Yellowfin Tuna from Venice Louisiana...Oil Painting

 

This is a photo taken by some dear friends of mine that went fishing in Venice, La.  They were gracious enough to let me do a panting of the day's catch.

This is the painting that resulted from it.  I wish everyone could see the real thing (painting).  Up close you can see the little brushmarks and when you get far away your eye blends it into a composite smooth version.  My favorite part is the guy in the corner.  I don't think these are his fish!  Is he going to go home and tell a "fish tale"?  I wonder...

What's for Dinner?.....Oil Painting

This is a fairly large painting...24x24...and I can just see it gracing a dining room wall somewhere.  The background is so much prettier than the photo seems to indicate.  I'll admit this one has spent a little time in my living room.  (The ones I really like, I bring them out of the foyer and rest them on the fireplace where I can see them when I watch TV at night.  That way I get to enjoy them for a while before they find a new home.)

Bottle Collection.....oil painting

These bottles are part of a collection that I have been working on for years.  They normally reside in the windowsills of my three kitchen windows.  But they took a little vacation out to the sunshine of my back deck for a photo shoot one day.  I love it when I paint glass and it comes out looking like you CAN see through it. 

Big news!......Empty Easel and a workshop

Well a lot of crazy things happened all at once and this tomato sort of became the poster child for my art. 

First of all, I have an article being published today on the Empty Easel art site.  I have subscribed to EE for quite a while now.  It is a great artist's resource and has grown tremendously over the last few years.  A couple of weeks ago they published an "art opinion" that I strongly disagreed with, so I wrote a response and sent it in.  You can read both my article and the orginal one that I responded to by going here.  This tomato's cousins (from my blog post on 10/11) are featured in the article along with some pears.

Next, I have, as mentioned in the article, been asked to teach my first workshop.  I am very excited.  It will be April 19 & 20, 2012 at the Eastern Shore Arts Center in Fairhope, Alabama.  They are in the process of putting together the brochure for the spring so once I have definite info for how to sign up I will post it here.  This tomato will be the featured art for my ad in the brochure.

Lastly, I will be attending the Peter Anderson Festival in Ocean Springs, MS on November 5 and 6.  This is an amazing festival that is in it's 33rd year.  This is the first year that I have run an ad in the festival handout that is put together by Southern Living Magazine.  You guessed it...my ad features the one and only bold tomato.  It is a very striking ad I have to say.

Well, I am off to Memphis later today for the River Arts Festival.  This is going to be a rough one simply because, due to circumstances beyond my control, we are going to be getting up there for set-up very late this evening.  But, that is all part of the process.  It happens that way sometimes in the "glamorous" life of an artist....oh, and YES, I am an artist.....and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Beached......oil painting

This is the first painting that sold at my art festival in Shreveport at the beginning of Oct.  It was a larger version of the 12x12 crabs that I have been doing.  This one was 16x20 and was done at the suggestion of my daughter, Dacia.  Good idea Daysh!  I'll have to listen to you more often! 

Courtyard in Sorrento.....oil painting

This was painted from a photo from our trip to Sorrento in southern Italy last September.  I don't know for sure what this building was.  It looked like a church, but when you peeked into this courtyard there was art hanging on the walls in the walkway fehind these arches.  Whatever it was it was my kind of place!

Sax Appeal......oil painting

Ok, sorry for the lame title, but I have already done "Sax Education" in the past.  I can't help myself sometimes.

This striking photo was taken during our recent visit to Austin, TX.  The group was named Roxy Roca and we really enjoyed hearing them at the Saxon Pub.  I painted a larger painting featuring four of the nine memebers of the group (posted on 10-17-11).  This is a close-up of the gentleman on the far left.

On another note... Imagine my surprise when I realized that the blog posts that I had saved as drafts and thought I had set to publish at later dates for the last year or so have been sitting in limbo-land saved as drafts, but not actually scheduled to publish.  So I went ahead and published the ones from the last couple of weeks.  I'm not sure if they all arrived in the inboxes of my subscribers in one big wad...if they did, I apologize for the art avalanche.  If not, then there are some posts that you loyal subscribers that don't like to miss anything will want to scroll back and revisit.  I'll get the hang of this one day!

Right now I have lots of new artwork to publish, but when I run out of new stuff I plan to go back and publish some of the things that got missed!   There's some good stuff in there.

Bonito.....oil painting

This is a fish that we caught this summer when we went deep sea fishing during our trip to Dauphin Island.  I asked my son-in-law, Shaun what it was after I had painted it and he said it was a bonito.  So I went with that.  Well, I was sitting in my booth in Fairhope minding my own business and a little boy who could not have been any more than 6 or 7 said, "Look at the bonito, mom!".  Wow, that is some savy little fisherman! 

On the Chopping Block....Oil painting

This is a little bit of a departure for me.  I think is the first painting I have done of this type with the dark brown background.  I really like it.  But my favorite part is the skin on the onion!  I LOVE the pink in it!  and the highlight!  It just doesn't take much to make me happy!

Playing the Blues...oil painting

This painting is from a photo I took on a recent trip to Austin, TX.  These guys were playing at a place known for it's great music...the Saxon Pub.  It was a great evening and I love the painting, too.

Tabasco and Peppers....oil paintings

Tabasco is still going strong, as well, in the popularity department...this time I have added peppers with some of them.  The folks in Shreveport live so close to Texas that they thought the peppers on the right were supposed to be a boot.  I see their point.

My Crab, Shrimp, Crawfish, Oyster series is still proving to be a favorite.  They are so versatile... horizontal on a backsplash, vertical in a group of two or three, hung in a block of four, three in one spot and the fourth on an easel on a pile of cookbooks.  Lots of ideas and luckily lots of seafood in the sea! 

Tomatoes....Oil paintings

                     

    

I have decided to streamline my blogging process.  I want to share my art, but life keeps getting busier.  My plan is to try to do blog posts that don't take as much time, so therefore they may actually get done.  If you are interestd in a certain piece, feel free to email me about the size and cost.  It takes a while to center that info under the photo and not everyone needs that...so poof, it is gone by the wayside.

These are the tomatoes that I promised "tomorrow" a couple of weeks ago.  Someone at one of my shows reminded me that they were still waiting for tomatoes....so here they are! 

My tomatoes have been very popular this fall!  I sold 5 (five!) tomato paintings at RedRiverRevel in Shreveport and could possibly have sold more if I had had them. 

Ok, I am off to paint! (You guessed it!  Tomatoes today.)