Where has the year gone?

OK, I've had that song by Rod Stewart running in my head all evening, Maggie May! It's way past late September, in fact creeping up to mid November already and I'm already in school almost everyday. The great thing is that I'm the teacher and get to choose how I'm going to spend time teaching people the art of making a mess in mud or paint! I love my job!



This lovely little piece was done at Shane McDonalds Group. I've been painting with that group for the past 15 years. This was a particularly lovely pose and the addition of the mask added a sense of mystery.

So where have I been the past month plus. Well to catch you up I've traveled a few times to paint, bought a new car, went on a couple of dates, saw the Da Vinci show at the High Museum and installed a scar crow my class at the Benson Center made at the Atlanta Botanical Garden to just mention a few things. I've also pushed a little paint around myself and would like to share some of the images with you now. Please take some time to look over what I've made lately and feel free to leave a comment, encouragement or just go ahead and throw money at me. I'll need it for the new car payment "yikes"!




Finally finishing this portrait study I started several months ago.


This is Ellaine who sat for the first week of my painting from life class. This Demo shows that you can move paint around quickly and still get a good likeness.



This lovely little piece was done at Shane McDonalds Group. It still feels incomplete to me but I have little interes in bringing it to a finsh.



This lovely woman stepped in to take a models place after she missed her appointment. What a wonderful surprise.


Driving up to Highland I finally ran out of patience and had to pull over to paint this misty scene. I and everything I was wearing or using got soaked but it was worth the effort.



A month ago I stopped just outside the gate of Fort McPherson on Lee Street in Atlanta to paint this scene at sunset.
the brilliance of the light was fantastic and as the light shifted to the reds and pinks at sunset and the whole scene came alive.



I call this piece "Out of the mist". It is by far my favorite I accomplished on our trip to Highlands. The layers of trees and the subtle changes of muted colors made this a particularly challenging painting. One which I feel is completly successful.



This was the view from the cabin I stayed at in Highland NC. It was a rainy cold foggy day and a few of us decided to stay at the cabin and paint off the covered porch. Happily I got two paintings done and both were pretty strong representations of the atmospheric conditions we encountered on our trip.


This old barn sits on the road to Sky Land GA. from Hwy 106 between Dillard and Highland NC. I couldn't pass up the early morning light on the roof and the autumn colors of the trees.


I've looked at this barn for years just off Wiggly Road on the back side of Sweat Mtn. in Cobb County. I painted this Saturday morning along the roadside.


This is a quick little painting done along Abernathy Road in Sandy Springs GA. I stopped one Friday afternoon after work to capture the light on the trees last week.