I stopped by the florist for some cut flowers and found these amazing lisianthus and stocks stems. I love the different shades of purple and green. Such a nice contrast to each other! Gouache is known for its wonderful colors and velvety matte finish. This is a painting is on illustration board and should be…
Hiking along the trails of the Oberg Mountain always reminds me of the scenery from the elf forest in Lord of the Rings. There is something magical and beautiful about the filtered light as it passes through the tree branches. It is one of my favorite spots along the North Shore of Lake Superior.
This painting was done back in the studio using the pages of my sketchbook for reference.
This picture was painted on location on a blustery Sunday morning along the Mississippi River.
There is just something about asparagus — I love everything about it! I love how it tastes, the feel of it, the color, but especially how it’s sold. I’m fascinated by how it’s displayed in-store; standing up on end, bound with a beautiful, colorful rubber band. When I happened across asparagus on sale at Whole Foods, I knew I had to paint it.
For this small painting, I wanted to play with color. I know that gouache is capable of rendering an object in great detail, but I also know that it can do an excellent job of showing one color against another and exploring the relationship of warm and color pigments — that’s what I wanted to focus on for my painting.
This painting began with a dinner party. I had just moved into a new apartment in downtown Minneapolis. As I was unpacking, I rediscovered a table runner that picked up several years ago. It’s a multicolor stripe woven cloth — red, green, yellow, blue orange. I knew that I wanted to have that cloth on my table when I had my parents over, and I also knew that I was going to need some flowers. I picked up a bunch of tulips, and my table was set.
The next morning, after a wonderful evening with my parents, I ate breakfast and stared at the flowers sitting on my table. I had to paint them!