Tag Archives: acrylic

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2020 Show Updates

Both shows in which I was scheduled to participate in the next few weeks have been postponed or modified. Princeton’s 50th Communiversity has been rescheduled to Sunday, Sunday, October 11. Handmade Hopewell’s street fair has been cancelled; however, there will be a virtual fair the weekend of the original show (May 3rd). The plan is that there will be a map of what the street fair would have looked like, and visitors (to the website) can click on each booth and see a short video created by each participating studio. I will post the link closer to the date the fair goes live.

In the meantime, please enjoy this painting inspired by my trip to Hawaii in September. Also, happy Easter (yesterday)!

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Paintings from Paradise

Alooooooha! Two and a half weeks ago, I returned from my first visit to the Hawaiian Islands–Kaua’i and Hawai’i (the Big Island), plus a day on Oahu. The different environments, animals, and a number of the local art galleries, inspired some fun, artistic exploration once I got back to the mainland. That’s what I’m sharing today. 

  1. Some pen doodles inspired by some of the simple graphic designs on National Park pins. My traveling party saw green sea turtles (honu in Hawaiian) on two occasions: once at Punalu’u, a black sand beach, & again at Kaloko-Honokohau, a National Historic Park.

 

2. Ginger plant (acrylic, 8 x 10″). The ginger blooms in several different colors — red, white, yellow, & pink. The pinks & reds were quite striking against the green foliage of the rainforests.  

3. Painting of a honu resting (oil, 9″ x 6.5″). This was painted more like a watercolor would be (in terms of layers & values). First I painted the yellow across the whole hardboard (such that it started off looking like a background color), and then the blues on top of that, preserving the lights. Many of the greens were actually mixed right on the surface when the blue & yellow paint met. 

Mahalo nui loa for reading. 

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Happy Harvest-time

It’s starting to look more like autumn up here. The colors are turning later than usual because it rained so much earlier this autumn–lots of refreshment to keep the plants green longer.

In the spirit of autumn, here is an illustrative piece I painted this week and within a week (started last Sunday, finished Saturday/yesterday).

 I’m not sure what I will title it just yet. The tree “slice” on which it is painted has been hanging around the art supplies for a couple years. No idea where it came from since I didn’t purchase it. But I’m glad to have come up with an idea that works with it as a painting surface. Actually, the squirrel picture had been tucked away longer than the tree piece. Maybe five years ago? More? I’m not sure. I had drawn this on the back of some scrap paper while visiting a friend. (This is actually a modified scan of the original drawing; the original had some scribbles to indicate a pumpkin vine curling around the bottom, rather like in the painting.)

As you can see, I made a few changes, including making the pumpkin on which the squirrel squats taller to better fit the vertical picture plane the tree slice provided. It’s fun to bring out old subjects and work with them again.