A MAN for a change

Usually our models are females but last night Bud posed for us. How interesting to paint a male figure this time.

Max in sunshine

Here is Max again, this time outside relaxing in a summer field. This one is a wee bit larger at 6x6. I like it a lot better, but, still the background is kind of busy. Just can't keep from fiddling with it!

Max, the dog

I painted this painting from a photograph that my friend took of her dog, Max. it's small -only about 5 x5. I added the legs in the background to represent Max's people, but I think it comes accross as too busy and complicated. I want this one to be very simple, especially for a piece this small. Instead, I think today I will paint a simple, green background as if for grass.

Farley keeps staring at me.

I don't know what he wants. He's been out, he's been fed but he keeps staring at me as if he wants something. So, I decided to put him to good use and use him as a model for me to sketch a doggy portrait. He was so good. Stayed pretty still while I sketched as fast as I could with my colored pencils. I haven't used them in such a long time that this was really fun. Every now and then he'd look away and I'd tell him, "no, no, look back at me," and he would. Good boy. He got a treat at the end. Maybe that's what he wanted.

Nokomis

Last night our beautiful model was of Native American heritage and her name was Nokomis. One of the music CDs that we painted to was Cher which made the evening even more fun. I decided to capture her pose this time instead of focusing on a portrait. All I need to finish the piece is to put in a background and and abundance of flowers spilling out of the basket in the forground. Nokomis will be back week after next and that will give me a chance to focus on her beautiful face in a portrait painting. Can't wait!

Art Blog Award

I received an Art Blog Award from from my friend, Jeanne Grant. In return I am supposed to list seven things that I love and then I need to pass the award on to seven of my favorite bloggers. Here are seven things that I love:

1. My family. Always there for me and what a bunch of characters.

2. My two dogs, Farley and Cookie.

3. Coffee. Oh, the first sip of coffee in the morning. I love coffee more that I love chocolate.

4. Ahem. Okay, chocolate. Anything chocolate. A chocolate anything trumps other desserts.

5. Sunshine. I love to see it shine through the window. I love to feel it on my skin as I work out in the garden. In the kitchen window I have an old periscope prism that I scraped the mirror part off of so the light can shine through it and spatter a rainbow accross the kitchen floor.

6. A hot bath. Oh, what a luxury. Nothing else can chase away pain like a hot bath. Pity the olden days when they didn't have hot running water at their fingertips.

7. The computer! What a huge world the internet lays down for us at our doorstop. News! Weather! Art! Friends! Just doing a search on a subject -any subject and being able to learn about it is so stimulating.

Now for my favorite Blogs:

Jeanne Grant's blog: http://jeannegrant.blogspot.com/

She's already listed me, but hers is one of my favorites. She always has interesting posts about her life and her art.

Karen Margulis: http://kemstudios.blogspot.com/

I love her beautiful pastel paintings of landscapes and animals, her tales of her travels.

Anita Davies: http://artbyanita.blogspot.com/

She has several blogs with gorgeous sketches.

Judith Nejholt-Strong: http://kats-in-klompen.blogspot.com/

What a fun sense of humor she has.

James Gurney: http://www.gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/

Always something to learn from this accomplished artist.

Katherine Tyrrell's Travels with a Sketchbook: http://travelsketch.blogspot.com/ I love looking at artist's sketchbooks. There was once a magazine called "Sketch" but it ceased production after I had only received a couple of issues.

Karin Jurick: http://karinjurick.blogspot.com/ I love her...what what would you call it..contrasty style and she writes about her thought processes.

Those are my Seven Favorite Bloggers

Portrait Painting of Sarah

Our model the other night was so pretty, but I was unable to do her justice. In three hours though, I think I managed to put a lot down on a 24" by 30"canvas! I am really happy with the colors. I used magenta and cyan where, normally I would have used alizarin and cobalt.

Music in Mosaics

I LOVE working in mosaic. For me it is like reading a good book that you just can't put down no matter how late the night is getting. I'm learning a lot as I go as to which tiles will give me the look that I'm after, which kind are easiest to cut and what colors they come in. I just get lost in putting down one color, picking it up and trying another instead. Sort of like planning a quilt in some respects when you have all the fabric strewn all over the place and you have to decide what color each piece should be as it relates to the one next to it. I have to be careful though because the dog thinks all those little pieces of colored glass look like candy.