"A Royal V Eight"

I finished another painting this last weekend.  This has been on the back burner for almost a year.  I've played with the idea of doing this painting shortly after I took the photos of the 1954 Dodge Royal V Eight at one of the Thursday night cruises in Cedar Rapids early last Summer.  In fact, while I was playing with this ideas for the Demon painting came into being.  Then, I ended up getting some other commissions and other projects.  This painting ended up getting set to the side.  Now, I finally had the time.  Here it is...

"A Royal V Eight"; watercolor on 16" x 20" cold press paper.
Available for purchase.

It was fun playing with a bit of a different style on this one too.  I welcome any comment you may have and thanks for stopping by!

Breast Cancer Fall Bazaar-- This Saturday!

Hello!  Here's a slightly different slant for me of late.  I've been working on some flower paintings for a Breast Cancer Fall Bazaar that coming up this next Saturday.  It takes place in the Cherry Building in Cedar Rapids, IA from 9AM to 2PM this Saturday October 25th.  If you happen to be in the area swing by and say Hi!  Here's a couple of new pieces available for the Bazaar...

Photo: "Blue Stemmed Flower"; Watercolor and Ink on 8" x 11" Paper.

Photo: "Dear Karma"; Watercolor on 13" x 11" Paper.

Purple Plymouth Special

Wonderful Summer time!  It’s that time of year when there’s more and more car shows going on.  I went to one this last weekend with Mr. Motorhead.  Then, this last week I got to looking at different photos that I had taken of cars from last year’s season.  This is based on one of those from last year. 

   

Here is the painting; I refer to as, “Purple Plymouth Special ” …

"Purple Plymouth Special"; Watercolor and Ink on 10" x 10" paper.

This is a watercolor with a bit of ink.  I thought that I would try something new this time.  I decided to just focus on the front of the car and leave out all of the various other details.  I purposely made for white spaces to be in the painting and just added in shapes for cars and trees that were in the original photo along with the Plymouth.  Please don’t ask me what year or specifics on it; but the original car was a burgundy color.  I can tell you that much! J  Though, I do believe it is late 1940’s Plymouth Special Deluxe from doing a bit of research on-line.

I welcome any feedback you may have and thanks for stopping by!

Dot, The Horse...

This was a commission painting that I was asked to do by a friend for a friend who had to give up a horse.  The friend ended up moving into town and had to give up her horse because there wasn’t the room in town.  I imagine that was very hard.  My wonderful friend thought that it would be nice to have a painting to remember the beloved horse. 

I must admit that I had never painted a horse before and was a bit uncomfortable with painting a horse that actually looked like a horse.  I know that may sound silly but these things can sometimes be a challenge.  Also, the other part of the challenge was that I only had one photo to go off of.  The photo of the horse was mostly in shadow and rather dark.

The Photo of Dot that I worked from.

I started out doing a great deal of searching on line for photos and paintings of horses to figure out how to best approach the subject matter.  I then did a fair amount of sketching and drawing as a prelim to get a better feel for how to approach the actual painting.  I will tell you that some of the drawings looked like oversized ant eaters!  LOL! 

After doing a fair amount of drawing and sketching, I did some prelim sketches of various sizes.  My friend wasn’t sure which size painting would be best.  So, in an attempt to give her a feel of the different sizes, I sketched 5 different sized drawing.  She decided that she liked the 12” x 12” size best.

Another struggle for me was which way to go on the browns of the horse.  I played around for a week on scratch sheets of watercolor paper blending different browns—from golden shades to rusty shades to gray versions.  Ok, I’ll admit I may have been over analyzing but I wanted to get it to where I felt right about the right colors.  I ended up using quite a few of the browns that I had “experimented” with.

Then, my wonderful friend waited patiently while I slowly painted the actual painting.  Another 3 weeks later and I was FINALLY done with it. My friend came over and I had her take a look at it.  She smiled and said she liked it but as I looked at it with her I saw some fixes I needed to do.  They always say an artist is their own worst critic and I find that it’s very true for me. 

Another week later, and I made those changes and then I signed it.  I’ve made this rule with myself that once I’ve signed it I step away from the painting.  It’s done and I really do hope that my friend’s friend enjoys the thoughtful gift.  Here’s the finished piece that I call “Dot, The Horse”….

"Dot, The Horse"; Watercolor on 13.5" x 13.5" Paper.

Thanks for stopping by and I welcome any comments you may have!

A Dream Begins...

Soon I’ll be starting the first leg of I’ve come to refer to as a “US Tour”.  It’s been a dream that’s been at the back of mind for years.  When I explain what I’m doing, I’ve had all kinds of reactions from surprise, to being an inspiration, to “you’re crazy”, and “you’ve got some balls, girl!”(My boss)  I’ve even had it referred to as a “female mid-life crisis”. (Thank you Popette)

Photo- "Blue Moon Garden"; Oil painting on 16" x 20" wrapped canvas. SOLD!

So what is it that I’m exactly doing you might ask.  I’m about to enter into a new exploration of the USA’s lower states – just my car, my bike, & myself.  Basically, I’m quitting my job and entering into a nomadic lifestyle.  The plan is to do this for 2 years and to travel at random.  There’s no set time though I am thinking of starting in the Pacific Northwest and heading south along the coast to start with.  Yeah, maybe I am crazy.  I’ve been saving for 4 years and am downsizing to a car.  I’m really doing what is the opposite of people when they reach their 40’s.

But I want to travel the US and see sites, landmarks, National Parks, and etc. while I’m still young enough and physically able to enjoy it.  I had originally planned on being 42 years old when I started this voyage.  But I got side tracked with bicycle accidents and other things.  I wasn’t able to saving as much as I thought I could and now three years later things have kind of aligned and fallen into place.

You'll be able to follow my progress of this adventure on my other blog... The Allgood Life; just click here.  I still will be posting my works of art that I will be creating while on my adventure here.  Thanks for visiting! 

A Psychedelical Direction...

I went in a bit of different direction this last week.  I wanted to try some new ideas and work in an abstract type of form.  I also have been itching to get the liquid watercolors out again.  So in the mix of creating, this is what came into being...

"Psychedelically Cranked!"; Poured Watercolor on 9" x 12" Cold Pressed Paper.

The real funny thing is that I would have shown this on my blog sooner but I couldn't think of a name for it.  So thanks to my friend, Kym, and throwing some titles around I finally arrived at a title.  I told her that sometimes putting a title to a piece of art is harder than doing the actual piece.  She didn't agree with my estimation! :)  I welcome any comments and thanks for stopping by.

"100 SLC Porches, No.46"

"100 Salt Lake City Porches, No.46"
Oil/Acrylic on 16" x 16" Canvas

I almost put this porch painting on my blog yesterday.  I took pictures of it but then I got to looking at the porch painting and the original porch photo.  It was then that I realized I missed some of the detailing on the railing area.  It's all in the details; sometimes.  So last night, I went home and fixed it.  I took a new approach on this porch painting.  The house is mostly a series of green.  So I decided to start with the green acrylic that I prepped the canvas with.  I thought I would just paint the actual porch and the wonderful front window off to the side of the porch.  There's some beautiful details in this porch and I couldn't resist not painting in the pretty flower bed. I would love to hear any feedback you may have.  To view the progress of the 100 Salt Lake City Porches, visit this page.

One Scene - Two Approaches

"Arches - Focus on Light", 8.5" x 11.5" watercolor on cold press

This week, I played with the basic same scene but approached it from two different ways.  One way was to focus on the light in the scene.  Above you will see this scene where there's more light that shows on the stones and the wrought iron gate is perceived as white through out the darker colors of the shaded background of the arches.   The other way was to focus on color.  In this approach I chose to have the color and detail decide what is close to you.  You will find the color focused arches scene below.  Let me clarify that these are basically the same scene EXCEPT for being mirror images of one another.  I'll admit that I cut corners with the one above.  I did it in my watercolor painting class and in the interest of time... It was enlarged and then traced.  I know that was kind of BAD of me. 

The above was especially a fun water color painting class experience because it started off as a rose colored wash.  Colleen showed me various ways to remove color from a water color painting where the paint has all ready been applied.  I rather felt like a chemist as we mixed bleach 50/50 with water.  A piece of clear acetate with cut out areas for the lighter areas (like the top arches and the windows within the arches) was placed over the rose colored wash.  With the acetate taped down, an old brush was used to apply the bleach/water mix to the rose colored wash.  It was interesting to see how the rose color started to disappear.  Those areas were then masked off.  While the masking fluid was drying, Colleen then showed me the FUN of using wax.  Wax was applied to various areas of the painting to give the effect of bricks.  I would color wash an area, then apply more wash, and then apply a wash with another color.  Layer upon layer; it was almost like building brick by brick and added bits of various colors to each wash to create the end result. 

Next, it was on to the shaded areas of the arches.  The shade was built; working from greens, browns, and then finally the blues.  Then Colleen showed how to remove color from the shaded arch areas to create the feeling of the wrought iron gates.  A metal razor blade was randomly and lightly scratched over the dried water color paint.  Thus, bit by bit the gates were formed.

" Arches with a Color Focus" 9" x 12" watercolor on yupo

The other approach was a focus on color.  The closer the surface is the darker and closer it is.  Therefore, on this painting there seems to be more of a focus on the wrought iron gates.  The inside of the arches are further away and thus contain lighter colors.  The inner arch areas almost disappear away with this approach.

So which do YOU like better?  I would love to hear your input!

A Bit of a Blue Direction...

This is a new direction for me. An experiment in blue with a bit of abstract. I call this " A Blue Abstract of the Moochie Bike Ride". It's based on some pictures taken from a Moochie's Restaurant bike club ride that took place earlier this year. It just felt done to me, and I thought it rather looked interesting. It's a bit of a change from how I usually paint, and I hope that you find it as interesting as I do.

This is done in oils on a canvas that measures 16" x 20".

I would love to hear some feedback on what you think...