Betatakin

On Monday, my little girls and I went to town to buy some baling wire for our garden fence. The store, rural as it is, was out and said to come back in the afternoon. Hmmm. Not wanting to waste an hour of driving, I decided to go exploring. We ended up in Betatakin at the Navajo National Monument, where nestled at the base of deep canyons are some ruins of an ancient Anasazi apartment complex. I didn't think my toddlers were up for the 8 mile hike to the bottom, and as we got there, they both fell asleep in the car. So naturally it was a good time to step out and paint for a couple of hours. And... I just happened to have an easel and paints and thinner and some spare panels with me. ;) One of my favorite things about painting outside is getting to meet all of the people who stop alongside the road to see what you're doing. On Monday I got to meet people from Sasketchewan, China, Indonesia I think, Texas, and some local coal mine workers. It's always fun to hear people's stories and make connections.

Highlight of the Flathead

This is a miniature painting- 4"x 6" - a teenie weenie little hard to make your brush touch right where you want it to painting. But a good challenge, I suppose. This one is for the Hockaday Museum of Art benefit auction, and the proceeds of the sale will go to the museum.

Waiting Backstage

This isn't the best photo so I'll swap it out when the lighting's better, but here's the painting finished about a week ago. It was painted from a live model- a really great one. :) She was perfectly still, and multitasked- studying geometry from a textbook on the floor while modeling. I decided to make up quite a few things, like the fringe on the outfit, the hair sticks, and the background. I just didn't want to paint a dancer sitting in front of a chalkboard. So I thought, "What if she's actually sitting backstage, waiting for the intro to her song to come on? It's the final performance of the evening, and all of her family and friends are watching, waiting with the film crews for her to come out and be awesome! ;)"  So that's how I painted it. Better photo coming soon...

Waiting Backstage

Study in Oranges

This was done a while ago but I just came across it and thought I would share.