I have read several articles about how beneficial painting in a series is to an artist. One piece went so far as to say the way to tell professional artists from art hobbyists was their willingness to work in a series. I'm not sure about that but it is food for thought. [...]
Annie, Penny and Sophia. Our daughter's (full of personality) potbelly pigs. ‘Honey’ and our son like to fish. They have both been fishing for years and have good fishing techniques. One time our son cast his line over a tree branch and a fish jumped out of the water and took the hook as it hung from the tree. Now that is fishing talent! The two of them have informed me that there are many fishing techniques but this is the first time I have heard about catching a fish with the line dangling over a tree branch. They both say that [...]
I took the lid off my dried up watercolor paints and picked up a bristle brush. I decided to go ahead and use the hard as a rock and sometimes flaking paints on the exercise Skip introduced. Why not, at least I wouldn't be wasting any ‘good' paint while fooling with the same subject over and over again. My object of choice was a 3” yellow plastic spackle knife. Not once did I paint it in yellow. I explored that yellow spackle knife forward, backward and inside out before I got finished. I thought I never wanted to see another spackle knife in my life! [...]
I really don't consider myself to be a perfectionist (well, maybe just a little). To prove it let me tell you this, I think I could be a much better painter than I am, and I have difficulty accepting compliments. In fact I think compliments given to me are undeserved. Perfectionism is also a big cause of stress and procrastination, I'm definitely a procrastinator. [...]
We all know some subjects sell better than others and painters who don't work at other jobs need a way of supporting themselves. Their best bet would be to spend one day a week producing work that they know will sell and the other days producing their better work. Those who happen to feel passionate about what is the current ‘best seller' in art are the lucky ones. [...]
I took a photo of these thistles while in Napa Valley, CA. Looking at the painting makes me think of the warm day and beautiful view with miles and miles of grape vineyards. A few years ago ‘Honey’, his brothers and their sons went fishing in Alaska (their wives and daughters weren’t invited). That gave Barbara, my sister-in-law, and me a chance to go to Switzerland. That is how we found ourselves in a little town on a plateau in the Pennines Alps with mountains rising high all around. Many of the people there were contented and enjoying comfortable lives. Others looked at [...]
This is one of a very few watercolor architecture scenes I painted. Miralago, Switzerland is such a beautiful place I would love to go back there again. Narrow streets and alleyways. Amazing. When I retired my life didn’t change a lot. ‘Honey’ was still working and I still did everything at home. All that changed is I had more time during the day and I was less organized than I had been when I was working. When ‘Honey’ retired something happened to my brain. I took off my wristwatch and declared, “I am retired too!” Thus it started, [...]
Robins built a nest on our deck rail Robins have built a nest against our house right next to the front door. They chose the deck rail for their creation. How could they have missed seeing us going in and out the door? Didn’t they know the rail was low and offered no protection from predators? The deck gets very hot in the afternoon sun, why couldn’t they feel that? Had they thought about it ahead of time they wouldn’t have built the nest in that particular spot. If they had been capable of planning ahead they wouldn’t have [...]
