Illustration Friday - METAMORPHOSIS

     When I was brainstorming the idea for this one, I was doodling butterflies, dragonflies, frogs, cocoons, etc. and had the inspiration to mix them up a little.  This is a metamorphosis gone terribly wrong, or maybe beautifully wrong.  The original was a simple sketch in one of my sketchbooks that I wasn't going to take any further but it was so dull in color that I just wanted to digitally tweak it a bit.  I ended up tweaking a lot.

The Villa

The Villa

11 x 14 oil on gesso board.

I just finished this piece.  Its the front of a villa right outside of Florence, Italy.  I don't love traveling but I love to be in other places once I've traveled.  (How does one get there without traveling? hmmm.)  My step-daughter's wedding was so beautiful and the trip was truly inspiring.  I've done several mini paintings and I'm currently working on my 5th larger one.  I have quite a few more photos to work from but eventually will run out and will either go back to painting still lifes (which I enjoy doing) or I will have to take another trip somewhere gorgeous.  The world is a beautiful place and with billions of glorious places, people, and things, I should be permanently set up.  The trick is paying attention and I think I'm getting a little better at that.

new logo

I recently did two of these marble logos for myself, they're 5" x 5" oil paintings.  The other I posted a few days ago.  I think this one is my favorite.  I also think I need to do more marble paintings.

Illustration Friday - PEACE

A few weeks ago, I went with a friend to watch an oil painting demonstration by Steven Walker.  He did an entire, beautiful painting in an hour and a half.  I was so inspired that I thought I'd give that a try.

This is what I had after an hour and a half.  I put a bit more time into it today (about 45 minutes) and have the top picture for my contribution to Illustration Friday this week. 

Looks like a pretty peaceful place to be.

logo

I have been working on two small marble paintings to possibly use as a logo.  Here's the first.  I'll probably have the second done within the week.

Turtles at Lake Cumberland

I just finished this 8" x 10" oil painting this morning.  It hasn't even dried yet but, it's been so long that I posted a finished piece, I was in a hurry to share it. It would be a lot more visually stunning if it were   4' x 5'  but it's a sweet little memento of a couple of curious turtles that were hanging around our houseboat a couple of weeks ago.