Rhino

Take a look at my newest painting!

I recently bought a ceramic rhino while I was in Washington, and since then I've been obsessed. I had so much fun painting it. I used crackle to get the weathered skin on the rhino. I want to try a few more of these with maybe elephants or hippos. With crackle the possibilities are endless. :)

Cleveland

As you can tell I haven't done a lot of serious painting in the last few months and I am definitely feeling something missing in my life. In an effort to fix that I came up with an idea for a series of paintings all centered around Cleveland. I've lived here for a year now, while my husband is attending medical school, and I just love it! Since our time here is limited, I want to take advantage of all the unique experiences and culture Cleveland has to offer. The goal is to create at least ten works (give or take a few) in the next year and then have some sort of an exhibition. I figure if I blog about my progress I will have to commit to the challenge and actually get some work done.

Here is my first piece. I used a map of downtown Cleveland and abstracted it. I wanted to capture the dirty gray feelings a city has, along with all the exciting pops of color and life. I'm not completely satisfied so I may change it up a bit. Or just leave it and make another with the same concept.

Birthday Flower

Here is one of my most recent paintings I did for a birthday present. I combined a few aspects from my other paintings to make this flower. The color choice was inspired by the receiver and I just love how it turned out.

Inspiration

Last time Jeff and I went to the Cleveland Museum of Art I was inspired by some of Van Gogh's tree paintings. His work has so much expression that I want to capture in my own art. I especially loved this painting I found online.


I decided to make my own version of it and this is how it came out. I loved creating it and I think the free brush stokes give it a lot of movement and character.


I'm excited to use this style of painting in my work to come!

Christmas Paintings

Once again I've been busy painting for Christmas presents. Here are some of the finished products.

I love the velvety feel of this Dahlia.

Flowers

I went to the Cleveland Art Museum and found this painting by Piet Mondrian of a chrysanthemum. I loved the outlining of the peddles and the muted color scheme.


So I decided I needed to paint one too. I painted a dahlia instead and used crackle in the background.

Today was my last day of spring break. I really didn't do anything too exciting this week, but I managed to do something productive today. I painted this flower on one of my canvases I've been saving. A lot of times I will make a painting based on an empty wall in my house, but today I just wanted to paint. My art is starting to pile up! I guess I'm just holding on to all of them in hopes of living in a house with more walls to fill someday.