Apple Imitating an Apple (in Progress)

This photo is from last night's last class of this series with Jennifer Balkan. It was an open studio class. It felt MFAish. Which is a dream come true. I'm happy and excited about my "art imitating life imItating art imitating life series." It was hard to get there some Tuesdays, from 7-10 p.m., my that's late for an old lady, but fun city once I made it.

The Sweet Life of Stawberries

Here it is my 300th post. I'm really excited about this painting. I'm taking a second class with Jennifer Balkan, and this is a still life that we set up in last week's class. It was inspired by a conversation I had with my painter friend Kirsten Brooks, where she mentioned that the secret to great art seems to be: "Paint Big." So here it is, my super big strawberry, on a bib that's full of strawberry illustrations. Art imitating life and art imitating art imitating life. Maybe it needs to be bigger still.

Times Square Clock on the North Tower

This is a beautiful clock just off the north tower in Times Square. It took a while to notice it behind my favorite coke bottle.

Times Square Subway Entrance

Times Square Arrows

Times Square Cherry Coke

I was a bit in love with the 3-D coke bottle advertisement. If it was empty you could see the green bottle, and then it would fill up with the pretend soda.

Times Square Virgin Jet on Top of Brewery

This was another wild advertising scheme. Virgin Airways had a jet on top of a building, veiled for a long time it seemed.

Times Square Horse and Buggy

Here is a painting of a horse in Times Square. I can't imagine how it must feel to be a horse among so many yellow cabs.

Times Square Pigeon on the Red Face Fence

There is a red face fence in the middle of the north part of Times Square. It's very Broadway. This is a strange moment I caught on film and then painted.

Times Square News Stand

I like how the magazines came out in this painting, less is more. I know many places still sell phone cards, but they seem strangely out of date in this cell phone world. I do always try to keep one with me when I travel, just in case I haven't any cell phone service, and I need to make a call without breaking the bank.

Times Square Peep Show and Donuts

My husband and I started our Times Square book project in 1997, we went to the square over 250 times in one year. The square was changing every minute. For instance, this painting shows one of the last peep shows, and the little donut shop two doors down was total time travel even then. It was more of a hallway than a full on restaurant. If we went to the square late enough and stopped for coffee, the guy working at the shop would send us home with all the free donuts we wanted.

Times Square Raining Day Folks Exiting the Subway

This is another from my 1997 Times Square series. The first painting I sold in NYC was from this group, and another in the group got me into my first group show at The New Yorker Magazine Gallery.

Times Square North Tower Coca-Cola

The two add towers, north and south, could fill a year all on their own. Here is the coca-cola straight on. The sing behind the coca-cola bottle would switch from diet coke to regular.

Times Square 3-D Coca-Cola from the Side

Did you ever get to see the huge coca-cola bottle in Times Square? The top opened and a straw came up and drank it down. It's gone now, replaced by a newer coca-cola sign. I thought it would be there forever. It seemed so modern then, and now it seems as old fashioned as they get.

Times Square No. 47 Facing South After a Storm

I've been amazed lately how people are now able find my art, art from 2006 that I'm not actively marketing, via the internet. I have so many paintings in storage, never before published on the internet, only in one show or another over the years.

So, I've decided that when I don't have time to paint, I'm going to post some of my older work. My blog will then also serve as a more complete archive of my life as an artist, which by the way did not begin in 2006, when this blog began. It began in 1989 with my first pointalism project done in high school, under the watchful eye of Ms. Mota-Costa, a RISD grad, and genius high school art teacher, at my not so great public school of West Warwick High. I followed every dot, used a grid, and still my piece was not precise, but everyone, including my parents loved it. To this day, that sums up my style of painting: Me, working tirelessly to paint exactly what I see, and somehow walking away with my own interpretation. Completing that project was the first thing in life, other than sports, that I could work on for hours and never notice the time.

Today's blog piece was completed in 1997, my now husband and I, spent one year documenting all the changes in Times Square, (the last days with peep shows and cheap coffee) he with text, me with paint and charcoal. This is number 47 of one of over 250 paintings. One in the series got me into my first show in NYC at The New Yorker Gallery.

New Doll Christmas Morning

This is the first collage I did in 1991. I found it today in the garage. It helped get me into Parsons. It's so detailed that it makes me laugh about how much free time I used to have. I really enjoy the results of magazine collage. There is so much detail in each piece of cut paper.

Heirloom Tomatoes in November from our March Garden

Austin was so hot this summer that our tomato plants bore no fruit until Mid-September. Here are two of the little fruits hanging out with the paprika can my mother-in-law brought back as a lovely gift from eastern Europe. This still life was set up at last night's Jennifer Balkan studio class. It really is something to feel like I have time to paint. I only feel that way in class.

SciFi Loving Feminist

This painting is another from the Jennifer Balkan portrait class I took in the spring. The model spoke of her love of science fiction and feminism during the breaks. I start another one of her studio classes here in Austin this week.

Self Portrait

The self portrait — all artists must have one. Some folks have said this doesn't look like me. I thought it did, atleast a little. It's funny how one's face changes. I really notice it doing the occaisional self portrait. I used to have a round face, now it's much longer, I never planned on that. My nose is much longer too, it used to be this tiny little nose. :)

Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island

I painted this image for Brown over the summer. They chose another, so now it becomes a post. Brown has a very beautiful campus. This painting features Manning Chapel, University Hall, and Slater Hall at sunset. I haven't done much watercolor work, but I love it, watercolors have their own personality that they add to every painting.

'O' for Obama in '08

Eight LONG years of the letter 'W!'

I'm ready for a new letter, a more well rounded, centered letter, an all inclusive letter, a letter that says opportunity, others, and open minded politics.
'O!' Obama '08!

Signs of Fall in Austin: Butternut Squash at Sunset

The artist I share my studio with, is very neat. She is a dancer not a painter. I don't know about the rest of you painters out there but I cannot paint unless my whole house is clean, and my whole house is never clean. There is always something else I could organize or clean, and thus I found little time to paint. But this new studio, I walk in, and it's clean, and the light is lovely, and it shines through the window onto lovely things, like butternut squashes, which will always remind me of my mother.

Red Head Sea

This is a final painting (finished yesterday) from the portrait class I took last spring with Jennifer Balkan. And here's a photo my studio. Thanks for the promt, Kirsten.

The Barn: East Austin

I've gone hog wild and rented studio space in East Austin. The barn in the back yard helped sell it. Lord knows how long I'll be able to afford it, but for now, it's a dream come true. If you build it, they will come. This is the first painting I did there, a few weeks back.

Blog Action Day — Please Help Haiti

It's Blog Action Day 2008, and the topic is poverty. I'd like to address the extreme poverty in Haiti, a beautiful nation in the Caribbean that I was fortunate enough to visit when I was 16. Haiti is the poorest nation in the western hemisphere. Environmental degradation and overpopulation have combined to create hellish conditions. Please consider donating to "Haiti Children" which works every day to save the children of Haiti. I'll donate 100% of today's sales, open to any painting available on the blog, to "Haiti Children."

Today's art is a little line drawing of two Haitian fishing boats.

Barton Springs Austin Baptism

It sure is cold the first time you go in.

Miss Barton Springs 2008

This was commissioned by a DC client, who loves Barton Springs. I just love painting there. Barton Springs is certainly one of mother nature's great beauties.

Boy in Pink

I added some of the new collage to the old "boy in pink" painting. I cut out all the girl room stuff from the pottery barn kids catalog.

Here are some interesting pink facts from wikipedia: "In Western culture, the practice of assigning pink to an individual gender began in the 1920s. From then until the 1940s, pink was considered appropriate for boys because it was the more masculine and decided color while blue was considered appropriate for girls because it was the more delicate and dainty color. Since the 1940s, the societal norm apparently inverted so that pink became appropriate for girls and blue appropriate for boys, a practice that has continued into the 21st century."

Seated Woman with Flowers

Here's more collage work. I've had this image in my mind for months. I wanted her to really sit on the canvas.

$110 + $5 s/h

Brave in Yellow

"Courage is being scared to death - but saddling up anyway." - John Wayne
Poor yelllow, always pegged as the scaredy-cat, today it will be brave!
$110 + $5 s/h

Peace in Red

This is part of my typographic painting series. Let's question our society's ingrained thoughts on color, shall we. I use junk mail for the collage, thank you Pottery Barn.
$110+$5s/h

Hold Me

I'm really moved by the strength I see in the women around me.

Co-sleeping Strawberries

We are night weaning at my house, so I've got family sleep on the brain.

SOLD

Lone Sunflower

My daughter ate some sunflower seeds the other day and then asked my husband where they come from. Later that night, he arrived at the house with a bunch of beautiful sunflowers for my curious monkey.
SOLD

Boy in Pink

This is the companion piece to "Girl in Blue." Another word/color study.

Feng Shui: Golden Yellow for Health

In feng shui, the middle of your house is the health quadrant. Yellow can be placed there to help with your family's health.

Girl in Blue

I'm an graphic designer by day, this painting is a color/word association painting. Who decided that baby girls shouldn't wear blue. In the fifties, many little girls were dressed in light blue (virgin blue) and way back, pink was considered a masculine color.

Red Sky in Morning

This canvas was a yellow bike, then a ship caught in a storm. Now, I've painted over it again with red. I love the layering and the texture. You can almost see hints of the ship through the red. When I was a kid, I loved the saying "Red sky in morning, sailor take warning, red sky at night, sailor delight." I would sit on big a rock in my backyard, look at the sky, and try to figure out the next day's weather. I miss feeling that close to the ocean.

Black for Career

Silver for Helpful People and Travel

Sleeping Lu Bear

I did this one while my daughter was asleep.

Pink for Romance and Relationships

A few friends have hung my pink feng shui paintings in their romance quadrants and they now have new romance.

Green for Family

This painting would enhance your family and money situation for everyday things.

Left Hand, Right Hand 1 — Limes

The painting on the left was done with my left and the one on the right with my right. I'm hoping to do a series of paintings that compare the results of my right and left hand. A little healthy competition between the two.

Red Headed Diva

This is the last in the red headed series, all from a figure drawing session here in Austin.
SOLD

Red Headed Warrior

The first friend I ever made in this life (at age 1) has red hair, perhaps that's why I loved painting this model.
SOLD