New Years Art Resolutions, and my Blog is Moving!

 

"Park Trail #62" (pastel, 6x12 inches) bid or buy

 I wrote a really nice long inspirational New Years post today about painting more, and you can read it here! (or on my Patreon page.)

What I really want to say here is that my blog is moving! I'm retiring this location and continuing with the Daily Painting posts on my new website blog... 

(Update: Nah, don't go there either I decided not to use a website blog. Just go straight to my Patreon, EVERYTHING gets posted there!! 😃 And tons of free public posts to entertain you if you don't want to subscribe yet.)

But you can always find them also on my Patreon page, and on DailyPaintworks.

I won't delete this blog, I just won't post here any more. Thanks for being great fans! See ya around on the web in other places.

Happy New Year!

"Brimli" Bunny

 

"Brimli" (pastel, 8x8 inches) bid or buy

My Patreon patrons chose this cute grooming bunny for me to pastel last week at my Virtual Open Studio. Moo-tastic Muses and Bunny Buddies on my Patreon can watch the complete pasteling video here!

The rest of y'all can enjoy this speed video! 😎

"Finley" the Fawn

 

"Finley" (pastel, 7x5 inches) bid or buy

See a 40 second slide show video of the creation of Finley here!

"Gurty" the White Cow

 

"Gurty" (pastel, 6x6 inches) bid or buy

Here's a quick high quality GIF for you, and guess what? I made it myself! My son showed me how. There's a program that only works on Mac or Linux... well, I won't bore you. But I'll probably have to get my son to show me again the next few times too. (PS: If this GIF doesn't play for you, click to watch it here!)

 

Gurty is short for "Yogurt" because doesn't she look like vanilla? Today's your lucky day too because I finished painting Gurty in my Virtual Open Studio Episode 118, Part 2, which I decided to make public for everyone to watch! The 30-minute episode picks up early on in the pastel process, as I had started Gurty elsewhere, but I did manage to find good enough progress pics to put this GIF together. I hope you enjoy it! (And the video too!)

#9 of 21-in-31 "Summer Road Trip"

 

 

"Summer Road Trip" (pastel, 8x8 inches) bid or buy

Here's the first star of Saturday's "Summer Road Trip" Paint-Along, so I titled this painting the same. This is painted on white Art Spectrum Colourfix paper with a pastel underpainting washed in with alcohol. I liked the result! I clipped out some key still shots from the video to make a little slide show video for you of my process.

I only tweaked it a little bit afterwards, adding some green (with pastel pencil) to the sky and other little bits of color, including some pink in the distant fields, to pull the color harmony together.

Enjoy!

(Muses and Buddies can see the entire paint-along here!)

#8 of 21-in-31 "Twilight Road II"

 "Twilight Road II" (pastel on UArt 320 dark, 6x8 inches) bid or buy here 

This is one of the paintings I did for the Summer Road Trip Paint-Along on Saturday! I really liked the photo and painted it almost just like it was. Nice when that happens.

 

The paint-Along video is in editing progress and hopefully will be posted by Monday some time. But of course with my 21 goal this month I wanted to post these! Stay tuned for the other Road Trip painting tomorrow.

 

It was a great group at the Paint-Along. I'm eager to show off their paintings to you! meanwhile, enjoy this little GIF, here!

#7 of 21-in-31 "Fiesta Chick"

 "Fiesta Chick" (pastel, 6x4 inches) is on auction for a limited time at DailyPaintworks.

All right, it's the wrong time of year for Fiesta, but everyone needs a fun party now and then right?.. This Chick looks like she had a little bit too much fun last night, lol. It's funny how baby chicks do have such serious expressions, and those eye bags! Like they're older than their years (weeks, days?)

 

Enjoy these progress photos of the painting process! The last photo is of the colors I used.

#5 of 21-in-31 "Baby Blackbird"

 

"Baby Blackbird" (pastel on black Richeson surface, 7x5) bid or buy here

Here's something different.
Ok, it is another bird, but it's on the black Richeson pastel surface. That surface has a lot of rough texture, but it's a uniform texture. I've used it a few times and always like it, especially for landscapes actually. But this bird was so very black I felt it called for starting with a black surface.
I set my phone right in front of my painting today as I worked this one. It was fairly quick (but not this quick, lol) and I like the looseness.

Enjoy this little speed video!

Day #4 of 21-in-31: "Lorikeet II"

"Lorikeet II" (pastel, 7x5 inches, bid or buy here)

Ok, I'm slooowly catching up! This Lorikeet is one I've painted before. It's one of the best pics I've got of a Lorikeet, such personality! Maybe someday I'll do a painting of me with a hat full of Lorikeets from the family vacation that garnered me this pic. LOL

 

See the first "Lorikeet" painting from 2017 on my blog. This time, I flipped the image, and made the arched perch into a branch. 

Enjoy these progress pics of "Lorikeet II"!

#3 of 21-in-31 "Cheeky Chick"

"Cheeky Chick" (pastel, 4x4 inches) bid or buy here for a limited time

Here's my third painting for the month! I know I know, I'm only averaging every other day so far instead of the 2 out of 3 I aught to be, but I'll be catching up with many that I underpainted yesterday.

See a GIF of this cheeky chick on my Patreon page! 

#2 of 21-in-31 "White Cockatoo"

 

"White Cockatoo" (pastel, 12x6 inches) bid or buy here

My second finished painting this month! Seems like I'm getting a slow start... it's already the 5th day... but, I did finish a batch of 6 underpaintings today, and a little chick for posting tomorrow! Yay! I'll catch up as the month goes on.

 

Tomorrow I'm working my gallery in Boerne. We're having our Too Hot to Handle sale this month! Check out some of the deals here!

 

Meanwhile, you can watch a quick speed video demo of this Cockatoo on my Patreon page!

Day 20 of 21-in-31: Wildflower Field #38

 

Day 20 of 21-in-31: "Wildflower Field #38" (pastel, 4x4 inches) bid or buy
Almost done with my 21-in-31 goal! This is the other little 4x4 I painted yesterday. This one is "Wildflower Field #38". There weren't really any flowers in this scene, but I felt like it was calling out for some delicate little pink blossoms!
I used almost the same pastels here that I used for yesterday's little park trail. In fact I painted them side by side.
See a quick progress video here!

Day 9 of 21-in-31: Camilly

 

Day 9 of 21-in-31: "Camilly" (pastel, 6x4 inches) bid or buy here

I pasteled this darling baby camel the same day as Moofasa and Mimoo. Finally posting her! I had her underpainted since February, but didn't get to finish her then. She was the last little underpainting I had left over from the February batch.
I saw this baby at the Minneapolis Zoo last fall.

See progress pics and reference photos here!

Mother's Day Rose

 

"Mother's Day Rose" (pastel, 8x6 inches) bid or buy

Happy Mother's Day! Here's a fresh rose (painting, that is) for you on this lovely day!
Also to be my painting #3 of my 21-in-31 goal for May!
See a quick GIF here!

Chic Chick

 

"Chic Chick" (pastel, 6x4 inches)

Here's another one of my little favorites that was languishing in a gallery all through the pandemic. "Chic Chick" is finally home with me and will be with me at The Woodlands Waterway Arts Festival this weekend, hopefully to find her forever home. (If you're in the area, find me in booth 404 by the Watercolor Terrace!)

I love this one so much I had her as my Facebook business profile pic for a long while there! Enjoy this fun GIF and progress pics!

"The best paintings are sometimes the simplest."

Little Fish

 

"Little Fish" (pastel, 4x6 inches)

 Yay! My "Little Fish" painting has been accepted as one of the 100 creative works to be "caught" at the famous VIP "Art Dash" Party on April 8, the night before The Woodlands Waterway Art Festival (just north of Houston, TX.) Get your tickets here!  

This FUN fundraiser benefits The Woodlands Arts Council Student Art Scholarship program. Afterwards, enjoy the festival (April 9&10) and find me in booth 404 near the Watercolor Terrace!

See a quick GIF here!

Day 12 of 28: "Tulips and Pot"

 

Day 12 of 28: "Tulips and Pot" (pastel over watercolor, 6x6 inches) bid or buy here

This was my replacement for missing out of recording "Spring Garden 2" from Tuesday's VOS. It's painted the same way, with a watercolor underpainting on Arches w/c paper.
The real time creation of this little landscape will be available to Patrons on my Patreon page soon, but meanwhile everyone can enjoy this little speed video!

Day 11 of 28: "A Sunny Walk"

 

"A Sunny Walk" (5x5, pastel over watercolor on UArt) bid or buy

This little painting will be the feature of my VOS video Episode 90, Part 2. Part 1 is another little garden landscape that I painted to replace the actual VOS Episode 90 (in which I painted "Spring Garden 2") which, due to technical difficulties, did not actually get recorded!

So I had some fun with watercolor underpainting for a couple days. I really like this image. I clearly remember taking the reference photo on a walk in some gardens somewhere. The happy daisies shooting up and casting long shadows... All around me were beautiful sights, but sometimes you just have to look where you're walking or you might miss something sweet!

Enjoy these progress pics!

Day 10 of 28: "Spring Garden 2"

Day 10 of 28: "Spring Garden 2" (pastel over watercolor, 6x6 inches)

This was a re-paint of a sold painting from 2012 that a client fell in love with. The original of this little landscape was one small part of a photo reference that I had posted way back in 2012 on DailyPaintworks as "The Cropping Challenge". Read all about my adventures with this challenge and the other paintings I did, here!

Wimby Kitty

"Wimby Kitty" (pastel, 8x8 inches)

Here's Wimby Kitty, the adorable little cat from last month's VOS Episode 80! Subscribe to my Patreon to watch the full video with commentary here!

Wimby is a friend of CallieCal, another black and white kitty I painted a while back. They look very similar but are no relations.

See a quick speed video here!