My own personal albatross

"Oh, yeah!" you're saying. "She said she'd be posting more clues to the mystery painting. But a whole week and nada." You have my deepest apologies. I've been painting away until the wee hours and frankly, it seems like the more paint I put on this piece, the farther away I am from completing it. For someone who enjoys 6x6 paintings, I'm way out of my comfort zone here. I have less than a week to finish it and get everything else ready for my show, so you probably won't hear from me until that's all finished. But no more empty promises. I'll put up a proper image when the show is up.

In Progress

Yep! I'm still here -- my computer was in for repairs and I'm painting away on my big surprise for my upcoming show, so I haven't posted for almost a week. Much remains to be done, so I'll be getting back to the studio now, but here's a sneak preview of the painting. Any guesses?


Look for more clues next week...

Battle weary

Turns out I didn't win the skirmish with Feedburner two weeks ago after all. After a complaint from a friend that she wasn't receiving notices of updates to my blog, I went back to the lair of the dragon known as feedburner. Let's just say that my armor is quite scorched. And leave it at that.

I hope I'm not giving false hope when I say that you should be able to subscribe to my feeds now.

Homage to Homer

No, not the famed author of antiquity, nor the renowned 19th century watercolorist. I'm paying homage to a much more recent Homer: infamous donut-eater, father of Bart -- yes, the Simpsons. I am particularly fond of Homer's signature exclamation -- D'oh!! -- as a way to express a moment of sudden enlightenment. (I suppose some might argue that this is really nothing more than awareness of prior stupidity, but it sounds so much better cast as enlightenment, don't you think?)

So this week, I started on an acrylic painting that dwarfs my usual efforts. Using the same brushes that I use on my 6x6's, I gamely started on the larger piece. Frustration multiplied by frustration!! In desperation, I finally resorted to some stiffer brushes designed for acrylics that I've been avoiding because I don't like long-handled brushes. Paint moved when I wanted it to, stayed where I put it, blended together easily!! Truly a Homeresque moment.

Since I'm going to keep that painting under wraps until my gallery show, I'll share the most recent 6x6, just being varnished today.

Quack-quack
6" x 6"
acrylic on canvas

Enjoy the weekend. I gotta go paint now.

My Monet period...

Back in the fall, my gallery decided to do a group show of 6x6-inch canvases. I was eager to try my hand at acrylics and decided to experiment with a looser, more impressionistic style after having followed Karin Jurick's blog for a while. Things started out well -- this little snail was my first painting:

Zoom-zoom
6" x 6"
acrylic on canvas

Notice the painterly approach on the shell, the suggestion of treads on the wheels, of light reflected on the face. I was pleased. I started on the second painting:

Buzz-buzz
6" x 6"
acrylic on canvas

Notice the slightly more controlled style! But there are still impressionistic elements in the piece. I started on the third painting:

Waddle-waddle
6" x 6"
acrylic on canvas

OK!! At this point, there's no denying that I've completely returned to my realistic roots. And in only three paintings!! A veritable nano-period in the history of art. Ah, Monet, we hardly knew ye....

I caught a "fish"

It's not like I've been living in a cave, unaware of the whole cyber-universe thingie. But more and more this past week, as I set up a website and this blog, I've been feeling like I set out to catch a fish and discovered that I'd somehow snagged a whale. The options for communication are SOOOOO vast -- well, it almost leaves me speechless. Which brings me around to the subject of chattiness. Those who know me in person are fully aware that I do not lack the gene for yakkety-yak. But set me in front of a blank sheet of paper and I kind of freeze up. Good thing this is an art blog, I guess!

I mentioned that I'd been honored to be chosen as artist of the month on The Artist's Magazine website back in January. Here's the piece that was featured:

Heirlooms
10" x 10"
watercolor

My mom had a pair of these little salt shakers in her china closet and I always loved them. Over the past several years, I've collected a whole flock of little guys like this, as well as some definitely stranger cousins. Look for more paintings featuring them in the future.