Thursday, February 26, 2015

some 2015 new work

Here are some new pieces that I have completed recently.  All are oil on canvas.

Dalton and Cason, two sweet brothers whom I phtographed at the family Christmas get together.




My beautiful great granddaughter, Kaislie Lynn.


A fun painitng I did of one of the re-enactors.  I wanted to make this a really loose technique.
Title is "Hombre" and is available for sale.  10 X 20 oil on canvas.  Contact me for details.


And last in this post, a painting I did of a good friend, Tyler.



Saturday, September 27, 2014

Wayyyyy too long!

It has been so long since I posted here and I apologize for that.  First a really long (long for us) RV trip of 25 days and then trying to get back into the rhythm of painting often.  Although I took a ton of art supplies with me on the trip, I only painted one day.  Too many new and exciting things to see.

I am working on perfecting several aspects of my painting style, which involves a lot of trial and error.  So much to remember and think about as I paint, but I think that's what keeps me interested.  Edges, color temperature, values, transitions, and on and on.  I love the challenge of learning new things.

I am really fond of the work of Jeffery Watts, Daniel Gergartz, Richard Schmid, and many others who use varrying colors, temperatures, values and textures to produce amazing paintings that draw and hold my attention.  I can look at photos of their work again and again and learn something each time.   If you are not familiar with their work, I urge you to google them and treat yourself to viewing their magnificent art.  While I really admire the talent it takes to produce work that is very photo realistic, it is not the style that I want for my own work.  I love lost and found edges, vignettes, and candid poses showing the essence and character of the person.  I have mostly focused on portraits but I am beginning to include more of the figure in my work.  New challenge!  I am also learning to add areas of light and spark to my work, which produces lovely effects.

I try to paint several times per week.  Sometimes ending up with pleasing work and at other times, prompting me to grab a rag with OMS and wipe the entire thing off!  I have no desire to keep wasting paint on a piece of work that I hate!  I have also returned to previous pieces to enhance them with techniques I am learning to employ.  I have a wonderful artist friend, Gini Bosco, who is so generous with her time and gives me honest critiques as well as tips on how to improve my work.  I greatly appreciate her expertise and help.

Here are a few recent pieces:

Above is Blake, a recent model at the Monday portrait group I participate in.  This is from a photo I took during the session.  I'm actually pretty pleased with it.  I particulary like the various color temperatures that I used and the fact that I blended less.  Such a hard thing for me to do!


During our camping time at the north rim of the grand canyon, I took a mule ride down into the canyon. This fellow was in our group and I took this photo of him when we stopped to rest the mules and our butts!  Again, i really like my lack of so much blending here.


i revisited this painting of Mark Davis.  It just looked too bland to me so i added more color to his face and to the background.  I think I like it better now.  

The next two are of a couple of my favorite subjects to paint.  Both members of the Texas Legends re-enactment group.  Always so generous with their time.

Ooops! Excuse the shadow on the upper right corner of the above painting.  It is not there in real life.


Wednesday, August 6, 2014

On our long trip

We are on our longest RV trip to date.  We will be gone for almost a month.  Stops include Colorado, Mt Rushmore, Deadwood, Cody, Wyoming, Yellowstone, the Grand Tetons, Zion and Bryce Canyon and finishing up with four days at the north rim of the Grand Canyon.  Right now we are visiting friends in Colorado and I decided to pull out my journal and watercolors and do a little sketch of the view from their front porch.  Ahhhh!  So beautiful to wake up to the mountains and cool air.  I am seriously out of practice with watercolors but I'm posting this anyway.  Fun to experiment with a different medium but my heart still belongs to oils!



Monday, July 21, 2014

James and Joel

This painting is of two longhorn brothers who are members of the Fort Worth Herd.  The Herd is driven down Exchange Avenue in the historic Fort Worth stockyard area twice each day and is a huge tourist attraction.  I donated this painting to the silent auction which will benefit the herd.  The auction is a part of the American Cowboy Gala on July 24, this week.  The reference photo is by Lavender Pathways photography's Lola Hardisty.  22 x 28, oil on canvas.

Wednesday, June 18, 2014

The Cattle are This Way

The newest painting of one of the drovers in our historic stockyards area, David Mangold.  Many thanks to David for permission to use his photo as the reference.  

Friday, June 13, 2014

I can finally unveil this one!

This is a commissioned painting of a special horse, Dancer.  My friend, Pati, had me do it as a Father's Day gift for her husband.  I'm so proud of how it turned out!



Saturday, May 17, 2014

Drover paintings

Here are two paintings, almost finished, of two of the drovers in our historic Fort Worth Stockyard area.