FINALLY BACK TO THE EASEL

PRIMROSE

6"X6" OIL ON PANEL

PRICE $100

It feels like I have been away from painting a very long time and the start of this painting felt a bit awkward. A brief moment of "OH where do I start"? Primrose always starts showing up in our market at the end of December and I can't resist them. If I can keep it alive until time to put it in my garden, it will be a miracle. I'm better with cactus.

SAN DIEGO MUSEUM OF ART

I know it has been a very long time since I've posted so I thought I would share these photos from a recent trip. We went to California for a visit with family and friends and part of the trip involved a visit to San Diego Museum Of Art. This is a portrait by Robert Henri from the museum collection. He has always been a favorite of mine and I feel very lucky whenever I discover one of his paintings on a museum visit. His colors are rich and his brushwork is loose and free. He can say so much with just a few strokes. This second photo of a brooch, is an example of brevity of brushstrokes to create an object. The paint is laid on very thickly in this one. Henri also wrote a book called THE ART SPIRIT that I believe is a must read for painters. I do not get anything from amazon but I thought I would make it easy for you to check out the book.

BERRY REFLECTIONS

6"X6"

OIL ON BOARD

PRICE $100

Thank you California for strawberries in September. Not only are they beautiful but also delicious for snacking.

WINESAP

6"x6"

OIL ON CANVAS

PRICE $100

It's apple time in the midwest and winesap apples are my favorite. I bought two of them at the local farm market and couldn't wait to taste that typical sweet, tart very crisp apple. What a disappointment. Mushy is the only word for it. So the second one is in this painting.

SERENE DAY

This is another painting from my plein air trip to Carriage Hill Farm. I spent the morning painting a barn and the afternoon at the small fishing lake on the property. It was an absolutely gorgeous day.

FRESH AIR

6"X6"

OIL ON BOARD

I met a friend today for some plein air painting. We went to an historic farm called Carriage Hill for some painting, drawing and chatting. The weather was absolutely perfect for spending the day outside.

VERBENA 2

6"X6"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

PRICE$100

There are still a few hardy flowers blooming in the garden so another try at Verbenas.

FALL FLOWERS

6"X6"

OIL ON BOARD

PRICE $100

These are Woodland Sunflowers that I picked today on a small road north of our neighborhood. I have been going there for several years to get them for painting. They are abundant on many of the country roads this time of year. I discovered today that manganese blue with a yellow makes some very nice greens. I'm always looking for alternatives to ultramarine blue.

WEEDS

6"X6"

OIL ON BOARD

PRICE $100

Yes I know they are innocent looking but they are very invasive weeds that have now taken over my garden.

SLICES

6"X6"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

PRICE $100

I started this painting with the idea that I would use bigger brushes than usual but it didn't take long to go right back to my picky ways. Just can't help it. There is an article in Artists Magazine about Karen O'neil and the way she uses large brushes. She is an excellent painter, teacher and all around nice person. I have taken two workshops with her in Maine and thoroughly enjoyed both of them. Her explanations are very clear about how she is thinking about color, value and temperature while she is painting. Karen also uses gorgeous grays to make her bright colors really stand out. Her husband Peter Clapper is also an artist and they both teach at the Art Students League of New York.

DAYLILY

OIL ON CRADLED PANEL

This is another painting that is hanging at THE CLOUD NINE CAFE through the month of October. Life has been a little hectic at our house lately so no time to paint. The hectic part has all been good. Having our niece visiting from CA. and getting together with family and friends. All fun.

ARRANGEMENT IN BLUE AND YELLOW

11"X14"

OIL ON BOARD

 

This is another painting that will be hanging at The Cloud Nine Cafe on August 30. The cafe is located at

102 West Auglaize St. in Wapakoneta, OH. If you live close by, stop in for a great lunch and enjoy the paintings.

SPRING BOUQUET

14"X11"

OIL ON WRAPPED CANVAS

This painting will be part of a show that opens next week. August 30th will be the first day at CLOUD NINE CAFE in Wapakoneta, OH. The paintings will be hanging for the months of September and October. If any of you live close by, stop in for a great lunch and check out the paintings.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CAROL

6"X6"

OIL ON BOARD

PRICE $100

SOLD

The title of this painting comes from a Daily Paintworks Challenge. CAROL MARINE'S husband David has issued a challenge for fellow bloggers to do a painting for Carol's birthday. So here are some flowers for Carol. Carol is one of the original daily painters and bloggers. She has a huge following by now and is quite

successful.

ORANGE AND WHITE

6"X6"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

PRICE $100

I have been painting both on these canvas panels and masonite recently and I think I like the masonite best. So the next painting will probably be on masonite to continue the experiment.

BACKLIT

8"X6"

OIL ON BOARD

PRICE $100

This painting is for the DAILY PAINTWORKS CHALLENGE. The challenge is to interpret a black and white image in color. In this case it is a photo of a window with light coming in and back lighting the objects in the window. I chose a small area of the photo with this one plant and added the cherry for more color.

VERBENA

6"X6"

OIL ON BOARD

PRICE $100

This is another painting of flowers from my garden. The garden is not looking so great this year between the scorching temps and the deer eating all the hostas, it is in sad shape. But these flowers seem to tolerate the heat a little better than others. That said, I would rather have this than snow.

OVERLAP

6"X8"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

PRICE $100

I'm finally back to blogging. My daughter-in-law and I decided to take part in a neighborhood garage sale last week. It was held on the two hottest days of the year, so far. This was my first garage sale and it was exhausting. I'm still tired.

For this painting I decided to try a small circular composition of flowers from my garden. I like the movement and pattern created by overlapping the flowers and leaves.

DAISY WITH CHERRIES

6"x6"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

PRICE $100

I have so many flowers blooming right now that it is hard to decide what to paint next. The daises were starting to fade from the heat so I brought in one of the better ones to paint.

A LILY TODAY

6"X6"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

PRICE $100

I am spending too much time on the computer and not enough time painting these days. I'm working on moving my website to another company so I can manage it myself(I hope). My computer skills are not great so it takes me longer to do this stuff. My two year old granddaughter is pretty good on the ipad so I figure she can take over in another year or two.

SUMMER

7"X5"

OIL ON PANEL

PRICE $100

Zinnias, a sign of summer in the midwest. They seem to thrive on our heat and humidity. I have been using up some of the black masonite panels from a workshop last year. They are great if you plan to use dark background colors but I find the black is a problem when painting the lights. I prefer painting on white, burnt sienna or yellow. But it is always fun to experiment with different grounds.

MUSTARD FIELD

5"X7"

OIL ON MASONITE PANEL

PRICE $100

This is a cornfield near our home that is now a wild mustard field. The flowers are beautiful but very invasive.
These weeds are showing up everywhere now including my flower garden. I leave them alone until the flowers are ready to go to seed then I get rid of them. Inevitably they will be back in my garden next year until I toss them out again.

JUNE LILIES

6"X6"

OIL ON PANEL

PRICE $100

Two types of daylilies from my garden. I have painted lilies so many times and I am always surprised at how hard they are to capture in paint. There are so many nuances of color that it can get confusing to the eye.

ORANGE BLOSSOMS PROGRESSION SOLD

This is the beginning of a painting of Mock Orange Blossoms from my front garden. I painted this on an ampersand panel which I covered with a coat of acrylic burnt sienna. I find that the paint flows easier on these panels if I coat them first.

Here is another shot with more of the background added.

7"X5"

OIL ON PANEL

PRICE $100

Here is the finished painting. I found these flowers a little difficult to paint because I was having trouble establishing the color of the shadow areas. White is a tricky subject.

ON THE RUN

5"X7"

OIL ON MASONITE

NFS

This is a painting of my granddaughter running around the park. She will be 2yrs. old in June and she is pretty good at running.

WHAT IS IT?

6"X8"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

PRICE $100

It's a dead jellyfish. We have been vacationing at Hilton Head Island for many years and this is the first time we have seen so many jellyfish washed up on the beach. I guess I should have asked a local fisherman what is going on but didn't think of it at the time. These kids were certainly interested in the jellyfish.

ASIAN IRIS

7"X5"

OIL ON PANEL

 PRICE $85

As I post this, there is a deer peering at me over our short wooden fence . She is trying to decide whether it is worth jumping the fence to graze on some flowers. They will eat pretty much anything except coleus and certain hostas. A deer can wipe out a hanging basket of flowers in a few bites. They even like tomatoes.