Ribbons at the Fair!

Fern Lake won 1st in Mixed Media class.

Foggy Fall Morning won 1st in Acrylics class.

Canyon Night won 4th in Mixed Media.

My paintings got three ribbons at the Clackamas County Fair! Two of my watercolorist friends also got prizes this year, one with three and one with four. I was just glad that they had air conditioning units in several places in the building. I bailed out at 11:30 when it was 95º and came home to cool off and start watering the garden.

All the displays will be up through this Sunday. There are hundreds of paintings and photographs, plus many other beautifully made art and craft items.

Thank you, unknown judge at the Fair! And thanks to all the volunteers who staff the exhibits and make the whole event possible. What a fun event!

Villa Catalana Cellars Paint-Out this Saturday, August 22nd

The August Paint-Out at Villa Catalana Cellars is this Saturday, and I'll be there. It will open to the public at 5:30, and there will be live jazz music again, and catered suppers and their award-winning wines to purchase, and a new treat this year, ice cream creations. Admission is $10 per person, and you can reserve your spot online here.

For you gardeners, this is also the home of Rare Plant Research, and you can see many hardy tropical plantings on the grounds.

I've picked out the compositions I'll be working on there, and there will be a lot of different artists working this year. The weather predictions are for sun and mid-to-upper 80's, and probably a light breeze. Watching the sunset from the patio there is tough to beat by itself, but add in a glass of wine,  the lovely strains of talented musicians drifting over the lotus pond, and the chance to watch and talk to a couple dozen local artists, and you've got a memorable evening.

Showing at the Clackamas County Fairgrounds

I'll have five paintings on display at the County Fair in Canby, OR, August 18-23—two mixed media paintings and three acrylic paintings. Some friends who are great watercolorists inspired me to enter. It's a fun fair with an amazing range of art, craft, and hobby displays.

Painting Greeting Cards are now for sale on Etsy!

I make the colors as brilliant as I can

I've just released sixteen of my paintings as 5x7" photo greeting cards on my Etsy web site! These are the same cards I've been selling at art fairs for several years. They include many of my old and new paintings, sold and unsold. I do plan to release more as I get the cards in stock and ready to ship.

Sample Card in an 8x10 Ikea "Ribba" frame

I've been contemplating this action for a while now, as the cards have become more and more popular. But before I went ahead, I wanted to make sure the images are copyrighted. So I submitted forty-four of my original paintings on Copyright dot gov. That took me a few days because I'd never submitted works of visual art before, or submitted work as a collection. But once I figured out their terminology, it really wasn't hard, just a bit arduous getting everything ready. It does feel really good to have them legally protected now.

Our US Copyright service is one of the best things this country has to offer to creators, and the people who do it are doing a great job. I'm sure there are those who would like to eliminate it from government, but I sincerely hope that never happens. It's one of the few art services that artists on fixed or small incomes can actually afford. I'm sure if it were privatized, it wouldn't be nearly as affordable. Those 44 images only cost me $55 (and a few days' work). How much art supplies can you get for $55? Now I can publish the images in any format as long as I live and they'll still be protected.

And speaking of frames, I talked to the floor manager at Ikea two weeks ago, and she said that Ikea is very gradually adding US-sizes to their frames; the 8x10 frame above is actually 8"x10", but it was the only smaller-than-poster-size one (use their handy measuring tapes before you buy). Otherwise, they're great for matted paper works, but not for standard panels. She said the reason it's happening so slowly is that the US market is such a small percentage of their total sales. When expensive frames are so easily damaged in handling and showing, having an inexpensive display option is a really great thing.

Painting a desert morning

I haven't had all that much luck painting detailed landscapes before, especially the mixed textures of dirt and grass, but I was pretty happy with the way this one turned out. I did a lot more glazing than I've been doing lately, putting in every color I could see, and this time it seems to be working. I do feel like I got really lucky with the colors, but this is my third painting of this area so maybe my experience is accumulating.

I think another part of the reason is that I really took my time with this one, almost the whole of the 12 days of heat we've had. And before that I worked longer than that on a still life that I may never finish because I came to detest even the idea of continuing with it. Maybe next year.

I also think—and this is going to sound strange to some—part of it has to do with the additional fish oil I've been taking. After borrowing Grain Brain and reading how important sufficient levels of fats of all kinds, including both HDL and LDL cholesterol, are to the health of the brain, I added fish oil to the flaxseed oil I've been taking, and a couple days later I started seeing visual slideshows of colorful images as I was going to sleep. That only lasted a couple days, but I couldn't help wondering if some small part of my optical brain was working just a teeny bit better. Plus, the acupuncture I've been getting has made me quite a bit more relaxed when I'm working.

Isn't the whole point of being healthy that your body (including brain) feel and work better?

Anyway, it was a fun painting to do. Much more fun than the still life. Guess I need to go back and study that stuff more.

Red Rock Canyons

Red Canyon

22"x30" Ink & colored pencil on archival paper $500
You can purchase this painting HERE.

We're in the second painting season of the year, the one where it's too hot to work outside, and I'm working on inks as well as acrylics. I wanted to try a different theme with the inks, so I decided to try some of my canyon images from Zion National Park. I was hoping the angular nature of the rock cliffs would work well within the limitations of my process. I also wanted to explore some different color schemes than I've used before.

Canyon Night

22"x30" Ink & colored pencil on archival paper $500
You can purchase this painting HERE.

The second one I did, I wanted to make into a night scene. It took me several weeks and a couple different tries to get the colors right, but I'm happy now.

The art becomes a garden

Mother Nature, embraced by Nature

I was out in my garden this morning in the overcast light, mesmerized by the flowers and the colors and how lush everything looks on a cool, calm, summer morning, and I came at last to my only plaster sculpture.

I carved this Nature figure in a sculpture class I took in the winter of 2005, as part of my excuse to retire to do only art. When I arrived at my new home in Oregon, I didn't have a garden as such, just a mishmash of jungle, one camellia and some rhodies, and patches of aggressive groundcovers, so I set it on top of the picnic table. Within a year the birds had taken to landing on it and pecking the top of her head. I thought, "Critics. Hmph," and knew I couldn't do anything about it, so I just left it there.

Now, ten years later, I see that it has become something else entirely, and rather than demeaned by the conscious reworking by the birds, I consider it to be enhanced, both by the unknown service it has provided them, and the discriminating colony of algae that now inhabits its tiny crevices and distress scars from the birds and the weather. Here is Mother Nature in her permanent "in progress" state.

I think it's time to find it a place of honor in the garden that has taken form around it.