Another Cherries and Spoon

I'm really enjoying my cherries and spoon paintings. Cherries, especially the Rainer variety, are fun to paint with their yellow and red coloring. I enjoy the reflections of light on the spoon, too. My daughter who now lives on the West Coast in Oregon says that the cherries are available around the country because there was a bumper crop this year. Yea for bumper crops!

Rainier Cherries with a Spoon

We have been blessed with Rainier Cherries at our local supermarket. They seem to have a much shorter season than the usual red cherries. Their sweetness is legendary and I long thought that growers in Washington State kept them to themselves, along with the peaches, apricots and marion berries. Perhaps more are being harvested these days. Whatever the reason for them showing up in Minnesota, I had to attempt to paint those two tone little orbs before eating them. Next I'll be on the lookout for some other fruits from Washington State.

Deck Flowers

It's been cool and windy in Minnesota lately. We could use a little warming, global or otherwise. Some friends and I tried to do our artwork out on the deck, it was sort of sheltered and just enough sun to keep us from heading indoors. I had a good sighting of a colorbowl of flowers and added a few pieces of pottery for a nice little still life. I wanted to do the cat but he was unwilling to join us. I decided a little ink caligraphy would add some pizzaz.

A Man Seated

The Different Strokes picture this time is a man seated on a folding chair. Nothing too interesting about that, or his surroundings. Sometimes I think the challenge is to make an interesting painting out of something ordinary. Maybe I think too much! Anyway, I did the exercise and decided that the painting was crying out for some red so I made the ordinary brown chair red. It works for me! You can check out how other artists painted the same picture at http://differentstrokesfromdifferentfolks.blogspot/

Last Night in France

It seems that the latest memories are the most vivid. We had a morning flight out of France so we were in position near the airport on our last night. As usual the trains were scheduled to go on strike the day we were to leave. Being near the airport is the smart thing to do even if one desires a last night in Paris. Luckily, we had a west facing window in our hotel room or I would have missed a spectacular sunset. It was one of those sunsets that lasts and lasts and the colors just get better and better. Long after the sun had gone down there was still an orange glow on the horizon. The sun peeked in and out of low clouds and at last came out from behind the conical steeple before decending behind the horizon. My painting doesn't do the scene justice but I enjoyed reliving the breathtaking sight.

Painting at Sea

Another little painting that I did when the seas weren't too rough. A melon slice and a lemon. My inspiration was from another blogger, now I can't find the painting and give credit because it was several weeks ago. Thank you, friend. Rather than copy her painting I did it from memory because I thought it looked so fun to do.

I'm getting my brushes wet again, after a long period of dryness, at least for me. A friend challenged me to just paint for a certain length of time, 1 hour or 2 hours, and then just stop for the day. Even more challenging, do a completed watercolor in that length of time. Not so easy if you paint wet on wet, the drying time is too long. So, small and quick it is!

View From the Ship's Balcony

This little painting was my view from the balcony of the QM2 on one of the brighter days at sea.

Our trip across the Atlantic reminded me of the old silly Navy song; "I joined the Navy to see the world and what did I see? I saw the sea!" We had a nice balcony stateroom but there wasn't much to look at. There was a report of a whale sighting and dolphins but not when I was looking. Truth be told, the whale sighting wasn't more that seeing the spout way off on the horizon. Most of the weather was also gray and rather stormy so it was hard to paint with the constant motion of the ship even though it had modern stabilizers. This is not to say it wasn't a pleasant way to cross the ocean, it was; they even had a watercolor class (which I didn't take advantage of). There were many lovely things about it, I just had a hard time getting into the zone for painting.

At sea

Believe it or not, I'm writing this at sea. We are crossing the Atlantic to England on the QM2. I won't be able to post my usual watercolor blogs until we return in early July. I hope to have lots to little paintings to share then.

Pam's Peonies

My gardening friend, Pam, graciously picked some of her peonies for me a few days ago. I have been working on a painting of them ever since. I have a vase that is made to look like birch bark that I love to use, it's shaped like a big piece of birch bark that has been curled around and fastened together. This was a bigger painting project than I thought it would be. Interspersed with the peonies were daisies, just to add some interest. I was challenged all around with the white daisies and peonies, it was quite a lesson. I think painting from a live subject is so much more challenging than from a photo but it is worth the doing.

Spring Flowers; Peonies

I've been trying to paint the peonies that I saw this week. They were the single petal type and remind me of poppies. The first ones I painted are tight and hard edged, which was OK but I long for a looser style. Nothing gets me painting loose like Yupo, so I threw some paint on some Yupo and think the first results are quite fun. I may play around with it some more and if I do, I'll be posting any additions that I make.

A Different Strokes Challenge

I'm just getting into painting again since the "transition". I wanted to enter the Different Strokes Challenge and today was the final day to submit an entry. I had to get my brushes going fast. Sometimes if you don't sweat it too much things work out better. That was the case today. I had a picture of a bull that I always wanted to paint but didn't know about what background would be interesting. The Challenge provided me with a perfect background for my black bull. Is he an Angus? I don't know, he was all by himself on a ranch in Wyoming, and he wasn't too happy about it. He stopped complaining long enough for me to take the picture. I think the farm picture is Pennsylvania, maybe he'll be happier there.

Transitions

This is a drizzle rooster I did awhile back. You drizzle a glossy acrylic outline and when it's dry you can wet the paper and add the color. It's a fun process, especially with chickens.


We've been in transition the last couple of weeks. We pack up and leave Florida's hot and steamy weather for something more moderate in Minnesota. People call it the theater of weather. You can get it all in just to span of a few hours. Some years a summer in Minnesota can be as hot and humid as one in Florida, but that is unusual. I hoped I could paint something during the down time of traveling but it just didn't happen. Now that we are settled in, groceries bought, bags unpacked, laundry done, I can get some organization going in my painting area and get back to blogging.

Brush experiment

I had to sit and mind the gift shop at our local art league (http://www.capecoralartleague.org/ )and to pass the time I decided to try the brushes I bought several years ago that have water in the handle of the brush by Aquaflow. I thought they might be handy for painting in confined places where you might not want to have a cup of water. It was frustrating in the beginning because I'm so used to rinsing my brush frequently in water; with this brush you have to squeeze it to flush whatever pigment you are using out of it before going on to another. It's nessesary to have something absorbent handy to catch the drips and to wipe the brush; papertowel or sponge work well. I painted on a postcard sized piece of w/c paper trying to keep in mind a confined space. It's no masterpiece but it gave me some insight into painting with these interesting brushes. The Aquaflows have a valve in them that keep the pigment from being sucked into the water in the handle which was a problem with another brush that I had. I'm thinking that I might even be able to do quick sketches while riding in the car on long trips.

The Humble Onion

I had a little painting session with some friends today. While they chose to do landscape paintings of the area, I chose the humble onion, three of them. My friend's husband is a wonderful gardener and here in South Florida this is the harvest season while the rest of the country seems to be just thinking of planting things. He had an abundance of onions, and they are an interesting subject with their dried tops and papery skins.

New York Street Scene

What a fun painting Karen Jurick had for us to paint this dsdf session. The canyon of New York City with their colorful, ubiquitous taxi cabs. I had one more strip of yupo, so I had to paint it on that. I love the result of the wavy edges and the way one color oozes into another. It's a small painting, only 15 x 3.5 inches, so I could only do a sliver of the whole picture which you can view at http://www.differentstrokesfromdifferentfolks.blogspot.com/ You can also see all the other fabulous painters' renditions of the same picture. It's really fun to see the creativity that takes place on that blog.

Watery Sunset

I think I've finally come to the end of my long, narrow yupo paintings. It's time to move on to something new. But I have one more to post. It's 26"X5", so it looks small on the uploaded picture because of it's length. I like the way the sun puddled into the water on this one. Sometimes the sunsets do have the feeling that the sun is just dipping down into the water and you don't know if the sun will overcome the water or the water the sun; and then, it just disappears. Perhaps I should do one more painting with a "green flash".

More Art In Bloom

I think I need more photography classes. For some reason my camera was very confused taking pictures at the museum. So many of my photos were blurry. It seems that my camera didn't know where to focus even though I tried my best to direct it. But this painting of the boats lined up on the shore and the flower arrangement lined up in little boat shaped vases was really nice. Another favorite.

Art In Bloom

While we were in Minnesota we took advantage of an annual exhibit at the Minneapolis Institute of Art (MIA) called Art In Bloom. Floral arrangements are made to resemble different works of art. My favorite was done of a painting of a steamboat. I love the baby's breath in the smoke stacks.

Yellow Daffodil

I've been in Minnesota for the week end and have once more experienced the variety of weather they call spring up north. We had rain, wind, cold temperatures, sun, fair skies; in other words, the whole enchilada! We went to the Minnesota Arboretum in Chanhassen to see spring in all it's glory. We saw daffodils, tulips, magnolias, crocus', all shapes and sizes of trees leaves, from small buds to several inches. It was glorious and many pictures were taken.

I just had to paint a daffodil and then I came up against the problem of painting yellow flowers; what do you use for shadow color? I used a purple which I knew would turn to brown on the yellow, but blue would turn green and red would turn orange, etc. I'm not totally satisfied with the outcome but if anyone who paints in watercolor has a solution I'd love to hear about it.

Sunset, Sea and Sky

This one is a small one, 14.5 x 3.5 inches. It was painted on Yupo. One reason I like Yupo is that the pigment stays on the surface and dries there; doing so it remains vibrant. On ordinary watercolor paper a lot of the pigment is absorbed and it dries at least 20% lighter. If you don't go strong with the color the first time you have to glazed more color onto it.