Backlit Pier

Backlit pier is another watercolor completed in class with my USA students. Our last class was Thursday night and I am already planning for the next go round of teaching.
While I am not going to be teaching for USA, I will be at the Eastern Shore Art Center in Fairhope. The class," Why Haven't I Been Taught That Before?" is a class using a limited palette and exploring color and value. The class is suitable for beginners and not so beginners and can use oil or acrylic. It starts in September and promises to be fun!.
Backlit Pier watercolor 15 x 20.

Just a Glass of Wine Please!

This painting is another of my demonstrations done in class. It was done in 15 minutes in response to how do you paint glass? My students often throw me curves like this when I am teaching. I try to give a response that is more than a quick answer, but also does not take up the whole lesson time if we are working on a painting together.
I cannot emphasize enough the gift of time to give yourself in painting and making mistakes on your own. It is hands down the best way to learn! I made numerous mistakes while I was learning and taught myself a great deal in the process. I also advise anyone to take lessons under numerous instructors, each one has something for you take away and tuck into your learning box.....Best of all, just PAINT! Repeat the same painting with different colors, paint another bunch of grapes, paint another sky, go get books from the library, get frustrated and throw a few away. The more you paint, the faster you learn!
Just a Glass of Wine Please! is 8 x 10 Oil on canvas board. SOLD

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.

Thinking of Monet

I finished this watercolor during my class tonight while in my studio. It was a delightful time, playing with the colors and pushing the water while instructing at the same time. I would get a few brush strokes in, help one of my students, examine it from a distance, and add a little here and there.

We found out today that the Raccoon Retreat will be ours! The adventure begins with a complete gutting of the interior. There are a few things I may try to save out of the house, not the least of which is a beautiful four poster bed frame. Right now, it is covered in mildew and rather forlorn looking. I am hoping to clean it, and give it new life in our home as a guest bedroom piece. The road ahead of us is going to be a lot of sweat equity to empty out the house, drop the roof down and load the dumpsters with all the junk and mushy, moldy ceiling tiles. Chris also seems to think there is carpet underneath all the water. We have started the next page in our lives with an investment in our new favorite part of the world.
Fairhope here we come!

My Friends Pier

This painting was a lesson for my USA students and I believe they all turned out well. One of them had a beautiful foggy effect and others were just gorgeous. Some of the students really liked them, others count it as a learning experience. Tonight was our last Oil class and as usual, I am feeling already like I am missing a bunch of old friends. I really hope they all continue to paint.

I really can't emphasize enough the importance of giving yourself a gift when you are learning to paint. The gift of time.......... Time behind a brush is the only way to become a better painter. Time to make your own mistakes and dig yourself out of them. Time to experiment. Time to learn, but most of all Time to play in the paint. SOLD

See the Seahorse Mommy!

I am in absolute awe of people that can find something in nothing and one of my favorite artists that does just that is
 I absolutely love his work and hope to collect one someday. His work is 'found' art. Objects d' Art that make the ordinary extraordinary. I enjoy looking at all the details that he puts into his work. He takes something that would ordinarily be thrown away and makes it into something wonderful. Bird heads from driftwood, old "Billy Bass" recordings that are hysterical in their use, angels from rusted bits of metal, and farm implements you never could imagine could be what they become. His work is on www.brucelarsenart.com
My husband and I seem to be moving soon in another direction as well, across the bay to the beautiful city of Fairhope. We have "found" an object (a house) and hope to make it our own Object d' Art and home in a short period of time.
"See the Seahorse Mommy" Oil 11 x 14 is a painting of one of Bruce Larsen's pieces that overlooks the bay in a public park. Children are fascinated by it and in reality, I am as well.

Bonding

In case you have not realized, I adore the sea.
It all began with living in the Philippines and was strengthened by watching the Undersea World of Jacques' Cousteau. The undersea program was the only one I was allowed to stay up late and watch on a school night. My mother and father were both divers and I longed to be with them. The program gave me a chance to be underwater with divers and made me ever mindful of our impact on this planet. I wonder what Cousteau would say about the Great Pacific Basin and the tragedy unfolding before us with our wasteful ways. (It is a sea of plastic some 150 miles off the coast of California) Every piece of plastic ever manufactured on this earth is still here in some form or another.

This painting is about bonding, the bonding that occurs between mother and baby and the beautiful way these gentle giants guide their young to the surface for air. I hope to see them in person some day even if I am only snorkeling.
Humpback Mother and Baby "Bonding" 30 x 30 Oil on canvas.