"Mommy and Baby Great Pandas" (watercolor on paper; 6" x 6")

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Since I came back from the family road trip to the Midwest, I have been busy painting large landscapes to get ready for the Art League's annual landscape show in August.  They take days to finesse!  I sometimes take a break to splash water around doing small watercolors for fun.  "Mommy and Baby Great Pandas" is yesterday's output.  Isn't it an adorable piece?

"Handsome Zebra" (oil on stretched canvas; 18" x 18")

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The zebra is my favorite animal.  I have never seen an ugly zebra!  While I was painting the portrait of this handsome zebra, I was puzzled: Is the zebra a stocky white horse with black (or brown) stripes, or a black one with white stripes?  What do you say?

The Collage of My May Paintings

The collage of my May 2015 paintings

Last month I started out with portraits and florals in oil.  Then, suddenly, I got my watercolor box and brushes out.  I guess it was the heat, which seems to bring out the water lust in me.  Hehe.  How do you like the collage of my May paintings?  Which painting is your favorite?
 

"Robin's Nest" (mixed media on paper; 6.5" x 9") sold

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It's a risky thing to do, but who can resist peeking into four vivid blue robin eggs in a beautiful nest up the tree!  The painting is a mixed media of watercolor and oil pastel.

"Chesapeake Bay Tranquility" (oil on stretched canvas; 11" x 14") sold

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I once saw a lone house on an inlet to the Chesapeake Bay. I imagined tundra swans flying over the house. In my mind it was the dusk with the mauve sky and the dark, choppy water.

"Fawn in Dappled Light" (watercolor on paper; 8" x 8")

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A fawn in my wooded backyard. It looks exactly like Bambi!

"Duck Pond" (watercolor on paper; 6.5" x 4.5") sold

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These days I feel like painting watercolors.  The desire came upon me suddenly and I can't shake it off.  So I turned the kitchen table into my temporary studio to my husband's inconvenience!  I have already taken over the dining room; the living room is on the way to becoming my studio space as well.  I guess that's the price a guy has to pay for living with a creative person.  He he.

How do you like my small watercolor painting above?  Who says that a painting has to be large to have an impact?  A pair of ducks glide on a dark, lush surface of a pond.  I've said what I had to say in small format.  Sometimes less is more!

"Kauai Rooster" (oil on linen; 8" x 8") sold

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Some birds are born to rule.  Look at this Kauai rooster with a red crown.  Kauai is called the garden isle for its lush vegetation.  Now people are calling it the chicken isle because it is overrun by roosters, hens, and little chicks!

Most of the birds are believed to be descendants of former fighting cocks unleashed during a devastating hurricane more than a decade ago.  The birds now forage at outdoor food courts and parking lots, and ruin sugar cane and corn crops.  They wake islanders and tourists with predawn crowing.

When we first saw them, we thought they were exotic and fun.  We took gazillion pictures.  But there were just too many of them to remain excited.  Some resourceful islanders capture them and put them in a chicken coop for future dinners.  The wild hens are edible, but remain tough even after hours of cooking.  How about roosters?  Well, as I said, they rule the island.

"Guarding Alcatraz Island" (oil on linen; 8" x 8") sold

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A seagull takes a break, while eating the famous San Francis sourdough.

Alcatraz Island is located in the San Francisco Bay, 1.5 miles offshore from San Francisco.  It is home to the abandoned prison, the site of the oldest operating lighthouse on the West Coast, early military fortifications, and a seabird colony (mostly Western Gulls).  Today the island's facilities are managed by the National Park Service.  As far as I can tell, due to the recent budget cuts, the island seems to be guarded mainly by the seagulls!

By the way, the seagull population is skyrocketing and the birds are taking over San Francisco. Don't feed the gulls and pigeons!

"Doe and Fawn" (oil on linen; 8" x 10")

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A doe and her fawn in an enchanted forest. It is a dreamy, surrealistic painting!

"Zebra Love" (oil on linen; 30" x 20") sold

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This is an unusual piece for me, because I love color.  However, with zebras, who needs colors other than black and white"?  They are handsome by nature and don't need any adornments.

"Southwestern Wildflower Meadow" (oil on linen; 11" x 14") sold

"Southwestern Wildflower Meadow"
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"Mule Deer in the Meadow" (oil, 9" x 12")
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Bobbi Pratte's landscape class is winding down, with just a few more classes to go.  She suggested that we should all do some field exercises, that is, paint fields.  I chose a southwestern theme.  "Mule Deer in the Meadow" was the first one I did, based on a picture I took on the way to the Cedar Breaks National Monument in Utah during my family vacation in the Southwest last year.  I didn't know why the deer's ears were so big until a friend of mine told me that they were not ordinary deer, but mule deer.

I like the second "field" painting better.  It started raining by the time we got to Cedar Breaks National Monument.  At the altitude of over 10,000 feet, it was chilly although it was late July.  At one stop, we saw a breathtaking view of a wildflower meadow sloping down to the valley of spruces and firs.  The red flowers in the foreground are Indian paintbrushes.  There were also Queen Anne's laces and many other species in the meadow.

In my opinion, the biggest challenge in painting a field is to create the sense of depth.  What's in the background should stay there and don't come forward, no matter how interesting and beautiful they are.   On the other hand, it was really hard to keep balance between enough details and fuss in the foreground.  For instance, how do I not trap the viewer's eye in the foreground with brilliant red flowers in "Southwestern Wildflower Meadow"?

Making sense of the terrain is also a must, I think.  In "Southwestern Wildflower Meadow," it is clear that the meadow goes downhill, whereas everything is more or less flat in "Mule Deer."  I can imagine myself painting fields and meadows over and over again in the future to get to the bottom of it.

"Where Buffaloes Roam" (oil on linen; 8" x 12") sold

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Reference photo

Have you ever seen a buffalo really close up?  I did.  Last month my family were driving through Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota at sunset, enjoying the views.  We spotted a buffalo herd (there are over three hundred bison in the southern unit, where we were).  What a treat!  As you can see above, the lighting was ideal--with the setting sun streaking its golden rays through the trees and caressing sage-strewn grass field.  We went wild and started clicking cameras.

Suddenly something dark and huge went by within inches of the side of the car.  Oh, my god!  It was a stray bison.  You see that's why we stayed inside the car; if we hadn't, I might have been trampled.  Never go near these huge untamed wildlife!

"Spring Robin" (oil on linen; 4" x 5") sold

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When you see robins busily building nests, you know the spring has finally arrived--a welcome sight especially if you live in a place with a cold winter such as Minnesota.  I lived there for six years, so I know what I am talking about.  The picture was taken by a naturalist neighbor down the street.