Virtual Frame

Well, what do you think? I have tried many styles and colors of frames but this one on www.pictureframes.com really was the only one that looked good. I haven't bought it yet. I can upload a photo to their website and try out most of their frames in their virtual frame shop. Pretty neat!

I think this is the one I'll go with. Black killed it, silver was worse, woods in all the brown flavors looked terrible. Really, this was the only one that worked, at least for me....and it was the last one I tried, thinking that a green frame would be worse than all the others, combined. Go figure.

Orchid Shadows

Orchid Shadows        Oil on Canvas       20 x 20   

It is finished. After my last post about this painting as a work in progress, I fussed and fiddled with it for many more hours. I wanted to insert more drama, more interest, and I especially wanted to work on the edges, losing and finding them as necessary. I have never paid much attention to that until recently, and realized that it could make or break a painting, so I paid extra attention in many places, and I think it helped, somehow.

It must now be framed and I am at a loss to know what to do to it. I have tried some various frames online and nothing hit me, so I'm now trying to figure out what will work best. Gold kills it, and black is not good either. I didn't try silver, so that might work. I'd love to see this with a liner, but I can't imagine how that will come together either, and white would not work, and natural linen kind of leaves me cold. Of course if I gave up and took it too a pro framer I'd save myself much trouble, but in the end it is always about money. This is a gallery wrapped canvas, but I'm of the opinion that my work looks best framed, except those very wide edge canvases with the painting wrapped around...that looks OK, but for the most part my work looks sickly without a proper frame.

A Pastel

Chincoteague  9 x12 on Art Spectrum Paper (unframed) $70

I have not done a pastel for a long time, having been so enamoured with Egg Tempera. I did this in my Sampling the Media Class which had only two students, and down to one on the last night....plenty of time to fool around with my own stuff. 



A Work in Progress

This is not a finished painting. I like it so much I just had to post it to my blog. I wonder why I like it so much....perhaps the color combination is satisfying to me, or perhaps it is the subject....two lovely orchids that were given to me by special people. I don't know, but it is strange how this particular painting is developing. It seems to flow and come together effortlessly. I wish all my paintings were like that! I have not named it yet, so if you have any suggestions about names please make a comment, or email me. Perhaps something like "Chiffon and Orchids"....that seems very ordinary. Anyway, something will come to mind, and if not it can always go as "Opus 1".

Dragon Fruit

Egg Tempera       6 x 8 gesso panel        $450

This is a Dragon Fruit....magenta skin and all. It is about the size of a lemon and tastes sweet and somewhat like a watermelon...kind of. Smitten, I am.

Sweet Treats Series

Only a truly obsessed artist would spend months painting stuff she can't eat! Diabetic problems forbid the candy, muffins and cake presented here, although I did sneak some of it!

CAKEFEST

CANDYFEST

MUFFINFEST

These three paintings are 16 x 20 each. The series price is $1400 for all three.

Icy Pond Series

These two little 8 x 10 acrylic paintings were done for the upcoming "Winter Wonderful" show at Carrollwood Cultural Center this December.

Icy Pond, Mystic, CT

Icy Pond, Woodstock, CT

Not One. Not Two

Oak Tree       Metalpoint Drawing        Private Collection

I had an email request to use my Oak Tree Drawing in a Blog that had such a lovely message about the "edges of God" and the tiny grey spaces and delicate lines and marks in which we live. I was honored to have this nice sentiment illustrated by my drawing. To read the whole blog post go to this link http://stillinthestorm.wordpress.com/

Corn Wins

Genesis: Corn won an honorable mention at the Florida State Convention Art Show of the National League of American Pen Women. I was very pleased as the competition was very stiff!

Rambutan

Rambutan      Egg Tempera on Gesso Panel     
6 x 8        $450

Fresh Rambutans are much redder than the one I found at my local Publix Market. They are native to Indonesia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and other parts of Asia and they are being grown in areas of South America. Their name comes from the word "hairy" in Indonesian. The white fleshy fruit is sweet, although only a small morsel of it is in each fruit as they are quite small, perhaps slightly bigger than golf-ball size before the hairs. They are used in jams, jellies, and eaten fresh or in deserts.

Best In Show

My Egg Tempera "Genesis: Pear" was awarded Best in Show in the North Tampa Arts League Member Show called "Debut" at Carrollwood Cultural Center. I was so blown away by this award, and my thanks goes to Robert Hellier of the Tampa Art Museum who judged the show. This is my second Best In Show for one of my Genesis paintings!

Inspiration

Inspiration    Oil on Linen    48 x 30

This painting will be shown for the month of September at Carrollwood Cultural Center, along with 8 other paintings in the "Feeling Series". For more information on this painting click here.





Genesis: Blue Corn

This is number 22 in the Genesis Series of paintings. I wanted to find real Hopi Blue Corn for another painting, but no luck, even from friends in Arizona/New Mexico. Evidently you just can't get the real thing anywhere. I finally bought blue corn (Indian Corn) at Thanksgiving time from my local supermarket. It isn't the same but it is close enough. I especially liked the fact that the corn cob was red, which I would not have known had the kernels not fallen out when I moved the bunch of cobs. It looked awful in the painting I bought it for, so it became one of the Genesis paintings. 

Primary Trilogy

It took a long time to get these three finished. The Red and Yellow paintings were done in 2009 but I only just finished the Blue painting two weeks ago. They will be shown at the upcoming Student/Faculty show at Carrollwood Cultural Center.

TOTAL DISASTER!

After about a week at home touching base with my life and work I decided to apply an egg wash to the painting I did at the workshop. Who knows what happened but the egg wash didn't go on properly, it puddled into thickish spots of brownish yellow goop that didn't bleach out in the sun. I have finished all my ET paintings this way and never had this kind of problem. The more I tried to fix it the worse it became. The painting was ruined. I was devasted!

I thought I'd have to throw it out and begin again, but I decided to experiment, based on Koo's advice that "there are very few problems that can not be fixed in Egg Tempera", so I plunged ahead and sanded off the several coats of gluey egg wash removing some of the background color in the process. There were several bare spots down to the gesso panel showing when I set up to fix the mess.

I spent all day on Sunday working on the painting. I couldn't duplicate the color of the background so I changed to a new color that I had ordered in dispersion form from Natural Pigments, Maya Blue...a lovely grey blue color. I cut new masks and out of acetate this time and could control the sponge a bit better this time. Practice, practice, practice.....she makes it look so easy. After about 20 more paintings I'll have it down.

Anyway, here is the revised painting. Perhaps a bit better? I love it still, but am afraid to seal it off with another egg wash. This one will probably just go under plastic glazing as is. It appears to be a little dark in this blog, but you get the idea.

Celebration of the Egg (Revised)