Hydrangea leaves.....

I've been working on a private commission lately, so I cannot post images of my most recent work. Nevertheless, I'm always on the lookout for reference material....as any artist should be! I never expected to find inspiration while raking the gazillion leaves in our yard. This hydrangea is growing on the side of our garage, and while dragging a sheet loaded with wet, heavy leaves, I spotted the sun hitting the leaves in such a way that it made me drop everything and get my camera. I think the hydrangea is prettier now than in the summer full of blossoms. I love the colors of the leaves, and I got so lucky that the sun was hitting the bush in such a way as to make it look like I had used some fancy lighting effects!

Doing a painting of "just" leaves might seem unusual, but

leaves, on their own, can be just as beautiful as flowers. I can't get over how spectacular these leaves looked today. I'm so glad that I had the camera ready to go. Painting these leaves, with their yellow green centers fanning out towards their wine colored edges will be a challenge....and loads of fun!

A Clarence Center Halloween.......

It's one of my favorite times of the year. I love fall, and Halloween is so much fun- especially in our neighborhood! The photo on the left is on our front porch. The floating heads look so great contrasted with the pumpkins in the front. My husband carved the craft pumpkins- the scary cat one on the left, and my prized possession, my Edward and Bella pumpkin in the middle! After we took these photos, we then headed down the street to the Haunted House above all others.

The photo on the right shows the entire house, all lit up, at dusk.

He had just opened for the evening, and the smoke machines were just beginning to crank out their misty fog. What follows will be a series of the best photos we got this evening.

Halloween, Clarence Center style.....

Another Halloween, and we are again fortunate that our neighbors, Gary and Margaret Server, are doing Halloween proud! We love Halloween, and how lucky are we that we live just a few houses down from one of the most fabulous Halloween displays I've ever seen.


I went down to get some photos on a recent sunny day- even before everything was up and running. The photo on the left has my husband Bob with his back towards the camera, and Gary coming out his front door . Putting up all this takes months of work!

In the photo above, you can see the entry to the dungeon on the far left. The photo on the right is from inside the dungeon. The attention to detail is amazing. As you follow along dark, narrow passageways, you come upon the witches cave on the left here.

So wonderful! I think everyone is going to love it. What I'm not including here are all the deep, dark passageways leading to each spectacular room. SO exciting! Hard to believe that all this can take place in a garage- an extra large and deep garage admittidly, but when you're inside, you feel like you're in a large, haunted mansion. The gargoyle tower below is one of two towers on either side of the driveway. What a great sight to see as you're driving down the road! We are certainly looking forward to seeing the whole display turned on- with all the smoke machines fired up, the music on and the lighting effects that make it all so dramatic and scary. Happy Halloween 2009!

The "brick irises" are done.....

It feels so nice to get another painting done. I had a lot of fun with this one.
The last bit of work I had to do was to give the bricks some depth by putting some subtle shading underneath each individual brick. After that was done, I just had to put in some finishing touches; deeping some values and putting some textural elements onto the leaves, stems, and bricks.
I noticed that once it was finally done, that it really doesn't look like a watercolor! I'm pretty sure that some will assume it is a colored pencil, or possibly even a pastel or acrylic. At this point, I cannot imagine the learning curve involved in utilizing another medium!
I think I have my hands full with watercolor!!

Purple iris continuation......

I've been able to get a lot of painting time in lately- hurray! I still have a fair amount of work to do on this painting, though.

The iris flowers themselves are mostly done, along with the leaves and stems. The brick wall is now my focus. I've laid in a layer or two of color on each individual brick- always making sure that each brick has it's own unique color pattern. Now I'm in the process of shading the bricks and the mortar, to give the bricks a three-dimensional look. Otherwise, they would look like brick wallpaper! This is picky and time-consuming work.....right up my alley!

The colors on the actual painting are much more intense, but it's so dark this morning, that I couldn't get a photo without using a flash. When I take a photo when the painting is completed, I'll make sure to get one without a flash. This is going to be one colorful painting!

Purple iris progress......

I have made some noticeable progress of late on my painting. I've just about completed the irises, and only have a few stems and leaves to finish. It's been fun to have the rose leaves to paint, along with the iris leaves. The different shapes and varying shades of green have been a joy to work on.
I've had fun with the brick wall, too! I started laying down color on the bricks beginning at the bottom. Better to experiment with varying colors on the bricks that are behind the flowers and leaves, than to start at the top! I moisten only part of each individual brick before I put down the paint. Better to create the varigated look to the bricks that way. I've been using many different colors for the bricks, including Burnt Sienna, Burnt Umber, French Ultramarine, Dragon's Blood, Lemon Yellow, Sienna, and more. No two bricks are the same, so they shouldn't be painted in identical fashion.
Boy, this will be a colorful painting when it's completed!

The irises are coming along.......

Showing some actual progress on my latest painting!

I've been deepening the colors of the iris blossoms, leaves and stems. I love that rose leaves are interspersed among the iris leaves. They provide a nice contrast to the spear-like leaves of the irises.

I've been using Windsor Violet and Windsor Blue for the irises, coupled with the soft pink of Rose Madder Genuine. At this stage of the painting, I'm working on slowly building up the colors of the petals and leaves. I wanted to get those colors deepened before I work on the brick wall. That will be lots of fun.....and quite time consuming, to say the least!

Back to work!