My two homework paintings for the Seascapes Course of Johannes Vloothaus. I love this man's teachings and have bought his series. I recommend Johannes courses and teach his principles in my classes.

 This is the Pavilion at Lakeside. I began this painting last year and it was not working. After looking at it for a long time, I realized that it was too bland, so I went in and started the sky. I am happy with how it came out. I really darkened the trees bringing out the sunlight behind them. I worked on the foreground and made it very loose. Then the water and darkened the areas around the Pavilion.

 Finished this but thinking it could use some smaller branches..I overworked the dark areas. It is very hard to get a good dark and keeping it transparent.

This is an oil I began. I am so excited about doing the agility with Tosca and thought I would paint her jumping through the hoop.I have a lot more to do to on her and then tackling the hoop.

Finally finished it. Looks too dark here but will photo better on  a sunny day. I think I may have overworked it but accomplished the look and color I wanted. Had to improvise with a lot of pines to get the effect. I do like my big tree and the bark. Need lots more work on tree limbs. But the inspiration did get a neat effect.

I have been studying Alyson B. Stanfield's book "I'd rather be in the studio. One of the first things she wants you to do is make an Artist statement in two sentences. So I need to figure out what in two sentences I can say about my work. I know I like my work to be impressionistic, to have vivid color and much contrast. I would like it to have some mystery so the viewer stays with it for a while. I want the viewer to see my brush marks, my use of color whether watercolor or oil. So I am working on that statement.

So I am working on a painting of my own in the style of Feng. I hope to finish it today. It is a photo of a river I had in my collection. It may be from Montana but I have changed a few things.

This is a copy of Z L Feng painting, "Autumn River"/ I wanted to practice my watercolor as I hadn't done it for some time. I am inspired by his work.

This is a watercolor that I started long ago, I added a darker sky and some yellow and green.I will continue working on this today. It is from a Lakeside, OH photo. I hope to go to Lakeside this year during a competition.

I have been working on my art all week. I will post later today.

I was notified today that my Longhorn done in coffee won first prize in a Coffee painting contest on Fine Art America!

I worked on this plein air oil today. I got a late start because I had books due at the library and needed a few groceries. Then I got caught up with my mortgage company for a long time as my January payment went to the old mortgage which is paid off instead of the new mortgage.It took a long time but it will be automatic now. So....this painting was done last Fall and I don't believe I photographed it. It was dull and too pinkish. So I darkened a lot of it and lightened the sun lit places and I am much more happy with it. When ever the sun comes out (I live in mid Ohio) I will photo real well but it is cloudy and only 26 degrees. The dogs are begging to be fed and I am going to practice with Tosca, my Australian Shepherd I rescued 6 months ago for some agility moves. We have 8 inches of snow so have to do it in the house.

It may need a few touch ups but basically I am happy with it for my first acrylic in a long time..

January 2, 2013
A new year and new goals. Last year in the last 3 months I worked at minimum wage jobs and those jobs are finished so.....I figured if I could take the time to work those jobs, I would take the same time and paint the same hours. Today I did....I started at 12 and worked until now (4:50) and finished an 8x10 acrylic. I had invested in a couple ruling pens and wanted to work in some acrylic for a change. It is too dark to photo but will do so tomorrow. I am fairly happy with the painting. I worked on a gessoed board, very smooth and if the paint was very liquid the brushmarks showed so there had to be a happy medium which I did not achieve but I rather like the transparent look. The ruling pen was a challenge as if one put too much paint in it , then it would make a big blob at the start. I really liked it for making branches and weeds. To work in a transparent manner one has to plan as well as with a watercolor. The advantage is one can repaint and still get a transparent look, Will get my iPad and see if I can get a decent picture of the painting tonight.