A Commission and New Painting

This past month and 1/2 has been B U S Y! I thought life would slow down a bit so I can paint all these images and ideas I have dancing in my head. Nope! It's been go, go, go, go between the part time jobs, commissions, submission pieces for shows, and other things. Yeeeeeeeee haw! Never a dull moment, that is for sure.

This is a commission I finished a couple of weeks ago. It is an ink drawing of a house on Flathead Lake, with two ink colors to show the red flowers on the deck. It was a lot of fun. Most of the time I do ink drawings is when I'm doodling while watching a movie or keeping my hands busy at church. I really ought to do things like this more!

I'm working on another commission of three horses standing at a fence. I'm REALLY excited about how this one is turning out so far. I can't wait to share it a bit later.

But to keep the creative juices flowing, I have to eek out a bit of time to work on something I want to. So here is my newest piece, Fire In His Eye, along with the study I did to give me an idea of layout. I ended up cropping in closer to give the impression of his power and size and he leaps to the side. I want to do some large scale horse paintings. Horses, I know, how original. But they are my favorite thing to paint and I just love love love them. Hopefully I'll be able to paint all the ideas and I'll have a couple of submission pieces for juried competitions.

Fire In His Eye, 22x30

Watermedia 2013

I attended the opening reception for the MTWS annual national juried exhibition, Watermedia. It was held at the Bigfork Museum of Art & History in downtown Bigfork, MT. The show runs the entire month of October.

Over 200 entries were submitted and only 50 were chosen. I had the opportunity to hang among some AMAZING works done by some fabulous painters. This is the 9th time in 10 years I have been accepted into Watermedia.

The juror for this exhibition is a very talented watercolorist, Sue Archer. Her works are stunning. Be sure to click on her name and check out her work. I'm pleased to announce that she awarded me the MTWS Founders' Award (4th place) for the amount of $500!!!! THANK YOU SUE!

OMG!!!!!!!!!!! I can't contain my excitement. I seriously keep doing a happy dance...kinda like the one Katherine Heigl does in the Ugly Truth

Yeah....that's how excited I am.

Well, here are some images from the exhibition. If ANY of you are in the area of Bigfork during October, 2013. YOU REALLY NEED TO GO. The works of art are fabulous.

Sue is discussing the reasons why she chose my painting. She said I took a big risk leaving so much white space on the left side of the painting...a risk that paid off. :D

Me posing by my 4th place piece!!!

My FABULOUS friend Elena who came with me to the show!

I get sidetracked easily

The Sound of Coming Thunder, 11x14

I did work on the commission today....most of the day. I've been very productive. But I did get sidetracked. I had so much fun painting 'Oynx' that I decided to paint another running horse. The horse that I'm painting is named Jet. He was one of the two horses I took some photos of a couple of weeks ago. I have SOOOOOOOOOOOOOO many more photos that I can't wait to work on. But, I have to finish a couple of commissions and then there will be a LOT of horse paintings...and cows. I have some I need to paint but haven't yet. I'm excited about this summer painting season. I have so many ideas!

What happens when I'm frustrated...and procrastinating

Onyx 11x14

So I'm working on a commission. I'm super excited about it. So much so that I'm doing a couple of different versions of the images I have dancing in my head. One painting is 1/2 way there. Another image is just a series of sketches at this poing and I just can't seem to get it out on paper. So out of frustration, I decided to work on the 1st idea I have for the commission and try to finish it. But as luck would have it I didn't have the motivation to work on it tonight. So I sat there and stared at it....and stared at it...and stared at it some more hoping that I could convince myself to just geterdone!

Nope, didn't happen. Out of frustration that the commission wasn't coming together I painted this piece. I wanted to feel like I could at least make SOMETHING work! I should've just soldiered through and worked a little harder on making the images for the commission come together but I just didn't feel like dealing with it. Tomorrow is another day, right? I've gotta make good on this three day weekend and paint my little derriere off!

Blue on Black

Blue on Black 19x30

I finished it! I'm naming it Blue on Black...partly because that song (by Kenny Wayne Shepard) came on my playlist quite often while I was painting this piece and each time I thought how much blue and black (and purple) I was using in this piece. It's very tonal and the phrase, I thought, is fitting (yes, I know the song is about heartache and dealing with it, but we can just look past that aspect). So a shout out to Kenny for his inspiration when it came to a name!

I do want you to know that after I finished the piece and stared long and hard at it determining that it was, indeed, finished, I scanned it and stiched it together in photoshop (as I do with all my pieces) and then noticed a couple spots that needed so shadows. So, I've sinced gone in and given the piece a little more depth and beefed up some shadows within the shadow. I just got so excited that I was finished that I failed to notice I forgot those. Painting time clocked in at just over 19 hours. Add that with the drawing time and I'm under 25 hours for the piece!!! Close to 24 hours of drawing and painting time.

Thanks for letting me share the process with you!!! :)

I hope you all have a wonderful Saturday night and a fabulous end to your weekend tomorrow.

Black & Sorrel

So, I started the different versions of the same horse but in different colors. I'm really liking this! So far two down and plenty of colors to go; Gray, Dapple Gray, Appoloosa, Bay or Buckskin...Yeeeeeeeee haw!

Sorrel

Black

And I had to do one of a Griz. I've been working a couple of different images of Grizzlies for my brother. He just moved to Bozeman (which is where MSU, home of the Bobcats are) and feel that he needs to sport something on his office walls that proves he's a true Grizzly, even if he is in Bozeman. SO....here is one image that is finished. The others are in the works.

In the Company of Daisies