Lately I’ve gone from painting dead birds to live ones! My teacup birds, while quite whimsical in concept, are a really about putting some life into the still life genre. I love the layers of artifice that go into these pieces, There’s the teacup artist’s interpretation of a flower and then my re-interpretation of that as well as my careful observation of the real flowers in their corresponding teacup that …
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Here I am driving myself crazy! Each shell is shifting universe of light, changing every second. Much too subtle, much too elusive. It’s easy to get lost chasing the detail and miss the magic. Hoping to catch a rainbow…
My Evelyn is in bloom again and oh how I love its delicate fragrance and masses of ballet pink petals. So many petals that it requires a lot of support or a very low vantage point. Makes for a good cut flower too though my favorite thing to do is to shoot them and paint them!
Most roses really thrive in the sun but my Spirit of Freedom was having none of this 92 degree onslaught! It’s really quite delicate. I had to shade it with my big green market umbrella and hope that those ponderous heads of tightly wound petals wouldn’t fall away from their delicate stems like a dried up umbilical cord. These roses seem shy, always looking downward. I think I would have …
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It’s that time of the year for my annual fix. My favorite rose is blooming in my friend Nilofer’s garden! It’s a David Austen climbing rose called Eden (rosa x meiviolin) Meiviolin was developed by Meilland. These roses are perfect with their porcelain exterior petals and the crush of magenta petals at it’s center… ….which unfolds into a heavy pink cup. A client …
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I received a lovely gift from a friend. Her father was a well loved gardener and upon his passing she found homes for many of the beautiful plants he had tenderly cared for. Not only do I have several of his beauty berry bushes and white tree peonies, but this glorious purple tree peony. I send my friend a photo of it blooming every year. What I really want is …
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happiness is…………………………………………………………….a big blue sky. happiness is………………………….dancing through a field of buttercups. happiness is………………………………………………………..a vast blue ocean. happiness is………………………………………..a bright bouquet of balloons. happiness is………………………………………….sun shining though the fog. happiness is ……………………………………………….most decidedly, yellow. Happiness is……………………..spending a beautiful day at the shore with my camera and my favorite model!
If you have the right perspective even a mud puddle can be lovely.
Of course I am saddened and discouraged by the amount of garbage we dump into the ocean. I need to say that, it cannot be said enough. And yet, I am smitten by these barnacle covered bottles. They have an almost poetic quality. Though delicate, they have weathered the tides, currents and waves and survived unbroken. They tell a story of the barnacles and bivalves that have made homes on them …
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photo – Cooper Bates How I love spring – it’s the miracle of all that dormant life bursting out of the dark and damp with such delicacy and pure beauty – it stuns me. A perfect milieu for a walk’n talk with Nilofer Merchant as we share budding new ideas. Our areas of expertise are quite different, Nilofer the business innovator, author and speaker and me the visual artist and …
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Somebody lost a feather. Did you know dipping has been all the rage lately? It’s done to sculpture, furniture, paintings & plates. This little feather I found on my lawn this morning reminds me of that trend, as though someone had dipped it into a pot of cadmium yellow. Here’s what I’m talking about: I adore what Italian Sculptor, Willy Verginer does with his beautifully carved wooden sculptures as seen here …
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I was quite taken with this riot of retro color going on at Three Sisters in Willow Glen! All this glittery, dazzling, saturated, kitsch was set up in an alcove the size of a phone booth. I felt like I’d entered the land of Dr. Seuss! While not particularly a fan of orange, I fell in love with this little deer with her vintage coral beads and crazy orange antlers (oh, …
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I can’t get over these chili peppers I picked up the farmers market – they look like they’re made of plastic! They are so fanciful with their corkscrew spirals, surreal sheen and insanely red hue – and turns out they’re lip burning hot too!
I’m hooked on hooks! They have such a strong graphic shape and a universally understood symbolism. This is a herring hook that was used by Bay of Fundy fishermen that came from Morden, Nova Scotia. It’s one of many in my stash that came with the church I purchased in the back in the eighties. My first daisy chain of tuna hooks on lovely marbled paper that was handmade in …
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Some days seem to have a theme going on – today it was ducks! This morning I was working at the Los Gatos Museums Gallery as the Staffing Artist. It was first time since the new hanging that I’ve had the time to really pour over all the new work. I came across Linda Smythe’s ducks – I so adore her painterly approach to her subject matter (often roses) nice and …
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Hit another yard sale and came up with some vintage pink luster spatterware (or pink splattered lusterware)! Either way I’m a pushover for painting props for my roses! I love the chaos of the splatters, like a blight that blooms on pottery. The luster is really fun to paint too!
I so love this project! Conceived as the first of many installation pieces to compliment my Florilegia series, this casket full of forget-me-nots combines my love of gardening, antiques and art. Rooted in of the Victorian language of flowers where the message of the forget-me-not is, not surprisingly, “remember me”. This early wicker casket is as much a basket as it is a coffin. I love the underlying sentiment of …
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Flowers and poetry – such a cliché and yet I’m really moved by the innocence of the daisies and the beauty of Tagore’s Fireflies. And yes, I understand that this poem isn’t really about flowers!
Sometimes a patch of grass and sky and a smattering of blooms is enough to fill your heart with spring!
One of my favorite painters, Ayesha Durrani, makes masterful and exquisite use of the dress form as a metaphor for Pakistani women and their position in society. She uses the traditional techniques of marbling, gold leaf, and gouche on wasli paper that have been used for centuries for manuscript illuminations and miniatures to make very contemporary paintings that are accessible on a global level. She’s used the dress form from …
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