Painting with Lola 1

My dear friend and fellow artist Lola arrived from Madrid on Saturday, November 23rd, in the evening. The next day we got up early and headed to Monte Rio to paint by the river. It was a gorgeous morning; there was a mist on the river, and ducks flew by and landed in the water as we painted.

Playing with ink

Today was a fun day for art! I experimented with the new artists' acrylic ink I recently purchased at Riley Street Art Supply (as pictured above). I am clumsy with them; they are more different from watercolor than I had previously thought. The sketches above are the view I had from Red Hill Trail, above Shell Beach, where I walked last Friday with my wife.
Today, I also worked on a larger acrylic painting of Goat Rock Beach which I started some time ago. It's still not done, so not ready to post.
 So wonderful to have a day filled with art!

From my sketchbook

Island off the coast of Sicily at sunset. Painted 2 years ago, from a photo in a travel magazine. This is my first day of summer vacation---a glorious day! Should have more recent paintings to post soon, as I'm planning many painting excursions this summer.

Bright limes

Watercolor value study

This is a value study from the watercolor class I took at our local junior college. I need to do more of these in order to learn to see clearly the value differences in a composition. I get impatient doing the top portion, but when I finish I always like seeing the two versions next to each other. 

Watercolor apple

I took a watercolor class in the fall of 2010. It was very helpful for many reasons, one of which is that it got me in the habit of painting regularly. My favorite still life subject is fruit because of the color variations and the irregular shapes.