Watercolor on 140# paper … 9″ x 10″
Today our paint out group went to Eaton Canyon Nature Area in Altadena, CA … a new place where I had not painted before. In the early fall some of the trees were starting to show tinges of brown and gold, and the hills were brown from the […]

“Morning Glories”
Watercolor, caran d’ache soluble pastel and colored pencil on Rives BFK paper.
5″ x 7″ Available.
Like “Enchanted Pond” from a few weeks ago, this is another in the same fantasy botanical series and is my initial experience painting on Rives paper. It has a softer more absorbent surface than the cold pressed watercolor paper […]

11″ x 11″ Mixed media, watercolor and pastel. Unframed.
SOLD
Well, I have finally decided to take the plunge and list something on eBay. Thanks to all the friends who have written me and given me the push to make it happen.
Prompted in part by the recent Illustration Friday theme of Farm, which I missed […]

So this afternoon we were coming back from Pasadena and stopped to get some gas, so I pulled out my sketchbook and made a very hasty 2-3 minute scribble (see below) of a house with a few trees behind it and a smaller palm in the side yard. If you look closely you’ll see that […]

When the light changed for the surveyor painting, I grabbed a smaller piece of paper and did a a quick sketch of some trees in the distance which were framing some sort of building or structure beyond that. Whatever the outbuilding was, it was in the shade and so indistinct that I couldn’t make much […]

Today’s outing took me back to the park by the Rose Bowl, where a steep hillside towers over the aquatic center and tennis courts. I walked around for a long time trying to find something that caught my eye, and finally I settled on this scene which was backlit by the morning sun, but […]

Not far from the Japanese teahouse which I painted a few weeks ago at Brand Library, there’s a small stream that winds around and adds to the tranquil ambiance. In Southern California we have few naturally juicy bodies of water. There are some dammed up areas that hold water during the rainy season, but as […]

It’s been awhile since Ripley has been featured here, so I thought I’d post a charcoal drawing of her I did tonight. If you remember the secret code, sleeping dog = most likely drawn from life, which this was.
I saw a pretty interesting charcoal demonstration about a week ago. The artist was using many […]

This is what can happen when you begin a painting in a location where the light is changing so rapidly that there’s no way you can finish what you started in any reasonable period of time.
On Labor Day, my husband and I took my aunt to Descanso Gardens for a late afternoon/early evening event with […]

I’ve been wanting to experiment with this house for some time. It’s a craftsman style bungalow in Sierra Madre, and I was driving by one afternoon when the leaves of the palms, backlit by the sun, caught my eye. [Insert screeching brake noise here.] The best I could do was to take out my […]