At Hall Ranch

Last Saturday I painted at Hall Ranch, got there very early hoping to catch the shadows on the mesas before they retreated for the heat of the day. I worked on two paintings and left before it got too hot.   I didn't run into any rattlesnakes, so that was good. It's still fairly green there, the browns of summer haven't set in yet. Here's the first one, also a picture of the scene as it was when I finished. All those cool shadows were gone.  Morning Shadows, 8 x 10. 

Why Not Niwot

Each year Niwot has an art contest/exhibition. The idea is to do a piece that is representative of Niwot, a small artsy village near here with lots of historical buildings, antique stores and interesting stuff.

Last year I entered this and won the grand prize. This year I did a different sort of piece,  a mostly black and white block print, completely different from last year's entry and much to my surprise won it again. The winning piece gets printed onto wine bottle labels, cards and posters. This year the wines chosen were two Italian wines, one red, one white.
Here's a picture of my winning 2016 piece as a wine label.

White peonies

Back to flowers again, something I haven't done a lot of and need to do more. We have some white peonies - they were just about finished and had a few blooms left so I thought I'd better paint them while there were a few flowers left. Here they are, in a Japanese cup that we have. The surface for the painting was really textured, I'd painted over an old painting.

White peonies, 10 x 8.

Afternoon Glow

It's been record-breaking hot here for the last couple days. Nevertheless I decided to go paint one late afternoon. I found myself a shaded spot behind a small grove of willow trees and set up painting, looking westward toward the city and the mountains off in the distance. The skies are murky these days, polluted from forest fire smoke from California and points west, so no blue skies, just a hot golden glow.

A redwing blackbird sat on a nearby tree giving off alarm cries and complaining bitterly the whole time I was there.  It was a bit buggy but not too bad working in the shade.
Afternoon Glow, 8 x 10, sold.

Telephone Poles

After finishing up the last painting at Peschel  ( On the Lookout) I did a few painting sketches on paper before I packed up. This is one of them.  Telephone Poles, 5 x 7.

On the Lookout

Last weekend I went to Peschell Open Space looking for something different to paint. I have been there so many times. This time I opted for the fallen tree as my subject. I remember painting under this tree several times two years ago, but then when I came back last summer I found it toppled to the ground.  A fortuitous bird alighted on a branch top while I was painting.

Here's the scene and the setup.  Below is a picture of the painting.
On the Lookout, 9 x 12.

Oil on paper

Trying some new materials - always fun. This is on Cobra water based oil paints and Huile oil paper.  I tried them out at the local pond the other day. The paper works well and I like the texture it has. It seems to dry pretty quickly also.

Study 1, 5 x 7, oil.

Purple Iris

The iris are all in full bloom now. These purple ones are especially stunning. So once again I decided to try my hand at flower painting, a new endeavor for me. I'm in a learn-new-things, paint-new-things, try-new-stuff  type of mode right now,  and this fits the bill.

This flower is tucked away in a cut glass creamer that we received as a wedding present years ago and never really had any use for, not being the sort of formal dinner-party type of people who might use one regularly.  But it makes a good temporary vase.

Purple Iris, 10 x 8.