"Single Peach Rose" and some photos

 

The local Upscale Market had some single roses on sale, which were a godsend as I'm all about saving money on supplies and subject matter, and I've been on the hunt for flowers that cost less than an Andrew Jackson. First up this week is an individual peach rose, which have special significance for me for reasons I won't disclose (she knows who she is). Happy birthday J!

 

"Single Peach Rose" - 8" x 6" oil on Ray-Mar canvas panel

Available on Etsy Now - Click Here!

I've also been adding some photos to my Flickr. I thought this one was of artistic interest:
 
I swear I didn't pose anybody in this photo. It looks like a painting by somebody who's name I can't recall.

Link and run - Peter Funch's photographs

I love this kind of thing:


Peter Funch builds composite images out of photographs taken over the course of several days. As a people-watching artist with a hangup on all sorts of confusing and interesting social phenomena, I must say that these pictures are my cup of tea. I can't help but be reminded of "The Matrix" looking at some of his photos.

I'll be back with more paintings tomorrow.

"Wednesday Rose" for a Friday

 

I may be approaching my goal of "not terrible" with flowers. They are a challenge, or perhaps I'm trying to paint out of a rut... I'm not sure. Maybe I should blame the warm muggy weather. In any case here's the second one this week that I'm almost satisfied with (almost - since complacency is an artistic sin!).

 

"Wednesday Rose" - 6" x 8" oil on Ray-Mar canvas panel

Available on Etsy Now - Click Here!

 

"Tuesday Rose" for a late, unhappy Thursday

 

Title says it all. I'm not happy with most of the week's work and this was the first one I thought was even worth posting... And that's all I have to say about that.

 

"Tuesday Rose" - 8" x 6" oil on Ray-Mar canvas panel

Available on Etsy Now - Click Here!

 

"Snapdragon 2"

 

Only a few minutes ago it was Thursday, and now it's Friday, so here I am making a Friday post... I'll be away for the weekend, and will hopefully have a chance to post more new work right after I return. In the meantime here is the second Snapdragon. I had to rush a bit to complete this one as one of the blossoms died on me while I was painting, and then the photo didn't turn out so great... I really need to invest in a reliable setup for photographing my paintings as soon as I have the money.

 

The plant itself cost me $2.15 total, and is thriving happily out on the porch with plenty of new flower buds on the stalks, so I should be able to re-visit this subject in a week or two. I am pleased with the large painting return on a small monetary investment, and I look forward to the test and comparison between "old" and "new" paintings.

"Snapdragon 2" - 8" x 6" oil on Ray-Mar canvas panel

Available on Etsy Now - Click Here!

 

eBay (almost not) Thursday - "Snapdragon 1"

 

It's that time of the week again... 11:47 PM Thursday is still Thursday, right? I bought some Snapdragons and I generated much better results painting them then I did taking photographs of the paintings. The white background makes a mess of processing; if I make it as white as it appears to the eye, the whole image looks burned out, but if I keep the highlights knocked down enough to see the canvas texture, the overall image looks like mud. I did the best I could with the JPGs, but the real articles look much better.

"Snapdragon 1" - 8" x 6" oil on Ray-Mar canvas panel

Available on eBay Now - Click Here to Bid!

 

"Orchids Old And New" for a Late Wednesday

 

A follow on to the subject of the first "eBay Thursday" (now available on Etsy, by the way): the second painting of Philaenopsis Orchids. I had to pause and leave the painting mid-way through completion, and when I returned later in the week to finish it, one of the orchid blossoms had perished and collapsed in a sad, floppy heap. I decided to paint what was there, instead of faking the complete blossom in the background. I find that I don't have any objection to painting shriveled, dead blossoms... In fact I rather like the contrast they provide. Flowers are finicky, delicate things, and they die just as they live, so that's how I like painting them... It's either that, or I'll have to go old school and start putting skulls in my arrangements!

"Orchids Old And New" - 8" x 10" oil on Ampersand panel

Available on Etsy Now - Click Here!

 

Post-holiday "Sunday Roses"

 

Some roses for a post-Sunday Monday - a relatively quick & loose outdoor sketch of some white roses that the lady of the house received for her birthday, painted "live" out on my porch on my plein aire gear. These were actually painted a couple of weeks ago. I meant to post this (and several other works) before the holiday weekend, but on Wednesday & Thursday I actually didn't have enough light to photograph paintings due to inclement weather. At least the random cold snaps have stopped, which means the flowers I'm painting are that much less likely to perish before I'm done with them...

 

The trouble for the outdoors-minded painter is that there are only three basic seasons in north Texas, "Ungodly Hot", "Stormy", and what I as a Yankee transplant describe as "Ludicrous" - Ludicrous being the fitful, random, non-sensical transition between the first and second seasons, a sort of perpetual manic fit of conditions that alternates between a beautiful spring and quasi-winter. At this point I'd normally expound at length on how I strongly believe that a properly structured world should have four seasons, but I'll let it go, and just close by saying that I'll have some new work up tomorrow!

"Sunday Roses" - 6" x 8" oil on Ray-Mar canvas panel

Available on Etsy Now - Click Here!

 

eBay Thursday: "Three Orchids"

 
I will call today "eBay Thursday", which is a good day to post a lonely little 10-day auction for a larger-than-small painting. Well, it's almost not Thursday anymore, but posting at 11:30 P.M. local is close enough for government work (now where's my billion dollars?). Painted from a locally purchased Philaenopsis Orchid which happily survived my painting sessions, and now graces the roommate's desk at work:
 
 

Click Here to Bid!

 

8" x 10" oil on gessoed panel

 

Pansy Wednesday... And my cat, and some changes.

 
A couple of pansies for tonight, both of them on Etsy, both 6" x 8" on Ray-Mar canvas panel, both painted relatively quickly in the great outdoors from a live source. I apologize for the crummy photo of the first one:

 

"Purple Pansy" at Etsy

 

"Orange Pansy" at Etsy

 

Over the next couple of days I'm going to close up my Ebay store and move everything over to Etsy. I will still post items on Ebay occasionally, but fees, costs, and general downturn have made Ebay non-cost-effective. I'm also working on some fun stuff aside from the regular painting routine, a small preview of which is visible below, cleverly concealed within a gratuitous cat photo: