MY FAVORITE LICENSE

Paint what you love! 

My teddy bear illustrations are inspire by my love of collecting hand made bears. This remains my favorite license, for a scrapbook company.

FROM GARDEN TO CUSTOM GIFT

After all these years of painting, I have my share of ups & downs, with the frustrations & uncertainty. This remains the best part of a creative life...the ability to create a bit of enchantment. To bring joy to someone's day!

MORE SUMMER INSPIRATIONS

Came to Photoshop very late in my career. It took forever to learn. Since then, I dont remember the last time I actually complete an illustration. By not fuzzing over one single painting which could take up to a month to finish, I can dream up many variations working with a few images.

It always starts with a sketch. This seaside cottage sketch came from Noank, CT.

The sky & water is from my archive. I've been painting forever, so there are tons of painting I can use.

I started this with watercolor, but the ethereal watercolor just can not express the colorful garden. An impressionist painting can come together pretty fast.

I then pulled some sailboats from another painting, just need to seperate it from the original.

Layer on a flag...

Viola! A new design for my Summer Collection. For someone who cant seem to stay focus on finishing a painting, the magic of photoshop is a real blessing.

RADIANT SUNRISE WITH OIL & PASTEL

We become painters at some deep level not out of a love of images. I think, at some point, we fall in love with our chosen medium. We seem to spend our lives trying to master it. 

Trying to express the blinding radiance of the morning sun with just yellow & green, oil turpentine on paper.

My current favorite is to use pastel over my oil sketch. Pastel is fast & gives me that bit of texture from the paper to convey the meadow.  

By brushing the pastel over with turpentine, I dont have to use any fixative.

SUMMER MORNING

Typical summer morning. A workout for my eyes.

Always something new to discover thru my window. Another up-close & intimate study after nature.

I have a lot of papers that are toned. This definitely speed up the sketching process. My window of opportunity is about half an hour before the fog gets burn off by the rising sun.

POPPY INSPIRATIONS

                                               From my first visit thru the English countryside, memory of endless meadows of wild poppy have always stayed with me. So when my rep mention that Poppy is trending, I drop everything & started some new ideas for a Poppy collection.

It's not a project I can wait, mainly because my neighbor, Etsuko's Poppy garden is in full bloom. For my illustration, finding the right reference is half the job. 

I've travel far & wide to visit famous gardens. I have yet to come across a Poppy garden that can match her Poppy collection. Here's a few pictures to inspire the gardener in you!

COOPERSTOWN ART ASSOCIATION

Because of Lake Otsego, Cooperstown, NY is a nice place to go & look at art. My friend, Judy Thuss's works are included in the current exhibit at Cooperstown Art Association.

Her vibrant work is meant to be appreciated in a gallery.

The Smithy is another hidden gem in Cooperstown for compelling local artists.

New Design for License

Much has been written about the process of creativity. For me, it's time on my bike that's the most creative. Ideas kind of flow together. Putting different elements together is a big part of creating an illustration. This design is a perfect example: my rep always sends over a wish list on what's trending. 

Cloud was on the list recently. I have tons of cloudscape in my archive. They are all fine art paintings, not exactly commercial art.

There's also this dreamscape, it's too muted to be license for anything. It has been in the closet for years. For whatever reason, combining these 2 paintings just came to me while I was biking.

With the magic of photoshop, I created a new design for license, by combining 3 paintings.