Eddie painting #74

 

     Here's Eddie, our sweet mail carrier, on the day he told me he was retiring.  I ran inside and got my camera for a snapshot I could paint his portrait as a retirement gift.  I still had the photos, so I thought I'd try it again, in my new style.   Actually, I worked on a white ground this time, and just REMOVED the lights !!!!  Pretty fun !

Sunflower 6 x 6 painting #73

 

     I had the setup, so I decided to do another version, with the square format.  I really do enjoy these flowers... (can you tell? ha ha)

Dark background painting #72

 

I thought I'd try a darker background today.  Hopefully I got enough contrast of values... Here's the progress during the process.
     I DID forgo the polka-dots for the sake of simplicity... ha  !

Wedding centerpiece painting #71

 

SOLD

     This is from a picture given to me years ago by a teacher at school.  She showed me this centerpiece from her daughter's wedding, because she loved the flower combination.   I just saw her at a happy hour this week, and started to search for this picture and found it.....  Since I've painted so many hydrangeas lately I thought I'd try it.  
         I discovered a cool method to compare my paint mixture to the photo.... I just painted a dab on the edge of the card, moved the card to the photo, and checked for intensity, hue and value.... woo woo !  it really worked !   try it !!!  (this picture of the chart and photo looks a little 'yellowish' because I took it with the light from my lamp, instead of a flash)

Complements painting #70

 

     These persimmons were a natural to fit into this periwinkle bowl of mine.  I've always loved this color (bowl) and it makes the persimmon color 'pop', I think....

silliness

ran across this while cleaning out my files, yesterday..... it gave me a chuckle !  (maybe only art teachers will find this funny... !)

Balancing act painting #69

 

They kept falling over, so I had to keep changing my painting... ha !  I had fun with the composition, though.  I need to shake it up a bit. !

Persimmon trio painting #68

 

     I've seen these in the stores, but never bought any until now.  I bought them particularly for painting, so now I'll have to see how to fix them so we can actually eat them ! ha !  I really had fun painting them !

Up Close and Personal painting #67

 

 

     Funny, how changing the light on the same subject can alter the look sooo dramatically.   So many different ways of looking at something !  LOVE IT !  (my daughter and I just had this conversation 5 minutes ago on the phone, how her photography, and my painting are similar in that respect)  
     I painted another version, and posted that one, too...

Autumn Tea painting #66

 
   I love to sip on hot tea when the weather gets cool.... My favorite is Ginger-Peach..... This pot is one I got quite awhile ago. I love the two-toned coloring and the shape. 

Yellow Centers painting #65

SOLD

     These had yellow centers, unlike the dark ones I'm used to.  They have an interesting green to the center, with a texture, too.  This one is a little one, measuring 6 x 6...

Grace's first sales......

SOLD

SOLD

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  My granddaughter, Grace, who is 5 1/2 , loves to paint. (imagine that ?)  Anyhoo, the last weekend, she was playing outside and got bored.  Her dad said she disappeared inside the house and came out with her little table and her paintings with a sign on the front that said 'ART'... she had her own sidewalk art sale !  The picture is on my phone, or I'd post it.... it was soo cute...Unfortunately, they live on a quiet cul-de-sac, and don't get a lot of traffic......
     Anyway,  yesterday she painted 11 paintings, a bit bigger this time.  They were 12 x 12....   She sold 4 of them !!  Here are the two that her aunt bought, and I bought the one with the energetic blue lines.... PaPa has his picked out, too......
     Never too young, I say !!

Coffeebreak Rose 2

 

     Did I mention that these roses are HARD to paint !  whew, I'm trying my darnest !  This time I did put in a little sketch with my paintbrush first, which helped in the organization of it, but STILL..... It's really hard to get the freshness, as well as the stark contrast on the petals... never fear, I'm going to keep at it til the thing wilts !!!  ha ha

 

Roses are so hard to paint.... I wiped the first one, and kept the second, but I'm gonna keep painting it, until it gets easier !!!   (I could be all year ! ha ha )

Color Mixing Swatches

 

     I danced this morning, had my usual coffee date with a friend, and helped my daughter move into her new apartment, so I didn't have much time to do more than set up a new workable palette.  But.... as I was doing that, I decided to experiment with my colors, my "greens", especially.  
      I use only two yellows... Cadmium Yellow Lemon Pale, and Cadmium Yellow Medium.    They are actually quite different, with the later one taking on a more 'orangeish' hue.  The two blues on my palette are Ultramarine Blue, and Thalo Blue.... also quite different.  The Ultramarine leans more toward purple, and the thalo is more toward the greens.  I was actually quite amazed when I set out to mix the different combinations and record my findings...   To me, the two mixtures with the thalo are brighter, and more intense, while the two mixtures with ultramarine are both more soft and muted.   Of course, the proportions are estimated, so you can achieve lighter or darker values of these colors easily with more blue added to the mixtures, but I think the results are worth a 'look see'.....
YLP= Yellow Lemon Pale
CYL= Cadmium Yellow Light
Aliz. C= Alizarin Crimson
CRM= Cadmium Red Medium

     I found the oranges quite similar, with the same experiment of color mixing...  Maybe a little more intense with the combinations that contained the Cadmium Red Medium, as opposed to the Alizarin Crimson.   

Demo for local gallery- Sunflowers 9 painting #64

 

     The owner of a local gallery asked if I'd demonstrate my painting for their monthly gathering.  I enjoyed having my friends come and watch me and talk to all of them about my art.   One friend sat right by me from the start, and had so many questions.  It was a fun time.  Here's the finished painting.

Kirkwood House commission painting #63

SOLD

     A friend is putting a new house on this lot, and wants to share the memory of the old one with the former resident.   She commissioned me and I combined two photos to get the perspective and the awnings in there, that have been removed in recent years !

     I guess I failed to mention that the house is going to be taken down to build the new one.... ha ha

Sunflowers 8 painting #62

 

These are lasting awhile, so I'm gonna take advantage...  On this one I really liked the limegreen underpainting, and decided it worked !

Sunflowers 7 painting #61

 

     There are SO MANY different varieties of sunflowers !!  I was never aware of that, until I started painting them.   I still really love the traditional one the best because of the fantastic contrast in values.  I've finally gotten a new bouquet so I can tackle them a few more times..... so fun !

My Flickr Site

 Sandy's Flickr Site   (click here)

  I used to use this site all the time, but haven't put anything here for awhile..... This contains the student portraits I did when I retired, for a show in March 08.  Lots of other paintings are here, too.