My Big Painting Adventure: San Miguel de Allende, Mexico!

Hello Everyone.  I'm so glad to be back to blogging.  I know I have been gone for awhile.  The reason is that I went on a 10 day painting trip to Mexico!  It was a great trip and I can't wait to tell you all about it.

We spent our time in San Miguel de Allende, a beautiful town recently voted the number one city in the world in the Conde Nast Magazine reader poll.

These are some photos from the car leaving Mexico City.  The highway was busy and crowded leaving the airport, but eventually gives way to mountains and desert.

A few hours after landing we were in beautiful San Miguel.  San Miguel is a small city with a good sized American expat population, and after spending 10 days there I understand why people choose to retire or have second homes there.  The weather is great (75 degrees there today vs. 28 in NYC), it is very clean, the people are friendly and there is a great free spirited vibe about the place.

Sunset was soon after we arrived.  Every night was more beautiful than the last.

This is the view we saw the first morning.  The blue sky was unlike anything I've ever seen.

I heard some barking and this guy was looking down at me from his roof top.  Such a cutie.

Our first morning started off with Gregg doing a demo for us.  He did a two hour painting of the lovely Victoria in the outdoor studio of our B & B.

The block in

Adding detail

Placing the shadows

End of the demo

After Gregg's demo, we set up our easels to paint Victoria.  I made a good start, but it takes awhile to paint a complete portrait and unfortunately Victoria was unable to pose for us again.

This was just the start of a great painting week.  Tomorrow I will show you some of the spots we painted in around town and out in the desert.  

Hope everybody is doing well.  See you tomorrow!

Frances

A Blog Announcement

Hi Everyone,

I'm just popping in to let you guys know that I'll be away from the blog for a bit.  I'm off on an exciting painting adventure (in just a few hours, still not finished getting ready!).  I'll be back in about 10 days and will tell you all about my trip as well as post some photos from last night's opening reception.

I'm not sure what the internet situation will be, but I am going to try to post to twitter and instagram.

Have a great week everybody.  I'll see you soon.

Xo,
Frances

Still Life Show Opening Reception Tonight

Hi Everybody.  Hope you are all having a good week.  I'm still at work on my two remaining paintings, but I wanted to pop in to let you guys know that tonight is the opening reception for the Huntington Arts Council Annual Still Life Show.  Two of my paintings are included in the show.

Peonies In A Glass Vase, 16x20, oil 

Brass Pot With A Glass Vase, 16x20, oil

The reception will run from 6 to 8 pm.  If you are in the Long Island area, please stop by.  I would love to meet you.

Have a great weekend!

Frances

One Down, Two To Go….

If you recall my last post, I was working on three paintings at the same time.   Luckily, I finished one of them yesterday.

This is what I started out with.  Not bad, but it needed some tweaking.  That shadow in the lower right hand corner was too stark and the front line of the table cloth was a bit off.  I fixed the line (thank heavens for the t-square) and then I softened up the shadow on the right by adding a little more of the lighter color of the cloth to it.

I also darkened up the shadow on the right side of the background. I then used the same color to soften the back edge of the table cloth as well as add a bit of shadow to the top plane of the right hand side.

Another change I made was to lighten up the leaf in the very front of the greenery.  You always want to  have one leaf or flower stand out so that the whole bunch does not look flat.

I decided to add a green grape on the right side of the painting as I felt there was a bit too much space there, but something was not sitting right with me.  After a few minutes I realized what it was:  there were eight pieces of fruit.  You always want to have an odd number of objects as it is more pleasing to the eye.  I added another grape and then it was finally finished.

There was a lot of excruciating minutia involved to get this painting done, but that is how it really works.  I always laugh when I see an artist portrayed in the movies or on tv and they make a masterpiece in a day.  Much of the art of painting involves fixing mistakes and making tiny changes that add up to a completed painting.

After I finished this up, I had some time to spend on the dahlias.  Yesterday was my last long painting day so we'll see how this week goes as I get adjusted to the new time ( I am so not a morning person).

Have a great Sunday everybody!

Three In Progress Paintings

 I'm doing that crazy thing again and working on three paintings at the same time.  I didn't plan for this to happen, but since it did, I thought I'd show you some in progress shots instead of waiting until they are completed.

First up:  a still life with dahlias.

I got the bouquet from the farmers market, stuck them in a ginger jar and got to work.  I had to paint over a canvas so I found an old 50/50 painting (fifty percent good, fifty percent so-so) and laid in the set up and the background.

Unfortunately at this point in the painting real life intervened and I was not able to get back to them for a week.  Needless to say, the bouquet was long gone, but luckily I got a lot of the flowers in and I can probably finish the rest from memory.

Meanwhile, I have been painting another still life in Gregg's studio.

I thought this was finished, but then I looked at it last night and realized that I forgot to put the pattern on the shadow area on the right.

Since I thought the above painting was finished, I started a new one yesterday.

So that is what has been going on over here.  Crazy, I know, but sometimes these things happen.  The nice thing is that soon I will have three complete paintings to show you.

Have a great day everybody!

Concert Of Color At The Chelsea Mansion

Last night was the opening reception for the Concert of Color exhibition.  My painting, Peonies In A Glass Vase, was one of the paintings selected for the exhibit.

Peonies In A Glass Vase, 16x20, oil

The house and grounds are beautiful.  I'm going to try to get back there and paint before it gets too cold.

Here are a few shots from the reception

We were able to take a look at some of the rooms on the first floor of this incredibly beautiful house.

You know I had my eye on this incredible vase

And finally, a photo of yours truly standing next to my painting.  Don't mind the pink cast over the picture.  Unfortunately there was a pink (???) spotlight right over my painting.

I'm so excited to be part of this exhibition.  It will be on view until October 24, 2013.  Now, it is back to painting my dahlias!

Paintings, Shows and Happenings

Hi Everyone.  I'm back from an unintended blogging break.  Hope all of you are doing well.  I did not mean to take a blogging vacation.  Things just got crazy here, but in a very good way.  First, my paintings have been accepted into three more shows!  I can't tell you how excited I am about this.  I've had paintings in shows before, but never on a regular basis, so this makes me really happy.  There is nothing like validation from your peers to make you feel good about what you are doing.

My painting, Peonies In A Blue And White Vase, was accepted into the American Artists Professional League's 85th Grand National Online Exhibition.   I won the Colonel George J. Morales Memorial Award for the painting as well.

Peonies In A Blue And White Vase

I will also have a painting in the Chelsea Mansion on Long Island (scroll down to the end of the page for exhibit info).  The mansion is having the exhibition in conjunction with the Nassau County (NY) Fall Concert Series.  The opening reception for this show is Thursday, October 17th, from 5-7pm and will run through October 24th.  My painting, Peonies In A Glass Vase, will be included in the show.  The mansion was built by Mr and Mrs. Benjamin Moore and is beautiful.  I'm so pleased that my painting will be shown there.

Peonies In A Glass Vase

The third show (!) that I will be in is taking place at the Huntington Arts Council on Long Island.  The peonies above as well as my still life, Brass Pot With A Glass Vase, will be shown from November 8 to December 16.  I have never had two paintings in a show before, so this is very exciting.

Brass Pot With A Glass Vase

In addition to the shows, I've done quite a bit of painting.  Unfortunately, last weeks painting ended up being a wipe out, but I did work on two others.

 

This painting was a two day quickie that I did years ago.  It was ok, but I've always felt that it could be better.  In fact, if I'm completely honest, I felt like it was mocking me (crazy, I know).  I finally decided to do something about it and I'm very happy with the way it turned out.

 I'm not sure if anyone other than me can see the changes, but I'm now very happy with it.  I put another coat of grey on the background and brought that color into the top of the bowl on the right.  Losing edges is very important in painting and now the top of the bowl is not so glaringly obvious.  I also softened the highlight on the left side of the bowl.

I then integrated the shadows on the lemons and pumped up the grapes.  The secret to doing grapes is to highlight one or two and leave the rest.  These are iphone photos from my studio, but in a week or so I can varnish the painting and take a proper photo of it.

I also began this still life, but in my painting haze, forgot to take a picture of the painting!  I'll get one tomorrow, but in the mean time, here is the set up.

So that is a quick recap of what has been going on here painting wise.  As always, thank you for following along on my art adventures.

Xo,
Frances