Category: Color

1 The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. 2 He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. 3 He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. Psalm 23:1-3 David was a shepherd. As a boy, he cared for sheep and kept them safe, fed, sheltered, and together. He led them where he knew fresh grass and water would be and fought off their enemies for them. When they were injured he cared for them. When they were lost, he found them. However, years...

Inspiration Turtle Lake Sunset was one of my favorite paintings in this series so far. I loved celebrating the beauty and color of nature during this journey. The inspiration for this painting came from this photo. We were on a long evening boat ride and witnessed this stunning sunset. I just took this photo with my iPhone and couldn’t believe how well it turned out. who stills the roaring of the seas, the roaring of their waves, the tumult of the peoples, so that those who dwell at the ends of the earth are in awe at your signs. You...

The Inspiration The inspiration for this painting came from a photo I came across online of this beautiful field full of flowers. It seemed crisp and clean and sunny and the perfect subject for a painting. The Palette For this one, I used my typical palette, Ultramarine, Alizarin, Titanium White, Lemon Yellow, and Cadmium Yellow but I left out the Yellow Ochre and Burnt Sienna and added in Rose Red for the lovely pinks. The Painting This is Patra’s Meadow, 30″ x 24″done in oil with a palette knife on gallery-wrapped canvas. After working on small pieces lately, it was...

Here is a quick demo using a limited palette of six tubes of paint. This is to show that while the color mixing demonstrations in the previous three posts (Mixing Greens, Mixing Purples, Mixing Oranges) are all great practice exercises, we don’t really need all those colors to complete one painting. The colors in this demo are Lemon Yellow, Yellow Ochre, Titanium White, Ultramarine, Raw Sienna, and Alizarin Crimson. Limited Palette Demo Here’s the Result I just did this very quickly on an 8×10″ canvas pad with oil as a quick study. I like the hazy look that happened by...

Lily Pads on Turtle Lake Inspiration Turtle Lake is in Northern Minnesota and summer visits there always include lots of fishing. This photo below is of one of our friend’s favorite fishing spots. Its shady bank is a haven for fish and the water’s surface is littered with lily pads. I didn’t catch fish, but I did catch the perfect inspiration for a lovely lily pad painting. For the actual painting, I zoomed in to just focus on the lily pads for this one. This is done on an 11″ by 14″ canvas board. The palette included Blue Grey, Ultramarine...

There is a place in Minnesota that nourishes my body, mind, and soul called Turtle Lake. Some of the dearest people we know live there and their cabin has been a place of healing for me both times I’ve gone there. The pine tree-filled sky filled the cells of my body with oxygen and the clear crisp lake water soaked into my joints healing inflammation. The green and blue space surrounding me was rest for my weary mind. To get there, you have to drive down this winding dirt road through the forest. It’s like a path to peace. When...

Creature Inspiration Two of my favorite sources of inspiration for creating art about animals are books! Reading James Herriot’s All Creatures Great and Small warmed my heart and drew me into the country English setting and the quaint world of a country veterinarian with curiosity and wonder. Another book I love is Rien Poortvliets’ Noah’s Ark. It’s a beautifully done artistic journal of what life with animals on an ark could have been like. He’s an extremely gifted artist and has created an amazing celebration of life in this book. A graphite study I did from his book is below...

Glorious Messenger is a Christmas painting inspired by Luke 2:8-10 I just finished. In the passage, the shepherd’s encounter with an angel from the Lord is recorded and leaves the reader with a sense of awe and wonder. It made me curious. The only description we have is that the angel is described as suddenly appearing to them and because the glory of the Lord filled the area with light, they were terrified. What would that look like? What would it have felt like to witness this? This painting is not intended to answer these questions definitively but is my...