Happy New Year!

Here is a selection of images to close out the year:



I'm taking VisualQuest with Pixie Lighthorse--well, technically it's over already, and I am meandering along with the class material. It's really cathartic to paint large and messy. This is the biggest canvas I've ever painted, 30 x 30 inches.

Best wishes and happy creating in the New Year! One of my intentions is to post more regularly, as a practice for another intention of getting a "real artist" website set up. Any encouragement along the way is welcome!

Things have been happening

I'm nearly done with this year's painting for the Portland Audubon Society Fundraiser.

Then as a relief from careful painting, I started painting this.

And there was still a bit of black paint left, so I finished this off. It is #8 from the 100 Paintings Project (I'm up to 12, but a few need a bit more, and I will wait to post them in order).

More Paintings

Here are the ones I didn't post last time, when the internet connection was uncooperative.

This one is kind of a memorial, inspired by my purple opuntia that recently finished giving up the ghost. (acrylic)

Another desert scene. (water soluble colored pencil + water brush)

OMG--straight lines and bilateral symmetry! No! (For whatever reason, the curve is MUCH worse in the photo.) The best part of this one is the association--inspired by a lovely afternoon in the teahouse at the Portland Classical Chinese Garden chatting with Stephanie Anderson Ladd. (If you are interested in the Sacred Feminine or Goddess archetypes, do check out her website!) (watercolor)

This one was inspired by the view from my hotel during the Complex Weavers Seminars--Mt. Rainier. The painting took a fraction of the time it took to do the last one, and is much more satisfying. It is not true to life, but the colors make me feel like I did looking at the mountain, though the photo shows as crazy more orange than the painting. (acrylic)

The mountain itself, in evening and morning guise:

Paintings Proceed

First, documentary evidence of stripy windowsill kitty this afternoon the afternoon of July 6:

(My internet service has been PAINFULLY unresponsive for ages, but tonight it's back! To stay, I hope. Was it because of the World Cup?)

Next, paintings 3-7 of the 100 Paintings project--because I have decided I will publish all of them, even the bad less-appealing ones:

This one was inspired by the henna design I had on my arm a while back. I *really* like the background, but I was initially unenthralled with the painting because it didn't work like I envisioned. After not seeing it for a while I like it better. Acrylic paint with white gel pen for the outline.

This was my henna done by Roving Horse Henna:

...and I guess I'm done tonight after all; despite things generally behaving, pictures are v-e-r-y s-l-o-w. More paintings next time!

More Painting

First, an idealized picture of my workspace, adorned with my beautiful orchid.

Several in-process shots; this one is also watercolor.

And the final version--I actually rather like it overall, and several non-contiguous square inches are pretty good. The decorative things were to keep the brush busy while I figured out what to do in the center, and they ended up being undesirable. Note to self: keep a doodle paper at hand in the future, just in case. The snake wasn't going to get any better; it's pretty cute anyway, and I just stopped before something bad happened.

Finally, here is a bonus snake from my sketchbook in late May. For well over a year I've wanted to do a large, fancy snake painting, but I haven't managed to start--apparently starting with small snakes and working my way up is how it will happen! This painting was inspired by the little garter snake I saw while out walking. No, that snake did not look at all like my painting.

(The dark blue black is watercolor, the texture dots and eyes are gouache, and the shiny stars are acrylic.)

On the (Figurative) Easel

Since this is the first day of the rest of the year, it's really about time I add something new.

I decided a while back that I need to do 100 paintings. I keep wanting to paint, but I'm not actually very good at it, and I feel like these days I don't even know just what my "thing" is--motif, subject, story, symbolism. One good way to improve as an artist and to figure such things out, is to do a lot of things. Practice. It was proven to me a bunch of times at art school--make 15, 25, 30 things, and you WILL, guaranteed, end up with almost 30% good or extremely good things.

Anyway, I've been painting a lot of backgrounds. A couple are still only black gesso, and the rest are painted with acrylics.

And today, I finally got myself to paint one. I had to make it as simple as possible, and apparently that meant watercolor, because acrylic for whatever reason seemed intimidating. So here is painting number one!

99 to go!