Thursday with the Muses

We celebrated Theresa's birthday with a luncheon at Rose's home.  Wow!  Did we ever eat in style - we always eat in style at Rose's.  We had a wonderful afternoon enjoying great food cooked by Rose and Rosie, conversation and a movie!

The top picture is of us - "The Muses"!  The bottom picture is Rose's beautiful dining room before we messed up the table, ate all the food and spilled the wine! :-0

A New Group Of Tangles

I decided to share another group of Zentangles on 3 1/2" pieces of black construction paper with colored gel pens.

Still Life with Grapes

I painted this watercolor today so I could teach it Monday night at my intermediate watercolor class at Riverside Art Center in Wapakoneta, Ohio.  It is transparent watercolor, 12" x 13", and is painted on BFK Rives printmaking paper.  It is from a photograph by agnesdale from the image file at Wet Canvas.  This, of course, will be a lesson in painting crystal.

Pillars From The Earth

I finished this landscape of a farm this afternoon.  This is from a photograph by my friend Pamela Baker, www.bakercreekdesigns.com.  It is nice to have such a wonderful picture to use as a source.  This farm is near Spencerville, Ohio.

The painting is 1/2 sheet of hot-pressed watercolor paper.  This is watermedia, because there are a few touches of acrylic paint which I added at the end for the orange leaves on the trees and the foreground.

 Pamela and I are having a joint show in October at Riverside Art Center in Wapakoneta, Ohio - her photos, and my interpretations of her photos.  This will be one of the paintings in the show.

Give-Away Results

I am pleased to announce that "humbird" will be the recipient of the     watercolor snow scene.

Humbird - if you would contact me at rabs38@embarqmail.com and send me your address, I will mail the painting to you.  Congratulations!

Zentangles # 1

I have known for a long time that I just can't sit and watch television without doing something with my hands, (I suffer from ADHD -seriously!), thus I have discovered the meditative doodling called Zentangle.  These Zentangles were created during the last month while watching "March Madness" basketball.  This answers my need to be "doing" something while enjoying great basketball.

These have been drawn on 3 1/2" x 3 1/2" chips of white drawing paper...for some reason that size is considered perfect for Zentangling.  I used Sakura Micron Pigma black ink drawing pens for these. I have done several and will post them over the next few days.

Annie's Barn

This is my newest watercolor - I finished it this afternoon.  It is from a beautiful photograph taken by my good friend, photographer Pamela Baker (www.bakercreekdesigns.com). The scene is near Spencerville, Ohio. The painting is 12" x 6" and is painted on 140 lb. cold-pressed Arches watercolor paper.  I love to paint pictures of the typical Ohio winter - we have beautiful snows.  I am truly ready for spring, though!

Give-Away! "Silent Snow"

I would like to share this watercolor with a fellow blogger in thanks for following my blog.  If you are interested in winning this painting,  just reply to this post and leave a comment including your e-mail address.  I will put the addresses in a hat,  draw the name of the winner on April 12 and contact you for mailing information.  The painting is 8" x 12" and is watercolor on 110 hot-pressed watercolor paper. 

This painting is almost a conceptual painting - a study in negative painting where the process of negative painting almost overtakes the creative process.

Old-Fashioned Peony

I try to expose my watercolor students to a wide variety of subjects in our paintings.  I have always been a fan of the paintings of Georgia O'Keefe and especially her close up/cropped paintings of flowers.  I have prepared this painting to be our lesson next Monday evening...it is a closely cropped view of an old-fashioned peony.  Because I also like the work of watercolorist Birgit O'Connor, who paints close-up flowers and also uses strong, intense colors and values, this is sort of a lesson on O'Keefe and O'Connor - Wow!  - those Irish ladies!!!  The painting source is from a compilation of several pictures of peonies.

The painting is on 140 lb. Arches cold-pressed watercolor paper and is approx 9"x 12".