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Well finally had a chance to try to work on this painting a bit today.  The last few days were spent in the garden and then I was spent - getting plenty of tomatoes though!!  Worked  a lot of time today going over the mouth,  nose, got the eye angles corrected, I think, and working on getting the skin lighter than the black I have all over the background.  Trying to work with finding the colors, one advantage of these exercises tends to become good color mixing challenges.    This time I am using dioxazine purple , chromium oxide green and ultra marine blue along with yellow ochre and cad red light for skin tones. Going to try to get more of that light background in, not really sure what it is depicting, before I work more on the facial tones as that might change the value of the skin tones.   Right now anything I put on that black looks really, really light. By the way, I don't know why in this shot the hat shows yellow edges as that is not...

I haven't done a WIP in quite a while.  But thought I would try to do this Old Master's and would love it if others suffer with  me.   This is Girl with a Red Hat, by Vermeer in 1665-1666, and is one of my favorite paintings at the National Gallery.   The National Gallery actually has two-three rooms of little gems of Dutch paintings and I always have to go several times while we are there to spend some quality time.   This is a very small painting 9"x7" and I am doing as an 8"x10" - and boy, can you say small?  Anyway I was going to do as I did the last one, Girl with a Pearl Earring, using chircusso.     B ut  as I was adding my gesso layers to the canvas, I got the bright idea of using a black layer so I would already have the black dramatic background.  Duh - no can do gray tones and then glaze the face.   So  instead am going to try to get the block in and then lighten as needed.  We'll see ho...

                                                                          The Kid                                                                           16"x12"                                                         Colored Pencil/touch of Pastel It has been couple of years since I did my first eagle.  I was extremely lucky to sell that piece which was eventually used for a book cover.  They are such stately, though violent, being birds of prey.  I like most bird...

                                                                 Before the Storm                                                                        20"x11"                                                                        Acrylic One of the best things about having multiple pictures on the board is that when I get focused I can get things completed.  I did the flower yesterday and then decided to work on this a bit and before I knew it, it was complete...

                                                                       Open Tulip                                                                           12"x9"                                                                           Acrylic Well, been away from painting for a few days now and it is hard to get back in the swing.  I got some new colors, yeah, just like a kid in a candy store, that I wanted to try them out.  Found...

Summertime 9"x12" Pastel on gray paper This is for the PaintanddrawTogether June challenge.  It was to,take the two photos below and come up with a new composition.  Whew, that was a toughie.  Not sure I came up,with a viable arrangement.   My problem was trying to incorporate the tall gladiolas in the other short squatty items.  I toyed with making the glas jar taller, using a glad bloom as a diagnol, but ended up,trying to keep close to the original sizes and heights.  This was great fun and I can't wait to see what the others come up with. Super hot here in the ATL, mid 90s so,guess it will be good painting weather.   Thanks much for,stopping by.

                                                                  Butterfly Wings                                                                        Acrylic                                                                        11"x14" As you probably already know I am fascinated with fairies.  I haven't drawn a lot of them, but decided that a fairy with butterfly wings would be perfect for this week's DPW challenge, which is butterflies. I used a terra-cot...

                                                            Toys, Then and Now                                                                      11"x14"                                                                      Acrylic This is my DPW challenge piece for this week.  The theme is toys.  I looked at a lot of toys, couldn't get excited until I decided on marbles.  Checking on PMP I found Kathy Throops beautiful glass still lifes.  Lucky for me some had marbles i...