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

O Canada!

Imagine setting up your easel to paint in a sunken garden with masses of spring flowers and weeping willows cascading over a pond running under a stone bridge. You hear the Canadian national anthem "O Canada" being sung by the wait staff of a restaurant nearby where whiffs of grilled steak permeates the air. It is a comfortable 70 degrees in late March. Life is good!

My adventure in the Artists in the Gardens weekend of Epcot was wonderful. Despite the windy day we had on Saturday, the early Sunday morning rain, and the lack of shade in the afternoons, I had a difficult time choosing what to paint. When I first received my assignment, I thought, "What's in Canada that I would want to paint?" Little did I know that the area is based on the Butchart Gardens in British Columbia. The original sunken gardens were developed in a limestone quarry. Of course the gardens and grass in Epcot were "Mickey" perfect. An ideal setting for a plein air artist, if you can paint and talk to mulitudes of people at the same time. :>) That is really the fun of it all, meeting the guests and talking about your art and art in general. Children are especially curious and ask great questions. I was fortunate to have four paintings go to new owners. I even painted under shelter Sunday when it was pouring down rain!

My "art buds" this year in Canada were Dorothy Gardiner from St Pete and Linda Pence from Gainesville, FL. Both are wonderful artists and old pros at painting en plein air at Epcot. We shared a great host, D.J. Gibson, who normally works in management. He helped with our setups and getting us where we needed to be on time. The three days went quickly and I am so glad that we were able to paint through Sunday this year. Last year, we had stormy weather that called off Sunday afternoon painting. If you have a chance, you should definitely go to WDW during the flower festival months of April and May. You won't be disappointed!

For you painters, I tried out my new Anderson easel that swivels. It has telescoping legs like my Soltek. I think it weighs 7 or 8 pounds and is very easy to put up and carry. It worked great for my watercolors this time because I could lower it and sit down to work, stand and paint upright, or swivel it flat to add detail. The only problem was adding an umbrella. I will have to work on that! I worked on Stratmore's Gemini paper which has a softer tooth than Arches. It took the washes well and worked fine for outdoors where you usually have to really pile on the paint to keep it from disappearing.

Wishing you a season of beauty and good scents!

Durinda

Counting Blessings

As the holidays approach, we should pause and reflect on the many blessings that have been bestowed upon us. As Americans, even with talk of recession and financial problems, we are still among the richest people in the world. When you think about it, we have to rent storage spaces to keep "stuff" we don't have room for in our houses. We have two or even more cars per household. Computers, televisions, cell phones, the list goes on.

We are free to worship in any way. We can vote our convictions. We should be thankful for the privileges we have as Americans.

Greenway Walk, watercolor

My friend from Thomaston, Georgia, is thankful to have been born and live in the south. There is a large variety of scenery, a change of seasons in most southern areas, and somehow, the people just seem friendlier. So even if you weren't born in a southern state, you can still be thankful that you can choose to live there or come visit when you wish.

Mostly, we should be thankful for our family and our friends. Although you can't choose your relatives, most of us have pretty good ones that share our DNA. Our friends are the ones who stick with us, even when we whine about minor things, and we should be glad that someone else who isn't related, likes us for who we are.

If you are traveling to visit loved ones, or have guests coming to see you, I wish you a safe and trouble-free holiday. I am looking forward to having dinner with my "crew" and hearing what the Grands have to be thankful for this year.

Many Blessings to you!

Durinda

Scenes from Callaway Workshop

Here are some of the participants in the Sketching Callaway workshop last weekend in beautiful Callaway Gardens. We started on Saturday drawing close-ups of leaves and flowers and then ventured into the Rhododendron Trail on Sunday to capture the plants in the landscape. The group was just wonderful to work with and so open to trying new things. We enjoyed having Katie Steinhoff, Interpretive Horticulturist, explain the gardens and plants in bloom for us. I hope that that everyone will continue to use a sketchbook to record their surroundings and feelings.

I am pleased to announce that I have been invited back to teach Perspective Drawing, a two day workshop on drawing buildings, fences, etc in the landscape. Dates are September 20 & 21, 2008. We will work on the mechanics of drawing and use sections in the Garden that contain structures. Registration will be with Callaway: education@callawaygardens.org.

I am also looking forward to teaching another Sketching Callaway workshop next April. I will post the info as soon as everything is worked out.

Just a reminder: The Spring Show at Happy Painter's Studio, Lookout Mountain, continues until May 30. Hours are Tuesday - Friday, 11:00 - 3:00 or by appointment. This is your chance to buy directly from the artists!

Also, coming up is the workshop in France! I am getting excited about the trip and all the sites and images we will see and paint while there. If you are thinking of painting outdoors this summer, see my past posts on oil and watercolor gear to pack.

Have a Marvelous Mother's Day Sunday!

Durinda

See you at Epcot's Festival of Flowers!

This weekend is the Artists

in the Gardens at Epcot. I will be part of a group of plein air artists who will be painting in the World Showcase countries of England, Canada, France, and Italy. I won't know my assignment until I check in Thursday. Last year I painted in Italy. It was beautifully decked out with potted plants and hanging baskets. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience of meeting the guests, the other artists, and the cast members of Epcot. It is amazing how much goes on there!

Each spring the International Flower and Garden Festival is held in the World Showcase. Besides the beautiful scenery, there are seminars on gardening, and Flower Power concerts of music from the 60's.

I will be posting my paintings when I return. Hopefully some will find new homes while I enjoy painting in the park. If you are planning to be in Disneyworld during April 4 - 6, I would love to see you!

Durinda

Paintings from Florida

Here are some of the paintings I worked on while in Siesta Key.
The first is a group of bottles and glasses that I set up in the kitchen. While my other paintings with wine bottles are in very neutral colors, this one reminds me of the friends that came to visit and brought paintings to critique from our plein air painting trips. The center painting is en plein air from a house outside the Selby Gardens gate. Barbara and I were in search of "color" that morning. The fog was heavy and she showed me how to paint the sky very gray and then punch in the color when the fog lifts. Guess what? It worked! I think it needs a little more work here and there, but I like it.
The last painting was started at the Artists in the Gardens paintout in Epcot last April. I carried it with me to Florida because I kept thinking that it needed something. By adding some variations in color to the blossoms and hitting the highlights again with whites, I think that did it. I may do a larger painting from this study. What do you think? That is what is nice about doing smaller paintings, you can work out the problems and then paint a larger version from them.
I have a few more to post from that month away including some en plein air watercolors and some watercolor studies of ballerinas who posed at the Sarasota Art Center.
Just a few more weeks until spring!
Durinda

Search for Subjects

On a recent drive to Ellijay to buy apples, my husband and I came across this field of sunflowers just south of Chatsworth. It was the kind of scene you would expect in the valleys of Italy or France where I have painted. Last week in oil class, Evelle had photos she had made of a dirt road through a field taken not far from her home that she is painting. For some, objects that they own make the best subjects. The point is, subject matter for painting is all around us. Painting something or someplace that has meaning to you will be more fulfilling and interesting, not only to you, but to the viewer.