Butternut Gallery Exhibits My Paintings

from Louisiana

Hello, Susquehanna County! You are invited to the opening celebration on September 24th from 3 to 6pm at The Butternut Gallery in Montrose, PA. I will be there along with a selection of paintings from my recently completed Fifty States Plein Air Painting Project.

to California

All 50 original pastel paintings were done on location during the recent years as I traveled throughout the USA. They depict light and atmosphere of real places and certain days.

to Rhode Island

to Oregon

to Utah and way beyond.

I hope you will come to see the work and chat with me on Saturday afternoon the 24th of September.
I will be bringing a few garden pieces, too...including some small watercolors.

Paintings in the Poconos

Twenty two of my garden pastel paintings are on exhibit for two months in Snydersville, PA. The gallery is Wing and a Prayer Chapel  (120 Rimrock Drive). This one is called Tulips! Finally: my delight is evident to see bright colors where there had been only ice and winter debris for months and months and months. This scene brightened my mood and I hope it does yours, too. Good medicine.

My first cousin, Lizzie Tilley, formerly of Kitschen Sink in Ithaca, is the new owner of Silvery Moon Guesthouse. Her creative endeavors have transformed this historic property at the corner of US 209 and Rimrock Drive in Snydersville. You will love it! Besides the Chapel/Gallery and the main guesthouse there is an authentic old schoolhouse in the shade of huge walnut trees just crammed with art supplies where Lizzie teaches group painting classes. Brides, take notice; she does weddings and tea parties ( her vintage china). This place is new now, but check it out. It won't remain a hidden treasure for long.

My paintings will be on view through June and July. The open hours for the gallery are all Sundays 1-4pm as well as during the Monroe County Historical Association Garden Tour on Saturday June 4. You can call Lizzie for details on the art gallery, art classes or to book a guestroom. 607.644.0596 

Top Prize!

I won it! Most Luminous Landscape in the 2016 Vermont Pastel Society Members' Exhibit at Arts Alive in Burlington. The judge, Mickey Myers (from the Bryan Memorial Art Gallery in Jeffersonville, VT), said this about my painting Winter Garden 4pm:
  

This piece has such an unusual luminosity to it.  At once it is sweeping, and it is intimate.  It pulls the viewer to what lies ahead at a distance, and it pulls the viewer back to the crunch of the ground under foot.    That ironic concept of a “Winter Garden” in the title explains why the luminosity of this piece provides more than just a seasonal picture – it provides the depth of the season itself.  

 I appreciate the judge's comments. More judges should take the time to talk about why they chose what they chose. It can be helpful to the few artists who won awards and the many who did not win this time. She advised members to "watch your frames". Many good paintings look bad when placed in uncomplimentary frames.


I have not seen the show yet, but look forward to seeing it during the last week of April on a short mother/daughter trip to Burlington. The Arts Alive gallery is open 9-5 on weekdays.

Drawing, Sketching

"I sometimes think there is nothing so delightful as drawing."
 Vincent van Gogh


Me, too. Delightful, yes. Some days the drawing just rolls from my eyes/brain through my fingers on to the blank page. Other days there is rather more angst in the process and sweat on the paper. Whatever ...I Would Rather Be Drawing...than Not. Anyone else feel that way?

In my seventieth year, I tend to forget things and lose things. Drawing is a tool that has helped me learn and figure out my world all my life. It is my refuge and meditation and solace. I would sooner leave my house without earrings than without my sketchbook. In the above quick drawing I bundled up and drew my reflection in the glass door at a frigid 23 degrees. I know this winter has been unusually mild, but I have learned I can draw outside for limited duration at most any temperatures over 15! Choose a quivery subject....and put a heat pack in your pocket

 The above small sketch of my friend in class was done in 3 minutes or less. I was looking for her attitude and concentration rather than accuracy.

This large charcoal drawing of Martina is about mystery and mood.

My big cat Charley Parker has found the one spot he blends in to his surroundings while perched on an old brush pile.

In this pencil drawing I was exploring options for winter garden paintings I am presently working on.

What have you been doing these long winter days?

You may want to look at Vincent Van Gogh The Drawings 2005 The Metropolitan Museum of Art NY.  Check it out or order it from your local library.  It is a heavy book, good for at least a week of dedicated perusal.

The geese just went by Southern Vermont this morning, heading North! YES!

Look at my upcoming Events in right column.  And write to me.

FIFTY Paintings of FIFTY STATES!

Michigan

 

 

 

New York

My project over the last six years is complete. I painted a plein air pastel painting - on location - in every state. One early watercolor was grandfathered in because it was my first of a long tradition of looking for funky, homey, beautiful American scenes to paint while I sat outside in Beach Haven, NJ with a line of fishermen's shacks in front of me. Some of those flowers were plastic as I recall.

New Jersey

 

Wyoming

California

 I look forward to exhibiting selections of the project. I am in the phase of looking at venues to show these relatively small pastels.

Idaho

 The place that you can look at all of them right now is here. Please read my brief travelogue of ups and downs and faux pas along the way. Travel is always amusing, at least. Then let me know of your travels, art work, etc.

Vermont

Ohio

Pennsylvania

Garden Watercolors

Camassia and Tulips
(SOLD - inquire about similar work)

I am all about my garden at this time of year and am painting some small (4" x 10") watercolors in it...of it.

Hate to tear myself away, but Alaska calls...and Oregon and Washington.  When I return I hope I can see the 36" tall poppy heads over the weeds...and I am dreaming of the fabulous roses of the northwest...and the Cascade Mountains, Columbia River, Kenai Peninsula, and midnight sun.   These are the last 3 states for my Fifty State Plein Air Painting Project 
which you may have heard me mention...a few thousand times...over the last 7 years...yes? 

Tell me about your trips, garden, paintings, dogs or plans. (bunions, bad knees, periodontists...no thanks).    North to the Future!

See side bar for the exhibit at Butternut of Garden art work .

FOCUS!

Highlights of my week (and it was a wonderful one):

Spent Mothers' Day helping my daughter at her booth in SOWA Fine Arts Market in Boston. Yes, it was crowded and hot but we braved it together and anticipated a great get-away week to follow. Mothers Day is good, but I will always turn it into a week if I can.  (Zoe's Etsy shop...new things!)

my pen and ink sketch in Arnold Arboretum

We walked all over Back Bay/ South End; ate some very nice food (Barcelona); visited Arnold Arboretum at the height of lilac season; took in Hokusai show at Museum of Fine Arts; drank coffee at the Buttery; and did just what we wanted to. Then headed up to Portsmouth for some fresh clean salt air and more food - Black Truffle - paella to die for with fiddleheads, asparagus, shrimp and chorizo. 

Finally I returned home to the good news that my charcoal drawing of Woman in Big Hat had won an award in focus juried exhibit at Butternut Gallery in Montrose, PA. Saturday night opening was a hard one for me to miss. Yes, I do miss my friends and artists in NE Pennsylvania. Maybe you missed it, too? Maybe you over-indulged in a little too much chocolate and wine? You can still see all the ART...go before focus closes on June 7.  regular gallery hours: Thursday-Saturday 11am-5pm. 570-278-4011. 

 Write and tell me what I missed...and any other news you have. I will gladly send you my photo of Charley Parker flying.

Still Drawing Daily

Now I'm working out of two sketchbooks; a Moleskine and a Strathmore watercolor,  both 5.5 x 8 inches, but with different orientations. I am posting some of them below including one from the "unfinished and/or abandoned or total failure" category.

Most of us experience different levels of inspiration at different times or days. When I committed (on January first 2015) to drawing daily I knew there would be some duds. I do not dwell on those, but I usually let them live in (besmirch) my sketchbooks. The ebb and flow of inspiration is quite apparent when you do not have any days off...or pages ripped out.

 

 

 

The three sketches above were all done with a combination of Lamy fountain pen, Copic marker and transparent watercolor. Lamy pens are clog-free due largely to their use of water-soluble ink. This can be worked with and I went from the first drawing which was a total surprise to me...to more control and forethought by the third one. It has a unique look.

 

 

The three above, are watercolor, no ink.

 

 There is something to be learned from this sketch of the Connecticut River bank and Brattleboro;

1. Try to plan your time so you can finish in one sitting on location. At the very least, get enough down on paper so you can complete later and not lose the feeling of the day. 

2. Avoid putting a boring object in the foreground (never draw another patio heater?). 

3. Quit only when you have clearly lost the game! 

How have you been surviving this long winter into spring? (Or, to quote the parking meter attendant..."sprinter"; the season just before MUD in Vermont.)

Let me know what you have been doing, painting, writing, traveling, seeing.

The Garden Pool

 

A new pastel painting that I just sent to Butternut Gallery and Second Story Books,  Montrose, PA. This 8 x 10 nocturne is priced to sell. Four other new paintings, too. Hope you will stop in to have a look at all their exhibits, this year. The original art, gifts and well-chosen books make it a Northeastern Pennsylvania hidden treasure.

Sketching/Drawing

 4am....why am I the only one up?

This year I have done a drawing/sketch every day. I look forward to it. It is my time to do what I want. I've been inspired and UN-inspired....in that case, I draw anyway...it is only paper. Un-inspired often turns into something when you actually put pen to paper. Good to know that I actually can keep one New Years resolution (for 7 weeks, so far)!

Drawing is my attempt to control the chaos...for a little while. It is also how I learn things; the number of petals on a blossom, the infinite shapes humans take, the glorious and kooky hats worn by Vermonters in winter. Of course drawings go much deeper than that...there are scars and kisses and mysterious amazing tattoos and musicians' fingers and gardeners' souls to look at.

A lot of time is spent looking at the drawings of other artists, which I often find more interesting than the paintings they were done in preparation for. Smudges and erasures and start-overs; all unique and unguarded. My fave time waster is Urban Sketchers...traveling the world through sketchbooks.

Happy Mardi Gras to all! Let me know what You are doing, ok? I am also working on new pastel paintings to be posted in future post.

Bench with Boxwoods

WISHES; Happy New Year! I hope you are feeling hopeful and curious and ready to give it another go. I spent New Years' Day drawing with my sketch group. It was auspicious and I look forward to many Thursday afternoons sketching and catching up with my drawing friends.

 

HOPES: This year I look forward to making a few paintings; looking at art; seeing my daughter and son in law move in to their new home (with basic amenities).

DREAMS: Are you sitting down? My husband is joining me on a summer trip to Alaska....the only state I have never visited and one of three to go on the Fifty State Plein Air Painting Project. I intend to exhibit a selection of the 50 state paintings.

I wish you a year of doing what you want, health, hope and prosperity. Please tell me what you are up to...I'm losing patience with FB.

The above painting, Bench with Boxwoods, was never published here in it's final finished version and now it is SOLD. So long......make someone happy.

Postcard Invitation

I have two large pastel paintings in the Winter Members Show at the Southern Vermont Art Center in Manchester and was pleasantly surprised to see that one of them had been chosen for the postcard. It looks quite festive. Come to the opening reception on Saturday afternoon if you can; December 6 from 2-4.

Today marks 7 years of blogging here. The title of my painting featured on the postcard is Number Seven - a serendipitous good omen for the next seven!

Please look at Rodrica Tilley Gallery of available Paintings when you have time. The paintings on exhibit in Manchester are Number Seven and Community Garden, Putney.

Midwest Morning

Early morning of a soon-to-be-hot July day is a treasure to enjoy in the moment. This one was somewhere in the midwest...agricultural pursuits...a common enough American scene...turned magic by the slanting, warm-toned sunlight among the cool shadows.

11 x 14 soft pastels on Colourfix board for sale soon.

Halloween - Mwah hahahahahahahagh

American Pokeweed (Phytolacca americana) seems to always show up in my gardens. It is native and has medicinal uses...including poisoning. I can appreciate gaudy and I love robust, so I let it stay. The larvae of the Giant Leopard Moth eat the leaves. Some birds love the ripe berries.  

This is a small (9 x12) plein air pastel done almost completely with a set of Derwent pastel pencils on #600 UArt paper. What a fine day for sitting on a comfortable garden bench with familiars, wine and art supplies. 

One never knows when one will need a spot of poison.

The CLARK - Williamstown, Massachusetts

A gray morning, our calendars were clear, Michael and I started off to see some art. I am in high spirits and the fall foliage matches my intensity. We can't wait to see the re-opened permanent collection after years of extensive planning and construction. It is incredible! The Clark owns some superior pieces and their new home is a real beauty.   Explore it here.

Exhibitions? Yes, we strolled through Make It New: Abstract Painting from the National Gallery of Art, 1950-1975. A nice overview of the period and I was happy to pick out several by women painters from across the huge gallery...Helen Frankenthaler, Joan Mitchell, Yayoi Kusama and Lynda Benglis....maybe more. I did not take notes. I want to go back and actually read and learn. That time period coincides with mine...and one thing I learned was there were few or no women in abstract shows. As you know I have been counting girls and boys in the exhibits I attend for too many decades now. I say things are getting better, slowly, in some galleries. There is still room for improvement when a historical review is put up. Look harder...find those female artists.

We did not spend enough time reading Radical Words; from the Magna Carta to the Constitution. Thumbs up for including: The Emancipation Proclamation, The Declaration of Rights of the Women of the United States as well as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and others. This is important. Go there first, not last. It is small and immensely enlightening.

The new galleries housing the permanent collection was what we really came to see and we looked through all rooms...a quiet, low light, un-crowded, intimate viewing of some of our favorite works by John Singer Sargent, Edgar Degas, The French Impressionists, George Inness, Winslow Homer.

I discovered a new favorite oil painting,  Friends or Foes? Late in his career, Frederic Remington painted some nocturnes of exquisite beauty. I think there were some things that worried him about the 'winning of the west'. This one features a single figure, a Blackfoot scout mounted on a small black horse, in a vast western landscape of snow and stars. Far in the distance shine a few lights from a small settlement? trading post? encampment? saloon? The scout seems to be asking himself the title question.

For me this is a perfect picture, drawn by a master. It pulls the viewer into the blue shades of the night and miles of snow. The simplicity of the work speaks worlds to me...about the Native American perspective...the quiet of a snowy night under the stars...how big and lonely some parts of the west were...the seductive pull of the bright lights...and the vulnerability of the single figure alone in the dark...thick with mystery.