waking up crabby

"Tulip Shapes" Acrylic 16 x 21

Do you ever just wake up on the wrong side of the bed? I woke up today just plain ol' mad...no reason really....just a lot of little things adding up to a nasty mood............... .......................................................................................but i feel better now. :)

Kimberly Kelly Santini my first Arte y Pico winner!

"Ivan"... 8 x 8... inches watercolor (this is my youngest son...hehehe)

My first "Arte Y Pico" award winning blog choice is.....

(Drum roll)

Kimberly Kelly Santini! (wild screaming...............crowd noise dies down.......reluctantly)

Kim Santini is a very talented painter that I've actually met! :) She lives just a few miles from me, but I was introduced to her "cyberly" through the Robert Genn newsletter. She's just as charming in person as her blog reads...I love the fact that with many of her "dog-a-day" paintings, a portion of the money from the sold paintings, goes to very deserving animal help centers....and not always the same one, Kim spreads the wealth. Anyway, because of Kim's fun writing style, and terrific paintings....I am choosing her as my first award winner. Yay Kim!

Watercolor on Gesso

"Naperville" 10 x 7.5 inches...watercolor on gessoed paper

This is the beautiful view out of my brother-in-laws home in Naperville, Ill. Gorgeous home...gorgeous view...fun little town. Just wanted to do a small warm up painting before I head back into the aerial view series....
I prepared some sheets of this paper quite a while ago....I brushed the gesso onto the paper with a stiff house painting brush, that created a vertical pattern of brush strokes. It's fun to paint on...and easy to wipe back the watercolor to lighten areas...This is a good thing to do with the watercolor paintings that just don't quite cut the mustard....who doesn't love to be able to call "DO OVER!" :)

Below is another painting done on the same paper....This cute cherub sits in the gardens at Cranbrook, in Bloomfield Hills Michigan....A great place to visit...and a greater place to spend the day painting! :)


"Garden Watcher" 8 x 8 watercolor on gessoed paper
private collection

Aerial 9...now I'm REALLY finished...I think. :)

Aerial 9 Euphrates....14 x 10.5...mixed media

I re-worked this one a bit this morning....Sometimes it takes a while to really really really be done. :)... I got some online advice from fellow artists....and decided to add some glazes and tip it horizontally.

Aerial 4 continued....Here is where it started...Acrylic on paper...still working on it....Comerica Park is too bright, but I'll take care of that later. I'm really enjoying this one...Crossing my fingers that I'll still enjoy it when it's finished. :)

Arte Y Pico Award

I was thrilled to find out that I received the “Arte y Pico” award for my blog….Fine artist Peggy Stermer-Cox bestowed it upon me…I’m feeling like Ralphie’s dad in “A Christmas Story”….I’ve won a major award! :) Seriously…I’m tickled pink….Thanks so much Peggy!

“Arte Y Pico” is described by Ana, the award originator, like this: "Basically, ironically, it translates into a wonderful phrase in Mexico, 'lo maximo'. It will never find its counterpart in English, but if it HAD to, it would be something like, Wow. The Best Art. Over the top". Now how can I not be thrilled with that!?

There are some responsibilities that come with this honor and they are:

The award winners must….

1. Pick FIVE blogs that you consider deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and also for contributing to the blogging community, no matter what language.

2. Each award winning blog has to have the name of the author and also a link to his or her blog.

3. Each award winner has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her or him the award itself.

4. The Award-winner and the one who has given the prize have to show the link of “Arte y Pico” blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award which is here: Arte y Pico.

So, stay tuned to see who I will pass this honor to….It could be you!

"Aerial 9 Euphrates" 15 x 11 inches mixed media

I jumped back into my aerial series today...I think what's going to happen is that I'll work out some compositions in this smaller scale (11 x 15)...then re-do them larger....I used watercolor paper, coated with gesso....then added watercolor, colored pencil, gouache and india ink.
Edit....I've worked more on this one...here is the most recent view.

"Hide Out" 12 x 12 watercolor

I spent a profitable morning at my garage sale :)....then I closed the doors, and the afternoon was spent painting "Hide Out." It is so rare for me to do a painting that's all watercolor these days..(I'm usually mixing media).....but this image seemed to want "pure."

Lake Michigan, after a whopper of a storm took out the electricity at my mom's house in northern Michigan....(the picture was taken a couple of years ago)

I've spent a lot of today, in the garage that didn't get cleaned up yesterday....Procrastination has it's price......

"Orange Roof at Night"... 11.5 x 15 inches... acrylic

I've been procrastinating today... I'm supposed to be organizing and cleaning out our garage to be ready for our neighborhood garage sale this Friday and Saturday....but I painted this instead :) "Orange Roof at Night" didn't photograph very well....there is a lot of subtle color and value changes within each shape....Ok...now I HAVE to go out to the garage....yuck.

Work in Progress....30 x 22 (full sheet watercolor paper)

This is the really early preliminary stages for the newest Aerial View painting...

Anyone recognize the spot? (hint: "On the banks of the Red Cedar...." ) This will be for my oldest if he wants it when I'm finished....He'll have his choice of either this one ...or Comerica Park. It's a fine line with these...to have it be recognizable...but to still be compatible with my artistic aesthetic....push and pull....actual or fantasy patterning....It's a bit exhausting actually. I'll need to prop this one up and have a bit of a think.

I'm home from a fun visit with family in Honor, Michigan then Naperville, Ill..(Chicago suburb)...It feels good to be back to the studio after a long absence.

My nephew is in the Marines, serving in Iraq. He sent some photos from a recent mission, and I thought the patterning in a small section of one of his shots was interesting....So I played a bit in photoshop...cropping and changing color and contrast just to see if something tripped my switch....Below are a couple of options.....

I use the computer quite often as inspiration, and as a planning tool....The final paintings probably would probably resemble the virtual sketches above...but certainly not exactly...

Duane Keiser has posted the most interesting blog post....It's about his experience seeing Velazquez's "Las Meninas" in Madrid....

Happy 4th!

I'm up in northern Michigan, visiting my mom and her husband, Bill. I had made her this flag out of old barn wood, probably 5 years ago...I bought the wood from ebay....You know the old adage "there is a sucker born every minute"...well, I am one of them. The package arrived...extra heavy...because the wood was damp...and peee-yew! I paid extra for the barn animal smell....Luckily, when it dried out...the pungent aroma went away....She was pleased anyway! (The stars were snipped from roof flashing....they appear white on this photo...but are actually silver.)

We are going to watch the Traverse City Beach Bums baseball game tonight....Fireworks after the game.... "ooooohhhhh.....aaaaaaaaahhhhhh!"

"Blue Welsh Corgi" 5 x 5 watercolor and colored pencil

I've been painting each day...(and not always my aerial view series...or I'd start to go nuts working on the same thing all of the time)....I was browsing the copywrite free reference image library at Wet Canvas and found some really cute dog photos to paint from....Thanks to Crias at Wet Canvas for generously sharing many wonderful doggy shots...

Backyard blooms.... I like this combination of plants...Peachy orange lilies and the tall white thingys that I can't remember the name of. :) My dasies are in full bloom right now too....dasies are such a happy flower.

Did you ever wonder just what color "Puce" is? Here is a fun site that will show you....Name that color

I'm still working on the Comerica Park aerial painting....I'm a bit stumped with it at the moment.....hmmmmmmmm