Oil figure of a woman sitting on a bed in the morning light, 11" x 14 on hard board

"In the morning light"
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Angela steals the show and the light in the morning. I was striving here to capture her mood and enhance it with the light. I'm happy with the skin tones which are warm and the over all feel of the composition.

Oil Floral of Lilies and Cut Tangerine, 9" x 12" on panel

"Lilies and Cut Tangerine"
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This painting is done on 1/4" thick 9" x 12" hard panel and finished with a light varnish. The Lilies are painted thickly in the lights with generous paint. I especially like the composition here which has good strong negative shapes. I'm quite satisfied with the way that the flowers fade into the shadows.

White always presents a challenge for artists. This is true especially of flowers which have many nuances in them. In chiaroscuro painting, the emphasis is on tonal quality and not so much on color. However, the trick is to discover the color in terms of temperature change and emphasize it just enough to bring life to the shadows and make the whites stand out against each other without falling into mud.

Oil Floral of Roses in a Copper Vase, 12" x 16"

"The Copper Vase"
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It's been awhile since I painted in cool light. I generally use a warm incadescent light that I can dim or brighten according to the needs of the painting. But cool natural north light is always preferable. My studio sometimes makes this difficult. But today I moved things around a bit and this painting of roses in cool light emerged. I love roses, as do most people, but always find them a challenge to paint. Think I did OK here. I especially like the way the warm copper vase sets off the warm tones in the roses.

"The Copper Vase" is painted on 16" x 20" unstretched canvas. It has a lovely 2" unpainted border around it giving it a number of framing options. See the image below. If you have any questions, feel free to e-mail me.

Oil Figure of a reclining woman, 11" x 15"

"Angela Sleeping II"
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This afternoon, the sun was actually shining for awhile into my studio and I couldn't bring myself to shut down the lights, huddle in the dark and paint a still life. So I dug into my model collection and decided to do a sister piece to the last "Angela Sleeping."

I've been having a lot of fun with these pieces. I especially like the white border around the painting. It intrigues me with some design possibilities. While I certainly won't be doing all my pieces like this, I intend to explore it here and there with other ideas.

"Angela Sleeping II", like it's sister piece, is painted on 16" x 20" unstretched canvas. It has a two and a half inch border around it which sets it off in a lovely way. See below. It has a variety of options for framing. It can be stretched onto stretcher bars, backed on board, or matted decoratively under glass.

Oil Floral of Hayacinth and Cut Apples, 14" x 18"

"Hyacinth and Cut Apples"
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This pitcher and bowl have been hanging around my dining room for many years and I only now decided to paint them. I was aiming for a soft glowing look here and trying to pick up the color I saw reflected in the shadows. I'm quite happy with the outcome.

Postscript: About one hour before I posted this, my devil of cat, Nalie, jumped onto the still life set-up and knocked the entire thing to the floor. Sigh. Glad I painted it. At least I managed to salvage the pitcher.

Oil Floral of Pink Orchids, 12" x 20"

"Orchid Glow"
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Orchids, despite popular belief, are quite hardy. It goes without saying that they are beautiful as well. I like painting in unusual sizes. These orchids seemed to fill the space nicely. This sort of composition always intrigues me. I like designs where the object or subjects flows off the table. I may try this again from an even more severe perspective. I somehow picture a piece like this in a niche or on a narrow wall.

Oil Figure of a reclining woman, 11" x 15"

"Angela Sleeping"
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Angela is my favorite model. I barely had time to dash this off today before going to my life drawing group. It served as a nice warm up. I was surprised at how easy it was for me to paint and yet drawing today at my group proved to be a challenge.
I really enjoy painting the figure and love doing portraits and nudes. I was striving to stay loose here to retain the mood. What do you think?

"Angela Sleeping" is painted on unstretched canvas which measures 16" x 20". The actual image size is 11" x 15". You have a good choice here to either (1) have the canvas stretched; (2) have it trimmed and backed on board or (3) just matted and put under glass. I rather like the look of the clean canvas around the figure. It sets it off nicely. For a better idea of what I'm speaking about, see the image below. Color may or may not be accurate depending on your monitor. If she looks sunburned on your monitor, you're a little to the red side.

Pastel Landscape of a walking trail in fall, 11" x 14", $50

"Fall Journey"
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I've painted many stretches of the Discovery Trail, a long walking path that winds through the northern stretch of the Olympic Peninsula in Washington. This particular scene comes from one of my daily walks on the trail. This piece is in pastel – which for many years was my primary medium. I’ve been doing mostly oils for the past year to improve and stretch. It was nice to push a little pastel color around a bit today.

Oil Floral of Peonies and Red Vase, 11" x 14"

"Peonies and Red Vase"
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This red vase is a favorite of mine. Combined with the pink Peonies, it seemed to just pop off my still life stand. I think I caught the roundness of it pretty well. I've been struggling with that lately. It has a lovely romantic feel to it and the flowers have lots of thick paint on them. I was going to paint a landscape today but that red vase kept calling to me from the shelf. I’m having a lot of fun with color these days. Sort of change from my strict tonalist approach

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"Red Pears"
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Red pears are one of the loveliest things about fall. Not only are they delicious, but their jewel like colors always draw my eyes. I tried here to capture that color. I especially love the warm reddish glow on the shadow side. That color effect is so elusive. But that's what keeps me coming back to paint them again and again. The flowers here are a nice touch but they are just supporting cast for the main players. Hope you enjoy. Thanks for looking.

Pastel Painting of Blond Child in Lavender,16" x 22"

"In Her Thoughts"
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Lavender and children seem to go well together. I've been bringing out some of my pastel pieces to post mainly because the pieces are so seasonal, they rarely get seen except in the summer. This original is still for sale, albeit not for $39.00. Prints are also available. Feel free to email me if your interested in getting some prices for Giclee prints. I have several sizes available.

Pastel Painting of Young Girl in Field of Lavender, 14" x 20"

"Emily Flying"
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Emily is the granddaughter of a friend. She loves the camera. We took her to a local lavender farm last summer and I snapped a picture as she ran along the row of lavender. I think her feet never touched the ground. I did this in pastel because nothing matches the medium for intensity of color.