Little Red

Almost the same setup, but not quite. I'm loving painting these daisies. They're my favorite flower- they always look so happy, clean and white. They used to grow in the lawn at Dad's house, and he'd laugh at me for mowing around the clumps of daisies because I could not bear to cut them down. 6 x 6 oil

I'm a little teapot...

Had a group of ladies over at the gallery to paint yesterday, so I set up this deceptively challenging still life. This antique pot has an iridescent pink finish on it that will drive you
nuts trying to capture its nuances. Such a fun challenge! 8 x10, oil.

and a pink carnation...

Decided it had been too long since I had painted some flowers, so I skipped on down to the florist down the street and bought these. Fluffy flowers like these are so difficult for me: give me a lily any day- it only has six petals! Enjoyed the silver cup, though- it was my father in laws baby cup, dated 1907, and it's a little tarnished inside, so it's yellowish in there. Fun, fun, to paint.

It's 6 x6- I think I'm going to switch to non textured surfaces for these tiny ones, Carol Marine is right, the texture looks HUGE on a little painting.

studio plans !

Last night I found a great sample program on the web to draw some studio plans with- yaaay! It's called SmartDraw, and you get a free seven day trial.
Pictures didn't post in the order I thought they would, so this is interior, looking toward back door. There will also be a large shelf above the back door, which will provide up to 16 feet wide by 4ft high additional storage. (ceiling open to the rafters-)

Second one is overhead view, the rectangles are skylights. Planning on daylight flourescents running the length of the inside, plus plenty of outlets

for important things like the computer and coffee pot. (if this place had a bathroom, I could live here-) Pink dots are outlets, building is 24 feet long.

Last one is the front view. No, that area over door doesn't slant back, it's flat. The white line shows where a shed roof will go, over a four foot porch. I really wanted a double french or sliding glass door, but I'm not sure if that wouldn't be too much, structurally, for the SIPS to support. (structurally insulated panels- prefab-). Getting very excited about this project now- will post pictures of the cross section of the SIPS tomorrow so you can see what I'm talking about. You can check out the SIPS thing by googling eco-panels.

PLEASE, if you have any input, ideas, problems, anything else that I might not have thought of, let me know your thoughts, I would so appreciate it!

Studio: It's a start

This is to be the site for my new studio.We have had some of the big pine trees cut down, and the stumps ground. Next comes the rest of the site prep, grading and building the support pillars that will hold the building up.

We will be building the studio with a new kind of building system called SIPS- structural insulated panels. It is supposed to be very energy efficient and goes up quite fast- each panel will be about 4 feet wide by 8 tall for the walls, and a cathedral ceiling.

I'm planning on 16 x 24 feet. No, no skylights, sorry, they are bad about leaking. Here is the builder: google eco-panels

Will post a pix of a sample of the panels they use soon. I'm planning on posting about this as we go along, as I found only one or two blogs on this topic on the internet. Hope it helps someone else!

Can not WAIT to have a place to work again!

Haste Makes Waste

It has been a busy day at the gallery, lots of people in and out,

and several good sales. So I threw a set up together real

quickly and dived into painting.

Big mistake. You can't make a good painting out of a bad

set up, I don't care what you do to it. I always think about a phrase I heard in regard to writing, talking about rewriting already bad material: washing garbage. Does no good.

So I wiped this one once it was photographed. Only fair to post a bad one once in a while, I guess. we'll chalk this one up as a learning experience.

Zelda

This is my grand-dog-ter, Zelda. She is such a
joy, she bounces like Tigger.
This was supposed to be a simple one that took an hour, instead I kept finding more..and more.. and more little details to bring out her essential
Zelda-ness. 6 x 6 inches, a present for my son.
(or I'll keep it if he doesn't like it!!)

Quick figure sketches

One of my goals for the year was to
do more figure drawing. No time to
paint today, so I chose some models from
an amazing site, www.posemaniacs.com.
I'm finding it a little easier than before,
tho I still seem to insist on making people's
heads too big!

Orange You Glad?

Excuse the bad pun for a title, "red cup with
Oranges" seemed..boring.
Practicing what I learned in Carol Marine's
class. This is a 6 x 6, $50 from me.

Sunlit Window- sold!

sold this one to a nice lady yesterday.
I was happy it found a home, as it
was a favorite of mine.

Lewis' Boat

I've been working on finishing up this
commission the last couple of days.
I've decided that
doing a commission from a poor photo
is just asking for problems- duh.
However, I do like doing a painting that I am
sure will sell- always a bonus.

Spooning

Went to a workshop with Carol Marine last week.
She is just a terrific instructor, and a great person as well. See link to her blog on the right.

We did a lot of different painting "exercises"
and several finished paintings. I think this
one was the best of my lot.

The glass jar was maddening to paint,
because of the concentric circles, but
I think it worked out.
6 x6, $100, available
from http://www.renaissanceartgallery.com/
or message me on facebook.

Sneaking up on Dinner

Driving along the Colorado river not too far from Granby, I spotted this guy patiently casting, casting, casting. Don't know if he got a trout or not, but he seemed to be enjoying the whole process.
As for me, well, it was all about the cowboy hat.
I think this is 11 x 14, oil. Available through www.renaissanceartgallery.com

where did the summer go -?!

We are having snow flurries outside, and I'm remembering how wonderful the summer was up in Colorado. This 5 x 7 was painted from a photo I took on the way up to Leadville, Colorado. Gorgeous, gorgeous countryside.

On sale at www.renaissanceartgallery.com

, $175 framed.

Got back Wednesday from spending three days painting in the Smokies. It was wonderful - the color was amazing, brilliant golds just surrounding you. My biggest problem was deciding on a subject to paint. The painting on the bottom shows it, too. Too much going on, not simplifyed as it should have been.

The one on the top I did in Cades Cove, racing the sunset. Being in the valleys was a problem: the mountains shade them, so you only have a couple or three hours in the middle of the day when it was full daylight there. Cades Cove was good because it was so open. I painted next to the road, and I think the tourists going by thought I was one of the attractions, like the deer and the wild turkeys. Just some exotic species to photograph. ("and here's the crazy woman we saw, who was painting the field...next slide, please-") I even got video taped by a park ranger for a podcast they were planning for how people use the park.

Tannehill paintout Alabama Plein Air Artists

This is one of the paintings that I did Saturday at the Tannehill paintout, and I think it's the best one. The light was wonderful and the leaves were luminous- only the gnats and the yellowjackets were a problem.

Pam C. painting the same view.

Pam again. I really admire her determination to learn to paint, and to learn to paint well.

Glenda Adams working away, painting the mill. Barbara Davis chose to hide in the bush, for some reason. We had a great turnout, and I so enjoyed seeing my friends to catch up on all the news of their art doings, and their families and children. Glenda has THE most adorable grandchild ever. (well, we tell her that, anyway-).

Off to the Smokies that afternoon. Made it as far as my Dad's house in North Alabama and spent the night. He was happy to see me, I think. Spent the night and was off the next morning to the mountains to paint and do some leaf peeping.

Painting with the Tuscaloosa women's painters..

Our local painting group went to Moundville, Al, and painted out last week. This is what I turned out that morning. The weather was glorious, and we had a very good turnout. I'm not sure if I like this one or not. The golden green of sun shinging through leaves is hard for me to get without it turning into a sort of bilious green.

We had a terrific meal afterwards at Miss Melissa's Cafe. Wonderful food, great prices. Then I began to look for my keys. And I looked. And my friends looked. Finally someone had to take me twenty minutes back to my house to get my extra keys. It turns out someone else in our group had thrown them in her purse, thinking they were hers. I really was thankful that my friend Pam was there to ferry me back and forth to get my keys. I was also grateful that I wasn't 300 miles from home. I made sure I had an extra key to hang around my neck on my trip to the Smokies- just in case.

back from a workshop...

"The Ford" 8 x 10


"In the Cool of
the Morning" 8 x 10

Went to a workshop with Anne Blair Brown up in Tennessee last week. Had a great time,

she is a wonderful person and a great instructor as well.

We're already feeling the influence of fall- the leaves rustle with a dryer sound, and there are hints of orange creeping into the landscape. It was perfect fall weather for painting- we were down in Leiper's Fork Tennessee, just south of Franklin. Lots of lovely rolling hills and barns, bright yellow soybean fields. I turned out two decent painting out of the five or six I did.

Anne has an interesting method of painting, underpainting the most vertical surfaces bright yellow or orange, more shaded places in blue or purple. Then, overpainting with the more local color that you see. Somewhat similar to what I saw Lois Griffel do in her workshop, but much more subtle. The main thing I liked about Anne's work was the brushwork she does- it is beautiful, descriptive, like a kind of shorthand. Here's her website: http://www.anneblairbrown.com

And a new painting

I've been on a painting jag the last couple of weeks, after a long dry spell. Here's one from one of my photos taken on a recent trip to Colorado.

It's a six by eight oil.

I've really been looking closely at my compositions, and trying to do little compo sketches before working. This one is a combination of a tunnel, and maybe compositional lines that lead to the center of interest. Has only four or so main masses, that's a good thing. I think it's missing having enough darks in it, though. I need to make a note of that for next time.

Serendipity- the right place at the right time

This morning, I grudgingly dragged myself out of bed, examined the bags under my eyes, and forced myself to get dressed to go meet my painting group. I sooooo did not want to go today.

But I went anyway. We were supposed to meet in the historical district here in town.

I was the first one there, and I set up and began painting. Eventually, three other members showed up- we have around 12 in the group. The woman who owned the house drove by and spoke to one of the other painters, then asked me if I was going to sell my painting.

Well, of COURSE I was. She gave me fifty bucks cash , and I gave her an eight by ten that otherwise would have sat in the stack in my closet. And then, her husband asked me to paint their lake house as well.

Some days, the universe works in your favor- I guess it's true, success is 90% showing up.

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