I just started two large scale oil on canvas paintings (30" x 40") of imaginary women.  After painting so many beach paintings, I am going to use some of the bright colors with a Florida vibe in each one.  I am excited about them and about painting on a large canvas again.

The top painting is of an independent woman - she is both feminine and powerful.  The bottom painting is of a Mother and her young daughter.  The mother is loving and a "mother nature" figure.  Let's see how they look when I am done!

In fall 2020 and winter 2020-2021 I was in Dunedin, Florida and the pandemic didn't allow for indoor socializing so I walked around taking pictures of the beach, the bay, and sunset.  I was mesmerized by the palm trees, the beautiful sky, the clouds and the colors at sunset.  

Painting landscapes is new for me because I am an abstract portrait painter.  I have never done landscapes and have been wanting to try doing it.  I did about ten paintings and then decided I could do this and knew that I wanted to approach them from a portrait perspective.  Instead of painting a person, I approached the beach (or sky or sunset or trees) as the subject of my painting (the sitter) and am really happy with what I have done so far.

I am studying Fauvism because the colors are bright, fresh and fit perfectly with the colors of Florida.  In the begining I studied John Marin's beach paintings for inspiration with my oil pastel paintings.  What works for me is to mix colors because using them straight from the tube doesn't always give me the Florida look, feel and color that I want.  For inspiration I am using the photographs I took plus a few other photograhs I found with compositions I like - none of my paintings look like the photographs because I changed so much.

My paintings will be in a show exploring nudity.  The question to artists was, what does nudity mean to you?  For me nudity is when we are at our most unique and vulnerable self.  Most people we know don't see us nude so the people who do get this chance are very important to us and a meaningful part of our lives.

The show will run from May 12 to June 6, 2021 and is in the Van Landingham Gallery inside the Torpedo Factory  (105 S. Union Street, Alexandria, VA - 3rd floor).

These paintings - Two Babies, Happy Baby and Shy Love - will be part of a group show at the TFA@Mosaic gallery in Fairfax, Virginia from April 28 to June 6.  The gallery is located at 2905 District Avenue, #105, Fairfax, Virginia.

I studied her work for over a year trying to learn to paint portraits delicately and imitate her lyrical style.  She was a contemporary of, and exhibited with, Pablo Picasso but was not a Cubist.  When I see her work I am most struck by the soft colors and the way she composed her figures so that they look like gentle shapes of color that end up as people (as shown in the link attached below).  

https://www.artsy.net/artwork/marie-laurencin-le-trio-en-concert-ou-jeunes-filles-au-luth

I greatly admire artists who remain true to themselves and their style.  Marie Laurencin is a reminder to me to express myself through my art, and remain committed to my artistic voice.

My paintings - Passion and Last Embrace - will be on display (and for sale) at Tysons Corner Center in Northern Virginia from April 19 to May 3.  They will be on the lower level across from Traveling Players.

They are bookends really - the beginning and end of all great love affairs.  In the middle is love, life, and so many experiences (good and bad) that we forget.  When I started these paintings I was thinking about couples and relationships but decided to focus on romantic, intimate moments that outsiders don't see.  I think the magic of a great relationship is intimacy - connecting with each other and re-connecting after being apart.  Intimacy is the glue and without it the relationship falls apart.

Passion
Oil - 24x36 

Last Embrace
​Oil - 24x36

This painting came about because I wanted to try out for a portrait contest and they seemed to be looking for a painting that would address some of what happened in 2020.  So, I gave her half a mask to represent COVID-19 and how terrifying the disease was (and still is) but made the other half of her happier and hopeful.

This is an oil painting on Arches oil paper.  I love it.  The texture is smooth and the paint easily glides on to it.  Arches prepared the paper so the oil will not seep through.  For framing, I will need to mat it and put it behind plexiglas so the paint doesn't touch it.  The paint looks bright and deep and I am thrilled at how well it photographed.
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I am very intrigued by maintaining balance when weight is not evenly distributed.  When I practice balancing on one foot sometimes one side is stronger than the other and sometimes I can barely balance on either leg.   In this drawing, I am working on a face drawn without a sense of balance.  The structure is tilted left but the eyes are lined up facing the viewer but it works as a face.

A quick drawing.  It is so fun to draw an abstract face that has two sides that work together while having nothing in common.

My first time to combine a face with a landscape in one painting.  I literally made the landscape (the building) part of the face.  The canvas size is 6" x 8".  

What I was thinking while painting is showing what dreaming looks like - to show the actual elements in a dream.  So I put part of a face in the composition but spent more time adding the landscape that the person was thinking of.  The result is interesting but I think the next time I will use a larger canvas so I can put more dream elements in it so the viewer gets a better sense of what the painting is about.

On November 15, Georgia O'Keefe would have been 133 years old.  I am not just a fan of her work, but also the manner in which she lived her life.  The shapes of bright and vivid color on large canvases, of flowers so large that it is not obvious it is a flower.  We, the viewer, just enjoy the feeling of being mesmerized by enormous, gorgeous works of art.  I loved that she worked to find her personal style.  She was not content to paint just like everyone else was.  Toward the end of the 1920s she traveled around the US looking for inspiration; studied at several art schools and with well-known artists.  I greatly admire how she made a decision to learn and set out doing just that during a time when women didn't routinely have much autonomy and it was almost unheard of for a woman to earn her own money and have a career.

Three ladies out for a day of shopping (14"x18" oil on canvas panel).  Several years ago I took a fashion illustration class and now and then I add that vibe into my work.  It was a fun class and learning to draw/paint fabric, even in an abstract style, gives me more to work with in composing a painting.  I paired that style with an abstract background of color shapes.  When I studied painting, the teacher taught us a way of painting with color to create shapes instead of depending on lines.  The fun/challenge was making it work without adding too many lines.

This is a painting of the Jones Point lighthouse in Alexandria, Virginia.  The size is 6"x8" oil on canvas panel.  I really enjoyed painting the lighthouse from this position because it was a painting in basically three pieces.  The fun and challenge was to make each piece interesting while blending into the whole composition.

I am thrilled to announce that I was recently juried into the Torpedo Factory Artists Association (TFAA).  This is a great group and I am lucky to be a part of it.  Until October 18, there is a new juried member show at the Torpedo@Mosaic Gallery (105 District Avenue, Fairfax, VA).  Please come check out the show!
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