Hula is life

It's about time for me to start painting hula themes- I've put if off hoping my drawing would get better- but there's no time like now to get started. Hula sisters, I would love to see some of your favorite a`ali`i photos to get some inspiration.


Here's my first few attempts - can you name that hula?

Entering Shows

It's always a challenge for me to look at my work and decide if it's good enough for a show. But happily two works have been accepted:

SOLD
1) Kukui Fire, Watercolor 25x28, in the HawaiiWatercolor Society 47th Open Exhibition, Juried by Ann Pember, October 2009

and
From Waikupanaha, Watercolor 8x10 at
2) Windward Artist Guild Annual Member Exhibition,Curator Helen Iaea. (SOLD)

Hope you enjoy looking at my work.

Planning ahead

I love a photo we took with John and Sally in Barcelona along Las Ramblas. I keep trying to draw and paint it and think I'll use it as my first painting in my upcoming class. Eventually I'm sure it will be great. (That's what drawing and painting lessons are for , right?) When I finish my drawing class John (in the red hat) and Jerry( in blue shirt) will look great. So will the girl walking with her hands at her sides! Or I could just keep the flowers and cut everything else out?

Practicing washes

After reading about washes again, I redid my plein air painting by starting with a wash of cobalt blue from the top and new gamboge from the bottom. It's so light and didn't really show clouds I saw that day, but it's good practice. Also practiced dark tolight washes on the mountains. What do you think?

Kukui Fire Final

I created Kukui Fire to fill the space on my dining room wall while my coconut tree is on display this month. Tried to use colors of the Turkish rug with a local subject and here it is.

Kukui Fire

After seeing great sites and art in Europe, I got home and picked up my brush again. Im inspired to use the colors of our new Turkish carpet in a painting of a Hawaiian subject. Here's the first two phases of my kukui nut tree. I just went up and added much deeper colors- wonder how it will turn out..hopefully good enough for the dining room wall.

Ready to show? It's accepted!

Tomorrow I'm going to submit this painting to a juried show in the Windward Artist Guild. This is my first attempt to enter a show, so I have no idea if it will be accepted or not. Going to go for it anyway. Wish me luck.

Going Nuts

Here's where I am now on this coconut tree. It's hanging in a frame on my dining room wall for "practice".I still have to fix some of my fronds- too transparent. Can't seem to quit painting coconuts- all different views and sizes.

Exploring Edges

This week I've been playing around trying to work with softer edges on flowers. Here are some samples. 

Jason's yard

While we were visiting Jason in January, I painted the first one one day while Emma was napping.  Two days later, it snowed again, so I sketched the second pic and painted it on the long airplane ride  home.  Haven't had the chance to paint snow too often. 

We're still working on negative painting. This time our watercolor teacher loaned us some of her pictures of waterlilies and lotus plants. First I sketched a few to figure out the shapes, then I got an idea for composition.  To prep my paper (12x16) , I wet the whole thing then added medium yellow, aliziran crimson and thalo blue , leaving white spaces where my main flowers and leaves would be.  After it dried, I sketched in two main flowers and three main leaves.  It's hard to make the lily pads look flat, yet show some dimension.  I painted around all of the main shapes with a slightly darker value of the background colors, then waited for it to dry again. Repeat the process until I had as many lily pads as I wanted.    After that I did a little positive painting to accent the colors and then drew in veins using a broken twig instead of a small brush.  

I ended up going in with another darker wash of thalo green and turquoise to try to get the pond darker. 

I think I'll try this again, but with yellow flowers and a green pond this time.  Maybe a bee or butterfly? fish? 

Center Stage - SOLD

My first actual show was "Differing Views" presented by the Windward Wanderers. 17 artists who paint regularly on the windward side of Oahu displayed works at the visitors center of Hoomaluhia Botanical Gardens in Kaneohe. The opening reception was last night- take a look at some photos.
I displayed 3 paintings and actually sold one. What a great experience - very encouraging.

First Sale

Staff of Coconut Island Marine Biology Lab invited Windward Wanderers to have a show at Christmas and during their luncheon, they viewer works and even bought some. I didn't expect to sell anything, but was so excited to learn that someone purchased these little works- they are both 3x4 on Arches 140# paper, matted to 5x7. I sold another one, 8x10 but forgot to take a picture of it. Here it is hanging on the wall.