This May has been a perfect season of sunsets. I enjoy the light and the view from my front yard while I bask in the sun and talk to dear friends on the phone or just read. Oh, sometimes I paint! Flowers are such magical things, they catch the sunlight and literally glow in the long last rays of the setting sun. I attempted to catch what I saw last night, the velvet shadows, the glowing irises, the random orange poppy wanting a share of the sun.
This is a postcard-sized miniature painting. It is for sale for $35.00 to the first person who wants it.
Remember, all of the profits from my paintings go to animal conservation charities.
One of the things I am really trying to learn is how to paint depth with light, intensity and shadow. My house faces to the west so in the morning, things are shady until the sun creeps in slowly. Here you can see deep shadows, with the sun kissing the tips of the rhubarb flowers. This is a 4″ x 5″ miniature. I think I am going to mail it to someone.
One of my strategies for avoiding bad traffic is to get near to where I want to go before the inevitable heavy Seattle traffic hits, and then hang out in a coffeeshop (or library) until the appointed time. I always try to be prepared with drawing and painting equipment and something to read. Yesterday, I planned going north with my son so I left early and found a popular Starbucks near his house. I staked out the perfect spot in the room to sit; my back to the wall, a good view of everything else; indoors and out; and began to draw. Some people are great subjects. They never move at all, reading their newspaper, book, or whatever is on the screen of their cell phone. Others (who quickly become erasures) just keep moving around. Yesterday one guy spied me looking at him and realized what I was doing. I stopped sketching him immediately. .
Dawn. The most promising time of day. A new day, a beginning. Hope. Sometimes here in Seattle, dawn is kind of monochromatic. What does this mean? It’s going to rain? or out of the mist the sun will appear? This particular dawn was curious because all the light seemed to be coming from the lake.
This time of year my garden is a riot of color. After several attempts at trying to capture the blue woods hyacinths which fill the whole yard with fragrance, I did a study of just them and I was finally able to get a color that evokes what they look like in my yard. There are probably too many hyacinths in my little yard, but nothing else smells so good and they look wonderful The tulips, which are beloved by many creatures that eat them, are brilliant spots of light and dominate the scene.
I felt like I made progress with these paintings.
This May has been a perfect season of sunsets. I enjoy the light and the view from my front yard while I bask in the sun and talk to dear friends on the phone or just read. Oh, sometimes I paint! Flowers are such magical things, they catch the sunlight and literally glow in the long last rays of the setting sun. I attempted to catch what I saw last night, the velvet shadows, the glowing irises, the random orange poppy wanting a share of the sun. 
