Canal du Midi

Oil on 8x10 Gallery wrap canvas

SOLD

My father and step-mother took a vacation on a boat going through the canals of Provence and took this picture. It seems so quiet and relaxing, I would love to do that one day and bring my painting supplies and paint in plein air!

French Balcony

Oil on 12x9 Gallery wrap canvas
$50

Click here to purchase this painting

This was my other submission to the DailyPaintworks challenge.

French Balcony II

Oil on 10x8 Gallery wrap canvas

SOLD

This is one of my submissions to the DailyPaintworks challenge of the week entitled "Seeing Double". The challenge was to paint from the same scene two different compositions on two different size canvases. I chose to do a cropping of the first one and this is the cropped painting. The scene is from a picture my sister took this past summer when we were in Provence.

Eiffel Tower commission

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Oil on 48x36 Gallery Wrap Canvas 

NFS - Commission

I finished the Eiffel Tower commission last week and I'm so happy with the results. The Eiffel Tower itself was an exercise in patience, it had so many details. I loved working on such a large scale, intimidating at first but really fulfilling!

Yellow Sunflowers

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas

SOLD

Nothing says yellow to me like a field of sunflowers.  This is my submission to the DailyPaintworks challenge to paint something yellow.  Since I love that color, it was a fun one!

Spring Meadow

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas
$25
Click here to purchase this painting

I never get tired of looking at the trees when spring is in bloom. I just love this season!

A Spring Afternoon

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas 

SOLD

I love spring with the color of the sky and the newly green leaves on the trees.

Yellow Field

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas 

SOLD

A friend of mine lives in Germany and took this picture. The red roofs are so typical of Europe. I thought the spring yellow flowers in the field looked so striking next to the grass field!

Eiffel Tower commission

Oil on 12x9 Gallery wrap Canvas 

NFS 

 This is the proof for the large commission I'm working on. Friends of mine want a large painting (48x36) of their family in front of the Eiffel Tower.

Lone Tree and sketches

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas

$50
Click here to purchase this painting

I've been working on a large commission this past week which is very exciting and haven't had the time to paint so I painted this lone tree this afternoon...it felt good to get away from the Eiffel Tower for a little bit! Below are some sketches I did of the Eiffel Tower in preparation for the large painting.

Mountain Reflection

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas 

$50
Click here to purchase this painting

 I tried something new last week using the palette knife for some of the painting. It was fun to use yet I tried a few other paintings with the palette knife and it was very hard to keep the painting in control and ended up with a ton of paint on the canvas!

This particular mountain is in Annecy, France which is where my extended family is from and where my mother and father grew up. My sister took this picture. It's a beautiful place with gigantic mountains and a very pretty town with a lake and canals from the lake that wind through the town.

Chateau des Alpilles II

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas 

SOLD

This painting is from the actual hotel Chateau des Alpilles in St. Remy, France. An old house with beautiful mature trees that line the driveway.

La Tour Eiffel

Oil on 10x8 Gallery Wrap Canvas
$50

To purchase this painting, please visit my DailyPaintworks Gallery

I saw a picture of the Eiffel Tower from a friend of mine and I thought it looked so striking all lit up at night.

Village in Provence II

Oil on 12x16 Gallery wrap canvas 

NFS

I painted a larger one of the village in Provence. My husband liked the first one so I painted it to keep in our house.

The kids are on Spring Break for the next week so I'm not sure how much painting I'll get to do. Happy Easter everyone!

Morrisville II

Oil on 8x10 Gallery wrap canvas
$50

To purchase this painting, please visit my DailyPaintworks.com Gallery 

I love the calmness of the water and the reflections of the trees and hay stacks.

Morrisville

Oil on 8x10 Gallery wrap Canvas
$50

 To purchase this painting, please visit my DailyPaintworks.com Gallery 

I find that I alternate between landscapes and then a portrait. Portraits are so draining that I like alternating a few landscapes in between. This is from a picture taken a couple years ago when we still lived in North Carolina. I loved the calm water on the pond and the reflection of the trees. A storm was coming so the colors just popped out.

Chateau des Alpilles

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas 

SOLD

If you're interested in purchasing this painting, please visit my DailyPaintworks.com gallery 

This is a second one from the grounds of the Chateau des Alpilles in Provence from this summer. The trees and long stretches of grass were beautiful. The hotel is in St. Remy, a very quaint and artistic town, I wish I could have stayed longer and gone to all the galleries!

Dashing Gabriel

Oil on 12x9 Gallery Wrap Canvas 

NFS

 Didn't get to paint a lot this week but I did go to my class in Milwaukee on Wednesday and enjoyed it so much! This is Gabriel, my nephew, I had promised my mom that I would do a portrait of him for her.  He has this cute little mischievous smile in this picture and that is so him!

River Boat

Oil on 8x8 Gallery Wrap Canvas

SOLD

We went to see the river boats this past summer. It was interesting to see them going up or down the canal, and to think that they had this system for years and years. It would be such a treat to be on one of those boats painting!  My sister who's great at taking pictures took this one.

Village in Provence

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas
SOLD

This is another picture from this past summer. We did a lot of driving around in Provence and this is a village we drove by close to Barjols.

Sarah II

Oil on 12x9 Gallery Wrap Canvas

This is the portrait I did yesterday at the "Live model" drawing/painting sitting. I was a little worried about doing my first portrait in oils as opposed to acrylics but I found that it's easier to do a "softer" portrait with oils because you can make the edges fuzzy later, had I tried that with acrylics I would have found that the edges were already dry. Still learning but really enjoying it!

Path

Oil on 8x8 Gallery Wrap Canvas
$25
If you're interested in purchasing this painting, please visit my DailyPaintworks.com Gallery

 I just love the broken fence and this winding path. Where does this path go I wonder?

I'm getting more used to oil paints and I'm actually starting to like the fact that it doesn't dry so quickly.  You can actually move the paint with your paintbrush if you need to, I think that's just great!!!!  I went to my "Live Model" session today and am pretty happy with the results, I will post it tomorrow (it's already on DailyPaintworks if you're interested in checking it out).

Peaceful Meadow

Oil on 8x10 Gallery wrap canvas

SOLD

If you would like to bid on this painting, please visit my DailyPaintworks.com Gallery

This was my submission to this week's DailyPaintworks challenge.

Sunflower

Oil on paper 

I've been practicing with oil again today and worked from a sketch I did a week or so ago.  I figured I would save the canvas and practice on paper.

Boat

Oil on 8x8 Gallery wrap canvas

SOLD

If you're interested in purchasing this painting, please visit my DailyPaintworks.com Gallery

 Ok, so I tried oils again today. I guess it's hard trying a different medium whatever it might be. I have questions for fellow artists who have used oils, such as:

Do you tone your canvas beforehand? I noticed that the color was being mixed with whatever I put on top. Do you tone and then wait until it dries?

How do you work on details if the paint is wet and it gets all mixed up?

Do you use more than one brush or do you clean in turpentine between colors?

Do you do anything else than turpentine (or equivalent) to clean the brushes thoroughly?

Any pointers for a new oil user would be greatly appreciated!

Kelly

Acrylic on 14x11 Gallery Wrap Canvas

 This is what I did in "Painting/drawing from live model" class this week. I had a hard time getting some of her features right and it was frustrating at times...still decided to see it through and I'm satisfied with the end result. Hopefully next week will be better!

Sunflowers

Acrylic on 20x20 deep Gallery Wrap Canvas

SOLD

Unframed with wire ready to frame - edges are painted

If you're interested in purchasing this painting, please visit my dailypaintworks.com gallery

This is  from a picture I took this past summer.  We were driving back from Camargue in France when we drove by beautiful sunflower fields.  We stopped on the side of the road and took some pictures.

I also did some sunflower sketching this weekend for a future painting..

Hand sketches

Working on some hand sketches these days....it's a great thing to sketch since you always have a couple with you at all times!!!

Sarah

Acrylic on 10x8 Gallery Wrap Canvas

 I went to a painting from live model class this morning and loved it! I opted to work on the portrait only instead of the whole figure. So much fun, I will definitely try to go when I can! I also did some more sketching:

Didn't have time to paint this weekend so I did these sketches. Draw, Draw, Draw! That's what I did! Hope everyone's weekend was great!

Little of this, little of that

Acrylic on 8x8 Gallery Wrap Canvas
SOLD

First, I'm happy to report that after searching long and hard around here for a painting class, I have finally found one! I went to Milwaukee today to participate in a class with James Hempel and I really enjoyed the class and the people. I will definitely go back. This is the painting I worked on today from Cezanne.

Acrylic on 12x16 Gallery Wrap Canvas

I've been struggling this past week with what to paint and I came across a landscape book which is where I got this painting from. Any practice is good practice!

I've been doing a lot of reading lately just trying to figure out this art thing and one thing that keeps coming back up constantly, well actually two things: practice, practice, practice and draw, draw, draw. I was inspired by Azra's post the other day mentioning a very talented artist Adebanji Alade and I decided to start doing a lot more sketching.

Wisconsin Barn

Acrylic on 12x16 Gallery Wrap Canvas

I took pictures of this barn today and was really inspired to paint it. There are lots of barns around here, I need to go driving around and take pictures of all of them!