Fowl Play Collage, 8x8

I liked this guy so much I did him as a collage as well as an oil painting. This is an 8x8 collage on gallery-wrapped canvas, all sides completed so it may be hung unframed.

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Fowl Play, 8x8 Oil on Canvas

I was painting the little corncrib at the farm at Oconluftee Visitors Center in the Smoky Mountains, and this fellow strolled by to watch. He's much more interesting than the corncrib.

This is painted on gallery-wrapped canvas, so no frame is needed.

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Night of the Iguana, 24x18 Collage

Once I start a collage, it's hard to stop. I am loving this medium. There are a lot of interesting things in this one. Can you see the bowl of popcorn?

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Red House, 6x8

An alternate title for this would be "Summer's End." The inner tubes are stacked on the dock and the leaves are turning. This house is up the road from artist Carol Schiff's house in North Carolina. I can't imagine having a bright red house, but it looks just right in this setting.

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Femme Fatale, Collage, 24x30

I'm venturing off into a new area here, and it's a little break in my Travelogue. When I returned home I attended a Derek Gores workshop and learned this technique. I almost forgot to go home, I got so deeply involved in ripping and pasting. Next time I'll try full color, and I can tell you there will be a next time. This was really a lot of fun. I'm looking at magazines in a whole new way.

Bourbon Street, 11x14 Oil on Canvas Board

After Nashville, we drove down the Natchez Trace Parkway, and what a glorious road that is. Little traffic, gorgeous scenery, and historic sites along the way. Meriwether Lewis died on the Trace (there is controversy about murder or suicide), and he is buried there. There was a cypress swamp that I will paint someday. We stopped in Tupelo, saw the birthplace of Elvis (two rooms, no bathroom or electricity), and   then we went on to New Orleans.
What a place. Where else can you ride in a streetcar and a man with a silver face and a Confederate uniform gets on? Then you see a large, pot-bellied man wearing a cowboy hat, a bra, and shorts. The music being played on the street was amazing, and the beignets were my particular guilty pleasure.

PURCHASE

Nashville Cats, 8x6

After the Pieces of 8 art retreat in the Smokies, my husband picked me up and we drove across Tennessee to Nashville, where we visited with my granddaughter who is attending Vanderbilt, my niece and her family, and my songwriter friend Bobby Braddock and his family. Bobby wrote the country hits "He Stopped Loving Her Today, Time Marches On, and more recently, "People Are Crazy," as well as many others.

On the way to Nashville we stopped to see friends who told this story: their daughter was teaching a Sunday School class of little tots and she asked if anyone wanted to lead the prayer. A little boy volunteered. He bowed his head and reverently prayed: "God is great, beer is good, people are crazy."

I enjoyed sharing that with the writer of the song. 

This painting is of Broadway in Nashville, with historic Tootsie's Orchid Lounge prominently featured. You have to love a city where guys walk around with guitars and music is everywhere. This one didn't qualify as a "daily painting," it was too complicated and took two days to complete.

PURCHASE

Apples and Wine, 10x12 Collage

I could do collage all day. This was one of our activities during our retreat in the mountains, and we had a great time, guided by Donna, our Collage Leader and Noted Limerick Writer. This week I will be taking a collage class from Derek Gores, whose work is quite awesome. What fun!

PURCHASE

Corncrib, 8x8

The Pieces of 8 went to the Oconluftee Visitors Center in Cherokee at the entrance to the Smokies, where we painted farm buildings. This was a corncrib in pioneer days, and it is completely painted on location. I didn't touch it in the studio. That was really an accomplishment for me, because one always wants to nitpick and perhaps destroy the spontaneity. The visitors center is wonderful, with recordings of mountain people talking about their very colorful lives.

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Big Splash, 8x10

I've traveled a lot this Fall, and I hardly know what to paint next. This is a view from the cliffs of Prout's Neck, Maine, Winslow Homer's stomping ground. It's so much more dramatic than our beach here in Florida, except during hurricanes.

PURCHASE