Pink Magnolias

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Today is an exciting day for me - I am bringing 3 big paintings to my first gallery (in 8 years)! The name of the gallery is Art on the Boulevard, in Vancouver, WA.

These are by far the nicest frames I have ever used. I got them from a local place called Vistra, that also operates webpictureframes.com.

Also today, my husband and I are headed up to Seattle for further gallery scouting, and maybe a little playing too. : ) Unfortunately I won't be able to ship paintings until next Thursday, 4.25.19.

The Blue March

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Common Misconceptions about Daily Paintworks (DPW)

The first is the word “daily” in the name. While DPW always has new art DAILY on the front page, our members don’t have to produce art every day. Heck, I certainly don’t! Because life gets in the way, am I right? In fact we have no requirements at all when it comes to how often our members post.

Second, while DPW is an online gallery, we ALSO provide (newly) customizable art websites, and a great back-end that tracks your art and sales. Check out our new join us page (and scroll down) for examples of a few of our new themes, portfolio management system, and more.

Misconception number three is about blogs. In the early days, every daily painter had a blog. We set up DPW (listen to me, taking credit for this clever programming!) so it pulls posts from blogs automatically. But these days, not everyone has one, and it is certainly not a requirement. Honestly, if I were to start daily painting today, I would probably just use DPW, social media & a newsletter.

And (at the risk of sounding like one of those horrible infomercials) there's more! : )
(to be continued...)

Please Don't Fall

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On a totally non-art note, my whole family has birthdays in a 3 week period, which we are near the end of - all Aries. My son just turned 14, and my youngest stepdaughter will be 24 on Friday! I think their aging bothers me more than my own. Isn't that funny? I don't feel like I'm getting older, but their aging makes me wonder if I really am...

Shopping Experts

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I found these 4 in France, on a shopping mission. They were obviously experts. They finished before everyone else and were (in this moment) headed back to their swanky flat for lunch.

Natural Spotlight

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What is Daily Paintworks?

I started doing these little “daily” paintings a little over 12 years ago. I enjoyed it so much I raved to all my art friends, and several started their own daily practice and blogs. Quickly we realized it would be beneficial to band together and promote one website instead of all our individual blogs. Thus, Daily Paintworks (DPW) was born.

I created the original design, and my husband (the programmer) has put in countless hours building it into what it is today. DPW has become his full time job/passion, as he handles support, improves features, and adds new ones. My oldest stepdaughter, Sophie (28), answers questions from buyers and members, and my youngest, Maddie (23), does social media outreach. And I continue to … consult. : ) It is truly a family business.

I am very proud of what DPW has become, so I decided to talk a bit about it again, over a series of posts, in case some of you don’t know, and/or might be interested in using it. I also want to clear up some common misconceptions about what it is. (to be continued…)

Going About Life

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It looks better in person, so I'll try to get a better picture once it's varnished. This is from another oldie San Francisco reference. I just love the three very different ladies, heading ... wherever. I don't know if they were together, or if they just happened to be side by side in that moment.

Snack Break

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Here's another one from San Francisco. It ALSO came from a terrible reference. The lady was mostly ok, but the background was ick, and her bags were ... awkward. I was emboldened by my last one, so I decided just to go for it.

Waiting in the Cold

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This is another old one, also from San Francisco. The reference photo was terrible, but I always loved these ladies all scrunched up on the bench. So I completely changed the background. It was a total experiment, but I think it worked out.

The Shadow Knows

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This happens every year at about this time - I start feeling desperate for new reference material. And because I can't go on a trip right this minute to collect more, I dug deep into some old files. This one is from a trip I took to San Francisco years ago. It was late afternoon/evening, early spring, and I found this corner where the light was just magical. I stood in the same spot for about 10 minutes and took pictures of all the people walking by. Only a few are paint-worthy, of course. But that's how it goes.

Looking for Lunch

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I've had this photo for a little while - it's from my first trip to France, a couple years ago. I love the light, but the photo had problems. I really want to paint this larger, so I did this one as a study, experimenting with fixes to the problems. Fortunately they all worked!

I think I've mentioned I've been working on some larger paintings with the idea that eventually I'll get back into galleries. Well, it's happening! I'll have more specifics soon.

Also, I wanted to say that the brushes I mentioned in my last post, the Silver Bristlon's, are synthetic. : )

People Watching

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Last summer when I was teaching in France, my students and I would sometimes roam around a market or village taking pictures. Here I captured one of my students capturing the same scene that appealed to me.

Meanwhile, I got an email today asking me to talk about the brushes I use. To the right is a big jar filled with brushes I have acquired over the years (bought or been given). It looks nice on my table, and I do use some of them once in a while.

But these are my workhorse brushes (for my small paintings). They are all Silver Bristlon. The smallest is a filbert, the rest are brights. The filbert is a size 2 (I use it for drawing). The brights are sizes 4, 6 and 8. I use the different sizes based on the size of the stroke I want to make.

I replace each of these about once a month, when the bristles start to splay and I can't get crisp edges anymore. But I paint 4-8 hours a day, at least 5 days a week, which I call heavy use. I paint on Ampersand Gessobord panels - these brushes work very well on this surface. If I worked on canvas, I might use something different. Rosemary makes a brush called Ivory that is pretty much identical to mine. Let me know if you have any questions. : )

After Shopping

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Here's another one from France, a little ways away from the market.

Strolling Through in Blue

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For about a year I've been a part of something that I've been wanting to tell you about. My friend Annie, an artist in Portland, suggested we start a small art, "support" group. There are 7 of us, and we all live in different places, so we decided to call each other on Hangouts (with video) once a month.

We talk about 3 main things: what we've accomplished (in the month since we've chatted), what's next (big and small goals), and what we're stuck on. Everyone asks questions and offers suggestions, and we end up learning a lot from each other.

As artists we tend to spend the bulk of our time alone in our studio, so it can be really nice to chat with like-minded people once in a while. I've talked to a lot of people in my workshops who sound like they could use something like this. I highly recommend it! If nothing else, it really encourages ME to get stuff done! I mean, what else am I going to report to my group at the end of the month?!

Lately we've been arranging ART PLAY DAYS sometimes. This is where we all get together and one person leads the group in an activity that might be out of everyone else's comfort zones, and we just play with art all day. So far we've done collage and pastel, and next month we've rented a house in Hood River so we can paint the landscape for a couple of days.

Passing the Resale Shop

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I love resale shops. I get a lot of my still life props there, but also clothes and other things. I think of it as a treasure hunt. You can't go in looking for anything specific - you just go and look. You might come home with nothing - you might come home with amazing things you can't find anywhere else!

Ask the Spoon

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Sometimes, when I lose my focus, I look back at old paintings of mine that I was really happy with. And usually I see something that I was doing that I ... apparently FORGOT about! Before this I had done a couple that I wasn't happy with (that I ended up wiping) and what I realized is that I was getting too blendy. So for this I focused on [distinct] [strokes], and I'm calling it a keeper. : )

Serious Business

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In order to test out my new palette (specifically the black portion), I needed to paint something really dark. And I will say, it was MUCH easier, especially that black cup! If you notice, part of it is in light, and part is in shadow (and parts have reflected light). To mix those piles and get those subtly different values & colors "right," is hard! But mixing them all on top of black made it much easier, because I was comparing them to a value that was much closer to what it needed to be (closer than white).

Which brings me to a discussion about palette color in general. I started out with a white palette in college. Years later someone suggested a gray palette was "better," so I tried it for about a month. And it completely threw me for a loop! Because I was so used to mixing on white.

But some people love a gray palette (or natural wood). And I like white - and now with a black portion! So I've come to the conclusion that it is completely a personal preference!! There is no better or best. Figure out what works for you, and screw everybody else's opinion. : )

Examining the Stack

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Painting is hard. That's all I got to say today.

The No-Boiled Egg

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Last year I posted about a piece of glass I found at IKEA that I bought and used for a palette. Unfortunately what I soon found was that it scratched very easily, probably due to the fact that it wasn't tempered. The scratches were actually fairly easy to work around, though it made it a little harder to clean, and ... quite ugly. The top picture is from a few days ago.

The bottom picture includes my new PERFECT piece of glass! I got it locally, and it was super easy (which makes me feel silly for putting off for so long!). I got the clearest glass, which they call Starfire, 1/4" thick, tempered, 19"x48".

I decided to put paper underneath (for now). I prefer a white palette (so I can compare all my values to the lightest one). But recently when I painted on black gesso, I got a feel for what it's like comparing to dark values as well. So I also put a piece of black paper under one section. This is an experiment.

Abandoned Egg

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My goal is to someday say this:

“I have already settled it for myself so flattery and criticism go down the same drain and I am quite free.” -Georgia O’Keeffe

Make Your Own Breakfast

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Last year I built myself a table in my studio. I had some vague ideas about how I might use it, but it's turned out to be INFINITELY useful! Like, it's pretty much constantly covered with multiple projects. Here I was shipping books and working on a sewing project.

I got the idea for the design on Pinterest - thank you Pinterest!. You can see a picture of a smaller version if you follow that link. I used two IKEA Kallax shelf units, with a piece of 3/4" baltic birch plywood underneath (with locking castors on the bottom) and another, bigger piece, on top. I glued a piece of formica to the surface for easy cleaning. I'm so glad I put wheels on the bottom, as I move it around all the time. I've decided from now on, everything in my studio should be on wheels!