A Spring Flower

Orange Daisy in a Glass – 5" x 7" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

I was at Trader Joe’s and bought two bunches of flowers. This is my first painting of the flowers I purchased. I have since painted a few more small paintings of the flowers. It is a fun new challenge of depicting water and the three dimensional aspect of flower petals.

Spring is here!

Peach Halves

Peach Halves – 5" x 7" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

This is the peach from previously, however in this painting I cut it in half. I was inspired to paint peach halves because recently my friend, Evie Baskin, painted a beautiful palette knife painting of two peach halves. I was just fascinated with her painting, the oranges and pinks of the fruit on a pale blue plate. So I decided to investigate the same color palette, I was just not brave enough to complete the painting totally with a palette knife…

Warmer Months are Coming...

Two Strawberries – 5" x 7" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

Spring is on its way of being here! I always find evidence that the weather is getting warmer when grocery stores start selling berries in greater quantities. And this painting is proof of my purchasing my first containers of strawberries of the season! I love Spring and Summer, to me the happiest seasons of the year, I get to be outside and warm, it typically is sunny… everything I like.

A Pair of Pears

A Pair of Pears – 5" x 7" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

Steve, my husband, came up with the title to this painting. It was his comment when he saw what I was painting, and I liked it… For this painting I wanted to experiment with my view of the pears, I almost always paint them from the strong horizontal viewpoint. One of the pears really had a lopsided lean, so by painting them from the top, I still got a variation.

Thanks, Liz

Circle Within a Square

Peach – 6" x 6" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

This painting is my ode to Easter, I specifically chose these colors as they remind me so much of the colors one finds on anything that is related to Easter. When I was little, Easter was my second favorite holiday after Christmas. I loved going on Easter egg hunts and filling my basket with hard boiled eggs, candy filled plastic eggs, and once in a while I would find money in an egg or two… Now that I am an adult I used this day to catch up on chores and paint. As my work weeks are typically very busy.

I have not painted a peach in over a year, what fun it was to work on capturing the variations in the skin while also being true to the round form of the peach. I also like the graphic nature of the composition; alas I did go back to my favorite compositional method, of a circle inscribed within a square. I just like the stable and solid feeling of this design scheme, in architecture this would be called its parti. Which is a graphical summation (not necessarily representational) of an architect's design scheme and solution that outlines and/or clarifies the arrangement and relations of the parts of the whole design. I often feel that this parti is the compositional arrangement found in paintings, artists and architects just use different words...

Pear Still Life and Blogging Thoughts

Green Pear on a Checkered Cloth – 6" x 6" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

This was another fun experiment with paint and pattern.

I typically always write about my painting experience; however for the past few days I have been pondering on the wonderful outlet that blogging is! I have been having such a fun time with it, and I feel I have yet to maximize the communication potential. This may be because I do not interact enough on other’s blogs, however I do so enjoy receiving updates from other artists like Carol Marine, Karin Jurick, and Jelaine Faunce. Yesterday I discovered the whole Julie/Julia project blog, and this blog began in 2002 and has essentially been completed for almost 4 years! Wow, it is just amazing the fun stuff people share on the internet! I am glad I am participating in the blog-o-sphere… And in that vein of thought, I will share with you all some of the other more regular activities I do in order to improve my drawing/rendering skills beyond painting as often as I can fit it into my schedule…

One of the things I do is that I practice drawing as often as I can, the best opportunities for my during the work week is dedicating my lunch hours to drawing. When work is calm enough for me to take a break, I often go to a nearby mall that has a communal seating area with tables. I am working my way through Bridgeman’s Complete Guide to Drawing from Life, it is a tome of over 300 pages of drawings of people and anatomy. I have been using my lunch breaks to get through this book since last November, and as of today I am at a little more than half-way through the book. I anticipate once the weather warms up in the DC area with Spring and Summer I will head outdoors and actually sketch from life at the nearby parks. However until the weather is a comfortable 70 degrees or more I will stay indoors (as I get chilled easily), under a large skylight with piped in music and the noises of people buying products often found in malls. When I start drawing original scenes I will scan and post those drawings as well to share on my blog.

Happy Easter to everyone! Liz

Fruit Still Life

Apple and Meyer Lemons – 6" x 6" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

I am currently working on a larger piece with apples, however sometimes I get bored with just focusing on this one painting and need a break. So I set up this composition. I wanted to try my hand again with checkered fabric and I am always fascinated with trying to depict “round” forms.

I have also recently started painting on 6” x 6” canvas panels; so many daily artists use this format. It has been fun to see how I group items differently with the square format versus a rectangular one. As an architect, I like the combination of inscribed circles within squares as a beautiful design motif. This attitude is present in the way I tend to setup compositions. In past square format paintings, I would typically arrange all the items so the compositions would flow in a circular pattern, however for this painting I worked to setup a strong triangular composition instead. I believe it works well because of the fun pattern of the checkered cloth and the heavy brightness of the red apple being balanced with the three lemons. It was a fun little painting that was a fun mental challenge while also being good practice.

Still Life Study

Apples and Apple Half Still Life Study – 5" x 7" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

This little painting is a study of a portion of a still life composition I have currently set up in my studio. I am working on a new “frieze” painting with apples and apple halves. As I have never painted an apple half I wanted to get some practice in.

Thanks, Liz

Green and Purple

Three Green Pears – 5" x 7" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

Green and purple have always been a favorite color combination. I keep coming back to it in paintings, and with green pears with the variety of the value and hue that is found in them, the combination is never truly repetitive. On a side note, I think the emotional attachment to this color combination stems from when I was in junior high, there was a blouse with green and purple plaid fabric, I really, really wanted it. Alas I never was able to possess it, so when I am painting these colors I think sometimes my heartstrings are being pulled and I am satisfying some deep sense of satisfaction through my painting…

Well maybe that is what is going on, or I just have never gotten over my absolute love of how these colors just come together…

Last Vestiges of Winter

My Large Pumpkin – 6" x 6" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

I have had this pumpkin since the late fall. It has been a challenge to paint, as the color is not quite orange or salmon, so the shadow areas are just as nebulous… I have started a few paintings of this pumpkin and have more times than not, scraped them down and started over or changed subjects… In this painting was pleased with what I captured in paint and I really liked the shadow the pumpkin cast. Unfortunately I believe this may be the last painting I will be able to attempt as the pumpkin is starting to show its age and is developing soft spots in its skin and leaving marks on the table…

It is sad to see it age, however I am fortunate that spring is on its way and I am looking forward to focusing on painting flowers, veggies from my container garden and next autumn I will attempt painting pumpkins again…

Looking forward to Summer

Meyer Lemons with Bowl – 9” x 12” Oil on Canvas

I completed this painting; I am pleased with the outcome. I will be submitting it to juried shows this spring, so wish me luck! If I am fortunate enough to get it into a show I will post the information. Until then, I am working on a new “frieze” painting this time with Gala apples and another 9” x 12” painting with mandarins and the same curvy white bowl as in this painting. This new painting has a similar setup as the lemon painting, with subtle changes, as I am really fascinated with the white louvered doors as a background.

Bright Red Apples

Three Red Apples in a Dish – 5" x 7" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

These red apples had been sitting on our microwave for the past week in this bowl. I kept looking at them and thinking how beautiful they were and how it would be nice to capture them in a small painting. I love the way they turned out. The vibrant red and the cool highlights on the apples really make them look delicious...

Thanks, E. Floyd

Papaya Still Life

Papaya – 5” x 7” Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

I have been meaning to paint a papaya for awhile; I am very fascinated with pink-orange flesh of the fruit and the dark berry-like seeds. So this is my first attempt. In painting this fruit I learned that is more than what I had originally thought. I like how there is a dark green outline that surrounds the flesh of the fruit. How the color and tone change depending on how close or far away it is from the green rind.

My First of the Frieze Series

Mandarins with a Pomegranate Frieze – 24” x 5-1/2” Oil on Linen

Being that I am an architect and I was thinking it would be nice to interweave my professional career with my fine arts activities, I was searching around for ways to be inspired by architecture and interpret it with the still life paintings I have been pursuing lately. Recently I was looking at a bas relief sculpture detail on an architectural frieze, and I as inspired. I decided to pursue a series of paintings that have long linear compositions that are often utilized in such situations. I believe the most famous freizes in architecture are those of the Parthenon in Athens.

My paintings are not classical in subject matter, instead they are filled with the typical still life items, fruit, cups, and such.

I have several more planned and I will continue to work on them over the next several months. I will post them as they progress and as I complete them. Please stay tuned....

Here is a detail of part of the painting.

Study for a Larger Painting

Pomegranate with Two Mandarins – 6" x 8" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

This is another study I completed while I was working on a larger gallery oriented piece. I will post the gallery piece tomorrow.

In this painting I was fixated on capturing the leaves of the mandarins in a loose but convincing way. I like the play of light and shadow while also the play with the complementary colors, red-green, and blue-orange.

Fun with Pattern and Color

Three Gala Apples – 6" x 8" Oil on Canvas Panel SOLD

I had fun with this painting.