A Painting A Day

Jane Painting in the Olive Grove

oil on linen

16 x 20

$400.00

Available:  http://www.Durinda.com

Trying it again!  I am setting a goal of posting a painting a day for September.  May get a little tricky since I will be traveling a lot but hopefully I can do a sketch while on the road.  This painting is from a trip to Assisi, Italy.  Jane set up to paint in the shade, yes, it was warm that day!, and I loved the way her sundress slipped off her shoulder while she was painting.  I also love the twisted shapes of the old olive trees cascading down the hillside.  Awww, something about Italy keeps drawing me back!  I will return the end of the month to paint and play at Lake Garda in the lake district and then on to Venice!  

If you are a painter or sketcher, I plan to send back photos on my blog for you to enjoy so you will feel like you are on the trip with me!  They won't all be as complicated a scene like this and I will give you a few tips along the way about composition and cropping using photographs.  It will be the next best thing to being there!

Ciao for now!

Durinda

Super Sunday Sale

Midtown Gallery

1912 Broadway

Nashville, TN

Wildflowers I

oil on board

6 x 6

available at http://www.midtowngallery.com/

Looking outdoors at my back yard right now looks nothing like the images I am creating inside. Still trying to keep my spirits up during the winter doldrums, I am painting a series of wildflowers on hillsides and also marshes with "happy clouds". The small square format is perfect for these scenes. The hillsides are based on my Tuscany travels where I have painted. The marshes are images from different locales around Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas. One thing I tell my students is to choose your subject in a landscape. Is it the ground or is it the sky? Don't divide your composition by painting the horizon line right in the middle and developing details in both areas. This is a fun (two) series for me and I love the wide floater frames I am using on them. The new paintings are available at Midtown Gallery in Nashville where I am now represented. Midtown Gallery is located on Broadway near Vanderbilt University. I used to be in Local Color Gallery in the same location a few years ago and am very excited to be back showing in the Nashville area. I hope you will drop by Midtown and see my paintings. For Super Bowl Sunday, Gary Tisdale the owner does something pretty unique: he has a Super Art Sale from 1:00 - 4:00 pm. It's a great time to get new works for your collection at great prices. Tell Gary you know me!

Also, I am now a part of Daily Painters of Georgia and you can follow our blog: http://www.dailypaintersofgeorgia.blogspot.com/ I am hoping it will motivate me to shoot, edit, and post my paintings more often. I wish I could say that I don't mind that part of the art trade, but I dread it. So I usually wait until I have several new paintings to shoot before I set things up. This will be an experiment to see if I can do this!

Have a Super Sunday no matter whose team wins today!

Durinda

Opportunity Knocks

Tuscan Door

Oil on linen

There are some subjects that I never tire of. Doors and windows, flower fields, street scenes, and marshes really appeal to me. I am not much on greenie green landscapes. Summer is not my time to paint outdoors unless it includes architecture or flowers. So, I am painting a series of Tuscan and French doors and windows right now. I don't care if my subjects are "romantic" to some people. I like to paint things that I can live with on a daily basis. I want to give viewers the sense of, "Ahh, I would like to be there right now." The difference between a television show and a painting is: you can't turn the painting off if you are tired of it.

So this post is two fold: One, this painting is from my Tuscany workshop last fall. Plans are underway to go in October this year. You have the opportunity to go, tour, paint if you like, eat local cuisine, drink local wine, and enjoy the company of like minded people. My feeling is, you never know what may happen by putting things off that you really want to do. Contact www.ilchiostro.com for registration and do something you've always dreamed about.

Two, this painting will be up for auction at the Arts & Education Council's Art-a-ma-jig on Thursday, July 22 at Tanner Hill Gallery, Chattanooga, Tennessee. The Arts & Ed Council sponsor lots of projects in the area. The Young Authors awards I attended this year to see my oldest grandgirl accept a medal for her poem and be included in a published book of works by children from schools across the area. You have an opportunity to support this organization by attending and purchasing original artwork. If you are interested in biding on this painting, email:

www.artsedcouncil.org and let them know.

A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song. -Maya Angelou

Are you listening?

Durinda

New Homes and Gallery

Poppy Walk

oil on canvas

24 x 30

Italian Alley

oil on canvas

10 x 10

Bonjour!

oil on canvas

16 x 20

I am pleased to announce that I will be represented by Artistic Gifts and Framing in Dalton, Georgia. Donna Hilley, the owner, chose four oil paintings for her gallery: French Barns, French Farm, Bonjour!, and Oriental Lilies. The gallery is off Cleveland Highway in the Vista shopping center next door to The Spiced Apple. I hope you will drop in and see not only the artwork she carries, but also the gifts and other handmade items. Donna will custom frame your new artwork purchase too!

Field of Poppies went home with new owners at the Boyd Buchanan School fundraiser Saturday night. It is always an honor to have someone choose your paintings for their homes or businesses. I hope the new owners will enjoy the painting for years to come and thanks for supporting the school!

New works went out to Reflections Gallery in Chattanooga last week. I sent a series of sunset marshes. Other new works from a series of Italian streetscenes went to Ringgold Art & Frame as well as Poppy Walk, another in my series of poppy fields. More to come! I have lots of ideas for the series based on my three weeks in France. Not to slight my Italian poppy fields, I will be using some of those references for paintings too.

"Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life." -Pablo Picasso

Hope you have some art in your life!

Durinda