Winter WaterScapes

Watercolor on paper 8 1/2" x 5 1/2"

I've been continuing to work with watercolors.  I like them.  They are easy for me to set up, finish a painting, and easy clean my work area. I can work in watercolor paint without dedicating too much time to the process.   I have set up some new lighting in my studio. This helps me to have more flexible work hours and to be able to work at night.  

I've been out of my studio for a while.  I had a visitor who needed a bedroom for a few months, and I gladly gave her my studio/office to set up a room. I needed to change the energy in my place, and having her here helped me see what I was missing from life. During her stay, I stopped being creative and threw myself into my career. 

Now that I have my studio back, I've reorganized, and found a new desire to get back to work.  

I hung a large oil painting in my studio. It had been stored the past five years so haven't really been able to look at it.  The canvas fills most of the wall. It is the painting in the post titled "Green Blues" from 2012.  Looking at this painting everyday has inspired me to go back to this style in composition.  Calm waters in the background, with textured water or land in the foreground. 

 These watercolors include using my gold pen.  A fond memory from my days working in my atelier in Nice, France. 

Watercolor on paper 8 1/2" x 5 1/2"

Watercolor on paper 8 1/2" x 5 1/2"

Something New Finished

Oil on canvas 32 x 40

This is the finished painting of Facing my Fears.  I still have this new creative focus in life and art to challenge my fears and not put them behind me, but make them a part of me to help me move forward.  Defining my fears has been difficult, since through the years I have covered them with new ways of thinking to get around them.  I thought I was facing my fears then, but really I was only changing the routes to go around them.  
   
I see myself at a transition point in my life, and feeling stagnate.  Although I am passionate about new/old  ideas that I want to pursue, I have been procrastinating to take the steps that I need to make these ideas move forward.   I believe spiritually, psychologically, and physically, that challenging the fears in my life, and moving past them will give me the new energy that I need to progress.  The energy field that surrounds me will be able to open up and allow new nuances to enter and influence my direction.  If I want to keep moving forward in life, I need to cross over the fence,  or jump to the other side of the creek bed, and not be afraid of what's on the other side.  

(I watched a program on Leonardo da Vinci.. it has inspired me to try a portrait painting. :)     

Going Back

Acrylic on Canvas- 25"x 32"
tableau de Yannis

I call this painting tableau de Yannis.   While I was in Nice 2010, I asked Yannis for his advice several times for the direction I should take with this painting. 

I met with Yannis and Paulin again in September. It has been the first time to see them in five years.   It was good to see the gallery again.  It was time to go back, no regrets.   They have shared with me a significant part of my life that will not be forgotten, and for their friendship, I am grateful. 

There was always laughter between the three of us.  We were the three artists.  The best moments were spent filling my sketch book with characters and scenes while drinking vin chaude or beer in the afternoon.  We spent hours in bars sitting at a table, telling our stories conveyed in small caricature drawings.  There was once a day we spent a few too many hours at one of our favorite bars.  Our laughter and behavior started to become a little too disruptive, and eventually we were asked to leave.  There was much joy between the three of us. 

les trois amigos

 It felt good to be back again, like a second home, seeing them, and knowing that there could still be a small part of me in them as well. 

Something New

Something new, but back to something old also.    This is a painting for a concept to look at my fears.  As a result, it has influenced a lot of decisions in my daily life, and evaluating my anxieties and fears to determine their validity.   Instead of holding back, doing it anyway without "fear" of the impression that I may give out or of the consequences.  

I've spent the day in my studio today listening to Beethoven, evaluating my next step with this painting,  intending to take my brush into hand.  But today and lately, I have been too distracted.   I am overwhelmed by my thoughts and planning for my next trip to France,   Villefranche-sur-mer. It's been a long time since I have made this journey, and I hope to be able to make peace with the sea. 

Happy Day, May 2011 Villefranche sur mer

Progression

From this: 

PHASE  1:  Oil on Canvas 30x42

To this: 

PHASE 2-  Oil on Canvas 30x42

A progression from inspiration and motivation to a product of my thoughts and emotions and aspirations.   I am still not sure where I am going with this phase.  I am still experimenting in painting with no  planning or design and using intuition.  My subconscious is revealing what it believes needs to happen, even when I consciously try not to be predictable. 

Day Dreams

Italian Water scape  Oil on Canvas- 36"x 48"

My work has been challenging in the real world, and as a result, I think my paintings seem to reflect some of the challenges that I am facing and the hope of some relief at the end of the year.  I started and finished this painting to help me work through a difficult time.  

My dreams of traveling are mixed with a feelings of entrapment, 
but I know that this phase of living will have an end. I'm already planning travels and filling my thoughts with day dreams along the Cote d'Azur with sunshine, blue sky, wine and the Sea.  

In subject and composition, I have started a new painting with this same theme, but it is laid out with a different point perspective.  I am anxious to see the future that the finished piece will reveal to me. 

Short Stories



Oil on Canvas 11x14

Recently I was inspired by a friend of mine who is also an artist to work in a smaller format.   This was an important moment for me because until I saw the body of work he had produced, I was giving up painting and being an artist.   In the past few months since my last post, painting represented to me not a labor of love but labor to prove my value and worthiness to call myself an artist.  Without any new inspiration, I closed the door to future work. 



Oil on Canvas  11x14



 

It has been refreshing for me to work again in these small canvas's.  It's a quiet passion.  A smaller work that does not come with the rewards of seeing a large canvas come to life, but gives me the satisfaction of moving forward. I am still passionate about my Lake Scenes, or now they have become just "Water Scenes".  This format lets me continue to work with my mind's eye freely and without justification. 

Green Blues

48"x80" Oil on Canvas

This is the most recent oil painting that I have completed.  I believe this painting is going to represent a bridge into a new collection of my work-  
a new direction of colors and texture.

This painting is a continuation of the previous oil painting that I posted, but a much larger size.  I wanted to work again with the palette knife, and use again some of elements and techniques from the painting "San Remo".   Even with the Sea and its inspirational waves very far away from me, there is still a strong water theme in my work.   Instead of representing water, I am representing waves of Life's Energy that flow through and around everyone.  

The churning waters of the green-blue hues are carrying me, and helping me to discover a new direction of living and believing each day.  My life is very stable, calm, reflective, and content, but my paintings continue to reflect the passions that are still always a part of me.  I am alive and growing-  an energy of evolution.