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"Colorful Spring Bunch"

Oil of Wood Panel

8x8x1

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Recent Art.--all sizes

I try to paint everyday so I do get behind in posting here on my blog.  It sure seems like Facebook

has kinda taken over the enthusiasm for blogs these days but that's life--everything changes. 

I am about 7 years into my oil painting journey now.  I still wonder if I have found my style. I think it changes sometimes as I take a workshop or I am influenced by the fabulous art of some of my favorite artists.  I have many and just to name a few:

Melanie Morris

Nancy Franke

Trish Adams

Alice Williams

Connie Winters

and from here in Jacksonville, Paul Ladnier.

I have taken workshops from all of these except Nancy Franke whose workshops fill up in a matter of  minutes I think.  I am on a waiting list for Nancy Franke so hopefully I will be able to take one for with her.

I guess if I have a style it's probably a combination of all of these wonderful painters.

They are all impressionists and painterly painters. I love them all.

All of these paintings are up on my fine art website.

www.marthalever.com

Painting Day 8

This is Bessie.

She is enjoying the spring sunshine. In this cold here in Florida this one was comforting to paint.

I love cows.  Wish I had one as a pet. I guess I would have to live on a farm though.

Purples in a Barrel

Above is gouache and below is oil. I love gouache. Colors can layer over each other--similar to oils.

St. Catherine's--30 paintings in 30 days

I won't make 30 paintings in 30 days but if I can get 3 a week I'm doing good!  This is St. Catherine Laboure right across the street. I have always admired this little gazebo so I decided to paint it. 

Pink and Grungy

This is a paint-over of a recent scrape-off.  I could still see the design so I painted over it leaving the background showing through. I still enjoy a grungy look which is a throw-back to my mixed media days.  This one is an 8x10.

Waipu Cove

Trisha Day 2

 This one was very hard to paint. Trisha put a red light on the green apples and it was hard to make myself paint the colors that I saw rather than what I thought it should be.

I changed the light to regular light so this one was easier to paint. 

Ok, so Day 2 was fun!

Trisha Adams Day 1

I really enjoyed Trisha Adams' workshop this weekend. I think that she has helped me move along to seeing color much better. I enjoyed seeing her process and loved her easy-going encouraging style. This is the first of several paintings that I will show you. This one is 16x20.

The Road to Glenville, NC

Last night I went to a very special presentation at our Cummer Gallery by local artist Jim Draper.   I really enjoyed seeing all of his huge paintings of Florida and have always wanted to meet him. I got an opportunity to pick his brain a bit about his process and he was very willing to tell me but I felt like I was on "The Bachelor" with people coming up and stealing him away from me in mid art sentence.
His paintings inspired me to pick up a brush today and paint a landscape. I don't have any wonderful FL pictures like he does (I do not like snakes, alligators or chiggers --nor do I like to sweat).  I will never be a successful plein air painter will I?  Well, not here in FL anyway. So I decided to look through my pictures from my trip to Cashiers and on up the Glenville when I went to our girls reunion last year. This view was breathtakingly beautiful and I tried to capture the beauty of these Blue Ridge mountains but that beauty is hard to capture.  My paintbrush is no match for God's paintbrush! This was just a quick photo I took as I pulled off the little mountain road. It took my breath away. This is a small 6x8.

Day 18 of 30-30

This was an interesting process to this little 6x6 painting. As I try to set up simple still lifes I try to make it pleasing to my eye but then I also need to remember a few of the rules of composition--namely the rule of thirds. I think that this one didn't quite fall into the correct area for the rule of thirds. I will surely paint this darling Fiesta Ware cup and saucer again and try to slip it into a more successful still life.

I saw an excellent "Artbyte" by Patty Mollica that is very helpful.  I highly recommend the Artbytes which are extremely helpful tutorials from wonderful painters in the Daily PaintWorks site.

Day 12 of 30 Paintings in 30 Days

This blue pitcher always makes a painting pretty. It's not the easiest to paint with all the designs but it's one of my favorite things to put into a painting. It was only $8 at the antique store. 

This is a 9x12 on a canvas.

Click on the Vocaroo Link below to hear me talk about this painting.


Audio recording software >>

Orange Tulips--Day 8 of 30-30 Challenge

These beautiful daisies were fun to paint and with each still life I think I am improving in my quest to paint from life. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. I think I should paint these flowers one more time before they die maybe with a lighter background. I am watching Hedi Moran videos and I think she is one of the best teachers out there. I love the way she paints. I watch her then go try to do it and mine just doesn't do it like hers. She sometimes uses a little cheap .99 brush. I think there is magic in that little cheap brush.
I did use all transparent colors as a underpainting like she does---and this is how it looked. Maybe I should have left it. I think I might like it better.

Painting over an annoying painting-Day 4

So this is Day 4 or Leslie Saeta's 30 paintings and 30 days challenge.

Sometimes I see an acrylic painting in my studio that was ok at the time but basically annoys me now. This was one of those paintings so I decided to just paint right over it in oils from a still life set up. I like it much better now and it was certainly good practice to sketch right over the paintings with my oils and go for it. A little bit of the original painting is peeking through. A closer inspection shows it better.
I wish I had taken a picture of the original and I know that it is posted somewhere on this blog but I couldn't find it. It was a little village with a graffiti-like background.  I probably would paint over more of these graffiti -like paintings but several of them sold a couple of years ago. Who would'a thought???

Day 3 of Leslie Saeta 30 in 30 Challenge

"In the Blue Glass Vase"

12x12

I wanted to paint this one just with the palette knife which I think is fun to do. I might even become a palette knife painter. Washing brushes is a pain and the "odorless turps" give me a headache so it  might come to a point that I have to just put away to brush altogether and use the knife.

This was a still life that I set up in my quest to paint from life. This is a beautiful blue glass vase which is much prettier than I painted it. I will have to try it again.

On this one the background was dark and I turned it light. Not sure if that was a good idea actually. Anyway, this is painting 3.