Behind the studio
Posted in Art Work
New paintings in the Etsy shop this week.
For my local customers, I am also working on new mini paintings for the Mall gallery. I will be adding new ones each week.
These new paintings can be found at my Etsy shop
White Poinsettias
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White Lilies
Radishes This is the second painting in my Kitchen Art Vegetable series. More in this series to come!
Posted in Art Work, Peeking Behind the Easel, and Reference Photos
What's not to love about garlic? Just about any dish with garlic is delicious and it has a huge amount of folklore behind it. What I like most about garlic though, is how it looks.
The entire bulb is wrapped in thin translucent paper – like nature's tissue paper. As you pull out each individual clove, they are also wrapped similarly. It's like a little wrapped present from the garden. Once you get the clove unwrapped, the smoothness of the clove contrasts with the papery roughness of the bulb. It's an interesting vegetable and really fun to paint.
As a tribute to garlic, I painted all the parts of the garlic – the bulbs, the paper skin, the cloves and the undersides with the hair-like roots. I chose a creamy white neutral background to not detract from garlic. However it needed a few pops of color, so I added sage and forest greens as an ode to the garden it grows in and to add some depth to the painting. I also added a little touch of maroon – red in the garlic shadows to contrast with the green. And if you look closely at the both the photos, you can see the subtle maroons in the garlic shadows.
And that is my tribute to garlic and a peek behind my easel.
Posted in Art Work, and Peeking Behind the Easel
I have a new miniature painting in my Etsy shop. This is the kind of oyster I want to find.
One of the things I like about painting the miniatures is they can act as a thumbprint for a larger painting. I've painted oyster shells in prior paintings but haven't tackle pearls. This was a chance to experiment with capturing the luster of the pearl. I used little touches of purple, blues, and creams to recreate the colors you can see in a pearl.
I took a little artistic license and used a bed of sand rather than the oyster itself. I wanted to contrast the texture of sand versus the smoothness of the pearl.
I also used a pearly finished paint for the background to contrast the dullness of the oyster and highlight the pearl. I think in a larger painting, the pearly background would be overkill, but it works well on a small scale painting.
And that's a peek behind my easel – enjoy the rest of your day!
Posted in Art Work
I have added some painted ornaments to my shop inventory.
Some are painted while I am painting something similar since the paint colors are ones I'm already using. The butterfly and chickadee are examples. And others I am painting in between other paintings. I like the variety of changing up the surface that I'm painting on. Wood surfaces require a bit of prep work to get smooth surface. They need a little sanding and a coat of gesso before the actual painting. These little guys are fun to paint. I will be adding more through out the holiday.
Posted in Art Work
I have a new miniature painting up on my Etsy shop.
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Isn't he cute? We have Black Capped Chickadees year round. However, we really don't see much of them until winter comes. The bare branches of the trees makes it easy to see them when they are hanging out. I think they like the snow or maybe they just like that we tend to feed them more in the snow! I painted this little guy sitting happily in the snow – probably waiting for the feeder to be refilled. : )