Tag Archives: Arts

I’ve been busy!

I don’t know whether to start where I left off and come forward or where I am now and go backward. Guess the latter.

Last evening I delivered a painting to the new Bethesda office of Evers & Co., a regional real estate firm. We instructors at the Yellow Barn were invited to submit one of our paintings for display during this evening’s ribbon cutting and reception and thereafter. Here’s what I submitted from my private collection. I’ve loved this ‘baby’ too much to offer it for sale — til now.

Oranges on Copper

Oranges on Copper

Newish iPad Fun

I’ve been distracted lately by a major house re-org, urged on by my selected ‘completion reward’: revamping my office area to include a nice, sunny area for painting. Yum. In the meantime, I’ve been teaching an iPad class and preparing for a trip to Lafayette, LA to teach a one-day iPad workshop and attend a four-day watercolor journaling workshop. More on that later.

I’ve done a few new iPad pieces over the last couple of months. Here they are:

Admiring Make Piece Pretties

Admiring Make Piece Pretties

Trainspotting

Trainspotting

 

iPaintings Galore

I’ve been painting up a storm on my trusty iPad lately. I had been planning to try to sell some high quality, archival prints of some images, along with greeting card prints of other paintings, over the holiday season. Bronchitis intervened. So no marketing, but plenty of satisfaction from all of the new iPad art. I’ll share them with you over the next few days.

Here are a couple:

pitcher and pals

pitcher and pals

IMG_1090

round eggplant – never saw one before!

Quick Sketches, Another Nude

Last week at the Yellow Barn, we were graced with a fit and angular male model, Wayne, who maintained a very difficult pose with few breaks.

I chose somewhat unconventional compositions. For the first, I was seated at roughly eye level, looking from the top of his head down the length of his prone body (he was laying atop a series of folding tables that seemed none too stable).

nude 1

For the second, which was done more quickly than the first, I sat behind Wayne, a vantage from which his body looked like a lanky wedge.

nude 2

From whatever angle, Wayne is a wonderful model.

Fingerpainting Maria & Her Cool Sundress

Maria and her sassy sundress were posing at the Yellow Barn this afternoon. I think I’m getting hooked on using my iPad & ArtRage rather than those messy oils! Here’s the result of today’s session.

Maria in sundress

Maria models in her sundress.

More iPad/ArtRage Art – Practicing with the Watercolor Brush

I feel much less comfortable using the ArtRage watercolor brush (and oil painting tools) than I do with chalk, pen, pencil & paint roller. So I’ve been trying to trudge up the learning curve in watercolor. Here are my two most recent efforts:

A flamenco dancer I photographed during our trip to Cuba last Spring:

Dancing in Havana

Dancing in Havana

And a scene from Glen Echo Park, based on a photograph I took a couple of years ago:

Cuddle Up at Glen Echo Park

Cuddle Up at Glen Echo Park during a Cloudy Sunset

Dancing Dervish – more ArtRage/iPad Sketches!

At our Yellow Barn class last night with Walt Bartman, our wonderful bellydancer model danced for us while we made quick gesture sketches and 15 minute studies of still poses. Exciting and intimidating all at once. We had to push way out past our comfort zones, especially those of us who aim for fairly representational paintings. I used ArtRage on the iPad, in support of my continued efforts to prepare for the class I’m teaching at Yellow Barn.

Latest Landscape Paintings

Some dear art buddies and I attended a landscape workshop at Deep Creek Lake last weekend, taught by Walt Bartman and managed by his wonderful wife Robyn. The entire group produced some lovely paintings and starts on paintings of the spectacular Fall foliage.

Here are a few of our works:

Another iPad Value Study, Followed by Color

At my iPad art class last Thursday, the students and I worked on additional monochrome value studies, based on a still life, and then proceeded to add color. Here is my initial sketch,

Initial sketch, raku pot still life.

an interim stage,

Interim sketch, raku pot still life.

and the final product.

Finished sketch, raku pot still life.

Keeping a Gouache Painting Simple

In developing some PR for the just-ended Labor Day exhibits, I pulled out a photo of one of my earliest gouaches. Made on black paper at the suggestion of Yellow Barn teacher, Walt Bartman, I incorporated the paper’s rich black for the composition’s dark values — also his suggestion. I loved the outcome. Here it is.

Blue Girl, gouache on paper.

When I did the painting of grandson Max for yesterday’s post, I had intended to do the same thing, but wimped out in the end — not wanting a lot of black on a sweet baby’s face. I’m going to try again on my next gouache, but the restraint needed to achieve the simplicity of black shadows, etc. is hard hard hard.