BUILDING

6"X6"

OIL ON AMPERSAND PANEL

This little girl was having a great time playing at the beach on Hilton Head Island.

The painting I posted a few weeks ago by my ten year old nephew won First Place and Best of Show at a local art contest. He now has more art supplies to work with. Congratulations Ian.

KITE DAY

6"X8"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

SOLD

This is a little girl at the beach on Hilton Head Island. She was out with her family for a fun day of kite flying and running on the beach. What a nice break from painting  still lifes. Still lifes can be very time consuming with the set up, removing and replacing items. With a photo I feel like I have more freedom. I start the painting from a photo but once the drawing is correct, I usually don't look at the photo very often. It's a nice change from all that scrutiny that I give to a still life.

Emerging Artist and New Website

Lily by Ian Blackburn

6"X6"

My ten year old great nephew came to my studio Sat. to do a painting for an art contest and this is the finished product. He was not very pleased with it but I think it is great for a first oil painting. I think his taste is more photo-realism as opposed to impressionism. Last year he entered a landscape done with pastels and won 1st place in his age group and Best of Show. As you can imagine he felt very pressured to do something spectacular.

In teaching another person I always learn something myself. To keep things simpler for him I had him mix the most prominent colors in piles before he started the painting. It worked so well for Ian that I don't understand why I haven't used this method for myself.

My new website is up and running with the help of my friend Ryan Asher. Ryan has been so busy building websites for other people that he hasn't finished one for himself. But you can contact him at ryancasher@yahoo.com if you need some help with a website.

http://www.anitatresslar.com/

TULIP WITH EGGPLANT

This is the start of a painting from a few days ago. You can see that I decided to move the vase down a little so it would not line up exactly with the plate. I am using gessobord that I have covered with black acrylic paint. Sometimes I use burnt sienna or just start on the white primer of the gessobord.

Here I have covered the canvas with oils in preparation of getting a bit more detailed and adding highlights.

8" X 10"

PRICE $150

Here is the finished painting after another coat of loose paint and some palette knife work on the tulip.

CHANNELING ROBERT HENRI

I think I have mentioned in the past that I love the work of Robert Henri so I decided to do a study of this portrait titled AN IRISH LAD, hoping to channel Robert. I don't think the channeling worked but I think I learned a few things.

I believe this painting was done over a rust colored ground. I used white canvas paper which is fine if you are painting a practice piece or planning to frame an oil under glass.


He was in love with the face in this one and gave very little attention anything else. The clothing seems to be an afterthought.

His brushwork is lush. This practice made me realize that I don't mix enough paint at a time. That isn't a problem with very small paintings but it is when you start painting larger. It is something I have struggled with for years. Too much remixing slows the process and is frustrating.

The other thing I learned is that it isn't easy to get in the head of another artist as much as we all try.

This is a photo of the original that I got from the Internet but unfortunately the color is not very accurate. I worked from a book of Henri's paintings. His last name is pronounced Hen-rye. It was an assumed name adopted by him at seventeen. He was born in Cincinnati, OH. in1865 to a wealthy family that developed real estate. His real name was Robert Henry Cozad. The family later moved to Nebraska where his father developed the town of Cozad but there were many conflicts between the developers and the local ranchers. Robert's father shot and killed an unarmed man in a scuffle and as a result was indicted for murder. The family fled and all took assumed names out of fear. He was a cousin of the famous painter Mary Cassatt but couldn't tell anyone out of fear that his family would be found.

8"X6"

OIL ON CANVAS PANEL

NFS

Our granddaughter after a hard day of chalk painting with Mommy. Hayden is 2yrs 7months and an absolute delight.

IN THE FOLDS

8"X8"

OIL ON BOARD

PRICE $120

I have friends who belong to a local arts group that moved into a very spacious studio last year. My friend Diane decided to set up a large still life in the main room of their meeting site and she invited me to come and paint with her. The set up is just beautiful. I took small panels since I knew I would only be able to paint one day and this is the painting I did first. I will post the second one later in the week.

PORTRAIT OF LULU

This is Lulu, the very beautiful long haired cat who lives with us. She is very sweet (she slaps our dog and bites our son Tony but they both deserve it) to my husband and me. She also causes us horrible allergy problems but hey, she's a cat. I encourage you to paint your pets.

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.