Oil Painting: Grapefruit & Knife

6" x 8" Oil on Canvas Panel

This is a still life of a grapefruit with an old grapefruit knife. The knife has indentations for your fingers in the handle and the blade narrows and curves at the end, so while this painting may look distorted, it is not too far off. I tried to also capture the lumpy shape of the grapefruit with its peachy shading. This was fun to paint and I really like the blue background on this one.

Oil Painting: Still Life of Clementines

5.5" x 7.5" Oil on unstretched canvas

I decided to try painting a still life. It is interesting I think that an artist's style is so clearly personal. I took a watercolor class in town and although we'd be painting the same setup of flowers or squash, everyone in class had a distince style that showed in every painting. Now I know that artists study others and try to incorporate different styles into their work, but it is interesting to me that a style is evident from the beginning. I'll be paying attention to this as I continue to study, and see what I find out. Anyway, I see that I have a style as well, and I wonder why my style is the way it is. Is it the sort of style that I have seen most? Is it what I like best? Is it the easiest for me to paint? I admire many types and styles of art, so I am not sure if I know at this point.

In this still life, I worked on painting cloth (a dish towel from my sister) and trying to "see" the ripples in the cloth and the shadows on the fruit. I'm not sure if I really like the blue background. I like its simplicity, but I am not sure about the tone. Although, I think with the white cloth it works to set off the clementines.

Oil Painting: Vineyard Landscape

5" x 7" Oil on canvas panel

I tried some new things here. First, I did a golden orange underpainting under the vines and the near mountain. Underpainting is something I learned from friend and artist Dixie McCarthy. I visited her when she was at the VT Studio Center and she showed me her work and process. So thanks Dixie! I'll try to add a link to her website. I like the depth and warmth that the underpainting gave to the near mountain and it helped with the vines. I also tried to work on lively brushstrokes. This was from some photos from my mom of a vineyard in fall, actually across the street from her place (a little embellished). Ted and I actually really like this one. He likes the mountains and I like how the vine leaves turned out. Anyway, I am enjoying this and please feel free to critique!

More Oil Painting!

5.5x7.5 Oil on unstretched canvas

I may have to change the title of this Blog. I had lots of fun painting with oils this weekend. I have been doing some reading and looking at artists work that I like and felt like I could give it a try. So here is my second ever oil painting! It is a scene that I mostly made up but includes the grapevines in early fall from some photos that my mom took for me. Overall I think it looks pretty good! Ted likes it. I only have the 3 primary colors plus Ultramarine blue and white that I got in my workshop this summer, so I had to mix all the colors. Only having the 3 primary colors was a little less stressful in that I didn't have to worry "Am I using the right green?" But I could have used a nice earth tone. This was a good lesson for when I run out of my free paint and have to figure out what to buy! So I am happy with this and wouldn't be ashamed to hang it on my wall (or someone else's).

Oil Painting!

We had a relaxing weekend, which meant only a little adventure and a little sheetrock. That gave me some time to finish my first ever oil painting! And also my second! This summer I took some workshops, one of which was called "Painting Water With Oils" with Caroline Jasper. I liked her. Her paintings are very bright and colorful and she was talking about her techniques for capturing the ripples in water. I had to leave halfway through her workshop to catch my plane to go see "The Pizza!" so did not finish the exercise. So this weekend I finished that water painting of SF Bay pictured here. I think the mid tone water is a little dark.

11x7.5" Watercolor

I managed to complete one painting over vacation. This is a view in Calsitoga of some plum trees along a vineyard with mustard flowers. I was visiting my mom and saw this pretty scene. By the time I went to take some pictures for reference, they had plowed all the mustard flowers! But, a benefit of painting is that I could just put those flowers in anyway! I must be dreaming of spring! It's about 5 degrees today. No flowers anywhere in sight. Well, that's not entirely true, I do have some fabulous orchids in bloom right now in the house. I started another vineyard and barn painting. Also from a springtime photo. Spring grass in CA is so bright green! I don't know if the painting looks good with all that bright green. I may try to tone it down somehow...I don't know how...