Colorado Street Bridge – Pasadena – Spring Stroll oil painting

“Spring Stroll – Colorado Street Bridge, Pasadena – Arroyo Seco”
9 x 12 inches, oil on plein air panel
SOLD

Weather is funny in Southern California. Winter may just be starting, and green grass is popping up everywhere, because of the early December rains.
Around here, plants don’t care about the calendar. If there’s water, they’ll grow – creating the illusion of spring when there are months of cold weather ahead.
My ash tree looks like it’s living in mid-summer. There’s not a touch of fall in it yet. I’m not sure what it’s going to do in a few months. Shed the old leaves out of habit? Or keep them and ignore the deciduous ritual?
Down in Pasadena’s Arroyo Seco, the grass is sprouting joyfully and the little stream is flowing. We will enjoy it while it lasts.


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Buffalo Fork, Snake River, Wyoming oil painting


Buffalo Fork, Snake River
9 x 12 oil painting
(near Moran, Wyoming)

Another painting from our Wyoming/Jackson/Yellowstone adventure. I’ll have more soon, including some with wildlife. The Snake River was low as it flowed through this area, but I liked the way it formed reflective puddles, which wouldn’t have happened if it had been more free flowing. The time of year was late September, and Yellowstone was almost closed for the season.
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California Golden Hills and Oak Trees oil painting

California Golden Hills and Oaks
18 x 24 inches, oil on canvas
SOLD, now in a private collection.

This is a theme and location that I will keep returning to — California’s beautiful rolling hills, studded with majestic live oak trees. The rain has been light this year, so the hills are not as green as we have seen them in the past; which means the swaying grasses will not be as tall this summer and fall. But it’s all a cycle and will be repeated again and again. I’ve even seen some of the local oaks starting to re-sprout that were scorched by last fall’s fire. Nature renews itself endlessly.


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Cottonwood Breeze Owens Valley Sierra fall oil painting

“Cottonwood Breeze”
Owens Valley 14 x 18 inch oil painting
Eastern Sierra, California

Owens Valley was a blaze of color last fall. The cottonwoods fairly glittered in the sun. This is one of my favorite locations to paint, near Swall Meadow, Round Valley.
The blues and golds complement each other so well.

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Yosemite Sentinel Bridge Reflections – Half Dome oil painting


“Sentinel Bridge Reflections”
Half Dome, Yosemite Valley

16 x 20 inches, oil on canvas

This painting is quite special to me as it was the 1000th one I completed. I thought I had posted it on my blog last year, but discovered that I missed it.
If you’ve been to Yosemite Valley, you’ll recognize the view from Sentinel Bridge, with Half Dome reflected in the calm waters. With our current snowmelt, I’m guessing that the Merced River is anything but calm right now.

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Yosemite Paintings

Light in the Forest California redwood forest oil painting landscape

The Light in the Forest (California redwoods)
16 x 20 inch oil painting

SOLD but I have more forest paintings on my website, see link below.

These magnificent Sequoia redwoods are growing in the Armstrong Grove in Northern California, not far from Guerneville, which is on the Russian River. It is an old growth forest, protected, and will never be cut down. I love being in the redwoods and I love painting them, too. They impart a certain feeling of peace, grandeur and spirituality that is almost overwhelming. I try to capture the feeling of being there in every redwood painting that I do.

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Let me know if you are interested in a redwood theme in perhaps a larger size. I do a lot of painting on commission, and the redwoods are one of my favorite subjects.

Rose Garden Summer Pathway oil painting – Descanso Gardens

Descanso Rose Garden, Summer Pathway
11 x 14 inches, oil on plein air panel
Painted at Descanso Gardens, La Canada, California

Descanso Gardens is the closest botanical garden to our home, and it’s my go-to place whenever I want to do some plein air painting in an expansive and beautiful setting. This pathway is one that I have painted through the seasons and from different viewpoints. The San Gabriel Mountains can be seen in the distance, which also tower over our own home. The international rosarium is not only a rose garden but also contains many other perennials and flowering shrubs. It’s just a peaceful place to visit, and in which to picnic on selected summer evenings.

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California landscape eucalyptus painting – Beside Still Waters

“Beside Still Waters”
18 x 24 inch oil painting
On the road to Yosemite, through California’s Central Valley

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This scene has intrigued me from when I first saw it a few years ago, in the spring. California’s Central Valley was green with a plentitude of winter rain, and the distant Sierra foothills provided a beautiful cool contrast to the warm wildflower covered foreground. The pond, which seemed to be dammed up for cattle grazing, looked so inviting. If it wasn’t on fenced off private property, I would have liked to sit by it and dangle my feet in that cool fresh water. Eucalputus remain among my favorite trees to paint, although they are less plentiful the further you drive to the foothills. Oaks seem to dominate there. The day we were there, the clouds were drifting by constantly, creating beautiful shadows which I took full advantage of.

Bishop poplars – California eastern sierra Mt. Tom autumn oil painting

“Bishop Poplars, 2014”
14 x 18 oil on canvas

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We try to visit the eastern Sierra every fall/winter … sometimes several times if we can. One of the highlights is seeing the cottonwoods and poplars turning gold in the area near Swall Meadow/ Round Valley, just to the north and west of Bishop. In this painting, the iconic triangular Mt. Tom can be seen in the distance.

California high desert Valyermo oil painting “High Desert Color”

“High Desert Color”
9 x 12 inches, oil painting on plein air panel
Valyermo, California
Antelope Valley High Desert area

After our welcome rains that came a few days ago, my husband and I saw the sky was still filled with beautiful cumulus clouds – the kind we see around here too infrequently. So we decided to take a drive up to the high desert to see the wide open spaces. It was a picture perfect day and we found ourselves in the small community of Valyermo. Although the wind and rain may have taken away some of the glory of the cottonwoods, there was still some color left, and the paint brush took care of the bare spots.

This is a view of one of those cottonwood groves. I liked the contrast of the yellow golds against the blue violet mountains in the background. Those happen to be the San Gabriels, the closest range to our home. So now I’ve painted them from ‘both sides, now’.

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