Leaning Irises - SOLD

Leaning Irises Watercolor on 300 lb CP Arches Paper, 22.5" x 16" Half Sheet Size Sold at $80.00 This is the last of the "winter iris" paintings, drawn out in May last spring, and waiting to be painted. I had so many beautiful plants, that there was no time to paint them all. So they just got drawn, and now it's fun to paint them. Thanks for looking.

Anyway Roses in Rose - SOLD

Anyway Roses in Rose Oil on Canvas Panel, 12" x 16" Sold at $75.00 plus shipping. Practice with Roses. The top photo is the actual way I painted this one, but in Photoshop, I realized that it could actually be hung any way at all, and still look correct. For the resource, I used a couple of photos and a couple of silk roses from the craft store. And I definitely got some practice painting roses. Thanks for looking.

White Tulip - SOLD

White Tulip 10" x 12", Oil on Canvas Board Sold at $60.00 plus shipping. In Maryland, if you're lucky to live close to Brookside Gardens, there are new delights almost every week during the spring and summer. The outdoor tulip displays were amazing year before last, and I took some photos of them, always intending to paint them "someday." It's today. Thanks for looking.

Tree Study with Birches - SOLD

Tree Study with Birches Oil on Canvas board, 12" x 16" Sold at $70.00 plus shipping. I had a lot of reds and oranges left from the orange floral painting, and didn't want to waste them (expensive colors in oil), so found this photo of the wonderful trees at the top of my daughter's driveway. You see a lot of these trees in this part of the country, gnarly trunks covered with lichen, and of course, birches. This was taken in the fall, when some trees had lost their leaves already, but there was still a lot of color. Thanks for looking.

Purple Iris Profusion - SOLD

Purple Iris Profusion Watercolor on Lanaquarelle, 300 lb paper, full sheet 22.5" x 30" Sold at $130.00 plus $20 shipping. This is another of the drawn-out but not painted paintings. It's on a full sheet of Lanaquarelle, which is an incrdibly soft paper. I don't remember using it to paint on before, but the paint doesn't run nearly as much as on other paper I've used, and it works well for the modeling I do on the petals. This one took a lot of time, and I'm pleased with the final result. Thanks for looking.

Orange Floral - SOLD

Orange Floral Oil on Gallery Wrapped Canvas, 8" x 10" Wrap is 1.5" Depth Sold at $60.00 plus shipping. Just for a blaze of color, lots of reds, yellows and oranges, to offset the cold and grey of winter. This one needs no frame, since it's gallery wrapped and painted around all four sides. See detail below. Thanks for looking. Detail of wrapped edge.

Honeysuckle Dreams - SOLD

Honeysuckle Dreams Oil on Canvas board, 12" x 16" Sold at $65.00 plus shipping. On these severe cold days, when the whole neighborhood is a crunchy sheet of ice, and even to go to the mailbox takes your breath away, it suits me to sit and paint sunshine and summer. I like this one too, the swishy paint strokes. I used a really large brush for most of it. Thanks for looking.

Bending Iris - SOLD

Bending Iris Watercolor on 140 lb CP Arches paper, 22.5" x 16.5" Sold at $85.00 plus shipping. This one is larger again, but that's how I drew it out back when we had blooming iris. There were so many gorgeous flowers at the same time, that I simply grabbed watercolor paper, and drew up a few paintings to pull out and paint come winter. These were part of my "Mother's Day haul" and now it's time to paint them! Thanks for looking.

Sweet Summer Dreaming - SOLD

Sweet Summer Dreaming Oil on Stretched Canvas, 10" x 10" SOLD at $60.00 plus shipping. Okay, I've had enough now: ice, sleet, snow, blasting artic winds, and freezing rain. Not that it'll make any difference, so instead it's a summertime painting to remind me that warm and green will indeed come again. Thanks for looking.

Drama Queens

Drama Queens Oil on Canvas board, 8" x 10" Available at $50.00 plus shipping. You know the ones: it's all high lights and showmanship. The depth of the shadow, the intensity of it all! Sometimes we just have to chuckle at ourselves, and all the drama. Thanks for looking.

Sundrenched Pass - SOLD

Sundrenched Pass 12" x 16", Oil on Canvas Panel Sold at $75.00 plus shipping. This one is clearly "impressionistic" with it's spots of broken color. I tried for the feeling of intense sunlight, and how it bleaches out color, and I think this one really works. Thanks for looking.

Bag with Apples - SOLD

Bag with Apples 12" x 16", Oil on Canvas Panel Sold at $80.00 plus shipping There's just something appealing about brown craft paper. As package wrapping, as bags, as book covers, as sketch book pages. One of those things that you just like. So here's a brown paper bag with a couple of apples, and very fun to paint. Thanks for looking.

Experimental Roses - NA

Experimental Roses Oil on Canvas Board, 12" x 16" Not available. I have a couple of silk roses that I'm not sure anymore why I bought, but they seemed to want to be painted. I told them, "You know I can't paint flowers in oil, right?" But no practice, no improvement. What I learned: 1. To do roses, you must first draw roses, otherwise, you get lost in the folds. I didn't do that. And I did get lost in the folds. 2. Walnut oil makes cold paint tacky and really tricky to work with. 3. The folks who just splash paint on and it somehow makes a gorgeous flower, have probably done a thousand flowers before. I haven't, so I shouldn't. Thanks for looking.

Mixed Tulips Watercolor - SOLD

Mixed Tulips Watercolor, with detail Watercolor on 300 lb Arches paper, full sheet 30" x 23" Sold at $130.00 plus $20.00 shipping The florals in watercolor are much easier for me (see yesterday's oil of three tulips), but they do take longer. This represents many hours of delicate painting. It's a large painting, and since the paper is deckled, it could be floated at full size in a frame. It would probably look great in a formal living or dinding room. Thanks for looking.

Broken Tulips - SOLD

Broken Tulips Oil on Stretched Canvas, 10" x 10" SOLD at $65.00 plus shipping. Out of three bunches of tulips, these three were broken off at the stems, so I put them in a glass and took them down to the studio. For whatever reason, flowers that are easy to do in watercolor give me a hard time in oils. Maybe because oils feel more solid, although it's just paint. One of these days I'll figure out how to make a delicate set of petals in oil. Meanwhile, you get to see my practice (aren't you lucky?) Just kidding, and thanks for looking.

Mixed Apples - SOLD

Mixed Apples Oil on Stretched Canvas, 10" x 10" Available at $50.00 plus shipping. When I got done with this little one today, it almost had a "cloverish" look to it, with all the round shapes and round shadows. or maybe a round looping interchange, something like that. I'm glad I used a square canvas, to play with the shapes against a square format. Not as loose as I wanted, but I reverted a bit. Hard to change, isn't it? Thanks for looking.

Rough Garlic - SOLD

Rough Garlic Oil on Canvas Board, 10" x 12" Sold at $40.00 plus shipping. I used big brushes for this one, and resisted (it wasn't easy) picking up my "blender brushes" and going back over everything, as I usually do. Somewhere between this fairly rough (but more painterly) style and what I generally do, is where I want to be. More garlic is by request, but since it is different, the requester may want to pass on it. Thanks for looking.

Single Red Pear - SOLD

Single Red Pear
Acrylic on Canvas Board, 6" x 8"
SOLD at $40.00 plus shipping.

A little one tonight, as I spent the day finishing up my mural work, which turned out remarkably well, for a first attempt at doing anything on a wall. I'll be posting photos and writing about it on my sketch blog tomorrow. (See sidebar under links for the sketch blog.) This little painting is actually a success. I admire photo realism but I want to NOT paint that way, and that's where I usualy steer. This is more towards how I really want to paint, more sketchy and loose. Thanks for looking.

Double Gold - SOLD

Double Gold Oil on Canvas Board, 6" x 8" Sold at $45 plus shipping. Just a little one today. I love the colors in the Golden Delicious apples, expecially in bright light. So you can imagine the excitement here, big Pat's fans in this household. And my son, being a long time Giants fan... we shall see. Me, I'm going to sit and crochet, LOL. Thanks for looking.

Fruit Bowl, Apples and Red Pears - SOLD

Fruit Bowl, Apples and Red Pears Oil on Canvas Board, 12" x 16" Sold at $100 plus shipping. I had this one set up, and started it in a typical horizonatl format, and then half way through the drawing, I decided it would fit the canvas better in a vertical shape. I just love the colors of the dark pears and light apples together. Against all that wonderful blue, and I really like how this one turned out. Especially for a fairly large canvas. Thanks for looking.