April Dogwood

April Dogwood

Oil on canvas, 15x60

Please click here to email me for price and availability

Often, I already have the idea by the time I choose the canvas, but sometimes, the shape of the canvas leads me to the idea for the painting. 

That was the case with "April Dogwood." I've had this canvas for a while, and have been saving it for something special.                                                                                           Recently, I moved it from the shed where I store many of my blank canvases to the studio, where I paint. I sold a nice cowscape at a recent show, and thought that perhaps a good longhorn would suggest itself.                                                                                           I was taking a break, gazing out the door of the studio when I noticed branches of our pink azalea reaching out past the corner of the house. I knew instantly that that was what I needed to paint on this 15x60-inch canvas. 

It's an unusual painting for me. It is delicate, and subtle, though I will say that, up close, it has lots of colors and lots of texture. I love the rhythm of the branches, the three-dimensionality of the dogwood flowers, the feeling of spring it gives me. 

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Thank you! 

FOR EVERYONE WHO participated in my April sale, everyone who took a look, thought about buying a painting, sent their friends to the sale, or bought a painting, thank you! It was a grand success. Seven paintings from the sale sold, and one buyer bought another painting from the website. I found plenty of ways to improve the process, and have some great ideas for the next sale. If you have ideas, please feel free to email them to me - carrieBjacobson@gmail.com. 

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Dog of the Day

(See above! It's Koko!)

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A Final Thought

"The painter has the universe in his mind and hands." 

- Leonardo DaVinci

Pink Spring

Pink Spring

Oil on canvas paper, $65 matted

It's chilly here this morning, and the Christmas lights are up in town - but yesterday, I found myself painting spring! In part, it's because I got some new paint and wanted to check it out, but I know I also painted spring as a kind of therapy against the dullness of winter here in Virginia.

Please don't misunderstand! It is great to be in a place where 20 degrees is considered brutally COLD, and where we see snow geese more frequently than we see snow. I love this soft Eastern Shore winter - but I don't love the drain of color from the landscape, the grayness, the monotone.

In New England, the snow causes all sorts of problems and headaches - but all that snow sharpens the sunlight, bounces it along the scratchy branches of the bare trees, the dark hearts of the evergreens, bringing out the most of the few colors winter affords.

But in not so much more than a few weeks from now, when the spring bulbs begin to poke up, and the tips of the trees start to turn red, and the lawn begins to green up, not so far from now, color will flood back to the Eastern Shore, while the long, dark stretches of the north country will still be covered in winter.

It was those spring colors that lighted my imagination the other day when I painted this. It was a memory, a hope, a small song of praise.

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A Contest! 

PEOPLE OFTEN POINT OUT that I use a lot of paint - and I do! So at the end of March of this year, I started saving the caps from my used paint tubes. I'm going to save them until the end of March 2017, then count them. Anyone who wants to play, please send me an email with your guess. The one who comes closest without going over wins a 10-inch-by-10-inch painting of their choice! 

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Dog of the Day

From left, it's Henry, George and Jasmine, wishing you all Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Good Kwanzaa, and Joyous Festivus! 

Want your pet to be the Dog of the Day? Send a jpg to me at carrieBjacobson@gmail.com. Holiday-oriented photos are particularly appreciated! 

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A Final Thought

"When bankers get together for dinner, they discuss art. 

When artists get together for dinner, they discuss money." 

- Oscar Wilde

Big Cows - and Riding the Rising Tide of Spring

Big Cows

Oil on canvas, 48x48

sold

 

Another of the unexpected rewards of this life of painting is that I spent a lot of time outdoors. Throughout my decades of working inside office buildings, I thought I had maintained a connection with the natural world - and I had, but now I see how tenuous it was.

These days, I notice when the tips of the winter trees begin to redden with the very first touch of springtime, then turn yellow-green, and then, in what seems like seconds, burst into leaf. I've been out painting in chilly spring mornings when the first summer birds have sun their arrival. The earliest hummingbird landed, bedraggled and hungry, on the feeder outside my studio.

Here, on the Eastern Shore, and south of here, in the Carolinas and Tennessee, the dogwoods have bloomed, shining deep in the forest, and dancing along the edges of the woods. In town, daffodils have come and gone here, except for in the deepest of shadows. Azaleas are in bloom everywhere, ridiculously, piggishly bright, so vivid they seem to suck the light from everything around them.

This morning, I drove in a thin fog to the vet's, bringing a sample from Woodreau, who I hope is not as sick as the vet seems to think he could be. I made my way slowly, along the back roads, and the greening fields seemed to shimmer through the mist. I saw wisteria, hanging in vines in the woods, in front of a long-abandoned house.

The seasons turn in slow procession and these days, they carry me with them.

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Dog of the Day

This is Scout, who lives in Wachapreague, and walks by the house every day with Bill, a friend and fellow Red Sox fan. The dogs think Scout is the best target for barking EVER.