This painting was a challenge. It was a commission, a continuation of a story I began in an earlier piece about the tomato plant that fairly took over my front yard. Maybe you remember it with the lovely girl in her front garden picking a basket full of ripe tomatoes. The assignment here was to place our tomato girl in her garden again but this time at night. I don’t have a lot of experience painting night scenes. This is where I landed.

It’s a mild full moon night, the lady of the house sits on the bench in her side yard holding her squirming cat. There’s no doubt about her green thumb. The wild tomato plant in the front yard was no fluke. In fact you can see it at the edges of the scene trying to find a place here too. The air is perfumed with roses, peonies, dogwoods, tulips, trout lilies, daffodils, and those little seedy things. There’s scarcely room for anything else, the gardening style here being one of wild abandon. The little stream adds soft background music while birds and animals rest. The house is welcoming, warm light from the open window.

This is only the third commission I’ve taken. The first one was a success all around, the second was a nightmare which made me hesitant to take this “Midnight” assignment. But the patron was happy to review a sketch and then let me run with it. I was grateful for that and we are both pleased with the result.

“Midnight”
24 x 18 inches
Acrylic on claybord

Prints of this image are available in my Etsy shop here:
https://www.etsy.com/listing/1732756934/midnight-garden-art-print-of-original?click_key=88a21fe8b96e6e20b8bd45200102a90f8b7ee42c%3A1732756934&click_sum=70cc18d9&ref=shop_home_active_1

Thanks, as always, for taking a look!

This piece started with some photos I took back in February of a birthday bouquet that I wasn’t overly fond of. The bouquet, not the photos. Of course I said “thank you” but the arrangement had just too many different colors, too many different things. Roses, tulips, ranunculus, little pips, scabiosa pods, lots of extra greenery (why do they always do that?), blackberries which were a surprise, sticks covered with greenshield lichen, also surprising. I took everything out of the vase, got rid of the greenery filler, spread it all out, added a mourning dove, and here it is.
“Tapestry.”
Prismacolor pencils on black Strathmore drawing paper.
25” x 19”.

I’ve been enjoying the colored pencils but this will be my last pencil piece for a while. It’s back to the landscapes for me. I’ve also closed my Etsy shop for a bit. It will be on an extended vacation and will reopen sometime in the fall.

I have a bit of news. My painting, “Ghost Story,” has been accepted to the Radius 50 Show at the Woodstock Artists Museum. The show runs from September 7 through September 29 with an artists reception on September 14 from 4 - 6pm. I’ll be at the reception so if you’re in the area stop by and say hello. I’d love to meet you!

Hope you’re all enjoying the end of summer and thank you for following along!