A Whiter Shade Of Pale

A Whiter Shade Of Pale
Oil  8" x 6"
$100.00 + $10. s/h

SOLD

I love the warmth when painting in the late afternoon.  But, I love the challenge of painting the cool morning whites.  This was one of the last iris in our back yard.  We have fewer white iris than yellow and violet and only a few of them bloomed this year.  Maybe they're getting too much shade.  I'll think about dividing and moving some in the fall.

Whites are always a fun challenge, whether cool or warm.  For Christmas our son gave me a book called Roy G. Biv by Jude Stewart.  Many kids learned the color this way:  red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet.  I didn't teach it that way, I used the 3 primaries and 3 secondaries.  Nevertheless, it's a great title for "an exceedingly surprising book about color."  I just read the chapter on white.  It says that Benjamin Moore has 140 shades of white paint!  I also learned that Queen Victoria popularized white for wedding dresses, and that the Latvian song for happy birthdays is  "Have Many White Days."

Night Hawk Dreams

Night Hawk Dreams
Oil 6" x 8"
$100.00 + $10. s/h

SOLD

Night Hawk Dreams is from a trip to Iris4U Gardens in Denver.  Iris 4 U grows tall, bearded iris.  Some years there are more iris than others, but no matter how many there are, it's a spectacular place.  A garden that makes you want to paint and shop!

Morning at Red Rock Canyon

Morning At Red Rock Canyon
Oil on canvas on board  8" x 10"
$195.00 + $10. s/h

Last week several friends and I painted in Red Rock Canyon Open Space with PAAC (Plein Air Artists of Colorado).  It was an overcast morning and the light and clouds were constantly changing.  Something to always be aware of is not to chase the light.  So, the clouds created a strong shadow over the mid-mountains.  I blocked that in first.  The rocks in the front were in strong sun.  So I painted them bright and left them.  I painted in the back range, clouds, and sky last.  They seemed to be the supporting cast.

Once again I'm not quite getting the correct blues when I upload my painting pictures onto my blog.  The blues in the back range are just a bit grayer than in this photo.  Still working on this.

Two of the others painting.

Three photos showing the changing light. 

Old Garage

Old Garage

Oil on canvas on board  8" x 10"

SOLD

Yesterday my plein air group, Garden Artists, painted in a wonderful backyard owned by Sandra Knauf, the editor and designer of Greenwoman Magazine.  Her yard is filled with flowers, vegetables, a pond, and wonderful places to sit.  Sandra founded the magazine on three passions:  her deep love of garden writing, an enthusiasm for gardening, and a desire to do something that would excite people about both.   Greenwoman Magazine is "devoted to gardening thought in all its forms--fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, commentary, biography, interviews, art, and comics. We publish a rich variety of new voices and we revisit the classics."

You can read about Sandra in an article from our local newspaper.  I read this last fall and thought it might be a great connection and location for our plein air group.

Here are some of the others in my plein air group: