Not So Sunny Sunflowers

Not So Sunny Sunfowers

Oil on canvas, 20x24

Please contact me for price and delivery information!

I really, really love this painting!

I love the quiet colors of the flowers themselves, and the dark, deep, moving background. I love the swirls and pale rainbows of the petals, and the curves and sort of random but orderly quality of the palette knife strokes behind the flowers.

I love the presence that this painting has - and how interesting it is.

This background thing seems like it is taking me somewhere - and I don't know where, yet. But I am willing to keep riding, and see!

This painting, and many more, will be in "Dreaming in Color," my show with Shawn Dell Joyce at the Wallkill River School in April. I hang my work on Sunday! The opening reception is on April 14th, a Saturday, from 5-7 p.m. If you're in the area, please stop in!

For more about the Wallkill River School, click here. 

Kosey

Kosey

Oil on canvas, 12x12, commission

So where the HECK have I been? Well, in short, I've been trying to catch up, from a spot so far behind that I feel like I've been watching my own butt.

I ended up breaking even at the Paradise City Marlborough show, thanks to a friend and her husband who came along and bought my favorite painting, "Sunset on the Salt Marsh." Were it not for them, I'd have been in the hole for the show, though not as far in the hole as last year.

Still, a commission has come to me already, and I had some good and serious conversations with people at the show who might be interested in buying my work - so you never know. But with two precarious years in a row, I start to think that this just might not be a good venue for me.

So I think - OK, I won't do it next year. And yet, I can hear a niggling voice - Well, I did better this year than last year... and it should be an excellent show for me... so maybe Year 3 is the breakthrough year... I did have excellent conversations with a generally engaged and enthusiastic audience....

I guess the answer is: Wait and See!

In the meantime, I've been catching up on my day job, catching up on my commissions, catching up on painting for Center Framing & Art, and catching up painting for my upcoming show at the  Wallkill River School Gallery.  (that show runs for the month of April, with the opening reception on April 14 from 5-7 p.m. Please come!)

And I am making paintings that I love!

Paradise City Marlborough

My booth - 407! - at the Paradise City Arts Festival in Marlborough, MA

Well, Day 2 of the Paradise City Arts Show is dawning a little gray, which is excellent - if it's too beautiful outside, no one wants to go to an art show! I am a little sore and tired from putting my new tent up in the driveway on Wednesday (about 6 hours), then taking it down and putting it up in Marlborough on Thursday (four hours, with some errors) and then standing for most of Saturday - but it's a good tired, as my mother would have said.

Two paintings sold yesterday, and that was great! And I had a lot of people in the booth, enjoying my work, smiling and laughing, and bringing their own great energy and enthusiasm. The show is really fabulous, and I am going to spend some time this morning, before it opens, checking out some of the other work. What I've seen has been just luscious.

So if you're in the area, check it out! And if you're planning already on going, please stop by Booth 407 and say hello. The show goes on through Sunday, at 5 p.m.

And let me know what you think of my new setup! I made a couple errors, which caused the rear wall to droop a bit - but next time, I will know what to avoid. I welcome any comments or critiques.

Buttonwood Cows

Buttonwood Cowscape

Oil on canvas, 24x48

Please contact me for price and delivery options

I am hoping hoping hoping that this painting is dry enough to transport on Thursday, so I can bring it to the Paradise City show in Marlborough, MA!  It has everything, doesn't it? Sunflowers, cows and a really cool stone wall.

This is a somewhat frantic time for me, as I report and write like a fiend, to get my Montville Patch work done, as much as possible, before I leave for the show. Meantime, I am doing the finish work on paintings (painting the bottoms, putting hanging wires on them, making sure I've signed them...) and trying hard to remember every little item and doodad that I bring to shows. The wheels are rusty, that's for sure.

Storm Coming In III

Storm Coming In III

Oil on canvas, 10x10,
sold

Thanks for all the good wishes on my tent, upcoming show, etc. And for all you smart-aleks out there, and you know who you are, be glad I got a big tent. When we all go broke together, I'll invite you to live with me and the smelly dogs, in the aforementioned tent.

That tent, my future home, I found out, was NOT due to arrive on Friday (I waited breathlessly all day) but was due to leave the warehouse on Friday. Sigh.

***

If you are in the area of Gales Ferry, CT, this weekend, stop by for the grand opening of Seasonal Home, a brand new old-and-new store, 6 Hurlbutt Road (great name, eh?) in downtown (hahahaha) Gales Ferry.

One of the partners is a wonderful woman, Barbara Candler, whom I've gotten to know through my bad memory, perpetual lateness and the Groton Library (you can put it together)... The store is really fun, with great deals on interesting antique and vintage stuff, plus new stuff including paintings by ME, and gorgeous jewelry by my friend Maggie Platt.

***

I had the great delight on Friday to spend time with a lovely woman, Sandra, who follows this blog, and has been an excellent online friend and supporter. She makes these FANTABULOUS well, boxes, for want of another word - but truly, they are celebrations cooked up to look like boxes. The boxes contain other boxes that look like chocolates. You open these and put good wishes, or good thoughts, or reasons why I love you, or whatever you want inside, and give them as gifts. She does other really cool stuff like this, too - and wants to get me involved!

So we are working on a project, and I will update you with photos and notions as we go along. Meantime, take a look at one of these wonderful celebrations:

Cool, huh?? Here's where you put your message, or whatever you want to put! 

Storm Coming II

Storm Coming II

Oil on canvas, 10x10, $100
sold

Taking courage in hand, I did something the other day that I've been skirting for a while, though I understand it is one of the next steps.

I ordered a new tent, with a new display set-up. It cost me $2,000, and I am still reeling from the shock of paying that much for anything that you can't drive or live in. The Scot in me, I guess.

But as someone said to me last year, "How do you expect anyone to invest in your art if you won't invest in it yourself?"

A good question.

The tent and assorted whatevers are on their way, due to arrive on Friday. I have to learn to set this whole thing up, and I have to learn quickly, as I have a show next weekend (Marlborough, Mass! Come! It's a great show, the Paradise City indoor show - click here to find out more. )

This is one of the paintings I'll bring. It's the second of three I did in Virginia last weekend. And while I like this one a lot, I've saved my favorite for last, so be sure to come back and check it out! 

Storm Coming In

Storm Coming In

Oil on canvas, 10x10
sold

We spent the weekend in Virginia, where it rained and rained, and when it wasn't raining, threatened rain.

And I loved every minute!

The rain released me from any sense of duty, and being without phone or internet added to the liberation. I read, I gazed into the middle distance, I painted, I walked, and one morning, I slept until 6:20! (For me, that's like most people sleeping until 2 p.m. Where did the day GO?)

I painted three of these 10x10s, sheltering in the van when the rain was too much. I love the rhythm of the clouds marching in over the marsh, and the quiet of the gray sky and gray water.