"Reading the Comics at Starbucks"

10"x8"

Oil on Board

$255 plus $10 domestic s/h

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Happy New Year to all!  It feels good to end the year by painting!  I've been away for the Christmas holiday and haved missed my studio. . .

I mentioned in the post before last that I wanted to do a larger painting of this young guy reading the comics while he waited for Mom to bring the hot chocolate (or whatever!), so thought I'd work on that today.  In the study for it, I worked on a dark-ground board and wanted to try a lighter one as well as different colors.  So for this, I pulled out the pthalo blue, dioxozine purple, rose madder, cad red medium, vermillion, cad yellow lemon and white.  It's one of those paintings that doesn't quite fit the mold for my eyes and that I will have to live with for a bit before I decide how I "like" it!  Even as I say that, I realize that I do--it's just that it feels like somebody else did it!!  Odd! 

Colors of Christmas

6"x8", oil, sold

May sweetness and peace fill your hearts this Christmas and the coming year!

"Study of Comics Reader at Starbucks"

6"x5"

Oil on Board

$90 plus $10 domestic s/h

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I saw this little guy yesterday at Starbucks happily reading the comic pages as his mom was buying his beverage.  I worked with a triadic color scheme using alizaron yellow, pthalo blue and fanchon red (similar to napthol red) and white.  My board was prepared with a dark venetian red gesso which I thought would work well for the chair and floor area.  I really like using the darker gesso except that I have a hard time getting the lights as light as I want them.  I am going to do another version of this large, a different choice of colors and with a lighter-toned panel.  I love the subject!

"Green Pear and Mandarins"

8"x6"

Oil on Board

$115 plus $10 domestic s/h

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In the oil painting class I've been teaching, we recently focused on using specific color schemes and I realized that it would be good for me to put myself through the same paces!  So, this one is a split complementary scheme using cadmium lemon, cadmium orange, vermillion, ultramarine blue and white.  I like that this makes me work with tube colors that I haven't really used alot in the past year as I've worked primarily with a very limited palette--guess it's time to branch out!

"Malone Elevator"

6"x8"

Oil on Board

$150 plus $10 domestic s/h

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This is another painting of one of the "landmarks" of Klamath Basin (Oregon), the Malone Grain Elevator.  Though it doesn't really show it in my painting, this is one of the elevators that is slowly falling down.  It's hard to tell if they will be repaired as they age.  It seems like these elevators might be something that is disappearing along with the small and family-owned farms.  Hope not!

"The Old Takacs Elevator"

8"x6"

Oil on Board

$150 plus $10 domestic s/h

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I was down in Merrill, OR the past few days, where this grain elevator has been part of the landscape for longer than I know.  I love these old structures.  There is such an elegance about them--at least to me!  I brought this little painting out of the archives--it was done a couple of years ago after I'd visited the area on a very very cold weekend.  Pristine air, snow geese, swans--what beauties that area offers!

"Oceanside Office"

8"x8"

Oil on board

$150 plus $10 domestic s/h

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This grey day at the coast was warm and pleasant enough to be able to take out the paperwork and get busy--what a great spot for it!  This scene is of one of the participants in the Kim English workshop in September while we were taking a lunch break.  The rest of the day went from cloudy to pouring rain as it can.do on the Oregon coast.  We tried very hard to keep painting, standing under a big tree, putting up umbrellas as we could, placing the model in a comfortably dry spot, but the weather finally got the best of us!  The workshop was sponsored by Art in the Mountains and they had put together a great meal for us that afternoon of fresh-caught salmon, crab and cod (I think!).  A great feast which took our minds off the soaking we got!

This is my 600th post--how did that happen?

"Balboa Park Trolley Stop" Study (sold)

6"x8"

Oil on Board

$125 plus $10 domestic s/h

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This was too much fun!  In the oil painting class I'm teaching, we have been working with split-complementary color schemes, so I decided to go with that.  Also, I was looking at the notes and pics I took at Kim English's workshop in September and was inspired to try to see my subject in a simpler way.  I look forward to working like this more.  Even though I've painted and drawn seriously for all of my adult life, sometimes I feel like I am just beginning to see!  It is one of the beauties of doing artwork, I think!

"Rebecca"

16"x12"

Oil on Canvas

NFS

This is a study I did for a painting I hope to do soon.  I actually painted it twice!  The first one was with the palette I've been using alot over the past year and a half:  alizaron crimson, alizaron yellow, ultramarine blue and white.  The drama in it was great, the composition better, but the color ended up so muddy!  Skin tones were just plain ugly.  I decided to try it again using cad yellows, cad red, alizaron crimson, fanchon red and then cobalt blue and viridian.  It's better.  I am going to keep working on this, though!

"Anything But the Pits!"

6"x6"

Oil on Board

$100 plus $10 domestic s/h
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Admittedly, this is a strange title, but when I looked at these cherries, that's what came to mind!  They are SO BEAUTIFUL!!  It is amazing how everyday it is proven over and over that simple things can be the most affecting.  My goal today is to keep my eyes open for more of those gifts as I travel through the hours.

"Waiting and Watching"

10"x8"

Oil on Board

$290 plus $10 domestic s/h

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One of my favorite places for subject matter is at Union Station in Portland, OR.  I love the light and the reflections that seem to be everywhere and the variety of people I see.  I like going to a public place and being able to just snap away to get my reference photos, but at the station, I feel so obvious and so aware of security issues that I don't do that much anymore.  I ask permission and am often turned down--oh all those people who could've be immortalized!!  (:

"A Quiet Moment"

Oil on Board

6"x6"

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  This is a subject that many of you will recognize as I go back to it trying different color, trying a different feel.  Needless to say, I like it!  The setting is the Memorial Union Building at Oregon State University.  It brings back so many memories--falling back into the worn, soft cushions of the many chairs and sofas in the huge room with wonderful light--trying to study and stay awake there at the same time wasn't easy!