Headdress

This beautiful lady poses for a portrait painting/drawing group I attend and she wears the most wonderful head pieces and dresses. She also does fantastic hair arrangements. I'm hoping to do a series of paintings. I am able to get a good start from life, but since she usually holds one pose for about an hour, an hour and a half tops, I take a photo to finish up from. This one is 9 by 12, painted on board primed with gesso.

Fenced But Free

This 8 by 10 oil on linen was finished today and painted from a reference photo provided by photographer Lee A. Brown. Lee posts one of his beautiful photos monthly as a painting challenge and then posts the paintings that we email to him in a photo gallery on his website. Check them out at leeabrownphotography.com.

Happy Yellow Pears

Getting back to fruit, I did this mostly with a palette knife with a few touch ups with a brush. This was purely practice as I have almost no experience with a palette knife, but have loved the look in other people's paintings. It was fun, sort of a cross between finger painting and frosting a cake - yes, I used my fingers too sometimes. Since I knew I was going to do that, I avoided cadmium yellows and used non-cadmium versions. Permanent yellows light and deep from Holbein and radiant lemon from Gamblin. Also think I have permanent orange from Holbein in there. I do have some cadmium reds and yellow light as well as cobalt blue. No fingers then unless I use gloves which I get by the box from the beauty supply shop.

Stretching

Another ballerina. This is 6 by 12 oil on linen.

One of the paintings I did for the outdoor art fair. Dancers are fun to paint.