best,

Liz

As I was wandering through our backyard the other day I took a moment to appreciate living in the Pacific Northwest.  We get these amazing cloudy nights where the clouds create a luminescent layer back lit by the moon.  Looking at the clouds over my head,  I had an inspiration moment and decided to try and recreate the feeling I had.  It is rare that I’m walking through an area and can see what I want to create like a vision floating in my head.   The hard part is then carving the time to create what I want.   I will start research, photographs and sketches immediately.   I find that the painting takes over my brain and it’s all I think about—in our family we call it the art frenzy.   All else becomes secondary to creating the piece—at least it used to.. now I have a personal life that matters more so I have to figure out a better balance.

For this piece, I wandered through our backyard and took a series of photos of the trees that inspired the piece.  I then printed the photos out and pasted them around my worktable so I could stare at them as I created.

Creating the sky in my vision was an interesting journey.   Since I normally work in watercolor, I naturally began thinking of this piece in watercolor.

That being said, I thought this piece would be a great opportunity to create an oil painting.  I started a watercolor sky and an oil sky… and loved the oil sky.  I had so much fun that I began adding the trees to the oil painting first.

I found that the required patience of working in oil was a major transition but probably good for my character (I’m terribly impatient).  I first created the sky and had to wait two days for it to dry.  Each tree was painted and then given some time to dry.

Now the question is, “is the painting done?”.  I welcome your comments and thoughts on both the oil painting and the watercolor painting.

Best wishes to all who are out there!

Liz

The first piece is a watercolor landscape done in the puddling style.  The painting is based on my travels through Bhutan, a small country in the Himalaya’s.  While traveling through Bhutan I noticed that the air was incredibly clear, wonderful and it was some of the most beautiful scenery I’ve ever experienced.   The country itself was very safe, the people were lovely and the food not so lovely.  We knew we had problems when the dogs (which were everywhere) couldn’t eat food that we had leftover (read the meat was so tough I couldn’t eat it).  The painting isn’t finished, I am going to add a river flowing through the piece and some light colored mountains.  I am going to strive to achieve a sense of distance.  Grey out the colors in the distance so that you feel like you’re looking far away.

This other piece is something that came to me while standing in our backyard on a cloudy night.  Out here, we get these amazing cloudy nights, where the light filters through the clouds and silhouettes trees.   As I stood in our backyard appreciating the night I started to dream about how to translate it onto paper.  I’m trying two translations, one is watercolor and one is in oil.   Although I almost always work in water based media I thought this would be interesting in oil… so I’m starting.   I finished the sky in both the oil in the watercolor.

In the oil I love the flow and movement of the colors in the oil painting.   It’s very different than my usual style and I am interested to see what happens for the rest of the piece.  We’ll see if I love it, hate it or screw it up .   As in the watercolor I will add in tree silhouettes to really develop the composition.

In the watercolor piece I didn’t go as dark as I often do but it may still be too dark for my vision.  I’ve yet to decide if I love this night sky yet but I thought I’d put it out there so you could see the artistic process.   I would like to hear any thoughts.   I plan on putting in pine tree silhouettes in the next few days.

I would love any comments or ideas.

Thanks for the inspiration guys,

Liz

I’ve finally succumbed and am starting a blog.   I’ll use this site to update any new creations, let you know of upcoming shows and maybe to discuss art and the world of art in the pacific northwest.

I’ve been participating in a program started by the Arts Council of Snohomish County called “Art in Great Spaces” and have decided to stay in my great space through the end of the year.  So please feel free to come by the studio.  I will be there during the week from 9am-4:30pm and by appointment on any other days or any other time.

As of right now I have a bunch of new cards that are available for purchase, and I’m working on two new pieces based on my travels through Bhutan.   I’m going to collect some photos of the pacific northwest and work on a pacific northwest series.   Then I’ll work on a holiday series.