Join me and 23 other great artists at Ft. Worden in Port Townsend, WA

I'm proud to be among some of the best artists on the Olympic Peninsula. We'll be strutting our stuff at Ft. Warden Park in the Commons area of July 14th and 15th. We have painters, sculptors, jewelers, ceramicists and gourd artists! 

 

Expressionist Painting of WA Tree of Life

Tree of Life
21" x 31"
Oil on Canvas

This tree, dubbed "Tree of Life" by many who live on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington state, grows on the coast of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. The rocks and earth have been washed away by rains and storms and it appears to be hanging by a thread (or many). We don't know how much longer this beautiful tree has to live, but artists and photographers have ensured that it will live forever in their work. I'm happy to have finally joined their ranks. 

 

 

Contemporary Painting of White Egret

Great Egrets are a favorite subject. I love their beautiful white plumage and graceful movements. This painting was a bit of a departure for me and a direction I feel myself moving in. It has a great deal of energy and spontaneity. There is a subtle abstract feel to it without a full departure from the representational aspects that I love.

"The Dance"
32" x 23" x 1"
Oil on Panel

Painting of Hanging Copper Pots

"Hanging Pots"
24" x 36"
Oil on Linen Panel

I like to sit in the mornings in a chair in my living room, cat on my lap and coffee in hand, stealing myself for the day ahead.  About a month ago, my gaze fell on my copper collection which hangs above my kitchen island. Diffused, early morning light mixed with some sun coming through the skylight lit them up and I found myself studying the composition that they made.  I usually paint from life, however, I wasn't about to put hooks in my studio ceiling and move this collection within sight of my easel.  So I took several pictures and chose the best of them for this.

This painting will be shown in River Gallery in Mt. Vernon, WA starting on September 18, 2021 for the fall show. Stop by if you have a chance.  

Red Riding Hood Illuminated

Red Riding Hood Illuminated
Mixed Media with Gouache, Oil on Panel and Faux Gold Leaf
12" x 16"

Since the beginning of time, humans have been telling stories. From cave paintings to modern times, artists have been story tellers. As a child, my favorite books were the ones with beautiful illustrations that augmented and brought to life the written words on the page.

I have long been fascinated by illuminated manuscripts. Perhaps it's my design background or maybe my fascination with detail (I'm a reluctant Virgo afterall.) But the brightly painted curving lines and gold leafed illustrations just plain delight me.

About a year ago, I became interested in book binding. As is typical of me, my first bound books were anything but simple.
"You never do anything the easy way", my mother used to say. True. These two bound books were in leather and all the pages were designed and printed in color using designs taken from illuminated manuscripts. They were journals of a metaphysical nature and gifts for two dear friends. I'm working on a another for myself.

I found myself, about a year ago, becoming a bit burned out. I grew tired of the same old thing and was searching for some fresh inspiration. It was these books and my playing around with my Tarot cards that started to form an idea. I flirted with the idea of bringing words and images together and produced a couple of paintings along that line. Eventually, that idea found more fertile ground and took root.

In the panting below, a sort of prototype, I combined my love of realism, illustration, illuminated manuscripts and story telling and combined them. This painting has all the elements I was looking for. The floral design surrounding the image is painted in Gouache and acrylic gold metallic paint. The image itself is on a gessoed background surrounded by faux gold leaf and is painted in oils. The type is on archival paper. It's all carefully coated in varnish appropriate to the two mediums.

The image itself is an old one I've painted before from a photo session with one of my models. She was handy and the story quote was easy to come by. It served the purpose. I have another in the works but this one and several to follow will be based on various images from the Major Arcana of the Tarot. So one more aspect of what I love will be added to pot.

These, of course, are not my only projects. I have another bird image on the easel which is part of a series. But these new pieces are my new love and I'm enjoying the hell out of them. And that's my story.

Original Oil Painting of Sweet Peppers

"Sweet Peppers"

Oil on Panel
8" x 10"

Finished this little gem this morning for my upcoming show at the River Gallery in Mt. Vernon in April of this year. Really love those reds - and the peppers too!

Still Life of Alabaster Vases against Egyptian Background

"Out of Egypt"Oil on Panel13" x 19"

Finished. Spent this morning tidying up. I concluded the salt cellar lid and glazed shadows to neutralize some of the blue. I did this to the background as well though it may shop up that way in the photo. I toyed with the cast shadow on the wall and lightened it by scumbling a bit but didn't change it by much. Highlights on the small vase in the background brought it to a finish. It will be on display at Gallery-9 this Saturday. Come take a gander.

Still Life of Alabaster Vases with Egyptian Background

"Out of Egypt" - On the Easel

This summer has kept me pretty busy with travel, home improvements and sick cats. The latter have kept me hopping with medications and special feedings. I'm happy to report I'm back at the easel - in between taking sunshine breaks.

On a recent trip to Ellensburg, WA, I picked up three Alabaster vases that I fell in love with. After prepping the background, I set them up together with a salt cellar I've painted many times and proceeded to work. Here's a step by step on what I've done so far:

Day One: 
Now on the easel. I recently purchased several marble vases. I’ve painted objects like these many times and enjoy the challenge of the swirling colors and the translucence of the marble. 
This time however, instead of a plain background I was inspired by some Egyptian imagery and decided to try something new. The background is archival paper mounted and sealed on a cradled panel. The shapes of the vases were transferred from a drawing and painted with gesso to allow for a more translucent effect once they are painted. 
As you can see, the foot of the largest vase and the tile on which it sits have been given a first pass. Yum! I’m having fun and the paint is so delicious I could eat it! More later as the painting progresses.

Day Two:
(My apologies - this photo was deleted from my files prematurely)


I’ve matched the background and continue to lay in the large Onyx vase. This takes careful observation and, as always, this close looking, examining and considering brings on a meditative state. The swirl of color, the translucence of the stone and the rosy color of the light are hypnotizing. I know some of the values will need to be adjusted. Even the north light from my window shifts as the day progresses. Tomorrow is another day.

Day Three:

The first pass on the large vase is completed. I can see that there are still more value adjustments to make. The light at this hour in the studio is quite magical but eludes me. The vase in the front will also need adjustment. I’m pushing the background towards green. The cool offsets the warms in the vases and pushes them forward. Still much to do.
Day Four:

I took some time off on Saturday to enjoy the beautiful weather. But kept visiting the painting like a sick patient. Today I took to it again. The vase was off kilter so I took out my plumb line and redrew the thing. It sits better now. No longer drunk. I adjusted and conserved values on the vase in order to have highlights show up. Warmed some of the glow with a glaze of coral. The small vase in the foreground also needed adjustment and it too was off center. I needed to make a decision in favor of losing an edge or letting it show. I decided in favor of a slight contrast in value because the asymmetrical design of color created the illusion of it again being out of balance. Same for the smaller vase. I finished the day by laying in the smallest vase in the background. It will need a second pass perhaps tomorrow. I softened edges and toyed with the background and table top before closing. The horizon line needs fixing. The salt cellar and I are old friends. It will go easy and I anticipate being done either tomorrow or Monday. I am, though, considering adding another element. Something living?

Still Life with White Lace - New Beginnings

Since my beloved uncle passed in November, I have been unable to get into my studio for anything other than teaching. First grief and then the time consuming chores of closing out his apartment and assisting the executor in aspects of his estate have kept me in a state that swung from sadness to confusion to numbness. Then came the holidays. I don't need to explain what that was like.

When I first got the phone call from his guardian that said he was in the hospital, I was in my studio engrossed in a painting that I had envisioned for a long time. I put my paints away, cleaned my brushes and immediately left for Seattle. I was with him for three days in the hospital before he passed. And since that telephone call until two weeks ago, I was just unable to get back to the painting.

When I finally did, I was sure that I had gone cold on it and would not be able to finish. But I persevered and I'm glad I did. As the work progressed, I found myself pulled back into the canvas and in a dialogue with the painting that pushed and pulled me in a new direction. I insisted on painting it one way and it insisted I try another approach. We compromised and the final result is a kind of detente.

I hope you like it.

"White Lace"
Oil on Canvas
40" x 30"

Angel Tree

"Magus"
Oil on Canvas
30" x 40"

In North Carolina there is a tree named "Angel Tree". I've always found trees to be glorious, majestic sculptures. Each one has its own unique character and personality. I am especially called to Oaks. When I lived in California I spent a lot of time on the Santa Rosa Ecological Plateau. Contrary to its name, this beautiful preserve is located off the I-15 somewhere between Lake Elsinore and Temecula and not in Santa Rosa.

The park has hundreds of 400 year old California Live Oaks dancing on grassy hills with walking paths winding through them. There are mysterious shady dells and sunlit patches and knobby areas everywhere with boulders, blue skies and seasonal ponds. The trees dot the landscape like so many dancers celebrating their freedom and the endless horizon.

I spent many hours there hiking, painting and photographing those trees. But now I live where Oaks are rare things and fir and pine dominate the landscape. Although I had hundreds of photos of trees to choose from to assist me in bringing my vision to canvas, I chose the image of  "The
Angel Tree" because its reaching branches made me think of a great magician raising his arms to manifest something beautiful and mysterious into the world.

This painting was in a way a bit of breakthrough for me in that instead of my directing the brush, the painting took over and directed it. It was a kind of push/pull because I don't relinquish control easily. Still, I think the painting won. I called the painting "Magus", because for me, it's magic.

Still Life Painting with an Abstract Feel

The new year started with a whimper for me. I had all kinds of plans to do all kinds of new stuff but it all just seemed to evaporate with a puff of smoke. It may be that I have been focusing on my Magick stuff too much these days. My brain seems to be someplace else and despite lots and lots of meditation and other good mind stuff, my brain seems to have taken a vacation. I believe my teachers would say I need to work on grounding. OK, OK, I’m listening.

"Cityscape", 20" x 31 1/4", Oil on Linen

True, I had a video to produce on my Atelier class and that took some time and energy, but hey, I wasn’t the one editing it. My videographer was. But that’s another story. I’ll post the video after this post. I did manage to start another painting for the new year and I’m pretty satisfied that I came close to my vision for it. Lots of ideas are swimming around my head so maybe all that meditation did something after all.  I wanted to do a still life that had a feeling of abstract work. Well, not fully abstract. I am a representational painter after all. But I always say that a good realist painting has at it’s oily heart a good abstract design. So that’s what I was aiming for. I made the objects larger than they are in life and the painting measures 30 1/4″ by 20″ which is big for a still life.  Anyway, here’s the painting and I hope you like it as much as I do.

Marine Painting

Every time I paint a new marine painting, I'm reminded of why these can be so difficult to do well. Although I had the background for this piece worked out, finding the right resource for the water and the sailboat became a great challenge. I needed to find one where the waves, water, wind and light all worked with the reference photo of the clouds. Basically, I needed three photos. Actually, that's not as many as I used for my large marine piece, "Before the Reef". But still, even with finding photos that worked for all those factors, I was still confronted with the color issue. How to make all these disparate factors come together for a harmonious painting.

I find in these cases the best thing to do is to put it all together on Photoshop, work on getting the light and values to work together and then changing the whole image to black and white. Then I can use what ever colors work best for the piece without being influenced by what I see in a photo. That's what I did here. I may change things a bit later on. I sometimes do. But I think it's OK for now. Anyway, it needs to go in my upcoming show at Gallery 9 in December. Wish me luck.

"Running with the Wind"
17 1/2" x 23 1/2"
Oil on Panel

Painting Nature, Quail's Nest

I have several pieces done but this was my favorite. I just love the way the feathers curl around the nest in a little protective embrace. So I was looking forward to displaying this little gem at the gallery and last night a good friend came by for dinner and bought it! So the gallery loses the commission but I gained another 20%. And really, although I would have enjoyed showing it off, it sold and that's the point of these little pieces, isn't it? So I did a little happy dance and put it aside for varnishing.

I enjoyed this little painting and think I might like to explore nature a bit more. For someone who lives so close to it, I don't get out as often as I'd like. I'm pretty sensitive to the cold and now that winter is here, I spend less and less time out of doors. Maybe I'm missing something?

P.S. I'm now entering my work onto Art Work Archive. Here's a link to my Public Page. Still have a ton to put up there but at least things are getting organized.

Quail's Nest
5 7/8" x 6"
Oil on Linen Panel
SOLD

Miniature Painting of Tin Measuring Cup

Measuring Cups
6" x 8", Oil on Panel

During the months of October and November, Gallery 9 in Port Townsend, WA will be featuring a 100 under $100 sale which will include small art works, jewelery and miscellaneous items for sale under $100.  I just whipped this little piece out in anticipation of the event.  Be sure to come by and check out the sale! Lots of great opportunities for Christmas presents and other holiday gifts.