Soften My Heart

  

       Soften My Heart - oil on canvas - 34" x 37"

Who doesn't love pink and turquoise? Who doesn't love pink roses from the garden placed in a clear glass vase?

Who doesn't love when the petals start cascading onto a reflective surface?

It is enough to soften any heart. 

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Reveling in Cherry Blossoms

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One of the pleasures I have as an artist is exploring color and color combinations. I was so drawn to paint these pink little puffs with a golden mustard color as the background. The violet shadow tones in the blossoms "sang" beside the yellow, pushing the pleasure of painting and viewing this piece when finished. 

 

Cherry Blossoms

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Making this painting was a first on a few levels.  It is the biggest painting I've made to date, 48"x44". Additionally, it was the first time I painted a tree inside my studio. Well, maybe not the whole tree. 

I actually bought three cherry blossom branches from my local florist, and then brought them into my studio, plopped them in a bucket of water and started painting. Having the branches inside meant I could take my time with the little dangling puffs of pink,  and pay attention to the value  and color changes on these intricate, delicate forms. It was lovely to get up so close to them for a thorough study. 

Following the twisting, rising lines of the branches and foliage was dizzying at times. I had to push the perspective to create the sense of the branches reaching up, while putting thick bold paint on the thicker bark  sections at the base.  The chance to spend so much time intimately contemplating the beauty of these boughs was like a blessing. 

Pantone 2022 - Very Peri

Pantone chose Very Peri as the IT color of 2022. The purplish tone encourages individual inventiveness and creativity. Game on. Let's get some Very Peri on the walls. This little collection of recent work is a good start. 

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Cherry Blossom Jubilee

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My local florist sells cherry blossom boughs in early spring. I bought one, and brought it into my studio. The branch, plopped in a bucket of water, stood patiently while I placed different color swatches behind it, "feeling" for the right match. The pink flowerets seemed to sing when I put the turquoise cloth behind them, and that, of course, was the tell. 

Painting nature indoors is a curious thing. Without the elements, I could explore the details of the leaves and bark and buds almost leisurely, and at eye level, which was very sweet. But at times, especially as it started to die, the cherry branch seemed painfully out of her element. I realize now, that it was the turquoise cloth which echoed an open, free sky that helped soften the story of this wild beauty, held captive inside the walls of my studio.                                                              

Flowers for a Finch

 Happy New Year's Eve

I was just thinking that it had been a while since I last posted here, and that maybe today was a good day to check in. Looks like I had the same thought exactly one year ago. Check out the last post if you don't believe me. What are the chances of that? ... well, 1 in 365. 

 Flowers for a Finch is a breakout piece for me, new in every way except for the flowers, of course. I will  be back at my easel on Monday and am excited to continue exploring this new direction. I am resolute in my wish to post here regularly in the New Year.  I have a sneaking suspicion that was my resolution last year, too. Oh, well.

Here's to the best year yet for all of us. 2022, we are counting on you. 

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Sweet Peas and Peonies

I am very please with the colors in this piece and the sense of light. Color and light are two aspects of painting that I have been honing for years, and am starting to feel a sense of confidence in those areas. I am currently trying to up my composition game, and made two choices that I believe were successful here. The first was to juxtapose soft curving flower forms with the straight edges of a square glass vase. Secondly, I paid extra attention to the placement of the subject matter in the canvas space. Here, I made sure that the distance between the edge of the canvas and the painted object closest to that edge was the same on all sides. Again, I believe it was successful. 

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