Elephant and Macaw Watercolor Paintings

These are my first tries (since high school, 1986) at watercolor with cheap-ass paint and paper from Hobby Lobby. Master's Touch--I wouldn't recommend their stuff to a 3 yr old! But I framed these two and they're hanging in my living room, lol.

A Few Watercolor Paintings

I decided to try out watercolor painting....sold one already (the Cherry Pie) to a fb friend from my hometown. Still working on skills and finding the right products and how to stretch paper properly!

Each one of these is done on a 6x9"piece of Arches 140 lb paper. These were all 2nd tries. I'm pretty happy with them so far.

"Los Hornos" painting

Finally finished this one. "Los Hornos", "the ovens." Don't ask me how they work, I just painted them.

Idk, at this rate I'll never get 20 southwestern style pieces done...

I am quite happy with it--just wish it didn't take me so long to plow through the psychological stuff every time I try to paint.

Acrylic on 16x20" stretched canvas. Based on a photo from the website Paint My Photo dot com.

Southern NM State Fair Wins and More Art Plans

My 5 entries all won ribbons at the Fair. I also got Best of Show in the 2 dimensional art section (competing with about 70 total pieces). I was so shocked and happy. Felt like a star for a day, and I have a big 18" ribbon too. Also won a little money, yay!

I got a white ribbon on "Cap Off the Toothpaste," a red on "Silver Cup with Grapes" and "French Glazed Donut." And then I got a blue ribbon on "Silver Cup with Green Apples" and "Rhyolite Mercantile" which I had just finished literally the day of the evening I had to deliver it for set up. The bowl of apples won the Best of Show.

So now I have a display wall at home, lol.

Now I've decided to work on a collection of southwest architecture paintings. I love the feel of it (being new to NM) and so hopefully I won't get bored. The newest one is "Santa Fe Door." That's the second one and I have 2 more barely started. I hope to do at least 10, maybe even 15 or 20. In any case, I want to do a "southwest collection" that will include landscapes, architecture, and still lifes. At least a total of 20!

New long-term goal:  To become an "art-vendor" here in the city. First I have to make a collection and a website....was supposed to do that a long time ago.

  

A Pair of Impressionistic Paintings

Toothpaste and Cheez-Its

Acrylic on 8x12" canvas sheets. Both done in one afternoon. I wish I could paint like that everyday!

New Paintings

I finally got around to painting again. These were supposed to be practice paintings and so I did them on canvas sheets instead of stretched canvas.

Avocado

B is for Bananas

A Whole Bunch

Lime Sourball

 And my favorite one so far...

Silver Cup with Grapes

There were others but they didn't make the cut, lol.

Seascape and Vegetable still life paintings I put in the fair last month

Yay, I won 2 ribbons in the Erie County Fair in NY last month.

The Seascape is a painting I did for a friend, and it won a 2nd place ribbon.
And the vegetable Still Life painting, now hanging in my kitchen, got an Honorable Mention ribbon.

Here are some of the steps they went through:

and

Chili Pepper, Garlic, and Tomatoes painting

Another vegetable still life 12 x 16, acrylic on stretched canvas. Based on my original photo. I think I like this background more than the last one.

Red Onion, Chili Pepper, and Carrot painting

Second of 4 vegetable still lifes I'm working on. Acrylic paint on a 12 x 16" stretched canvas.

Eggplant, Mushrooms, and Chives Painting

First one of 4 vegetable still lifes I'm working on. Going to enter it in the Erie County Fair.

12x16" on stretched canvas, acrylic paint with gloss.

"Goin' West" Landscape and "Seaside" Coasters

**(Update on Seaside Coasters--they DID stick together using just the artist's Liquitex gloss varnish. So after that disappointment, I got out my small can of Varathane that I'm using on the chalk-painted chairs and brushed a coat of that on them. Worked great! No stickiness. I painted the sides like sand and they kind of also look like cork, even tho the coasters are hard inflexible material ( don't know what exactly..) Here's the final photo.

In the process of practicing clouds from a reference photo, I added land to the bottom. I heard that without a back, middle, and foreground, it is just a "study." Goin' West"---something I will be doing in the not so far off future.

And I was going thru stuff, trying to get rid of lots of things so our cross country move will be lighter and cheaper. I came across a cheap coaster st from Dollar General. I thought I could paint on those, so I gessoed them and today finished painting little seascapes on them. They are "reversible" because I painted a scene on both sides. I still have to do the edges and gloss them. And then make sure they don't stick together. I will probably make them available to purchase, but I don't mind keeping them!

Cherry Tomatoes painting

Cherry tomatoes. So much more delicious than grape tomatoes! Lol. I just finished this 11 x 14" acrylic paint on stretched canvas. Very happy with it! Mixing white is coming in handy.

7-4-16 Latest version: (It looked like it was missing something so I added a tomato top!)

(First version)

 (From this morguefile.com reference photo which I obviously cropped.)