Biloxi Blue

Today, a watercolor............

Biloxi Blue is from a photograph I took years ago when we made a day trip to Biloxi, Mississippi.

There was this wonderful little harbor behind a casino and it had the most beautiful shrimp boats. Along with shrimp boats, there was this little guy, posing for all the world to see. He just simply adjusted his position on the piling as I moved around him shooting photos. I got several nice shots of him, in front of both a red and a blue shrimp boat. I used this particular pose as a demonstration and painting project for my beginning watercolor students. The students learned a lot in the past 6 weeks, but most of all, they had fun! I love to think of this group of ladies joining me in the winter quarter for ESILL as well. Some of them already said yes to moving on to intermediate watercolor.

If you look carefully, you can see the out of focus shrimp boat behind the seagull. This class used both very loose and very tight techniques combined, along with a little masking.

Biloxi Blue, Watercolor on paper, 11 x 15

Day 95 of the 100 days~100 paintings 2017 

Headed for Home Too!

While this is not really a painting in a day, I finished it today. This painting has been in the works for several months and I was determined to finish.
It all began when we were out sailing with a friend and I had the camera along just in case I wanted to take pictures. It was a nice long sail and we were evening coming in to harbor. When we got into the channel for Dog River, my husband Chris spotted this boat off in the distance. His remark was, look at all the pelicans around that boat! I tried to get a shot but the boat was too far away. I waited for several minutes while looking through the lens at the boat. Once it got closer, I started laughing, Chris wanted to know why and I told him it is the same boat I painted before, Capt Sid. ("Headed for Home") Many beautiful shots later I was excited about all the birds on, behind, and around this vessel. Why I thought it would be fun to paint so many birds, I don't know!
Here we are, "Headed for Home Too!" Oil on canvas, approx 20 x 48. I will be putting it into print as well so look for it at the Fall shows.