Young Steer

Young Steer, 36 x 36 in. oil on gallerywrap canvas

This impressive creature captivated me with it's solemn look, the warm, soft wrinkles in its skin, and the afternoon light coming through the ear. The painting is bigger than life, 3 feet square, and will make a substantial statement on somebody's wall.

I have a bunch of new work, all in stages of completion...I'll introduce them one at a time here. In the early half of this year, I am concentrating on building my body of work, especially the larger paintings, and as a consequence I don't have much in the way of shows coming up in the near future. The Glastonbury Art Festival in September may be my next show, if I'm jured in. Then I'll be participating in the Artist Open Studios of Northeast Connecticut in November.

We are eagerly awaiting the shipment of baby chicks at the local farmer's coop, and the chicken coop is partway to being completed. I am reading up again on the care and feeding of baby chicks. The original plan was to raise the chicks out in the studio, away from the pets, in a large plastic tote, with a 100 watt lightbulb for heat. However, we've decided we need to be able to monitor the chicks more frequently, and there is no water source in the studio, so Plan B is to keep the brooder in our spare bathroom, door tightly closed at all times so they don't become lunch for the cats.

We have had nice surprise visitors recently to our little pond..a pair of mallard ducks. They have come a few times, and I'm hoping they'll stick around a bit and don't mind the dog.

More Piggies.

Piglets at the Fair, oil on board, 9 x 12 in.


Summer Drafts, oil on canvas, 18 x 24 in.


A number of new horse paintings are in various stages of completion, and I have to wait until the weather complies to drag the easel and the tripod outside to photograph them, but I'll post these piggies for now, and a piece that I completed last fall--
"Summer Drafts". It all comes down to the light, and I loved the backlighting on these meaty draft horses that were being held, waiting to be hosed down on a sultry summer day. My reference had a person in there, holding the horses, but I edited the head out of the final painting..as well as the lead rope attached to the halter. I wanted this piece to have a peaceful simplicity, and the handler made the composition too busy.

I made a trip to New York City last weekend, to visit friends, show my son some of the city, and check out the big ArtExpo at the Javitts Center. Our friend, a phenomenal painter, Nick Paciorek, had his work there, and it was so nice to see his colorful city landscapes in person. I may be in a booth at this show myself next year...haven't decided yet whether or not to do it. It's a lot of work, and it's going to take some serious planning.

Meanwhile, I have another draft horse on the easel now, and the horse colors project--my grid of 80 individual horse paintings is getting closer to the finish line.
I have about 20 horse heads left to paint, then the final adjustments.

The 10 inches of snow that got dumped on us Monday has really been a bit depressing. I am anxious to be able to get out in the woods to walk the dog, and ride! The horse's winter shoes come off in a couple of weeks--all the snow better be gone by then!

Star in the Mist

Star in the Mist, oil on canvas, 30 x 30 in.

It's been a good week of painting. Mainly because I decided to upgrade my computer. What does one have to do with the other, you might ask? Well, to make a really long story short, in the course of upgrading, I lost my internet connection in my studio. So the other day, I had a day of just painting...without any electronic distractions. And it's amazing how much you can get done without the computer.
However, online work must be done, so I have carted the computer into the house, to download necessary software updates, etc... I will have to get the internet problem solved, but in the meantime, I think I'll leave it in the house for a few more days.
Several new paintings are in progress, however, all have yet to be scanned or photographed, so I'll post some December paintings that have joined the inventory.
Star is a 25 year old Standardbred gelding that joined our barn last summer. He has a mane to envy--long flowing orange locks that hang below his neck, and a forelock to match. I photographed him behind the other horse on a misty summer morning. I loved the softness of the light. I'm not entirely satisfied with the way it photographed..I haven't been able to capture the true color in this painting with the digital camera yet.


Spotted Cow, oil on board, 11 x 14 in.

This second painting, "Spotted Cow" is an attempt to capture that beautiful afternoon sunlight that bathes the cows in the barn at the Brooklyn Fair. It lights up the pink in their ears, and and straw bedding just glows with warmth.

The Great Chicken Adventure

It has been decided at Underhill Hollow that we will raise a few chickens. Now I have said for a while that I wouldn't mind raising a few hens for the eggs. Yet, it is only recently that my husband is on board with the plan. He has visited some folks who have chicken coops, and is now sold on the idea that this would be a fun thing to try. Of course, our reasons for wanting chickens vary greatly--I think chickens are beautiful birds, and of course, fresh eggs are the main goal. My husband wants to build a cool-looking coop, and be able to watch them free-ranging around the yard. Realistically, we have a herding dog who may not agree with the free-ranging idea. We also have a healthy population of hawks around. So we will build a coop with a roofed, fenced outdoor run, and hopefully be able to let them free range a little bit.
My other motivation is artistic, of course. I am envisioning a whole series of chicken paintings. So we'll be raising breeds that will be good egg layers, are docile in nature, and are colorful and inspiring to paint.
This little painting above is of a chicken at the Roger Williams Park Zoo. 5 x 7 oil on board.

Johnny Come Lately

Johnny Come Lately oil on canvas, 30 x 40 in. Private commission.

Johnny is a big bay half-morgan, half Appendix Quarterhorse. I thought he was a warmblood when I first saw him back in October, his glossy dark bay coat just starting to get the winter fuzzies. What had to be captured in his portrait was his kind eye. His owner had seen some of my newer work, the big close-up head images, and she wanted something similar for her portrait of Johnny. I experimented with various croppings, with and without halter, until we came to an agreement about this pose. I usually like to do commissioned portraits with halters or bridles, unless the horse has really interesting markings, or a really well-sculpted head, the tack usually adds a bit of interest and helps define the bone structure a bit. In this case, the halter gave me an opportunity to personalize the portrait by putting his name on the brass halterplate.

Now that Johnny is completed and delivered, my New Year's tasks are to finish up some previously begun projects, and start some new big paintings. With spring commissions and potential freelance work around the corner, I need to seize this opportunity to paint for myself. Christmas vacation was supposed to be the start of some studio productivity, but all of the holiday socializing and entertaining, then the clean-up and putting away of all the Christmas stuff sort of drained my energy.

Then there is the distraction of the Wii. Since the Wii is brand-new to our family, we are still in the honeymoon phase of enjoying all the basic Wii Sports, and creating lots of Mii's for the plaza.

So, now that the work week has started, I have checked off task number two on my studio list, which was, "Create a new blog entry!" Now, on to number three, which is "Paint!"

Falling Leaves

Cheerio, my English Shepherd, is going to turn two years old this coming Thursday, and I thought I would celebrate her birthday by posting a recent picture here. We have a wonderful old maple tree in the side yard. I don't know exactly what kind of maple it is, but it has smaller leaves than some of the others, and they make a particularly lovely carpet around the trunk when they fall off the tree. The color just sets off Cheerio's coat beautifully.

Although she is nearly two and her "off switch" is much closer to being fully functioning, she still just loves to play, and our favorite game is to throw the jolly ball into the middle of a pile of leaves and watch her dive into the middle of the pile. She would emerge, leaves sticking out of the sides of her mouth with the jolly ball, reminding me of Linus jumping into the leaves with a wet sucker.

I've been spending all my painting time working on a large commissioned portrait, that I won't be able to post here until it's finished, and other studio time is being occupied by computer work. However, today was for more leaf raking. And what a day it was for working outside. It is so warm, I can't believe it's November. There is a small window of time to get the leaves raked before it snows. And I would rather not have to clean them all up in the spring. Growing up at my parents' house, on their small wooded lot, the leaves would be ankle deep, and you could easily accumulate a pile four feet high from raking a small area. We would haul the leaves on a big piece of plastic sheeting and dump them at the curb and wait for the city truck to come and suck them all up. Our yard now, with it's scattered mature trees, means I have a much bigger area to cover, and we tend to rake it in sections, depending on which trees drop their leaves first. At least our hauling method is the same, except there is no city truck to collect them. We just compost them ourselves along with the horse manure.

The big excitement of the day? Bluebirds! I saw a flock of five or six Eastern bluebirds in the yard this morning. I sure wish they would use the house I built for them, but I'm happy just to see them around once in a while.

And this last picture is my Morgan mare, Unique, looking cute wearing her fall "jewelry". I found someone selling these at Equine Affaire last year, and I thought it was a wonderful alternative to the big, clunky hunter-beware bell that clips onto the saddle (that is, if your saddle has d-rings, which mine doesn't, and those leather ties just don't hold it securely.) So now Unique is fashionable on her fall trail rides.

Horses, llamas, and pigs...oh, my!

"Working Eyes"

oil on canvas, 36 x 36 in.

I have finally gotten around to posting this guy. He was discovered at a pulling contest, on a blistering hot day in June. I was amazed at how little these big drafthorses were bothered by the heat. I love the big heavy leather harnesses and blinkers, and the way they frame the gentle eyes of this guy.

Soccer games and practices and meetings and computer work keep trying to take away painting time. Despite interruptions and delays, I've been able to get a brush on canvas and finish up a few small pieces, inspired by visits to the local county fair.
"Llama", oil on canvas, 12 x 16 in.
"Pig Snooze", oil on canvas, 8 x 10 in.
"Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner", oil on canvas, 11 x 14 in.

These little piggies were just captivating. I kept checking back in on them all afternoon, and that momma sow never moved.

We spent a day in Williamstown, Massachusetts, recently. A trip to photograph a horse made a great excuse for a day trip to see the fall foliage, and take in a museum. The Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute was a pure delight. It was a chance to see work by many of my favorite American artists such as Whistler, Sargent, Homer, Chase, and Twachtman. After taking in the art, we walked the trails behind the museum. A pasture trail takes you up a hill, to a spectacular vista of autumn foliage. This makes me want to paint autumn landscapes and I would not be surprised if one of these makes it onto the easel soon. The day could not have been more perfect. On our way back through North Adams, we checked out the Natural Bridge State Park, and were amazed at the wonderful rock formations, and deep gorge running through this old marble quarry.