Silvery Night Music (11 x 14 watercolor on aquabord) $250

I began this painting at the Silverton Art Festival and finished it up at the Oregon State Fair.  My photo reference is from the same group of photos I took for Silver and Glass make music.  But I wanted this painting to be more dramatic, so I darkened the background to make the light more obviously artificial  indirect lighting.

Painting outside in the heat on aquabord was an challenging experience. Most of the time I was painting the temperature was over 90 degrees and it was very dry. The challenge was to keep the board wet enough to work with. I brought in a spray mister the second day which helped considerably. I used cardboard pieces as a shield to keep from misting the parts I didn’t want wet.

Painted on clayboard and finished with a clear acrylic matte varnish and mounted on a black cradle frame, this painting is ready to hang. Alternatively, it can be framed like an acrylic or oil painting.

Prints are available through Fine Art America.com.

Silver and Glass Music (11 x 14 watercolor on claybord) $300

I painted this in my usual palette of  cobalt blue, phthalo blue, ceruleun blue, hasna yellow, new gamgee, burnt siena and dioxian purple plus a new addition, phtalo green.  Like phthalo blue, phthalo green is extremely staining and very transparent. Even on clayboard and canvas it’s hard to lift.  Typically, I mix my greens rather than pour them out of the tube, but there’s something metalic about phtalo green that can’t be mixed and it’s the perfect color for depression glass.

When I finish this one, my mother-in-law commented that she admired anyone who could paint glass. I will tell you the secret about painting and drawing glass. There’s nothing any difficult about glass than any other subject. The only trouble is psychological. If you just paint the shapes you see, no matter how abstract, when you step back, it will look like glass. It’s only when you worry about making it look like glass that it doesn’t. The same thing is true of metal.

Painted on aquabord and  finished with a clear coat of acrylic, and mounted on a black cradle frame.

Or purchase a print through my Shop at Fine Art America.

Dances With Pears (11 x 14 watercolor on clayboard) $200

No, it isn’t more instruments, but I’ll get back to those shortly. I painted this one at the gallery just after finishing “Jazz Buddies.” I love painting all the keys fittings on the sax, but it tiring work and I was no fit state to start another complex instrument painting full of reflections and reflections of reflections. So I painted nice simple fruit instead.

I took the reference photo while I had the mirror out for instrument photos. The pears and daisies were intended to be co-stars (and they probably will be in later paintings) but the looked so nice and fresh that I took a few photos of them by themselves too. I’m glad I did.

Painted on claybord and mounted on a black wooden cradle.  Ready to hang.

Available through my Esty shop or purchase a print through Fine Art America.com.

Triumphant Daisies (watercolor 10 x 10) $200

This is the second painting from my mirror and instrument shoot, this time from a more conventional angle.  The color choice is rather more conventional too, a complementary scheme of yellow and purple with a little bit of the neighboring complements, blue and orange.

Or purchase a print from fineartamerica.com.

Mothers' Day Daffodils (watercolor 5 x 7) $25.00

[This painting is currently on display at Art in the Valley, Corvallis, Oregon.]

I’ve spent my gallery shifts this month making postcard sized paintings for the OSU Mom’s Day Weekend Craft Fair.  It’s a fun fair to do.  Where else do you get to see a crowd of college boys with their moms?

As part of the Mom’s weekend celebration I’ll be at the gallery demonstrating  polymer clay cane-making on Friday from 1:00 to 2:30 at Art in the Valley, 209 2nd Street, downtown Corvallis.  The craft fair will be on campus in the Memorial Union Quad.   The fair runs from 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Saturday.

Three Tulips (watercolor 5 x 7) $25.00

Little Green Mister (5 x 7 watercolor)

Here are the last  two watercolors for my one woman mini-show at Art in the Valley, Corvallis Oregon.   Both are much smaller versions of recent paintings.  Both paintings were painted at Art in the Valley in late March.

I hang the show this Monday.  It will hang until Tuesday, May 4th.  During the show, I will be painting in the gallery on Wednesday April 14th, Wednesday, April 21, and Wednesday, April 28th.

Single Lily (5 x 7 watercolor) SOLD

Apples and Oranges (13 x 18 inch watercolor) $250.00

I had to watch my youngest daughter like a hawk to get this one painted.  She loves the sweet miniature Clementine oranges and kept threatening to eat my still life before I had it painted.  I don’t blame her much.  Clemetines are so very sweet and so small you can eat three or four of them and have had less than a full sized orange.

The palette is raw sienna, burnt sienna, cobalt blue, french blue, phthalo blue, quinacridone magenta and hansa yellow.  The magenta and the new hansa make a perfect orange colored orange.

Or purchase a print from Fine Art America.com.

Cherry Blossoms in a Blue Pitcher (watercolor 12 x 19) $250

We planted a two ornamental cherry trees the year we moved into this house.  Five years later the trees put on quite a show each Spring.  The branches I take inside don’t make a dent in the abundance of blooms.

I made two fundamental design decisions in painting this image.  Both help make the blossoms pop.  First, rather than paint the blue gray evergreens in the actual background, I added an abstract green background to compliment the pink blossoms.   Second I painted my white window blue.  I also moved the branches around to improve the composition.

I began by masking the blossoms.  Then I painted the background and window casing.  The blossoms and branches came last.

The palette was raw sienna, new gamgee (yellow), phthalo blue, quinacridone magenta, opera pink, dioxazine purple, and burnt sienna.  The background is raw sienna and phthato blue painted wet into wet.  The casing is phthalo blue and burnt siena.  The blossoms are magenta and opera pink grayed with phthalo blue or diaxazine purple.   The leaves are a wash of new gamgee and magenta washed over with dioxazine purple.

This painting is currently for sale on-line at my Etsy shop.

Jade and Tulips II (watercolor 11 x 14) $250

This is much the same composition and color scheme as  Jade and Tulips I.  I lowered the tulips which causes them to stand out more than in the original version, but makes the upper line of the composition less interesting.  Including more of the jewelry box increased it’s three dimensionality as did opening thing lower drawer.

The palette and work methods are the same as Jade and Tulips I.

Or purchase a print from Fine Art America.com.

Tulips, Jade, and Books (watercolor 8 x 11) $100.00

Our house is covered in floor to ceiling book shelves.    So it was really only a matter of time before the shelves showed up in one of my still lifes.  This time they feature only as a reflection.

Or purchase a print from Fine Art America.com. See more still paintings at: still life paintings