Cup Family

 

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A perfect little cup family: papa, mama, and baby. All nestled on their pink and red picnic "blankets." Waiting for the refreshments to be served. : )

Color Confab

 

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Here's another one that greatly benefited from taking off my glasses. In my experience we tend to only compare values (and colors) that are right next to each other, and we forget to also compare them to things all around the composition. When your vision is blurry (either by squinting or without glasses), you can see all the relationships more easily.

I'm repeating myself here, but I think this is a critical aspect of painting, and one of the most difficult. I've been painting for 30 years now and it is profound how much painting without my glasses has helped and why.

What's Left Behind

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil  on panel

After completing a recent painting, I started to dismantle the setup. I was going back for more when I noticed just these guy left behind. I was surprised how much I liked the simple, sort of random composition. So I adjusted it a tiny bit, and painted it.

Sitting Pretty on Yellow

Click Here to Bid - 8x8in. - oil on panel

For years I’ve been struggling more and more with close-up vision. I’ve worn contacts for distance since sixth grade, but eventually I realized I could still see up close perfectly well without them. So I switched to glasses, thinking it would be easier to simply take them off whenever I needed to see up close.

Unexpectedly, this has turned into an advantage for painting. I’ve been experimenting with leaving my glasses off for the first half of a piece, and then taking them off intermittently afterward. I often talk about squinting to see the “big picture” and compare values accurately—but squinting also darkens everything. Letting things go fuzzy because of my natural vision softens the details without dimming them, which makes value relationships easier to judge. In a way, you could say I’m lucky to have poor vision. : )

It's the Simple Things

 

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When I set up this arrangement, something about it sang to me. I love it when that happens.

Final Act

 

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Here's number two in my green series. I'm quite happy with this one. I like the drama of the light from below. It reminds me of actors on a stage, hence the title.

Green Sticks Together

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x8in - oil on panel

I did a couple of green themed paintings. Here's number one.

A Juicy Snack

 

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A few more orange slices. You can see that little white cup again, sneaking around, trying to get closer.

I painted the silly little white cup by itself below to illustrate what I was talking about in this post. The bottom image is the bottom of my palette, beneath which is a simple value scale I made with acrylic paint. You can't see it perfectly because of my photos, but I mixed each color for the cup above the value it corresponded with. This helps me keep them all straight in my mind. I only used the lightest value for the highlights.

And before someone asks how I mixed these colors, I used red, blue, yellow, and white. : )

BTW, I painted it on a little Richeson 4x4in. panel that I got a free sample of years ago. The surface was smoother than the gessobord I'm used to, and the paint application was very different. It seemed to kind of soak up and dry the paint super fast. Weird. Anyone else use Richeson panels?

A Loose Line

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

I used my smaller, zoomable light for this one, and focused it in on the larger cup and a few of the orange slices, like a spotlight. This made it much more challenging as I had to capture the subtle differences between each slice as they moved away from the light. Not to mention the rest of the scene. But man I just revel in this kind of challenge!

Red Rendition

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x8in. - oil on panel

I did 5 of these red themed paintings, but only 3 worked out. I found it quite challenging to make an all red composition work. I mean, obviously I added some white things for contrast, but still it was hard. I recommend the challenge! And guess what - the challenge for Daily Paintworks this month just happens to be a Color Theme Challenge, just like this. : )

Ready for Red

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

I recently posted a small blue series. Here is the first of my red series.

We are home early from camping. It turns out that weather is unpredictable. Who knew. But here are a couple of photos from Utah when it was nice.

Just a Few Things

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Tomorrow we're headed out for some much needed camping. We'll be gone about 2 weeks, so I won't be able to ship paintings or prints until around 4/19/26. I apologize for any inconvenience.

One thing I love about camping is - I get bored. And when I get bored I get new ideas - for painting, for sewing, for everything. I imagine it's a problem for young people today - there being so much easy entertainment at their fingertips that they never get bored. Boredom is SO good for creativity. For me anyway. I try to get bored on a regular basis, but camping is the primo version.

Hey That's Not Coffee!

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Today I forgot how to paint. It was a disaster. Luckily I'm ahead with my paintings, so I still had something to post.

Lately I've actually been way ahead with my paintings, and I'm finding a pretty huge benefit to this (in addition them being dry and ready to ship): by the time I post a painting, I am far less emotionally involved. If I decide - well, this one really just isn't up to par, it doesn't slay me like it would if I made the same judgement call right after I painted it. And you end up seeing only the work I am most proud of.

Waiting for Tea

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

I am completely in love with color, but a simple black and white composition can say just as much. It really proves the old saying that, "color gets all the credit but value does the work."

True Blue Friends

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Here's the second in my little blue on a shelf series. And speaking of rockstar subjects, you've probably noticed this little white cup a few times. I got it in Germany so many years ago, and it's cracked from when I poured hot tea in it once (?), so I can't even use it for liquids. But it's still perfect for being painted.

Got the Blues

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x8in. - oil on panel

I did a small series of blue paintings on a shelf, of which this is the first. It's amazing how just a few, simple objects and a light can create such drama.

And Breakfast

 

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This is another object I borrowed from my friend Patti - the ampersand. It had a lot of neat reflections in it, but also reflected a lot of funny light everywhere. I used my artistic license and left some of it out. My guess is you can't tell?

Party Cups

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x8in. - oil on panel

I found this pink stripey cup in Boise when I was there recently. I tried painting it a couple of times, but this is the first one that worked out. I think it's because of the company it's in. I tried with apples before, and my guess is they just didn't get along.

Orderly Breakfast

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

These eggs were surprisingly bright orange! And they weren't even the super expensive ones. I thought they paired quite well with the yellow teapot. : )

Big Bird Little Bird

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Here's another thing I borrowed from the lovely Patti - the brass swan. I decided he needed a companion in the painting, and now they are inseparable in my studio. I think some imprinting happened.