Big and Small

Waterfalls, Red Butte Garden (Utah)

I love visiting my daughter in Salt Lake City and walking around there, both in the city and in the parks. I think I have finally finished this painting. It took me quite a while since it is oil paint (Winsor & Newton Artisan, water mixable) and I had to let it dry for a while so I could continue doing some layers.  I'm starting to get a little more patient with this process.  This is the largest canvas I have worked on so far, 18" X 24" (stretched canvas), and I like working larger on some pieces. Red Butte Garden

Siesta Time

This painting is a lot smaller, 8" X 10" on canvas board. The calves were resting quietly at the farm I visited in Vermont. I guess they are used to seeing all the tourists and customers at the farm.  They were behind barbed wire, but I did not include that in my painting.  This is also water mixable oil paints.  It was my first time painting cows, but I have painted and sketched other animals before. You get see earlier versions of these two paintings in the previous posts.

Fall is finishing up here in New Hampshire.  While we still have leaves to rake up, snow is on its way. Meanwhile, Joe and I took a walk in a conservation area in nearby Londonderry, NH. I'm looking forward to the snow and getting out again on my cross country skis.

Nancy's Fuchsias

I think this painting is finally done. I couldn't get a good photo of it, the greens kept coming out too garish even though I tried to fix them with Photoshop. I finally decided to use my scanner. That worked out much better and the colors look close to what they really are. (Full disclosure, I have cataracts and greens are a problem for me.)

The painting is 8" X 8", Winsor & Newton water mixable oils, on gallery wrapped canvas. I took suggestions from several other artists and I'm happy with it now. I posted it on my website and you can order cards or prints there.

I'm also playing with two other canvases, but they are not finished yet.  I started on the heifers this week (I had prepared the canvas board quite a while ago).  I think I'm going to call it siesta time when it's all done.  I don't like the red I used for the tags and I have already washed that off and will try a different red when I go back to working on this one.  This is my first time paintings cows, although I've done other animals.  The cows were resting behind barbed wire at the Four Corners Farm in Vermont.  I don't think I'll include the wire in the final painting.

I played with some different mixtures of paint for this one. I mixed burnt sienna with viridian for one mixture, then with cerulean blue for another.  I tried adding yellow ochre to some of the mixes too.

My waterfall painting is moving along nicely.  The addition of the tree branch in front helped push back the rest of the landscape.  I still have more to do on this one, but I like it better now.  Because I was trying out different painting techniques, I was getting very discouraged at first.  I am still learning how to manipulate the water mixable oil paint and sometimes get very frustrated, but I keep at it. This painting is based on a photo I took at Red Butte Gardens in Salt Lake City, Utah a few years ago.