Hesitant swimmer SOLD

3.5 by 7 watercolor on gesssoed masosnite

My tega cay art league are all sharing the same photo and each of us is painting or drawing or whatever our rendition of the photo. I changed a few things.... I have the ladies going down to the water and in the photo they are laying in the sand. I also changed the woman on the end to a young girl.I also added the thinner woman in the middle. I placed their arms around each other to give it a feeling of camaraderie.

Koi swims solo

This is on gessoed Masonite, (watercolor) Its for sale for 40.00

go to www.dailypainters.com for paypal button

Turned in my painting today for the "spring into Art art show at the Charlotte Art League, lets hope it get into the show. Since these things are subjective, its hard to know what will get in and what won't. Sometimes I select the wrong piece to enter for the wrong judge. Once when I was helping out with a show I overheard the judge say to his assistant, well, now I have to pick an obligatory nude. True to his word, he only chose one nude to go into the show and it was't one of the two that I entered. You never know.... I also put in a still life which I didn't think was as good as either of the two nudes and it got in...

Glass Marbles watercolor on paper

This painting is 4 inches by 6 inches and will sell for $50.00.
I was so tired yesterday, I slept and missed my painting time. Today I decided to paint something that was a bit of fun. I love painting glass. Marbles are basically spheres and they can be easily painted in a variety of colors.


Update on Art, my husband. I brought Art home from the hospital, he is on O2 and sleeps a lot but seems happier. He starts occupational therapy tomorrow so we'll see how it goes.

Ancient Ritual 21.... 4" by 4"

If you haven't noticed I tend to paint many of my abstracts using a grid method. Sometimes I will use other methods but I find I naturally paint in a grid like manner. When an artist says they paint in a grid manner, what they mean is the way the put the paint down is very much like a grid. One section down at a time in rows both vertically and horizontally. Often the rows over lap or cross over making the piece more interesting. This piece was actually 4" by 6" and I felt there were too many focal areas, so I cropped it down to a 4 by 4 and now I feel it is more soothing yet energetic all at the same time. I love these colors. I put in the circles to break up the linear shapes. The circles were actually pulled out of the wet paint to allow the paper to show thru.


You can decide which way you like it.
Here is how it looked before I cropped it.

Zman A painting a day

I love painting things in black and white. Here is a Zebra I call Zman. The size is 15 by 8 and is for sale for 100.0

Ancient Ritual 19 ACEO

This little ACEO went thru about four color changes. Have you ever done that? You start out with an idea and pretty soon the piece looks nothing like what you started out with.

A Showdown... Saachi Gallery

Starting May 28th I'm in the showdown so if you like this painting, please go to their site and vote for it! Thanks! P.S. you may have to cut and paste the link if it doesn't work...

http://www.saatchi-gallery.co.uk/showdown/index.php?showpic=24648

Doves Corner

This is a small painting of an area frequented by doves and many other birds but we started calling it Dove's corner just because a pair of doves are always in the area.


The weeds are painted using a pallet knife, & the snow is just the white of the paper. I like painting snow and I think students love to paint it too. Maybe its because its easy to get the contrasts needed for a good depth in the values.

Windy day a semi abstract in brown

For my painting a day, I try to paint a variety of things. I have recently painted three small artists trading cards and also some florals which I haven’t done lately. In keeping with this need for variety I decided to paint an abstract. Of course this coincided with a query. I was asked by one of my collectors to use more brown. That made me laugh because I’m sure she meant well with that comment but I will tell you, customers are very hard to please. Most of the time I don’t usually try because the work suffers.
I had this little ampersand 5 by 7 panel and decided to see if I could paint an abstract with some browns. After only a minute or two I could see it wasn’t as abstract as I had planned but I went with it. I could see flags and trees blowing in the wind, then I saw what appeared to be a reflection in the bottom portion so I allowed that to stay, and painted some more reflective type shapes. When its all said and done I think it looks like a city street that just had a bit of rain, the wind is still blowing pretty hard and everything is shimmery.
So here is my painting with a bit of brown. Speaking of brown….I don’t know if this is happening in your part of the world but everyone here is painting their interior walls a color of brown that is somewhere between cafe latte and beige. My guess is: this is why there was request for more browns in my paintings.
Folks you don’t have to match your walls to your paintings. Be brave buy something YOU like, not something your decorator likes.Art is supposed to touch you personally, if you’e just looking for coordinating decor, you are missing out on so many wonderful paintings.
Artist’s TIP: if you want to paint watercolor on this ground you will have to use the watercolor almost full strength out of the tube as the surface is very slick.Also you will have to seal it with a spray varnish. I think its made for oils or acrylics but I’ll try watercolor on anything.

Abstract in blue - A painting a day

matted in off white to fit a 16 by 20 frame. The art is 11 by 15.

Abstract cityscape- a painting a day

I decided just to put together some ideas I had for a city scene, its a bit abstract. The trees were done in the similar style as in the last painting.

Winter's Solitude A painting a day & and a lesson

Its raining here in South Carolina but I thought it would be nice if it would snow. I painted this little tree with a palette knife. Its an easy technique and gives very natural marks for things like trees and rocks. For trees, first you mix up paint to the consistency of creme. It cannot be sticky nor can it be drippy. You take a clean palette knife ( you need to use vinegar or lemon to clean any oils from the blade) You take the knife and place it into you paint, flat,then you take the knife and place the tip onto the paper, You pull upward with the tip of the palette knife on your paper making long thin lines. You carefully decide where to place these marks, but the action itself must be fast and decisive. This gives you a natural appearance to a tree or shrub. You can wait till it drys and lift out areas if you feel it is too dark. The lifted out areas can be toned or left with the stain of the last application. either way it looks great.

The snow is a combination of burnt sienna and cobalt blue. Both have granulating qualities which gives the snow life.

The green hills are green and red mixed with sepia. The hills in the back are the blue snow mixture for one and the blue mixture with a little red added for the other it makes a soft lavender. OK so now you have it....go paint... Its fun!


This is a follow up to this post:
I received this picture fromWendy, one of my readers, here are her comments
"When I read in your description it was from your imagination I thought Wow, I have to send this picture to you !It is in my back yard in Maribel Wisconsin and the valley is part of the Niagara Escarpment. Amazing they are so very similar."
Wendy
Yes it is amazing! Do you hear the theme music to the twilight zone or is that just me?

Chickadee- a painting a day

SOLD

This little painting is 5 by 6 inches,it is painted on 140 lb paper. Black capped chickadees come to my house most days.

River watcher a painting a day -Art, the struggle continues

This painting is 15 by 22. I love the colors and the feel of the cool waters. It is for sale for $100.00 USD. If interested e mail me. It’s on 140 lb paper with only professional grade paints & I'll ship anywhere.

I don't think I'm going to be able to paint today.
I'm been feeling a little down the last few days. I'm struggling with my larger projects. I have three I'm developing and I cannot get a clear grasp as to what I want to say and why I need to say it. When this happens I tend to fumble and I get moody.

Creativity cannot be forced. It has to come from some place, some inner source that we all call upon. Some art just comes, easily and smoothly, like a gift. Then, like an addict you crave more, painting, painting, and painting, you trying to grasp that creative high so to speak.
When you fall into this depth as an artist you can mire and sink into the muck of mediocrity. This can be bad, really, bad.

Yes of mediocrity, & you think, “how can this be"? Last week I painted one of the best paintings I have ever done. Is that it? Will it return can I get that something back? You talk to yourself, you might try to just say to yourself this will pass, relax, take a break. Sometimes you consider just painting similar subject matter and explore all the possibilities, maybe try to get some of that magic back.

I’ve been painting for awhile and I can say from experience, when there is a major problem with creativity, I find I'm on the verge of a break thru of some kind and I have to wallow a bit into the self doubt realm before I‘m allowed to create something really worth while.

To create absolutely- An artist's journey to find uniqueness

There is a topic of conversation which I have thought about for a while and have come to some conclusions. The idea that we as artists create absolutely.
It’s hard for me to believe that anyone who is active in the art world can be creating without something or someone influencing their work. Thus the idea that their work is truly unique can only be true if you take in account their path to this uniqueness. Each artist makes a lengthy journey at finding their style and developing their methods. I contend, we choose certain combinations from a repertoire of ideas. There is a collective consciousness of humanity that we all reach into and pull out something that we respond to. This makes it ours, this is like taking a recipe and spicing it to fit our tastes. It is our uniqueness and our creativity which springs from our choices. It doesn’t come from nothing.
As an artist I can tell you that I am greatly influenced by many things in my environment both good and bad.

My work is consciously or unconsciously also influenced by what other artists paint. Sometimes I limit my exposure to certain things knowingly, to eliminate the possibility that it may show up in my work. Other times I grasp onto something allowing the Osmosis to occur, to let my work evolve as it may with the aid of other artist’s work. I don’t try to mimic anyone’s work but I will try to paint in their style or even paint one of their paintings to see how it fits with my style. I evaluate the process and try to get into the other artist’s mind. I’m always amazed that two people doing the same type of work can have such different approaches to the same subject in the same medium. Sometimes all I find out is how much I like what I’m already doing. By working with another’s palette or by trying certain methods I find I have a broader sense of the challenges each artist faces. Most of the time, it just gives me some ideas as to how I want to proceed in developing my own style. It helps solidify my tastes and gives me a direction to proceed. My confidence level is strengthened by working thru ideas others before me have mastered.

Folks are always worried about copying, or infrigment, and you should be concerned. But you should also know that no matter what your style or how you approach your work, you are influenced by what other artists are doing and you shouldn’t be worry about that, its part of the process of finding your own voice. All major artists movements fed off of each other, the impressionists, Ash can, Dada, etc. These folks only became better artists by the exchange of information and by digesting the work of their peers.