Sesame Street song: "One of these things is not like the other..."

The tangelo points to the answer. I really enjoyed the color of this one, especially the subtle color shifts in the Myer lemon.

Plein Air Tree Study-sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

click here to bid

Plein air is SO challenging for me, I usually only get one little painting done when I go out, then I'm tired and ready to pack up...(okay, I'm a wimp.) Sunday, with the help of a Tiger Milk bar and an orange I was able to do this little study too. This was good practice for maintaining simple shapes sans all the detail. I'm learning about greens too...maybe you CAN use fairly bright greens as long as it all works together???

Orange Beauties

oil on canvas panel 4x6 inches Okay, this really is the last rannunculas painting in the series. I found this little one hiding in my studio. It might be my personal favorite...it's small but has a powerful punch of color.

This painting is available at Vander Molen Fine Art, Arcadia, CA

Aliso Canyon Trail, Chino Hills State Park SOLD

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

Sunday I ventured out to Chino Hills State Park and followed Lower Aliso Canyon trail. I've always loved this trail with it's curve and roll. I've ridden it many times on my mountain bike, and painted it a few. The day was partly cloudy, breezy and beautiful. I had nice chats with bikers, horseback riders, hikers of all ages, and one aggressive bee going after the orange juice on my face...(still enjoying those free oranges!) Below you can see my setup and the scene.

There were some pretty good gusts of wind, but having ridden it so often on my mountain bike, I knew it could get windy, so I was ready for it. I anchored my umbrella with some Marine parachute chord (that should do it!) and the blue painter's tape you see, then I used a bungee cord to hang my backpack underneath to weigh down my EasyL easel. It worked!

Pitcher Of Orange

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

click here to bid

I just realized everything's coming up orange for me lately! This is the last in my little series of ranunculus paintings. I've been painting oranges, went to an Orange Festival, and I'm eating the oranges that are all over my kitchen counter. The ranunculus have faded by now, but there still may be more orange paintings ahead. It's a happy color for sure.

Vintage Orange Hauler- SOLD

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

On Saturday I had the most wonderful experience! Two artist friends and I went to an Orange Festival in Redlands put on by the Inland Orange Conservancy. Located in an orange grove full of blossoms, it was an aromatherapy painting session! If that wasn't enough, we tasted about 30 different citrus fruits, and went home with bags full of free tree ripened oranges, tangelos and lemons. Above is my work for the day...a 1948 Chevy loaded with wooden orange crates. The sun was in and out, so that was a bit tricky, but I really loved all the different colors on the truck and I'm happy with the result. If you want to help preserve the old orange groves in our area, click on the link above and check out the Conservancy's "Share Of The Crop" program.

Ranunculus

oil on canvas panel 8x8 inches

click here to bid

Flowers are beautiful and difficult subjects. If I didn't love them so much, I wouldn't bother!!! I wiped and repainted the main flower three times, but finally I got the look I wanted. Several of the stems were coming out from shadow into the light. I hope you can see that. The background is a bit bluer than the photo here.

Orange Party -sold

oil on canvas panel 12x9 inches

click here to bid

Every once in a while an analogous color scheme appeals to me: orange, yellow orange, yellow and yellow green are all next to each other on the color wheel. Trader Joe's had these ranunculus on sale, and a good assortment of interesting orange, peach and red-orange little buds with their characteristic squirrelly stems. Even the yellow-ochre background is a cool version orange.

One Serious Apple -sold

oil on canvas panel 6x6 inches

click here to bid

It might seem the teacher in me emerged and painted this one! Actually, the rich color scheme was my first motivation. Then the set-up interested me in so many ways: reflections in the deep shadow side of the apple, the print receding in space, and the shadows imposed on the printed fabric. It does look teacher-ish....maybe it would make a nice gift for a teacher.