Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Friday, November 20, 2009

Fiji

Just spent a week in Fiji! Therefore, my blogging has been severely ignored. But what’s a girl gonna do? Let’s just say I spent an inordinate amount of time trying to figure out how to paint Fiji and do it justice. I think I’ll stick to painting wildlife. Enjoy the pics!




Tuesday, November 3, 2009

There Are Elephants On My Canvas!


I’m nearly finished with a painting of a trio of female elephants that my husband took in South Africa; it’s about 80% there. The original photo is slightly overexposed, this washes the colors out. But I’ve made that work for me by trying to depict a misty, wet morning.


Everyone always asks me why I haven’t painted my beautiful daughter Tamara in! I think I’ll have to do that on a giclee for her, that would be fun.

The funny thing about this painting is that the elephants were a snap to paint! It was the frigging background that gave me fits. Not only the background but the bank that the elephants are on. My teacher, Jim, tells me to be looser and more impressionistic in my interpretation of the landscape behind the elephants. Easy for him to say! I can spend hours happily detailing the minutiae but—impressionism? It terrifies me! Isn’t that silly? I keep threatening myself (self I say) to paint some plein aire so as to capture a quickness in my paintings that leads to a quick interpretation of what I see. But the thought scares the bejesus out of me! Wow, I’m really nuts. Anything that takes us out of our comfort zone can be so scary, right?

With all of that said (or psycho-analyzed!), I’m pretty happy with how the painting is evolving. I still haven’t decided on a name yet. What do all of you think? Let me know.

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