Country Road in Autumn

Don't you just want to drive down this road real slow in a truck with the windows down and the radio on a country station?
Yeah... I do. 
But it has to be on this exact day... no longer hot, but not cold yet... the day before some of the leaves wouldn't have turned, and the next day they'll have begun to fall.
Hhhhhhhh.... just makes me sigh...
A car or a cow or a person would just stifle my mind's imagination for this scene.  
I'm wondering... 
Who lives down the road?  
How much farther 'til 'we're there?  
How far away is the nearest store?  
How often is this road traveled? Do you have to pull over if you meet another car?
Are there cattle behind that fence? or a horse? maybe a donkey!
What sounds would I hear if I was there? birds? crickets?

I love the peaceful tone; however, I have to say it was odd working on an autumn painting in June!  I've heard musicians say how weird it is to record a Christmas album in July.  I guess it's kind of the same.  😉

This was the second project Cheri had for us during our painting weekend at Welcome Home Retreat.  Lots of lessons from this one... perspective...vanishing point... light source... claiming freedom from the reference photo... using bits of sky color in other areas of the canvas...

And, just for fun... As I began working on this post I realized something.
Look...
I wonder... If we have a third workshop... ??? Oh, dear... you do not want to see my third painting... It was a white cup on a black background... not good... not good at all... 

My first painting ever
February 2007

Our first  painting workshop
 February 2017

My second painting ever
March 2007

Our second painting workshop
 June 2017

Original Oil Painting on 9" x 12" Wrapped Canvas
[SOLD]

The Strut

When I first saw his picture, I thought he was magnificent and asked my friend's permission to him.

Originally I'd imagined a portrait, a beautiful rooster filling the canvas with a kind of blurred out background. 

But, as I got started, I wanted my painting to tell the whole story.  The character, the rooster, really isn't the focus of this story.  It's about the setting... Her post said, "Quick weekend get away to do nothing but enjoy the beauty of Boxley and do nothing for a change."

So... it ALL became important... the trees, the rocks, the porch, the water tub, the peace pole, the fallen leaves, the foggy distance...

Don't you just want to be right there!?

Even with a stack of papers to grade on your lap, can't you just feel contentment and peacefulness of being in this place... and it's even better to know that a cocky rooster would be strutting around showing off for his hens!

Original Oil Painting -12"x 12" 

[SOLD]

Red Cottage in Fall III

Nope. 
It's not a repeat post... 
...just a new version... a rerun of a good one!
The last Red Cottage in Fall was for my school's fall festival silent auction.  My principal said up front that she wanted it and planned to bid to win, but one of my students out bid her. 


It was a pretty stress-free painting, so I did another.   
Surprise!

Usually I get to enjoy my paintings for a time while they wait to be bought. Sadly, I didn't get to hold on to either one of these and I really liked them. Hmmmm... maybe one more?? :)

Original Oil Painting - 8"x 10"
[GIFT]
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Red Cottage in Fall II

Every year our PTA asks each class to decorate a pumpkin for our Fall Festival.  They're raffled off for a fund raiser.  

This year we got a choice between a pumpkin or a canvas to decorate. 

Yay!!  

I picked... a canvas! Yeah, I suppose the idea was that each kid might put a thumbprint and make it into a little pumpkin face, but I decided I'd go a different direction on the idea of canvases and pumpkins.


I hung the painting in the front of the classroom and asked my students to think about who might live there and what the pumpkins were for.  I told them we'd make a book to go with the painting for the auction. 

First they thought, imagined, and talked; then they wrote...  
  
Oh, I do have a wonderful job!  

Such creative hardworking little people I spend my days with!   

I hope our little project makes a few dollars for our school. 

I bet it will.

Original Oil Painting - 8"x 10"
[SOLD]

A Family

I love seeing families who enjoy being together.  
I think that's the story that this painting tells.  There's a fantastic bridge, a pretty creek, a leaf covered hillside, and a bright autumn day with a chill in the air. But, I don't think any of those is what this painting is really about.  
At the center of it all... is a family.  
I love that.

[SOLD]
Original Oil Painting on 12"x 16"  Wrapped Canvas

Aspens in Autumn II

Who's your biggest fan?  Who's your best critic?

Here's mine.
He's been holding up my projects for me to get a photo for 30 years.  
He just always gets cropped out of the picture.

[SOLD]
   ... the painting... not the holder. :)

Fork in the Path

When there's a fork in the road, which one do you take?

Maybe Robert Frost's poem comes to your mind:

     "Two roads diverged in yellow wood..."

That's kind of perfect for this painting.

But, I keep thinking of another poem by Sam Walter Foss.

     "One day, through the primeval wood.

     A calf walked home, as good calves should;

     But made a trail all bent askew,

      A crooked trail, as all calves do.

It goes on to say that other animals then humans and finally a busy road followed that calf's crooked path instead of making their own straight paths.  I actually read part of that poem in my high school graduation speech way back in 1982.

If you follow this driveway and turn at the first fork, you'll end up at my house.  As soon as those autumn leaves fall, you'll be able to see it.  If you don't take that fork, you'll go around the pond and end up at our neighbor's house.  Watch out for our deer!

[SOLD]
Original Oil Painting on 12"16" Wrapped Canvas

The Cat and His Boy

Who's got your back?

What a sweet and peaceful image of a comfortable friendship!  I think that Cody THE Cat has got his friend T.J.'s back here.  

As I was thinking of a just-right title for this painting, I kept coming back to the friendship and the fact that the cat seemed to be responsible for, watching over, protecting the little one.  It reminded me of Nana the big Newfoundland dog who was the children's nursemaid in Peter Pan.  Then I thought of the fifth book from The Chronicles of Narnia, The Horse and His Boy.  It fits. This cat does not seem to believe he belongs to the boy; in this cat's mind, the boy is his.

Cody THE Cat showed up at my sister's family's farm and pretty much took on the role as overseer of all who come and go there.

I'm kind of a fan of every inch of this canvas.  

I was worried about getting enough depth in the background, so I started at the back and worked my way forward.  It's always a little scary (and exciting as I get more confident in my own abilities that it will work) to put a line of trees on top of a perfectly beautiful sky.  Then again, to set bigger more detailed trees down right on top what's already a lovely line of autumn trees and bushes.  Then again, again, to put that dark shadowy line at the base of what was a really nice background. Whew!

When I tackled the water, I took the opposite approach.  I started at the front or bottom and moved back or up.  I created nice water with the ripples and movement.... sigh...  it takes a deep breath and some confidence to put brown lines and smudges of golds and rusts and greens in the water.  Then once the color is there, to rake it back and forth to make it look ripply takes an even deeper breath and a self reminder that it can be completely painted over and redone when / if it gets completely ruined. When it worked out, I thought I'd feel relief, but I felt more disbelief... Whew! 

One step at a time... adding sticks and weeds... tedious... then a pole... bright red... and straight across my pretty ripples... excruciating!  
Who says painting is relaxing?  And, what are they painting anyway?

The next challenge was in color.  T.J.'s shirt was actually blue, the same blue as the pond.  And Cody THE Cat was practically camouflaged as he was the same color as the leaves!  I took a few liberties there (a.k.a. cheated).  I didn't think either would mind.

How odd that the easiest part of this painting was the little fella at the center of it all.

[GIFT]