It's a New Day

A New Day  

8" x 8"  SOLD

I always feel optimistic in the morning. It's the start of a new day and anything can happen. Time seems abundant. 

Carpe Diem!

Ingres Inspired

Ingres Inspired
24" x 18" -  ink, pencil, watercolour on watercolour paper - $50

I am calling this one Ingres Inspired, referring to the great French neo-classical painter Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres. He was mainly a portrait painter, but also painted the female form. Whenever confronted with a nude model in a back pose, I always think of The Valpincon Bather by Ingres .....

And when a back is 'too long' as in my painted drawing, I also think of Ingres and his Grand Odalisque ......

A Classical Figure

A more classical interpretation of the female form ............

Classical Pose
12" x 12" - watercolour on watercolour paper  - $50

T

Molly

  

Molly

17" x 14" - watercolour & marker on watercolour paper  $50

Molly was the model in an open life drawing session......and one more in this series of painted figure drawings.

Titles for Reclining Women

Femme Fatale
18" x 24"  mixed media (marker & water colour paint on water colour paper) $50

Thinking of a catchy or interesting title for an art work can be challenging when the image or subject represented, regardless of the style, does not have a specific location or identity. Certainly the motivation for painting any subject can suggest a title. When the subject is less specific, I try to build some 'word' fun into the title, like Big Macks - the title I gave a recent painting featuring two mackerels on a plate, or Pom Pommes which featured two apples on a background. 

The painted drawing posted here depicts a female nude in a traditional reclining position. Searching for a title, I began to think about other famous reclining nudes in western art. Did you know that the Venetian Renaissance painter Giorgione was the first artist to depict this subject in Sleeping Venus, painted in 1510? 

Since then many artists have been painting the single female form, reclining, awake or asleep. Their attitudes range from demure and virginal to provocative, to bold and challenging. Here is a small sample of that range....

Manet: Olympia, 1863

Goya: The Naked Maja, 1797-1800

Matisse: Blue Nude: Memory of Biskra, 1907

Modigliani: Nude with Necklace, 1917

Leger: Reclining Woman, 1922

Suzanne Valadon: Reclining Nude, 1928

     Lucian Freud: Benefits Supervisor Sleeping, 1995

As for titling my painted drawing - which I quite like for it's bravura colour and graphic strength - I am calling it  Femme Fatale. 

Painting Figures

A Woman of Colour  

24" x 18" - mixed media - marker & water colour on acrylic paper - $50

Another recent figure drawing - to which I applied some water colour paint.

I love the painterly looseness and intense but transparent colours.

Playing with My Paint Box

Resting Figure18" x 24 "  mixed media - marker & water colour on acrylic paper  SOLD

In February I posted several drawings I did in a recent Open Life Studio session - and said that I wasn't sure what to do with them, or how to process them further. This has been an ongoing dilemma - creating some interesting figure drawings on large pieces of paper, and then wondering how to paint them, but fearful of losing the graphic image.  Well yesterday,  I decided 'so what', and got out the water colours, had some fun, and am pretty happy with the way they now look - like painted drawings.

The Rocks at Ucluelet

The Rocks at Ucluelet
48" x 48" - acrylic on canvas
SOLD

Last September we did a 12-day road trip that started on Vancouver Island and finished with a drive through the Canadian Rockies. If you have traveled in this part of Canada you know how visually stunning the landscape is, ‘out west’. Breath taking and spectacular are words that come to mind. Before seeing and being surrounded by snow capped mountains I did wonder about the appeal of painting them – but now I get it!

I have sifted through my 1400+ photos of mountains, lakes, trees, river valleys, a glacier, and coastal views, and have selected a number of images that I hope will be starting points for lots of future paintings. There is nothing like new reference material, to get one re-inspired and squish out the paint and get down to business.

This painting is based on one of those photos, a view of the very dramatic, rocky coastline on the  Wild Pacific Trail at Ucluelet, on the west coast of Vancouver Island. My interpretation is less craggy than what exists, but I am pleased with the sense of scale and mood of isolation suggested by the light and colour.

Big Macks

Big Macks

20" x 24" acrylic on canvas

This is for sale - contact me for price if interested.

My husband has turned into quite a successful fisherman lately - and this means that we have been eating fresh fish, including flounder, whiting, back drum, sheepshead, redfish and Spanish mackerel, almost every day.  Yum!

I always take pictures of the catch - and in my quest to paint different subjects, differently (and get unstuck) - I painted these 2 mackerels based on the photo below.  It's interesting to see how similar they look (well of course they do as they are the same species!) but they actually look different too, and I don't think it's just the way they are posed in the photo.

Did I get stuck or feel stalled while painting this? Yes, at one point I did, and that's when I got out my pastels and started drawing on top of the acrylic paint, fixed that, and then continued painting. Several years ago I often added (soft) pastel marks/lines on top of many of my acrylic paintings, at different points in the process of  painting - liking the graphic natures of the lines and the way it stopped me from making things precious, and forcing a little boldness. As for the colour and palette I chose - these guys were good looking - and deserved a fitting colourful tribute.