For the Love of Blue

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After seeing all the destruction on the news today from hurricane Sandy, Daily Paintworks is hosting a fundraiser to help those in need on the East Coast. I have already donated 2 paintings. You may recognize them, as I posted them before (there is a long story for each about why I still have them - I won't bore you with the details). So please consider donating a painting or buying one - either will help someone whose cars got smashed under a tree, house was blown away or flooded, or other general mayhem from wind, water and even fire. And please spread the word! Thanks!

Tomorrow morning my husband and I are off to Texas to visit family for a few days. Above is my second color collection - blue.

For the Love of Green

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In addition to the demo video(s) I have also been working on a marketing ArtByte. This is often the most popular part of my workshops, so I thought it made sense to finally put it online. It costs $10 and you can find it in the Daily Paintworks ArtByte Store. It is called "Marketing Ideas for Selling Art Online".

Also, I have been working on a series of paintings, each focusing on one color. I did this before years ago with my old collection of still life stuff -- I thought I'd try it again now, and green is my favorite color.

Forktastic & free demo

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Last week I set up to film a demo. Things went wrong. Words were said. I won't say who's to blame - he wouldn't like it. We managed to salvage the video of the painting part (but not the palette) so we sped it way up and put it in a free ArtByte! I filmed another one with a slightly different composition that will be posted later in a not-free ArtByte, much slower, with voice-over and a palette shot and all that good stuff.

Whites

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I was looking back at my earliest daily paintings recently and noticed that I used to have much simpler compositions - often just one or two objects. Well, here are three, and all white. I think often the simpler compositions are harder to paint!

Meet the Prophet

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I woke up this morning to another email problem - I swear, I seem plagued with them. My darling husband fixed the problem, but apparently some emails were lost forever in the ether. So if you emailed me yesterday or this morning and I didn't respond, please resend. And again I apologize for the trouble.

Rosiness

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So, the good news is that we had tons of responses to our survey about the convention - thank you all so much! But it sounds like there are some major concerns about the cost of travel, especially from the east coast, in addition to the cost of hotels and possibly some scheduling conflicts. So we are going to table our concept for the time being, and return to the drawing board. We are thinking maybe spring 2014 is a better time, and a more central location as well. More about that later ...

Folds and Dots

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This is another one of the polka-dot patterns I made myself. The blue dots do funny things in the shadows, depending on the ambient light.

"Grapefruit Diet" & Convention Survey!

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I have exciting news I've been dying to share with you! We (at Daily Paintworks) have been secretly meeting for weeks to discuss plans for the first ever Daily Painting Convention!!! We are planning to hold this 2-day event (plus Friday mixer) in Portland, Oregon, next September (2013). We have created a survey that explains this all more fully and asks three pertinent questions that we need answered before we can move on. We would REALLY appreciate you taking 2 minutes (honest) to do the survey. Your participation is critical! Thank you!!

Stick a Fork In It

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I use a lot of cool backgrounds - blues and greens and whatnot - so this time I decided to go for something I NEVER use - pink! With the orange slices I have an analogous color scheme, but the blue on the fork balances all the warm colors out.

In Line to Party

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I bought some great big oranges, and grapefruit about the same size, thinking they would go well together. I especially enjoyed pitting all the grays against the bright colors.

Green Cup

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This green cup was the kind of acquisition that makes me do a little happy dance. It happens every once in a while that an object truly speaks to me. I was sorry to lose a number of those in the fire, but I have rebuilt quite a collection in just the year I've been here! BTW, I'm quite happy with this painting.

Food Fight

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I know this might seem like a simple composition, but I placed and replaced these orange slices about 15 thousand times. Ok, maybe not that many ... but close.

After Dinner, After Drinks

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In my workshops I've encountered a lot of students who have trouble with drawing. The first thing I recommend is reading Drawing On the Right Side of the Brain, and then (this may be even more important) I suggest buying a sketchbook and drawing every chance they get. When I was in college I carried one at all times, and drew whenever I had even just a few minutes of free time. Often, when there was nothing else, I drew my hand (always my left for some strange reason). The hand is great because you can hold it at all kinds of funky, challenging angles, and yet it must still be recognizable. I guarantee those hand drawings of mine helped me with this fork!

Surprise!

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Imagine receiving this little box during tea with a good friend. Ok, imagine having tea first. Having, like, high tea is something I've always wanted to do. With little crumpets? Not that I know what a crumpet is. And since I don't eat wheat I probably can't have crumpets. And don't crumpets sound like something muppets should have? Wait ... I think I got off topic.

Go Goldfish

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I went to goodwill the other day, searching for a few new props to liven up my studio. I was particularly happy to find these bright fishies. Apparently they are fond of grapes. And the yellow one is much better at catching them.

Unforkettable

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During my last workshop I happened to mention to my kids that I loved painting forks but that I felt I had been over-doing them a bit lately. They said (and I paraphrase), "Why? Forks are your signature!" And on the spot they came up with a number of new FABULOUS fork titles, including this one. In order not to insult them, I must paint more forks. Ahhh, the burden of it all.

Patient Husband

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I took the photo for this one years ago, in Seattle, at the downtown public library (which is very cool, by the way). I redid the face about 4 times (which is turning out to be the norm). He turned out looking kind of Asian, even though he wasn't ... not that I should be admitting that ...

A Special Gift

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I had to have one more go at this one. I liked the first one but I wanted to get a little further away from it. Why? Uhhhhh...

Too Early for Christmas

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I recently went to Michael's to get some things for knitting and while I was there I noticed their extensive ribbon collection! What was weird though, was the extensive LACK of wrapping paper. They had maybe 3 solids, but fortunately one was gold, which is always fun to paint.

Alley Van

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I have a whole slew of random photos from previous wanderings that I've been sifting through lately, searching for over-looked gems. This is done from one I took in Seattle maybe 10 years ago. I actually did a larger painting from the photo with more of the alley in it, but I think it works better small. There is something very compelling to me about alleys. I can't quite explain it.

Lucky Ducky

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Please forgive me for not posting at all this last week! I think once you hear about the group I had you'll understand. Let me start by saying, I already knew most of them. Why I agreed to teach them again when I KNEW they were all trouble-makers (?) ... not too smart. You can see in this picture below how they just roamed all over the place, laughing, making friends and having FUN, despite the fact that I told them no fun was allowed! Painting is serious business.

Honestly the whole week was like a summer camp gone awry. We rented a room at the Immaculate Heart Retreat Center, slept in nun's quarters, and were forced to eat breakfast and lunch in a large sunny room together with several photography classes. Every day there was a huge bounty of fantastic horrible food that we had to choke down ... in order to get to the dessert table before the others.

And as if this wasn't bad enough already, every night (of course) they gagged and bound and toted me to all kinds of homes and restaurants where I was forced to drink lots of wine, and eat a particularly unforgettable flourless chocolate torte (OMG!!!). And then they wanted me to perform too, like some kind of trained monkey (below are the demos from class, done under duress).

I have a vague memory of telling stories I may regret later. I think they were drugging me, which may explain how exhausted I am now that I'm home. Here they are, below, my misfits. It was the most horrible week of my life.      Not.