Gourd

"Coming and Going" or "Hello Good-Bye" were both titles considered for this painting. The gourd reminds of a wingless bird, maybe saying, "You talking to ME?"
It just about drove me out of my gourd, so to speak :-), trying to paint all these odd shapes, bumps, stripes and reflected lights. I usually do these small paintings in one sitting but this one took two.

White Pumpkin

The pumpkin: the October-November Cross-Over Fruit.
The thing I liked about this scene was the ribbon of shadow across the top of the pumpkin and the ribbon of light on the table behind it.
I painted the pomegranate and the pumpkin for an on-line challenge, calling artists to enter paintings done entirely during the month of October. My plan was to enter a plein air work of changing leaves and a still life made up of Autumn Harvest but when October started running out, I hurried and did these two small works using my still life props.
The pomegranate is 5x7, the pumpkin is 6x6 and was selected for the first 6-Inch Squared show at the Randy Higbee Gallery in California.

October Pom

To paint this pomegranate, I set it on a box and put the box on a table so that it was nearly eye-level. I rigged a backdrop using a cigar box and a pashmina, then I tacked a black fan to the right side of the box to block all ambient light. Lastly, I turned on a nice, bright light and moved it around until I was happy with the play. The thing that I liked was the way the top was peeling down toward me, casting a shadow barely caught.

Pomegranate and Company

I have repainted it, renamed it, cropped it and framed it.

It's still the same painting underneath.

Soda Springs

I kind of liked the original block-in of Soda Springs and thought to perhaps leave it alone, but there is something inside of me that always wants to make it better or to finish it, if it could be more finished. Sometimes I regret it but not this time. I had a lot of fun completing this little 8x10, reliving that afternoon painting the springs with my friends; the memories of the sounds and smells and jokes were keeping a smile on my face as I finished the afternoon on my canvas. That's kind of what it's all about.

Sisters Teach a Lesson

While I was in Wyoming, I had the wonderful opportunity to have had a couple of "brutally honest" critiques of my painting, "Sisters" by two highly respected master painters and I'd like to share the lesson, as it was very instructive.

One said that it was a wonderful painting, complimenting the brushwork, design and etc. The other wanted to see the shadow area painted in, judging it too dark and attention-grabbing. He also thought the black frame against the painting was too sudden and "closed in."

I have painted over the original painting, filling in the shadow, adding some touches to the sisters, and painting a lighter border around the inside of the frame. I do think that the changes have improved the feeling of Sisters, making it lighter and airier feeling. It more matches my own feelings when I look at the little figurines.

My take-aways: 1. Always be open to honest criticism of your work and willing to change. My goal should never be to be right; it should always be to be my best.

2. Everyone sees things differently and that's okay. I really like that one of the masters liked Sisters as it was. But I acted on the negative critique.

3. The frame is part of the painting.

I hope you like the changes made to Sisters.

Bougainvillea Blossom

I'm an oil painter but my students are watercolorists. It's a wonderful adventure with them because I really think that I would let my love of watercolor take a backseat, if not for them.

This is a section of a bougainvillea study that I did out in my backyard. The glory of watercolor is the white paper, bouncing the light back to you through the vivid color laid on the page. I love it.

Complements

An unfinished still life, begun in a workshop recently.

There are two sets of complements in this set-up: the sake bottle and cup; the green apple and red pomegranate.

To finish, I plan to leave the objects pretty much alone but I want to put something behind them that will unite and complement them.

Soda Springs

On this bridge, I painted with Lee and Kay, two of my great painter peeps. There was a big, huge heap of horse hockey right behind us, lending an authentic rustic air to our proceedings, together with the wonderful sounds of the springs, and of course our own witty repartee. Another artist did a painting of us painting on the bridge, complete with the hockey; I'll see if I can get a picture of that to share with you.
Anyway, we painted our hearts out until an enormous cloud rolled over our sun, completely changing all the color-value relationships in our landscape. We faked it for awhile, then we went in for supper.

Butch's Ice House

One day, while I was on my Wyoming retreat, we had a "paint the town" day, and believe it or not, this mine-like thing is right downtown where I was staying. It looked like a mine to me but as I painted, townsfolk stopped to chat and there were many explanations for this oddity. However, all agreed: it's not a mine.

Some said that it was Butch Cassidy's hide out, Butch having lived and worked in and around the town from the 1890's. Other's said it was created to house bootlegged liquor, and still others said it's only job was to keep ice cold. All agreed that in its recent history, it served as a pretty cool bar, so to speak.

It was very strenuous, fast painting for me because the shadows were perfect when I was setting up and I could tell that they wouldn't last long. I blocked in the shadows and the more prominent light-catchers before I did anything else and was very glad I did. In just a half an hour, the light had changed on it completely. We painted from 3 to 5 and if it had been open for business, I may have gone in for a cool one to celebrate my quick-draw victory! Annie Oakley would have been proud.

Whiskey Creek, 8x10. sold

*sold*
I believe the exact name of this creek is Torrey Creek but it is located in Whiskey Basin and they call it Whiskey Creek because, according to locals, cowboys used to hide their whiskey in the creek to keep it cool in the summer. Sounds good to me.

This is a plein air painting looking down into the creek, no horizon or even anything other than the creek itself. There will be more paintings from this locale forthcoming. The basin was carved out by a glacier and a glacier can be seen from where I was standing, along with bighorn sheep moseying around. This was an ecstatic day, I must say.

This painting sold while I was in Wyoming, still wet, but another person also wanted it so I painted it twice.  The first time was such a joyous breeze.  The second time was very hard.  I don't know why that was but I am going to try not to do that again.  I'm very grateful that there was that kind of union of vision for us, but maybe next time, I'll paint a little bit different painting of the same spot.  

Second Place Pig

This is Carol, the new mistress of Sassy Pig.

Sassy Pig won second in oils at the show in Wyoming. Who said you shouldn't put lipstick on a pig?

To Market To Market

To market, to market, to sell some fat pigs...

I'm off to paint for a couple of weeks in Colorado and Wyoming. These little piggies will be in a show in Wyoming. They look much fancier in their little frames. Happy pigs.

Jax Cat

Pretty kitty kitty, sleeping on a bench, being all difficult to paint. Jax is painted on a paper bag; something I really enjoy doing, although it's not too archival.

Anyway, I hope you like it. Jax doesn't care either way.

Sisters

These little piggies were given to me by my sister. I never meant to collect pigs, or anything else for that matter. We used to live in the country and when we first moved there, my mom gave us a pig cookie jar. It sat proudly in our country kitchen. People saw it and thought that we must like pigs so they blessed us with pig presents on every occasion. We have 32 pigs in our kitchen right now. Not counting any people. And we ourselves now collect them in spite of ourselves.

We have a few chickens, too. Not counting any people.