Lilacs

My neighbor has a lovely lilac bush. The fragrant flower show is now gone, only photos. As the end of July nears, summer soon will be gone. So much to look forward to in the Fall and Winter, watching my family grow.

Hydrangea Blues

Both of my parents are gone now. Today is the anniversary of my Dad's passing. It is a day of reflection and heartfelt memories. My Father was a professional painter, he had a sign painting and house painting business as second job. I know there is a genetic link to art in my family, my grandfather and his brother were professional sign painters. I can remember sitting on the basement steps and peeking around the corner watching the silkscreen process, fascinated. My Dad never wanted material things or status in his life, he was as good as good gets. His legacy is his character, family, religion. He taught me respect for all other humans, never make another persons life more difficult by your actions or lack of action. As a young child, we were corrected if we didn't hold a door for someone, ran in front of another, took the last of something. My Mum and Dad always gently reminded us of manners and respect for another person, a simple way, but now I know a gift. I hope my children have learned by my example, treat everyone, the way you would like to be treated.

Grape Vineyards

There is a beautiful view in my area that always takes my breath away. You can see Lake Erie, bigger than life, surrounded by grape farms. It is in North East, Pennsylvania where the climate is perfect for grapes. Vineyards and roadside fruit and vegetable stands pop up irresistible on your drive. The town center has beautiful, local shops, but the wine.....Lambruscano is my personal favorite. The parking meters take pennies, the rustic, vintage charm of this little corner of Pennsylvania always in my heart.

Geraniums

What exactly is it about Geraniums that I feel so drawn to them. Lots of summer flowers abound, yet I really favor these simple garden beauties to paint. This painting was done from the pre planning painting I did on my I pad last week.

Sailing Into The Sunset

Sailing Into the Sunset.

Original oil painting. Size 11 x 14. Gallery wrapped canvas.

Finished painting. Added a slight orange wash to tone down the blues. Shadows to people and landmasses. Scroll down, way down and see the 11 step process from start to finish of this painting. Any questions?

Step 11

Added some highlight to water, more definition on boat, note the shadows on boat, sails.

Step 10

More white on the clouds, moving in circles, with an upward motion (the way these clouds appear to be moving, from the center- moving out and up.) Note the value on the land mass, lighter above, darker shades below. Start long broad strokes of all the blues and a little lemon yellow with the rhythm of the water gently suggested.

White on the boat, suggest people on the boat.

Step 9

Add some yellow, green, to the land mass on the horizon line, start working in the white for the clouds when the wash of colors have dried.

Oil step 7

Added washes of blues to the water area of the canvas. Left light a small area for the sail reflection, and the sunset reflection.

Step 6

Added a little thin wash of sap green.

Oil painting step 5

Added a touch of aliz crimson, and my 3 blues, not neatly, just random and thinned with Turpin/linseed oil mix.

Oil painting step 4

Since this will be a sunset, I put a thinned wash of cadmium yellow in the background, with reflection in the water.

Oil painting 3rd step

Set up your palet of paints. I used burnt umber, ultra marine blue, cerulean blue, cobalt blue and phthalocyanine blue, cadmium yellow light, lemon yellow, sap green, aliz crimson, and white.

I had a one part linseed oil and one part turpenoid on hand. Take a very thinned out wash of burnt umber and draw the boat.

Oil painting 2nd step

Transfer drawing with charcoal. If you have hairspray, it will set the drawing on the canvas. Take a tissue and wipe the smudges away before the hairspray.

How to do an oil painting

I thought it might be interesting to show how I do an oil painting. Since it is summer and I have a lot of reference photos of sailboats, do not own a boat:( , but we have Lake Erie. This is my basic drawing of the painting. If you can not draw, take a digital photo of a boat, print out the size you want, grab some graphite/carbon paper and trace the image. Note your value plan, dark areas, light and medium areas.

Geraniums Digital Painting

Have I mentioned how attached I've become to my iPad? I didn't think so. It is beginning to dawn on me what a useful tool this is for planning a painting. You can instantly crop a photo to see the best composition for a thumbnail sketch. Flip it to back and white to see the values. The best maybe trying out the color palet, if the colors don't work easy to undo. No waste of printer ink, canvas, paints. Hey, I can take this anywhere, painting in a waiting room... So much fun! Digital art a valuable tool.

Sunflower Friday

Fooling around again with my iPad and sketchbook app. I really love how easy photography is getting to be in this digital age. Note to photographers : there is nothing easy about composition. I struggled to learn photoshop over the years, sandwiched in with raising five children and moving all over the country, it would be years from one session to the next. Far too complicated for this brain. Now, there are an amazing number of incredible apps to expand the creative process. All your photos on hand, pick and play, see what happens. Yeah, I know, I'm suppose to be painting.

Red Gerber Daisy and Friends

July is almost at the half way point. Soon the back to school adverts will begin. I have mixed feelings about this. My son with Down Syndrome and Autism is home for the summer. Next year will be his last in the Educational system, he does not want to go back to school. I think this is why I have been in a bit of a creative rut. Everything feels so heavy, yet, all around me - sunshine and flowers. My mind is preoccupied with what to do. I know the answer will come. After a lot of meetings.......

This 8x10 oil is painted on a canvas panel. It will be available for auction on my DPW gallery.

Pair of Pears

And a couple cherries in honor of the Cherry Festival starting tomorrow. This original oil is painted on a 5 x 7 canvas panel. I wanted to change things up a little and go darker. I saw a photo of pears in a crate in a food magazine recently and found the photo very eye-catching. This is my version of going dark, I love the drama.

New Art

Decided to try the Sketchbook Pro app I downloaded on my iPad recently. Just didn't know what to do with it...I found an old book in public domain about gardening, figured out how to get it into app and played with the different digital painting feature. Makes an interesting print.

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Summer Flowers in a Watering Can

Pink Geraniums

Balmy Beach