Rainy days and puddles Final

Here is the finished painting.  The changes are small but important.  Thank you for following along with this demonstration of the development of one of the approaches I use in painting.

Rainy days and puddles step 2 and 3

Here I placed the darks while maintaining the lights.  I used only three main colors and naples yellow and a little white.  It was a challenge to keep the values while working with such a limited palette.  My palette consisted of a cool purple, warm red and a warm green.  The colors were pre mixed.

Hope this gives you ideas to try.

Thank you for following this demonstration.  I will post the final painting soon.

Rainy days and puddles

I am working on this painting and thought that I would post a progression. This first image is the drawing plus a wash so that I will stay in the color palette that I have decided to use for this painting.  Hope you enjoy seeing this develop and I welcome any comments !

Sunset on the Ohio

Here is a painting I painted a few weeks ago.  It was a challenge because I found it difficult to get the correct values with it being just at sunset. I hope that I did justice to this beautiful scene.

Thank you for your thoughts.

Pansies

Here is a 12 x 16 that just came together so easily.

I love these happy little clown flowers. I hope that you enjoy my interpretation of a bowl full of pansies.

I appreciate your thoughts !!

By the shore

I am back.  I am sorry that I haven't posted in a while.  We had a bout of swine flu that set me back and getting the kids back in school always creates time warps and you just don't get everything done.  I never stop painting.  Sometimes I can't get into the zone and don't paint very well but painting is like breathing to me.  I have to be doing something creative at all times. With that said, I will share some of what I have been doing that I didn't get around to posting.  This first painting is painted under the influence of John Singer Sargent.  I say this because I found a print of his beautifully framed at an antique shop.  This print inspired my composition. I will post both the master's painting and mine so that you can see what I saw and was inspired to attempt.

Tea Time

This painting came about slowly and is really nice in person.  The figure has an almost old fashion touch to the way I painted it. I think I must have had a muse from the past looking over my shoulder when I worked on it because it is how I wanted it but painted with me having no idea where the influence was coming from.  Does this make sense to anyone else?  It is my model obviously but somehow the overall feeling that I see tells a wistful tale. A longing perhaps.  Something in the tea leaves no doubt.

Hope you see something in it. Let me know if you do !