Pow-Wow Indian WIP 4

I have done a few more things to help me see better "road maps" of this man's anatomy, such as blocking in his hair and I continue to work on his jaw. The eyebrows will need some refining and then I think I will move on to his hat. Lots of detail there. I need that to be the correct darkness to be able to gauge how much darker the skin tones or his face paint needs to be.

Pow-Wow Indian WIP 3 (or 4 or 5?)

I have mainly been working on this at night and haven't stopped during the daylight to take WIP photos as I promised. Sorry. This is probably more like WIP 4 or 5, but here it is, the third one.

He is wearing paint on his face, very dark and black on the lips and upper face, so I have to soften the edges so it looks less like a mask. Also, I misread the modeling shadows below his chin and needed to use the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser to correct that and will make it right the next time I work on it. There is more paint to add in the face and then the hair will be blocked in lightly so I don't get lost again. Details, details. I really owe a debt to Mr. Clean, he knows his stuff!

Stay tuned, when you see his black hat with the bead work and feathers hopefully you will like this guy as much as I liked his photo. Slow going on this one due to time constraints, but I will continue on.

Pow-wow Indian - WIP2

Just added the beginning modeling shadows late yesterday and this morning. Will work on it as I can today and see how far I get. So far, so good.

Pow-Wow Brave WIP 1

This is the underpainting for my newest project, an Indian man from a pow-wow in Banderra, TX. The reference photo was taken by a new online friend, Diana Webb. She graciously gave me permission to paint from her photo. I was taken by this photo and wanted to paint it immediately upon seeing it. It is hard to see in these early stages, but his gaze is intense, yet pensive and calm. Plus, I love his hat! Pardon the buckling of the paper in the face as I got in a big hurry to take the photo before the paper had dried after the wet-into-wet application of the underpainting. This will be my first attempt at these magnificent feathers that were part of his attire. I'll keep working and posting WIPs as I move along, although it will no doubt be fairly slow for awhile.

The image size of this painting is 24 x 16, watercolor on Arches 140-lb paper.

A Christmas Wish - Okay Three

I have three wishes for us all this Christmas Day. As so much of the country is enduring harsh winter weather this year, I pray that you are safely within the embrace of your families in a warm place. As we enjoyed the fellowship with my side of our family last night I was struck by the basic need of connecting and reconnecting with those whose pasts we share.

I also have a wish for all to be safe financially in these troubled times. I speak not of wealth, but of the security that allows us all to feel that we can take care of ourselves and have freedom from the threat that we will not be able to if the world's economy does not level out. This needs to change, may those who are in charge of making this happen for us be guided by good and not greed.

Lastly, my biggest wish this holiday season is for health for us all. If you are dealing with health issues may you find healing in this new year that will allow you to enjoy all of the above as well as look forward to many future holidays. This has been a year of working through health issues for my family and I realize that this is the greatest wealth one can have, health.

God's blessings to you and yours this Christmas Day......

"Rock Talk and Autumn Framed"

These are the two paintings I finished last week, but due to spending so much time working on my new computer, transferring files, etc. I have not updated my blog to include them. The reference photos for both of these was provided by Roch, of New Mexico Jeep Tours. His photos just inspire me, plain and simply. He stops to take the photos I believe I would take if I were where he happens to be as he leads Jeep tours through the wonders of New Mexico. Thanks once again, Roch!

Now, I can maybe squeeze in some painting time to work on my Indian brave painting. I have the background in, so far, so good.

12/12/08 Sunset

I neglected to share with you our sunset the night before last here. This was shot from our driveway. Whenever there are clouds present in the West at sunset you can count on a spectacular display here. I just about missed this one but got out in time to snap a few photos.

ArtChix Sale This Weekend

This will be my home on the planet for this weekend, an ArtChix sale. Hopefully, people will feel compelled to buy something, but in this economy one never knows. It was worth getting prepared for, I just hope it all works out to be profitable. Lots of people looking, few buying so far. The cooler weather tomorrow may hinder this effort, also. Sigh. Such is the life of an artist, I guess.

Cell Phone Sunrise

While leaving our house to run some early morning errands yesterday I noted this great sunrise. Not having my good camera with me, I resorted to using my cell phone. While this isn't the best photo I have ever taken, I think it shows this display of color very well for having been shot from a cell phone camera. Love these rosy sunrises!

The Birth of a Blog

I have added a link to my new friend's blog. While meeting in an RV park in Kingman at Thanksgiving, we discovered a mutual love of painting and talking about painting and she was intrigued with the idea of a blog. She immediately took my suggested route of using this blog forum and set about creating her own blog. I have watched her fledgling blog since then and think you all might like to pop on over and have a look for yourselves! She has a style of painting in oils and watercolors that is realistic, but definitely charmingly painterly as well. Her name is Connie Hummel-Kornell and the link to her blog is: http://chummelkornell.blogspot.com/ She will soon be adding more of her paintings and this promises to be a very beautiful addition to her blog. The paintings I have seen of hers are reminiscent of Norman Rockwell or maybe Currier and Ives with a bit of Thomas Kincaid thrown in.

Check out her photos and ponderings on her very interesting life.

Winter Scene

Another mentoring session today, the choice was for this Winter scene, copied from a favorite greeting card of the student. Since this was a study, neither of us will be selling this copyright-protected work but it was a good one for trying out new techniques and learning from it. What does a girl from Yuma, Arizona know about painting snow scenes? You are right...not much! It was fun to ponder and experiment a little on what might work to get the right effects. I learn about as much when teaching as I did as a student! I am nothing if not brave!

NM Petroglyph Site

This is the second painting I finished today. It was painted from a photo of a petroglyph site in New Mexico. Roch, from NM Jeep Tours gave me permission to paint from his wonderful photo, for which I am grateful, he is a great photographer!

These are very large petroglyphs, almost intaglios it appears from the scale of the rocks. It was fun to do and shows some of the marvelous colors that were in these rocks.

Now, on to my next victim, a moose painting!

Glade Creek Grist Mill - Final

For better or worse, I finished the mill painting today. My goal was to finish every unfinished painting in my studio before the end of this week. I finished two of these paintings today, so only one more to go and then I am caught up and have less piles laying around the easels and tables.

I still like this scene and feel a real attachment to it even though I have never personally been there. This is the third painting I have done from photographs of this mill. It speaks to me.

Keokuk Eagle

This painting is from a reference photo by a mentoree who wanted to paint this from her home town in Iowa. This is a wood carving done by a carver using a chain saw and looks to be a huge accomplishment.

We both like working in sepia, the value shifts are great and we both had good results today. We continue to work on values, textures and mass foliage effects. Good times.

Surpise Sunset - 12/2/08

One of the rewards for surviving the ghastly summers here on the Arizona desert are the sunsets, especially in the Fall and Spring. This is tonight's sunset, which I thought was especially nice with the band of clouds so accommodating.

Surprise Sunrise

This is a project painting for the watercolor Workshop online group. We were to paint skies of any kind, so I chose one of my sunrise photo jaunt photos for reference. This has a series of at least six glazes, done over a month's time. I kept putting it aside and not getting back to it, but since this week is my week to finish ALL of the paintings sitting in my studio I got this one finished this morning. I have finished three so far this week and that leaves two, but those two are the most complicated and involved ones to do. Then, I have two paintings that I really want to get started with, so I have to finish these first before I allow myself the pleasure of starting the newest ones. A little self-discipline is good for the soul?

Home Again

We are home again after having a great Thanksgiving holiday trip in the motorhome. I shot so many photos, everything was so colorful at this time of the year and we were able to go on photo jaunts each day we were there. This included a sunrise jaunt, a 4-wheel-drive jaunt and a nice trip back home where I shot photos out the passenger side window of the motorhome. Of course, at 65 mph some of the angles produced some blurriness, but the colors of the Sycamores and Cottonwoods were not to be missed!

I also shot a few series of pano shots, the one I have processed can be seen at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/wcbysusanroper/3074257558/ as the file is too large to be included here.

Another highlight of our trip was that I met a fellow artist and made a new friend. She liked the idea of this blog so she got busy and created one for her artwork over the weekend. When she has tweaked it to her satisfaction I will add the link to my sidebar. I am convinced that the art community is one of the friendliest communities anywhere, there seems to be an immediate kinship.

I have five not quite completed paintings sitting in the studio so that is my art goal for this week, to finish every almost-done painting and get them off the boards. A discussion on Rhonda Carpenter's blog this weekend spurred me to action; we all have projects sitting around, waiting for us to stop pondering and just finish paintings that we have previously set aside. I'll post them here if I meet my goal!