Half of Green Machine...

I've recently been house shopping.  And while I'm going through all of these houses, I've been dragging Mr. Motorhead along with me to look at things.  It always comes in handy when you have know someone that is a maintenance man to take a look at things.  It gives me an idea of what's fixable and what's not so fixable. Poor Mr. Motorhead putting up with all of this and never once complaining.  I decided that he little a extra Thank You for all that he's putting up with.  So, I did another painting of the Meen Green Machine for him.  The Meen Green is a 1971 Dodge Scamp that Mr. Motorhead owns and pampers.

I had Mr. Motorhead close his eyes while I put it out the painting in front of him and then had him open his eyes.  He liked it; I could tell!  But the first thing out of his mouth was: "Where's the other half?"  Yep, he has a bit of a smart-alack streak in him.  I told him if he continued to be nice to me, I MIGHT paint the other half of the car! Course, I told him it would be a smaller version if I did.  LOL!  Take that one buddy; got to keep him on his toes!  Here's the half I did paint...

"Half of Green Machine"; Watercolor and Ink on 8" x 16" paper.

   So hopefully, in the near future I will be sharing some good news about a house in the Cedar Rapids area that has become my home.  I would like to have a permanent place to call my studio.  I'll keep you posted as the process goes on.  Thanks for stopping by and always feel free to leave a comment!

Classic Cars Galore....

I've been a little slow placing some of my latest paintings up on here.  I recently started a part time job working as a cashier for a local large chain retail store and haven't had a great deal of time to do other things like I should.  And so, here I am doing a bit of catch up.

These paintings are based on photos that I took during my long road trip; which was about 2 years ago now.  My how time flies.  I took these photos during Day 19 in Long Beach, WA.  There was this HUGE car show event called the Rod Run to the End of the World put on by the Beach Barons Car Club. It occurs every year there during the first weekend of September and it's amazing.  I remember sitting on the main drag eating a bowl of clam chowder on a bench and watching almost a thousand different cars; all polished, painted, muscled out and pimped out, driving by as I sat there.  Between that and people watching, it was a wonderful day of just observing. It was a ton of FUN and I took a ton of pictures that day.  I used a couple of them for the inspiration for these two paintings....

Photo: "VW Vagabond on Longest Beach"; Watercolor on 11" x 21" Paper

This Volkswagen Bug caught my eye while walking along a back street area in Long Beach but the original wasn't on the Beach.  I decided that this VW was crying to be seen on a beach with its racked suit cases on top.  In fact, I refer to this painting as a Vagabond VW on the Beach.

Photo: "Pontiac at Beach Motel"; Watercolor on 11" x 17" Paper

This Old Pontiac was parked out front of this Beach Motel and it was a scene that I've been wanting to paint for a while.  My boyfriend, Mr. Motorhead, really liked this one!  And I will admit that it was a fun one to paint.

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

A Fountain Angel...

I started this painting back at the beginning of December but then got side tracked with Christmas paintings.  A couple of nights ago, while taking a break from prelim sketches for a commissioned piece I got to looking at it.  I thought to myself that I really need to finish it.  It didn't need that much more done to it.  I quickly went over a small area and then finished with a bit of ink.

"Fountain Angel"; watercolor and ink on 15" x 20" paper.

The painting was inspired by a photo of a fountain that I took during a Fall colors drive one Saturday along the Mississippi River.  There wasn't much color along the river that day, so I started looking at other things in the area when this fountain caught my eye.

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

Stormy Duo Glide

Yes, the last Duo Glide motorcycle painting was a bit "girlie" as I was told by one male friend.  I will admit that the colors did give it more of a feminine type feel.  I also had more of my female friends on Face Book that liked it than the guys.  

So with that in mind, I thought that I would do another painting of it but with more "male" colors; blues, browns.  So this is the result of doing that...

"Stormy Duo Glide"; Watercolor & Ink on 14" x 22" Paper.

I call it " Stormy Duo Glide".  I welcome any feedback or comments.  Thanks for stopping by!

A Hot Pinkie!!

I'm dreaming and painting bikes as the snow continues to fall outside.  It's just a bit of a case of " cycling on the brain".  Here's my most recent painting that I call "A Hot Pinkie!"  Enjoy!...

"A Hot Pinkie!"; Watercolor on 14" x 17" on Paper.

I used a bit of poured watercolor on the background of this painting.  Then, I used some puddle painting for the bicycle. I will admit that this picture doesn't quite do the original enough justice.  One of these days I need to take a photography class.  I would love to hear any feedback you may have!  Thanks for stopping by.

A Painting Break on Whigby Island...

I've been on the road on my BIG Adventure for 11 days now and I've really been keeping busy with other things.  I have not managed to find as much time as I thought for painting.  So when I woke up one morning while visiting Whigby Island and it was cloudy and cold; I decided it was a good enough excuse to take the day off from sightseeing and stay in to do a bit of watercolor painting.  Here's  what I did during my day off from sightseeing...

"Honesty Flower Stand"; Watercolor on 9" x 12" paper.

All over Whigby Island there are stands that are not tended by people they just put the flowers or sweet corn or other vegetable/fruit out with a box to leave the money in.  It just boggles my mind because coming from a large city where something like would never fly.  It is almost like it hails from another time.

"Libbey Beach"; Watercolor on 10" x 15" Paper.

This is based on a photo I took on Libbey Beach which is on the west side of Whigby Island.  It's the first watercolor I've done of a beach scene and painting the rocky beach was a bit of a challenge to figure out.  But it's always good to have room to grow and learn.

Ollie Oxen Free!

I've been in the process of preparing to move and have had my hands mostly full with packing since getting back from RAGBRAI but I did manage to get a watercolor done of a friend's dog.  This is Ollie and he is a Jack Russell Terrier.  He is a real cutie and he knows it too!  He also HATES to wear sweaters but his Mom seems to love to put him in sweaters during our snowshoeing excursions.  I feel like he's saying,"Mom, this sweater? ... Please take it off before ALL the other dogs see me!  They are going to think I'm a sissy.  PLE-ASSSSE!"  This is my first attempt at doing a dog in watercolor and I think it turned out rather well.  My friend was pleasantly pleased with it too.  Here he is... Ollie Oxen Free!....

"Ollie Oxen Free"; Watercolor on 10" x 13" Paper.

Here's Ollie in a candid shot just before Halloween this last year.  Diana Ross- Eat your heart out!

Photo- Ollie putting Diana Ross to shame!

Thanks for visiting and I would LOVE to hear any feedback you may have!

A Commission for Mom...

My mom recently decided to remove a shelf in the kitchen-dining room area.  She asked for me to do an oil painting of flowers that was large enough to cover the place where the shelf had been.  She gave the measurements and requested a wrapped canvas.  She didn't want to worry about framing and I think she liked the idea of a more modern unframed painting to update the area.  From there, she gave me ideas on what she would like but always mentioned that she was sure that whatever I came up with she would be happy with.  Thanks mom!  No pressure what-so-ever.

First she sent me a few magazine pages of ideas... A Van Gogh of flowers which she explained, she didn't like the actual flowers.  She considered them too child-like but she did like the green wispy strokes in it.  Then, there was a photo of yellow tulips taken in her dining room.  She wanted tulips.  Then, she included a couple of other pages with flowers that she would like to have in the painting. 

Then, she included a diagram of a certain degree...

She wanted to keep to yellows, greens, and purples with a bit of pinks in there too.  She kept an emphasis on keeping it nice light and airy.  Now, I will put a disclaimer here.  I'm not really a flower type of painting gal.  Buildings and bicycles are more my type of thing that I like to paint.  Flowers are a different territory altogether.  I will say I struggled with this for awhile.  I took a bit more time than usual on the under painting.  I did several layers with an iridescent gold and two different yellows.  Then before I started to lay in the actual flowers of the painting.  I painted in the green wispy things.  Here's what I had...

Next, I did some sketches of flowers on paper and played with arranging them on the canvas.

There was a selection of different flowers that I threw in that I thought might look nice with the other flowers she requested; irises, primrose and lavender.  I layed out the drawings on the canvas to get a feel for what looked good together and what would fit and still be light and airy too.  Then I sketched the general format onto the canvas with the same green paint as the wispy things.

I talked with Mom this last Sunday morning on the phone and explained the general format that I had come up with.  She thought it sounded pretty good.  So I proceeded to paint on Sunday evening and Monday night and this is the finished painting that was produced...

AND I hope that Mom is happy enough to hang it on her wall when I bring it home to her in Cedar Rapids, Iowa in July while I'm there for RAGBRAI.

A Red Big Bad Wolf...

I put the last finishing touches on this painting last night as the wind was howling and the rain was pouring.  It made me glad that I had decided to go for a run at the gym than to push being out in the pre-storm windy weather.  But either way, this painting that I had started a couple of weeks ago finally came together last night as I sat in my cosy, dry apartment.  Yes, I had a bit of painter's block on this painting and that happens sometimes.  But FINALLY I worked through it.   Yeah!  Here's the resulting poured watercolor...

"A Red Big Bad Wolf"; Poured Watercolor on 8" x 9" Cold Pressed Paper. 

I did this in preparation for the Little Red Riding Hood Bike ride that takes place the first Saturday in June.  The Big Bad Wolf is a mascot of the ride.  It's quite a FUN event and I'm really looking forward to it!  I'll have this painting and several others on sale in my booth during that event.

Another Girlie Duo...

The weather cleared up last night and I had enough time to get a 22 mile bike ride in and then put the final touches on this little bicycle composition too!  Talk about having a wonderful evening!  I'm calling this one - "Another Girlie Duo".  Some of you may recognize this; yes, it is a redo of "A Girlie Duo" that I did almost a year ago.  Only the "Girlie Duo" was done with a limited color pallet.  This Girlie Duo, I just played with a bit of puddle mixing and had fun with it.

"Another Girlie Duo"; Watercolor on 6" x 8" Cold Pressed Paper.

I hope the FUN shines through!  I welcome any feed back or comments you may have and thanks for stopping by!

Spring Cleaning Sale!

It's time for a little
Spring Cleaning! 

Room for new art needs to be made and in the spirit of "Spring Cleaning", I'm doing an on-line only sale on the still available 100 Salt Lake City Porches Paintings. 




All of the available porch paintings are
now marked down by 20%
& if you purchase 2 or more 
contact me for additional savings!



Visit the
100 Salt Lake City Porches page
on the Allgood Art blog. 

All marked down prices are in red. 
10% of all sales proceeds from the
On- Line "Spring Cleaning" Sale
will be donated to SLC's Habitat for Humanity.

Some of the porch paintings are framed and some are not.  Take you pick!  Meanwhile, help me free up some room, help me to purchase new art supplies; and help out a charity too!  Sounds like a Win-Win Situation!

A Groovy Red Bike...

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"Cycle of Red, Yellow & Tye Dyed"; Poured Watercolor on 11" x 11" Cold Press Paper.

SOLD!!!

Yes, you may recognize this bike as being in another form in another painting.  Yes, it is based on the same sketch as the "Green Betty" painting but I thought it might be fun to do the same bike as a poured watercolor.  I also had new liquid watercolor paints that just came in and I was itching to try them. 

But I really did this poured watercolor with a bike ride in mind.  This year's Little Red Riding Hood Bike ride has a Groovy theme. What's Little Red Riding Hood Bike Ride?  It's an all female bike ride that takes place in the beautiful Cache Valley in Northern Utah.  This bike ride has been going strong for 25 years and has gained popularity.  In fact, when it opened registration this year, the available 3500 slots sold out in less than 2 hours.  I'm going to have a booth at the ride this year.  I thought it might be fun to display some of my bike art along with some of my bike art on cards.  So thus I am gearing up, or cranking up (bike terms), with some bike art to show.  In other words, you'll be seeing more bike art in the next couple of months.

An Ode to Buddy the Cat...

"Mom's 10 lbs. Butterball"; Oil on 11" x 14" canvas board.

Some of you may remember this oil painting that I did back in November of 2010.  It was done as a gift for my Mom.  It's a painting of Buddy, who I'm sorry to say passed away this last week. Buddy was my mom's spoiled cat for a little over 8 years.  If you would like to read more about Buddy the cat visit this link.  It's a write up I did on my other blog.

"Road Warrior 1"- An Oil Painting

I put the finishing details of this painting on early Sunday afternoon, while working on poured watercolor.  A couple weeks ago I went over to a cycling friend's house and had him pose with helmet and glasses.  I took about 20 photos and am considering doing a bit of series of these.  I'm really rather having fun with doing some cycling paintings as I imagine some of you have noticed a BIT of a trend at late.  But here's the first of the "Road Warrior" paintings. 

"Road Warrior 1"; An Oil Painting on 12" x 24" Canvas

Bicycling Art Area...

I've decided to dedicate an area to bicycling art.  It makes sense with how much I ride my bicycle (about 3,000 miles per year) that I'll have a possible abundance of art about bicycles.  You will notice a page tab at the top that says Bicycle Art; click on it and bicycling art will be revealed. Bicycle art like my latest here..

"The Green Betty"; Watercolor on 11" x 11" Cold Press Paper.

" 100 SLC Porches, No.99" & An Art Show...

Last night, I excitedly put the final touches on this porch painting.  I emailed the picture off to the porch owner who I really hope like this.  After seeing a friend's porch painted in this project, the owner of this porch approached me and ask if I would paint their porch.  I thought it would be a good addition to the project, especially since I had not done any of this style or any duplex porches.  So here it is...

"100 Salt Lake City Porches, No.99"; Oil on 16" x 16" Wood Panel

AND Here's the information/ details of the Art Show...

100 SALT LAKE CITY PORCHES:

An Art Show

Saturday January 14th, 2012

From 2 to 6PM

At

235 West 2950 South - Salt Lake City

(Above the Offices of Gritton & Associates)

There will be FREE Music, Beverages, & Food for you to enjoy while you browse through the art.  Additional art will be on sale too!  20% of all sales proceeds will be donated to the Salt Lake City Habitat for Humanity.

From 2:30 - 4:30 PM Come Enjoy Music By...

 Os Corvos

Os Corvos (Portuguese translation of “The Crows”) is a diversely talented acoustic guitar duet of Jay Kirsch and Jerry Parsons. They perform a wide variety of musical styles including Latin, Jazz, Brazilian MPB, New Age, Flamenco, Classical, and Contemporary.

"100 SLC Porches, No.97 & An Upcoming Show"

I'm getting closer and closer to finish this 100 Salt Lake City Art Project.  It's exciting as well as gratifying in actually finishing a project; rather a sense of accomplishment.  This porch was suggested by my former oil painting teacher who lives just up the street.  Thanks Melodie!  It was a wonderful suggestion and I wish I would've spotted this porch earlier in the year because I imagine these flower beds would be gorgeous with flowers.  But here it is...

"100 Salt Lake City Porches, No.97"; Watercolor on 12" x 12" Paper

For painting this porch, I decided to keep it to a limited color pallet.  I only used cerulean blue, indingo blue, golden yellow, and permanent rose.  I started off with one layer of flat wash and then finished with the puddle style of watercolor.

UPCOMING SHOW...

I'm in the process of working out the details and will be trying to contact some of those that have all ready purchased their porch paintings.  It looks as though there will also be some live music as well!  It should be a fun little event where everyone can see all 100 Salt Lake City Porches in person. 

Prelim plans for...

Saturday January 14th  from 2-6PM

Please save the date! 

To view the progress of the 100 Salt Lake City Porches Art Project (or to request a purchase), click here.  I welcome any feedback you may have.  Thanks for visiting!

"100 SLC Porches, No.96"

I've been eyeing this eclectic porch for a while now and trying to figure out which time of year to do.  You see, the straw man that resides on the porch changes accessories from time to time- season to season.  Also, in mid summer the front yard raised gardens are in full glorious bloom.  It was hard choosing which version to do.  I chose this latest version that I took a picture of when I cycled by about two weeks ago.

"100 Salt Lake City Porches, No.96"; Watercolor on 12" x 16" Paper.

 
My other dilemma was trying to choose which method of painting it would be best.  I was playing with the idea of doing it in an oil but I've opted to do it in watercolor.  I started with a couple of layers of flat washes and then worked in the puddle style of watercolor painting.  To view the progress of (or to purchase one of) 100 Salt Lake City Porches, click here.  I welcome any feedback you may have.  Thank you for visiting!

"100 SLC Porches, No.92"

I want to wish everyone a very Happy Thankgiving!  I'm hoping to get some more porch paintings done over the long holiday weekend.  But in meanwhile, here's the latest porch painting...

"100 Salt Lake City Porches, No.92"; Oil on 8" x 10" Canvas.

This house is a cute cottage up in the Avenues area of Salt Lake City.  This painting is a commissioned piece.  It's for a friend and its her bosses' house.  She's giving it as a Christmas present; a neat idea.  I sent her a picture last night via text and received a "Wow. Absolutely spectacular".  So I'm figuring she liked it. :)  I'm starting to feel a little more comfortable with doing commissioned work.  I know its part of being a successful artist but I sometimes still struggle with the concept of someone wanting to pay me to paint something for them.  I guess its because I feel I'm still struggling (the eternal struggle) to be a good artist.  To view the progress of the 100 Salt Lake City Porches (or to purchase one of ), click here.  Thank you for visiting and I welcome any feedback you may have.

"100 SLC Porches, No.88 & Playing With Alternative Methods"

Here's No. 88 of the 100 Salt Lake City Porches, which I finished late last night...

"100 Salt Lake City Porches, No.88"; Watercolor on 10" x 14" Paper

I spotted this porch while out driving during my lunch hour about a week before Halloween.  The porch was surrounded by orange leaves and pumpkins.  The black cat had sparkles on it and shimmered with each light breeze in the noon day light.  It seemed to tease and beckon me.  There were quite a few cutely decorated houses along this quiet street in the Sugarhouse neighborhood.  I did this painting as a series of flat washes that I slowly built up upon.  If you would like to view the progress of 100 Salt Lake City Porches, click here.

Last night in my Wednesday water coloring class (taught by Colleen) we went through alternative methods; or as Colleen likes to call it-- "painting with the kitchen sink".  I painted this scene below with some of those methods such as: cutting when wet, using rubbing alcohol, applying wax and table salt, pressing saran wrap, and sponging.  I felt like a young kid in an arts and craft class where there was no wrong or right answer to doing things.  I was having SO much FUN just experimenting.  Not too sure about the finished product but HEY! I had a good time in the process of it...

"Basketed Bright Pink Bike Along the Strip"; Watercolor on 10" x 15" Paper

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