Star Watch

8" x 16" oils
sold
In college, I just about minored in astronomy. However, I got engaged and decided to be done paying tuition, so I simply finished my Bachelor of Fine Arts. I still love astronomy, and it finds its way into my art now and again.
I recently spent a week at a church Girl's Camp and I was in charge of conducting a Star Watch with the girls, teaching them constellations, etc.
Yesterday while I was sketching and thinking, a sketch very close to Star Watch came out and today I decided that it would become a painting. The meandering white line along the bottom is in charcoal and it's an oversimplified gesture of the ocean's movement. No need for details in this one.

Master of My Own Destiny

18" x 30" oil
sold

Master of My Own Destiny is a strong and balanced painting. I began my day today with no intention of painting, but as I ate my morning cereal, this painting popped into my head and once I went into the studio, it just all came out of the brush and knife and less than an hour later, this 18" x 30" catharsis was sitting on my easel, full of soul, love, and longing. Let me explain that last bit: art is great for sharing, and art is what I do, so I'm not too shy to say that the last bit of life for me has just been hard. I've felt some failure and disappointment. I've not painted much, so I think that's why today's painting leapt from the brush: it was all stored up inside.
Here is a poem I wrote to summarize the meaning of this painting:

The roar of the sea within my heart
laments the chances lost,
laments the failures keenly felt,
laments the sorrow's cost.

But it does not do to hide inside,
to never risk a fall,
to never try to live or die,
to never try to fly.

The sea, it says "I can be strong,
I can rise up again,
I can be free of chains and night,
I can succeed." And then-

My diligence is born of strife
My path's laid out as light.
The sun it rises steadily:
My destiny, my life.

Waiting For Birds

6" x 4" oil
sold

Here is my dog, Buttercup, sitting around waiting for birds to land in the yard so she can chase them off. She single-handedly keeps my raspberry and blackberry patch safe from quail. When I pick berries, she likes to help me eat a few. She hasn't learned yet how to eat them off the bush, and I hope she never does!

Last night I was talking to an avid art collector about how some artists (including myself) paint from photographs. The picture above is a good illustration of how I use a photograph for the inspiration and drawing, without limiting myself to the photo's drab color. A lot of painters stress about making their painting just like a photo, but why bother? Your imagination is so much richer.

awwww...

Busy Nose

6" x 6" oil
sold

I am participating in a group show June 18th at Alpine Art in Salt Lake City called "Best of Show." It will benefit homeless pets in Utah. I was asked to do various paintings of my yellow lab, Buttercup. This is the first one. They will all be petite like this one, and oh so cute.

Roll

18" x 36" oil
sold

This is my favorite seascape that I have thus far painted. The composition is simple yet bold, the color family is nearly monochromatic, but that hit of cobalt turquoise in the wave is the perfect punch of chroma. It doesn't hurt any either that I can close my eyes and hear the roar of a rolling wave. Thanks Bonnie-Jean for the reference photo.
Like Karin Jurick, it's very zen to paint the ocean on a frigid day. It's Spring Break here, and it's snowing. Hm. Poor teachers.
The hardest part of this painting, and the bulk of what I worked on today, was the falling water on the left side. It's hard to make seafoam and water not look like clouds. Both have mass, both have soft edges, both move, and both are pretty much not that fun or easy to paint.

ahhh, cobalt turquoise...the queen of colors.