The Storyteller ~ man playing flamenco guitar

The Storyteller ~ 5" x 7" oil on board

For sale at Daily Paintworks 

Bid Here

Confession: I've always had a thing for musicians… ;) I even ended up marrying one!  Lol!  I remember being a little girl, and watching my dad's fingers on the strings and just being in awe, tingling with excitement that such a beautiful sound could come from his fingers. The fascination has never left me. I'm the girl in the corner of the bar, sketchbook open, trying to capture some of their passion on paper instead of dancing. Not a few musicians discovered my habit, and own little sketches. Musicians open up their heart and soul to you, on stage, in person and I find it awe inspiring, raw, vulnerable and brave. I feel that they are most themselves when they're up there, and I want to capture that.

(reference photo attribution: Rich Anderson)

A Girl's Best Friend

A Girl's Best Friend ~ 5" x 7" oil on hardboard panel

Bid now in the Daily Paintworks Auction

My daughter LOVES cats...unfortunately, we had to give ours up when she was born because it's favourite place to sleep was on top of her. We didn't have a bedroom with a door, so we gave the sweet kitty to my parents where she lives to this day. The nice thing about that is we can still visit and Rhiannon can get her "kitty lovin'". 

Sunlit Parasol

Sunlit Parasol ~ 5" x 7" oil on masonite panel

Bid in my Daily Paintworks Auction HERE

It looks like the sun is coming back! After a week of rain and coolish temperatures, I've been feeling a bit blah, and lacking creative energy. But today the sun is weakly shining through thin cloud cover and I'm hoping it will clear today, so I can go for my run without getting soaked!

This painting reminds me of the sun!

Pizzeria

Pizzeria ~ 5" x 7" oil on hardboard

bid here in the Daily Paintworks auction

Well, now for something a little different from cows...I still love cows, don't get me wrong, and you'll be seeing more of them, but I needed a break.

This character spoke to me...he said "Paint me"...

I can't take credit for the great reference photo, other than creative license with cropping and placement of certain elements. It's from my friend, Fraser Koreluk's stash of travel photos, and he kindly gave me permission to paint it.

 I've worked in restaurant kitchens for most of my adult life, and the pose, the look of concentration, are so familiar to me. I also loved the light, and the old-town look of the stone oven.

Grace ~ Flamenco Dancer in Red

Grace ~ 6" x 6" oil on canvas SOLD

Today I have another Flamenco Dancer to share with you. I have it up for bid on DailyPaintworks, so if you'd like an opportunity to own a piece of my work for a very affordable price, click on the Bid Now button above.

I am captivated by dance, especially flamenco and ballet. I've always been hopeless at anything choreographed so I am left watching in awe at the passion and energy and pure worship that can be conveyed by these amazing women. I feel like, by painting them, I can capture some of that passion for myself.

I have always loved to dance, and have a good sense of the beat, but I have never been great at learning the steps. Now that I'm older, I'd love to take salsa or flamenco classes, but they don't offer anything like that here...hmmm, maybe a suggestion to bring up with the Art's Council!

Dance Like No-one is Watching

Dance Like No-One is Watching ~ 6" x 6" oil on panel

BID NOW

 Being happy, healthy, fit...It's something that I work really hard at in my life

. But sometimes, things don't always click. It's hard to stay present and be in the moment.  There are so many distractions that we forget to have fun, and the whole staying healthy, happy and present thing just becomes one more thing to knock off on the ever growing list of things to do. I'm up at 6 for my morning run, then back home to make breakfast for the family, pack lunches, get the kids out the door, then do my weights, shower, answer emails and do all the internet stuff, start painting, paint until the kids get home from school, then try to switch my attention to house cleaning, dinner, bath and bedtime. But just like so many other parents out there, I forget to take a break and do something just for me. Something that fills me with joy. And its something that is not on the to-do list but really should be. 

I love to dance. When I was a young adult, I loved to go to clubs. It made my parents worry so much, because that environment was so not like me. I didn't drink, I didn't even have boyfriends. That's not why I went. I just wanted to dance. So the other day, one of my favorite songs, "The Mull River Shuffle" by the Rankin Family came on, and I just stopped what I was doing and danced. Like a lunatic, until I was breathless. At first my kids looked at me like I was nuts! What's mom on?! But pretty soon they starting dancing too! It's one of the last times I really remember just having fun, with no agenda...So do it, now. Click on that link and go "dance like no one is watching."

Have a lovely day, my friends.

"When we are too busy doing things for our children, we forget how important it is to simply be with them." ~ Daniel Siegel and Mry Hartzell : Parenting From the Inside Out

Check out my little lovelies:

Self Portrait - "15.75 x "30.75 

I've really been wanting to paint figures lately, but I've had no good reference photos, and no models available, so my darling hubby and I did a photo shoot in my studio, and came up with some pretty good shots, with nice, dramatic light. 

This is one of those poses. 

Flamenco 2

"Flamenco" 6" x 6" oil on canvas panel

NFS

This is the final painting in my flamenco series. It was fun, other than I don't really know what to name them all. I finally got some good pictures...I stuck them in the scanner, and they all worked, whaddya know! So I replaced all the pictures in my previous posts with the new ones. Enjoy! Now, on to bigger and better things:)

My Little Artist

"My Little Artist" 18 x 24 oil on canvas
$800.00

Here's another fairly recent painting from my gallery show. Please excuse the horrible glare in the photo. It isn't there in real life.
I caught Jacob in a beam of light through our big sliding glass windows, and I couldn't resist painting the play of light and shadow. I also love to paint my children when they're doing art, which is often!

"Keiki Hula Girl" 14"x 18" oil on canvas

Aloha from Maui everyone,
this is one of my newest paintings, not from my upcoming show, so I feel like it's okay to show it:) The photo is horrible...the paint is still slightly wet and the camera seems to have managed to pick up previous layers of paint in the background...weird...you can't see them when you look at the original. In fact, I'm going to try for some better pics of this one. Anyways, here it is for now,
Enjoy

New Painting - Not an ACEO!- Le Petit Artiste

"Le Petit Artiste" 11" x 14", oil on canvas

Well, I've been trying to post for the last few days, but Blogger hasn't been letting me upload any pictures. Either Blogger or my crappy internet connection, who knows.
This one's went pretty fast. It was fun, too. It's a picture of my son, taking up the whole kitchen floor, sitting in a beam of sunlight while he colors. The scene took my breath away, and I knew I had to paint it, so I snapped a few quick photos, some of which turned out really well. There's another one from the series I might paint, too. But this is it for now.
Aren't children precious? Everything they do is precious, even the not so precious stuff. And today, that really hit home for me. I mean, I've always known it, and always thought it, but sometimes we take it for granted a bit.

That all stopped today. My daughter almost died.

For weeks, I've been telling her "Take that out of your mouth! You could choke!" Instead of just getting rid of the offending marbles, or picking them up, we'd get distracted by something else. She'd take it out of her mouth, and we wouldn't give it another thought. STUPID!@!!@#$% She's two. She doesn't listen or she just doesn't remember.

Today, she choked. She was gasping, and barely making a sound. Her face was starting to turn purple and she was clawing at her neck. I rushed over and stuck my finger down her throat, but it was a marble, and the slippery little thing just pushed farther down. I freaked! My husband rushed over and tried to get it out, but to no avail. He finally grabbed her and did the Heimlich maneuver. After only one or two tries, the marble flew out and landed on the floor in front of me. I broke down. I couldn't stop shaking. I just cried and cried. It was too close.
We went through the whole house after that, throwing out anything smaller than a baseball...well not quite a baseball, but you know...
I'll never take my children's safety for granted again. Nothing matters more than them. Her throat is sore, and she's shaken up, but she's alive.

Nap Time #3 (in progress)

Okay, this isn't really only the third painting session, but I didn't dare show you all the previous two or three before this! Frightening! For literally 15 painting hours, I went backwards. Once again, I seemed to forget everything I learned. I'm starting to question the whole inspiration thing. Every successfull artist I've ever read about says you have to work even if you don't "feel like it", but it seems like every time I try that, I screw everything up! The skin tone has gone from yellow, to orange to purple and back again! But, yesterday, I "felt like" painting, and everything I knew came flooding back to me. It was like I was working from instinct instead of thinking about it. Anyways, I'm pretty happy with the results. I still need to tweak some values and richen up the skin tone a tad, but I'm feeling positive about it again.
As always, constructive criticism is welcome, so feel free to comment.

In Progress-#2

This is after my first day of working on laying in the main colors. I quickly blocked in the background and started adding detail to the part of the blanket that's wrapped around the baby. I changed the position of the face, and added detail there. I quickly blocked in shadow colors on the arms and legs. I'm having a few problems with the skin tones and the temperature changes. I think that I may need to make the local skin tone warmer, with the shadows warm, as the light is fairly cool. Right now she looks kind of corpse-like...YUK. The colors in the reference photo aren't very good, and I wanted to warm the whole thing up a bit, so I am kind of guessing at the colors at this point...tricky...anyways, I'll have more soon.

In Pursuit of the Perfect Wave

~In Pursuit of the Perfect Wave~ 16" x 16" original oil on canvas $400.00

This is a horrible photo of this painting! The colors are off, and the big white glare in the middle doesn't exist, it's from the light in the room. I can't get a good picture because I can't remember the last day that it didn't rain here! I finished this painting last night, and I really wanted to post it, so this photo is temporary, until I get a good day.
It's quite a bit larger than anything I've painted lately, but I really felt like I needed to breathe...take a break from the mini paintings and stretch my painting arm! How can you tell it's winter?...I'm painting beach scenes! I'm dreaming of the ocean, the sun and holidays! I can't wait till January.
This was from a black and white photograph that my sister took at Long Beach in Tofino, B.C. Check out more of her photography at www.ArtWanted.com/Karie.
TIP: For photographing your artwork, the best light is outdoors on a slightly overcast day. It gives a soft, even light which doesn't seem to affect the colors as much as trying to shoot indoors, under artificial light. Put your painting on a flat, even surface, or hang it on a wall. I usually try to zoom as much of the painting into the frame as possible, then crop it in photoshop to get clean edges.