September 25, "One Stroke Orange"

This was my sample painting from Wednesday night, for my incredibly delightful painting class, and I like it well enough to offer it for sale!  So, if yer feeling yer needin a bit o extra vitamin C these days, here it is fer ya!

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click here to purchase~

September 24, "Steppin' Wolf"

Yes, I thought of this clever title ALL  BY MYSELF!  Aren't you proud of me?  Isn't it a bit obvious?  I really couldn't help it.  Sorry.

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!

Sept 21, "Another Tapir Butt"

Hmm.  Do you think putting "Butt" in the title will prevent certain sensibilities from wanting to purchase my work?  Or will it make them more controversial?
I have to apologize because I meant to have some great photos of the show and all and to post them Sunday when we got home, but of course what happened was I got way too busy and now only have photos of before and after kinda stuff, except for a couple mom took, so really, the best way to see the exhibit if you can't get there (and remember, you can go in for free to see my show if you ask at the desk!) is to look on my webpages here and here....
And now that it is officially FALL, I'll be trying to slow down a notch and finish up some COMMISSIONS that have been patiently waiting for me!
And I'll be painting every day (or as close to every day as possible!) so stay tuned~

 6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!  You know you love that butt too!

 Me at the table of goodies!  You can see the otters in the gallery behind~















ME in the gallery with the title behind me!  Yay!

 The boys at McDonalds in Hinkley, comparing Happy meals...

 Up at the rotating restaruant with Duane and dad and mom!

 Max and Jesse watch a coal carrying boat move under the bridge~

 On the drive home!  VERY sunny!

September 19th, TODAY is the DAY! "Line Dance"

Hey all!  I'll post photos of the show tomorrow and we're heading up soon!  See you at the Great Lakes Aquarium this afternoon!
Wahoo!  So here is another otter-  loving those moves!

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!

September 18, "Surface Lurker"

This one likes to hang out just below the surface, pretending he's a bit of driftwood or something non-threatening to all those juicy frogs hanging around...

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!

September 17, "A Nose Above"

Kids, I gotta tell ya, I am just really seriously excited about getting up to Duluth to the Great Lakes Aquarium for my Opening Reception on Saturday!!!! Have I mentioned that before?  Well, in case you hadn't noticed, it is THIS Saturday, the 19th, at the Great Lakes Aquarium from 3 to 4:30!  It's right in the middle of the afternoon, so you can easily zip up, hang out, and make it home before the best TV is on!
I know, it's a bit far~
I WILL be bringing all these recent 6x6 Otter Paintings along, and I will be taking them off my Dailypaintworks site while they are at the Aquarium, so if you were interested in one you'd best let me know soon!

This one is one I've been wanting to paint for a while-  I am so amused by that water line bisecting the otter, and that body expression that's going on there....

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click here to purchase!

September 16, AND the WINNERS are.....!

I have drawn three names from all my subscribers, and these are the paintings they'll be choosing from!
So I'll let you know who gets what!

 "Bingo 1000" 6x6 acrylic on panel  Ann Marie Palladino is  the first WINNER  and she has picked this one! no longer available!

 "Peeper in the Hand" 6x6 acrylic on panel

"Hand Thrown Mug, Art Colony" 6x6 acrylic on panel

September 15, "Otter Drift"

I really enjoyed painting this one... I think when you don't have the details of a face and whiskers, then the painting tends a bit more towards general abstraction.  I went to Artistry on Sunday with a friend to check out the art, and greatly enjoyed looking at Teri Bloch's paintings on exhibition there.  Her works are figurative but upon viewing I was getting more caught up in the glimpses of color and the compositional choices because the figure was secondary.  Really great stuff if you get the chance!
SO with this little guy, I loved the negative space and the reflected light underneath, and that one extended front paw...
SO for the giveaway tomorrow, I'll give away the Bingo painting and two others that I'll show tomorrow and I'll pick three people and the first gets to pick first, the second next and the 3rd last.  How's that sound?
SO this one is for sale!

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!

September 14, "Lacy", a commission!

Another irresistible face-  I mean, really, how can you NOT paint this?  Dang~
And I'll be drawing for the Bingo painting tomorrow, and I thought what the heck?  I should give away a couple more paintings too, because I am so excited about the opening at the Aquarium this weekend, and it couldn't have happened without all of YOU!

So thank you~  and subscribe if you haven't!  And tell your friends too!

8x10 acrylic on hardboard panel, sold~

September 13, "Bingo 1000"! my 1000th POST!

Wahoo!  This is my thousandth post to my blog!  And I was thinking and thinking about what would be the most appropriate subject for this post and painting, and it just seemed perfect to look up an old photo of Bingo, my faithful black lab mix, because it was my love for him and his black shiny coat that ultimately taught me how to paint black dogs, which led to painting more dogs, which led to me being who I am today!  SO here is Bingo as my thousandth post, and I wanted to make this a give-away thing, as a giant THANK YOU to all of you who've been following me for this long and supporting me and buying my work and contributing to this fantastic artistic and creative life of mine!
SO if you are subscribed to this blog, I will do a drawing on Wednesday afternoon from all of you faithful subscribers to give this painting away!  Good luck to you!

6x6 acrylic on panel, FREE!  to some lucky subscriber!

September 11, "Pine Key Grin"

Speaking of watery critters, I've been wanting to paint these dolphins for a while... I always have a backlog of Things I Want To Paint...  so here is one of those grinning little boogers from last August when we house-swapped and went to Key West and then drove up to meet Monica at the Dolphin Research Sanctuary on Grassy Key.  It was amazing, we all loved it, I think Max will become a dolphin research scientist someday.  SO when I get THAT series of paintings done, where should I hang them?  Hmmm....

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!

I have to add that I JUST NOTICED that this is my 999th post!!!!!!  Holy buckets!  If I post tomorrow, that will be my THOUSANDTH post!!!

let's hope it's a good one...

Hmmmmm...

No pressure...

September 10, Slide

And this one just seems to be the SLIDE into the water!  I am really happy with it too!  It was a super slick one to paint....

12x5 acrylic on panel, $120 click HERE to purchase!

September 9, "Diving Face, Right"

I am feeling spectacularly uncreative with names today.  If you come up with a better one, do please let me know!  Just feeling slightly overwhelmed with the usual adjustment to the back-to-school schedule, as usual....
I will say that I am quite happy with the ear, and the under lighting on this one!

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click here to purchase!

September 7, "Relax...."

Sometimes I have a really hard time sitting still.  Duane cleared out and rearranged our front porch so that it is much more amenable to sitting still in, and just being there.  I like it.  I think I sat still for almost ten minutes, sipping my coffee and almond milk this morning, before I felt like I had to get up and go do something.  That habit of just sitting is a tough one to acquire.  I will have to work at it more.

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase~

September 4, "Interruption"

I named this one because of the dividing line of the water's surface, and how the otter is visually interrupted by it... it is really so satisfying to me to be figuring out how to paint the way water shows itself by how it interacts with objects in and out of it...  a relationship of sorts... and the way water changes light.  I am happy with the green underbelly lighting on this guy!

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase~

September 3, "Diving Face"

I am starting to feel like I'm getting my feet under me now-  here's another otter!  I am also working on getting all the lovely dogs from the 30 Dogs Project back to their loving owners, and getting ready for the upcoming commissions that are popping in~  so many beautiful animals to paint in this world-  keep 'em coming, folks!

6x6 acrylic on panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!

September 2, "Schwoopity Curve"

Wow!  I FINALLY was able to sit and pick up a paintbrush TODAY!  It has been WAY too long!  I don't think I've gone this long in months, if not YEARS!  I haven't painted since last Tuesday, I think, unless you count a few touch-ups here and there on some of the 30 Dogs I'm trying to get to their respective homes!  Still painting otters, I am!  Though I hear there's a new baby giraffe at Como Zoo....  this is a new one!
And I still have space in my Painting Lessons coming up in 2 weeks!
This is another one from one of Duane's photos of the lovelies at the Mn Zoo...

6x6 acrylic on hardboard panel, $75 click HERE to purchase!  Sleek and lovely and ready to hang!

September 1, The Otters Underwater Exhibition!

It was definitely a busy weekend up in Duluth!  Wow!  Max loved our stay at the Radisson so much, he asked on Sunday morning if we couldn't just stay for ONE more day!  And really, we didn't get as much done as I was hoping!  It's amazing how much cool stuff there is to do up there! I'd nearly forgotten, as we seem to buzz through on our way up to Grand Marais most often...
Anyway, the boys sorta helped me out with hanging the show, Sarah at the Great Lakes Aquarium was extremely helpful, and I had a ton of people asking me about the otter paintings and exclaiming how much they loved them!  I am so excited!
Here's a few shots of the installation, and then you can come up on Sept 19th for the Opening Reception from 3-4:30!  Or any time between now and January 10th, 2016!

 Max took this one... can you tell?

Aug 26, "Sunstruck Sleek" and Otter Art Statement

I thought I'd include this art statement in here, so that I can find it when I want, and so I can hear any comments from you all, my faithful followers and let me know where I've screwed it up~  below the painting...

36x24 acrylic on black gessoed canvas, $1725 click HERE to purchase or contact me for inquiries~

Otters have intrigued me since I was a child visiting the New Minnesota Zoo, watching them perform their acrobatics through the glass wall of their tank. There is an approachable connection in their joy in their physicality, a familiarity I feel and seek to explore by painting their bodies' movement through that alien element of water. Motion and response, flow and surrounding self with bubbles... seems a great way to spend a life.

Otters are my favorite animal. I was given the book “Tarka The Otter” when I was about twelve, along with a set of calligraphy pens that I used to teach myself how to draw their muscles and fur by perusing the illustrations in the book. I am enraptured by their lively, lithe, nimble aquatic acrobatics and the shapes and forms they make in their underwater playground. They entice us to join them, making the alien environment of the underwater world enchanting and joyful.

These paintings began as a childhood dream, sliding wetly off the side of the pool into the water, believing I could be as sleek and weightless as an otter, effortlessly gliding below the surface. Animals were my refuge as an introverted and bookish child and otters reflected back to me the joy I knew was in the world around me.

As a painter I am drawn to the negative space around my otters, the water supporting them as they surge and float, they themselves the active force in their liquid world. They create their underwater environment and invite us as viewers to be more aware of our own surroundings, the shapes we create in our space as we move through our lives.

I have greatly appreciated my growing sense of color and light as I attempt to paint the reflected and refracted light of the surface of the water. It is abstract and real at the same time. To reference the above water world while painting the otters below the surface has been a challenge for me. I am continuing to learn more about how I want to make my otters seen. They are themselves abstract in their rolling and twisting away from the rules of gravity that bind the rest of us. 

August 24, "Bottoms Up"

Another sweet view of an otter in action!  Doncha just love those haunches?  This one should be joining the rest up in Duluth!  Come on up and see them!

24x24 acrylic on canvas, $1150  click here to purchase, or e-mail me for more info!