Feb 1 - Finishing the New Jersey Winter

Amazing how life gets in the way of the joy of what we really WANT to do, eh?  Tonight I finally finished the 9 x 12 acrylic that I brought back from New Jersey and present it to you on this cc-c-c-cold day for most of the country.  Snow everywhere except here, and I'm grateful for not having it here.  I bought seeds and a grape vine to put in tomorrow.

Tonight though, I am sharing this watery landscape with you.  And tomorrow the plein air pieces done as I finally get back into the swing of being an artist.  It's what I DO, that's for sure.

There's a March workshop on the web site now!  Special discount to "repeat offenders"!  Email me if you're interested in a three-day reinforcement of your Color System knowledge, March 12, 13 and 14.  There's always room for one more, beginner or not!  If you want to get away from the snow and ice, you can fly into Ontario (ONT) airport and I'll pick you up. You can help me harvest the gardens for fresh salads--yes, the studio looks bright and sunny just as the image shows below, so green with our winter rains.

More workshops are opening up, and if you can't make the March one, perhaps one further in the year will entice you! Now is a good time to improve your knowledge, especially about color!

I've been hiking these mountains and making some great trails into the preserve behind the house/studio.  Wonderful weather has made this a joy, and I plan to do more of it as the weather continues to hold.

The newest DVD on the Color System is HERE
You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2010 is HERE.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.

May 22 - How about a Workshop? And the name!

The Ocala, Florida, workshop was a great event in a grand locale, and I'm please to share with you the photograph taken by Maggie Weakley's husband--pro photographer, you can see his fabulous work here--of the ten people who participated. And of course, there is Sparky, hamming it up.

There has been an incredible response to my need for a name for the newest addition to the Two Trees household! Thank you all. A list of names, and creative they are! I looked over more than fifty naming options, and cogitated on it for a full day, and the choice is made.
Here are some of your creative offerings: (I'll never lack for a dog's name again!)
OhNo 'cause I'm positive that's what whoever cropped her ears said.
...she is a looker like "Vana White" on the game show and a lopped ear...Vanagogh
Shiloh...Oreo...Meadow...Bibelot...Harlow...Fargo
Hobo...Bardot...Margo (also Margeaux) ...Bravo...Aiko
Oido...Segundo...Solo...Yarrow...Juno...Echo
Shiloh (really "pup"ular)...CoCo...Calypso (almost picked this one)
Artisimo...Koloh...Arrow.. Halo...Duo... Mio...Timo...
and perhaps thirty more great suggestions. Even "Shadow", but I couldn't bring myself to name a dog after the Tibetan Mastiff pup I lost last January. Too painful. So Willow it is!

Donna McCullough came up with Willow first, although Cheryl Pass, Judi Evans and Mary Lou Roberts also suggested that name.
Donna's email arrived first, so she'll be sent her choice of DVD as a gift for helping name this lucky rescue. And I thank all of you caring hearts who love the rescues. What a grand community of wonderful people! And it made my job so much easier.
Willow settling in...

You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2010 is HERE.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.

Mar 24 - Jury Duty and the Next Stage

Covering the canvas as I always do, this 12 x 9 painting progresses into the misty light of the overcast day quite easily. I stay completely in the Cool Box, using trios of colors to keep the mixes harmonious. Most of the distant areas behind the bridge are done with mixes that have white in them. White, being the coldest color on our palettes, is used in distance to give the ethereal feeling of misty light. White is also used, to a lesser degree, in the nearby areas. My contrast of values decreases as distance increases, and in misty light, the values get closer together more quickly!

Where does the time go? I've been doing much Spring cleaning of my studio, offing old work and work that doesn't represent my legacy, and "relocating" books from my art library to new owners through Amazon.com. I'm also just enjoying this gorgeous spring weather here in California with gardens needing planting.

The workshop in Florida has been moved right into Ocala, so if you are in that area and want to attend this Color Boot Camp, please contact Kathie Camara ASAP (Link takes you to an email message)! The new location puts us in an urban area, and boot campers can come in daily instead of staying at the Carriage Park. It makes the workshop more affordable, as well.

Georgia is almost full, and it is going to be FANTASTIC as well!

I'm sitting in jury duty today....at least they have wifi!

You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2010 is HERE.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.

June 8 - Back to the Normal after the Workshop

As I continue to cover the canvas, I'm working on the lower 2/3, bringing the colors back with the new, hopefully more effective design. The flowers "grew", and the plates moved down and off a bit. Again, I've moved to the Open Acrylics by Golden, to give me some more working time to make decisions. Although I love my traditional acrylics, working on a larger canvas tends to make me hurry when I'm using them.

I got a call from the Escondido gallery--suggesting that most of his clientele have homes that react better to "warmer" palettes. But he said that of all the artists' work he took over to show one of his high-end clients, it was my work that worked best. The Color System... what can I say???

Well, it is back to the "New" normal... It is mighty quiet around here now, after all the new Boot Camp graduates left yesterday, Sunday. The July workshop is full, and I'm looking at the second weekend in October for the next three-day Riverside Boot Camp. Those of you on the East Coast still have an opportunity to relax and paint your socks off in Maine in September. There's another three-day workshop scheduled for August in Sebastopol, but at this time is only open to their membership. I'll keep you posted if that changes.

Here's a photo from the workshop that was kindly sent to me from the Canadian contingent after she arrived back home. I send it to show the rack behind me with the work of the students from the first day--they did either moonlight or misty light paintings and the new "silly painting" using just the CS values. I'm wearing one of the "I survived Color Boot Camp" aprons, and of course, Sparky is doing his "bird on a wire" act.

Happy painting!

You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2009 is HERE.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.

May 18 - Accommodations and more Florida

Another artist from the Florida Color Boot Camp, applying the Color System to make a good painting go into orbit. Nancy Moskovitz has a blog where she shares information on her art journey, and I was honored to have her among the wonderful group painting and learning at the Carriage Museum near the Villages, in central Florida last week. Her "AHA" moment, she says, "Just one? Learning how to use yellows, especially lemon yellow to create a morning mood. Learning how to keep sunlit fields in the distance with ochre. Thalo blue in sunlight; thalo green in shadow - wow!"

I just loved this evocative depiction of a common subject. Can you tell I love teaching? Both my Riverside workshops are full now, and I'm busy clipping and snipping around the gardens to neaten up the place after an absence of two weeks.

In Florida, below's an image of the Wisteria Lodge, one of two that were our accommodations for this workshop. Amazing place, the Austin Carriage Museum! Beauty in the site and beauty in the light. I slept in my Hennessy Hammock out in the trees and loved every moment of the Florida nights. The hammock has a bug net that prevents unwanted intruders, and it worked well even in the rain.

You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2009 is HERE.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.

May 17 - Home and Off to Paint Again

The Florida and Georgia workshops are history now, and I'm full of memories and have many images to share with you! I don't have images of my own work to share, since those paintings are either out of my hands or on their way home in shipping boxes. But I'm honored to share the work of one of the students, Jackie, who has said that knowing the Color System was the last key she needed to make her work reach that higher level. This is her 12 x 16 oil for her misty painting, and isn't it lovely? She already has a foundation of drawing, composition and a great "feel" for depicting the Florida landscape, so adding the time of day to her work is like the flowers on the icing on the decorated cake!

And here's the entire workshop on the front porch of one of our lodgings, on our last day, sharing the final images we were working on--backlit, and sunset skies. Represented are oils, acrylics and watercolors. Nobody had to say "cheese" to this group, and they all survived Color Boot Camp! I will miss them, and the fun we had. Some new terms they added to the CBCs are "Friggin' Green" and "Wine O'Clock". They want me to come back next year.This afternoon I'm painting on location at the UCR Botanic Gardens for their "Primavera in the Gardens" event. I hope to post the newest images later this week.

You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2009 is HERE--spaces ONLY in the Maine CBC.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.

May 9 - Thank you and Goodbyes

Here's the demonstration painting for morning light done as part of the lecture for the Georgia workshop this week. It's a 12 x 16 and done with acrylics (traditional) on a board-backed canvas and is one of the views across the woods and hayfields of Georgia. I really like the light patterns that fall on the jump on the right of the scene. I've walked this path on Fay's farm many times and never tire of it.

The students ("Recruits") in the Color Boot Camps are producing outstanding work--all because of the Color System applied to their curret style and subject matter. I'm honored to be teaching such a great group, and will be heading optimistically to Florida tomorrow to meet up with yet another great group of folks with a desire to know the Color System.

Here I am doing the demonstration for noon light--on a 16 x 20 canvas in Golden Open acrylics, pill boxes at the ready! Fun demo, and I'll post the finished painting later this week.

I want to thank all of you--especially those to whom I've not had time to personally reply--who wrote about Shadow. It is tough to lose a pet, and those who wrote such kind emails cement for me the connection I feel to all of you, and for that I thank you sincerely. I have a busy life, yet there are those bittersweet moments of memory that still bring an ache to my heart.

Now I'm off to Florida tomorrow morning, and will be seeing new faces, new Color Boot Camp Recruits, with Sparky is by my side! I hope I'll have a good Internet connection while I'm there!

You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2009 is HERE.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.

Feb 17 - Workshop Finished, Evening Light Demo

This 9 x 12 acrylic was done as the workshop demonstration piece for evening light, using the Color System. Nine participants finished up three intense days of painting from 9 to 4:30, learning the Color System for time of day here in my studio last weekend, and this was from the second day, in the afternoon.

I used the cool box colors to lay in all of the distances and shadows before judiciously putting the warms into the nearby lights and on the meadow. Evening light is showing as the influence of cadmium orange on the lights, and an interesting thalo blue/cadmium orange light on that blue spruce.

The source for this painting came from one of the students in the workshop. I seriously edited the placement of objects to create a more pleasing perspective and eye-path. It was done with mostly traditional acrylics, but there were some Golden Open acrylics in the boxes now, so it was a compromise on which "ruled the day".

The next Color Boot Camp here in California is full (April), but if there's enough interest, I will open a third one in June with the same three-day format. There are still spaces on the east coast in three of my workshops--first in Georgia in May, second in Florida in May, and the third one during the Fall Foliage in Maine, in September. Now's the time to learn!

You can see my entire blog HERE.
My workshop schedule for 2009 is HERE.
Color System information can be found HERE.
If you need to email me directly, please click here.