WIPs…or maybe they’re done…

 This little lady is done for sure although the background looks a little blotchy. This was a double challenge: a baby in a cream colored outfit!

This one is pretty much done too. I’m not crazy about the cropping at the top. I might try this again with more of the window showing at the top.

This is a backyard snow scene I just started. The green and red makes it kind of Xmas-y. It’s actually just the sun hitting the leaves of my rose bush in the foreground and the rest is in shadow. The leaves are covered with masking fluid right now…Well it’s cold and snowy out…good day to stay home and paint!

Alan Fall 25-7

 It’s amazing what you can find in your yard. We have a little smoke bush that turns some glorious colors in the late fall. It’s our first or second year with this in our yard and I decided to paint it a few different ways. 

Here is what I originally saw.

So I zoomed in and got this image. 

And then I cropped it to get the image I wanted to paint. 

I painted this on the polypropylene uncoated medium. I drew it using watercolor brush pens. There are a ton of colors in this set and I used about half of them. I also used a big Tombow marker and filled in negative spaces with watercolors. I finished with my “sctatchin” stick and a wet Q tip. I did the wrought iron fence with the water soluble Tombow and went crazy painting the leaves with the brush pens. It’s very colorful and fun to do. 

I went back to regular  8 1/2  X 12 140 # coldpress to do the next one.  So…it’s pen and ink with watercolor paint.  Each leaf was coated with water and I just dropped color in like real painters do.  Got some interesting effects here  

The last one is on 5 X 12 Yupo; real Yupo. I cropped the original some more and just painted it freehand and wet. I never did get the darker colors that I saw on the actual plant but I did get the colors in the reference photo.  

More autumn coming.  Trying the next autumn painting with the India ink resist technique.

Finished But Still Wondering

 

I’ve lost the chubby shape of her face making her older than she looked at the time. Shortly after this she went full “Goth” and has never fully emerged from that even though she’s in her 30’s. 

To see what would happen with a darker background I taped dark paper around the image. What do you think?

I know she “pops” more with the dark but then the shirt is too light and that summery feeling goes away. 

Two new horizontals (That's what I am calling them)

Like the top of that ha ha fence, not so crazy about the vegetation or the trees, but I am learning.3x12

Learned a lot on this one. and hey, I don't think it looks half bad. 3x12

These two are both 1 1/2x6.  Just something I'm fooling with.  Nothing to see here, move along.

 

The Old Wine Box Delivers

 I ran into Kelly recently and remembered that I had once tried to paint her…like over 20 years ago. We were at an outdoor party and I had my digital camera.  she was 14 or 15 and her back was to me.  She had used the leaves of a weeping willow to make a crown.  When she turned I snapped the photo cutting off the top of her head.  I throw the images I use for paintings into a wine box in a closet…really pleased that the photo printout was there.

Looking at the really good notes I took from the class I took last year, I went through the process, thumbnail sketch, one  color value painting, then the painting  then noticed that the last sentence of the notes said never to take up all of the paper with the head…which is exactly what I had done..so I got out a larger better piece of paper and began again.  Still working on that …can’t decide what to do with the background .  Will post when I resolve that.

This is the one from 20+ years ago.

Ho-hum paintings…

 

The first one is sketchbook size, the second one 9x9 on good paper. But I just feel the second has lost the sense of light. And the wall of ivy continues to stymie me— how to suggest it without painting every frigging leaf…

Finished tree. This one is not so ho hum, I like the blue and yellow, the shadow on the building. Kind of a wonky composition tho…But I like the saturation of color here — that’s what I feel I’m not achieving in above paintings. I guess I just have to go in with more paint in the beginning. I don’t have the patience for painting a million

 layers…e

It’s a baby! She’s 8 months old and I haven’t painted her once! And she’s so cute!

the kitchen sink

 Here's a tree that I updated. 9x12

Here's a couple of my long views.  The second is more in the direction that I am thinking of going. 3x12.

You know how Pat is always going on about sacrifice sheets?  I decided that I would try to makes something of mine and I think it turned out interesting,  This is a thing that other members of the class could do in those five or ten minutes when you are done with your masterpiece and there is still time to kill before showtime. 5x9.

And you know how at the end of the day you have wet paint still on your palette and you want to save it, so you kind of push it around so that it will dry quicker?  At the end of my day I thought I would push the paint around to make a picture.  It's a  stormy sunset see, and those are some tree trunks on the left.

Alan Fall 25-6

 I touched this up a little bit and sprayed it with a high gloss fixative. That’s what the reflection shows-and it makes it more vibrant as well as protected. 

 

I finished the big rose. I’m not totally happy with it but I sprayed it so it’s done. If I did it again, I’d definitely make the cream colored background grayer so that the rose would stand out more. 

I’m not going to paint any more little 🐕 for free, even though it’s given the 🐕 owners some pleasure.

On to some fall colors.

Fall Retrospective….

Three trees and a rhubarb plant. Still working on that 2nd tree, although changing the sky color kind of muted it. (It was a cobalt teal, a little too green for reality…but what is reality? Surely not a watercolor painting…)

Now I’m moving indoors, looking out….
 

Ss: Filipino Mural 11.15.25

I took part in a volunteer mural project at Rizal Center,1332 W.Irving P.,corner Clark, Chicago, a community center building for Philippine Immigrants. The planning, the concept and the funding took almost a year. The physical painting on the outside wall facing east and the parking lot started in October and the final painting day was last Sunday 11.16.25. I participated last Saturday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. I am grateful to have been given the chance to paint an outdoor mural conceived and executed by 2 dozen Filipino American Artists, from our Sinag USA Chicago Association. The joy and happiness of being a part of a sharing and artistic endeavor facilitated by a blue elevated lift rented from Home Depot, totally erased my appprension of the height of more than 20 feet with a windy wobble from time to time. I was assigned to paint the medals and stripes of the disabled veteran, fine tuned the shoes and the wheelchair and the black outlines of the adult figures. I might be the oldest painter of the mural project! Blessings! I thank God my fellow artist Geri, our Sinag president, and I painted without incident!

 

Two trees and um, an adventure?

Twisted Sisters?

 Needs to be fluffier huh?

Beginning of my next adventure?

November 15, 2025 — Elaine O.

I decided to make a painting out of last week's sketch. Here, it's in its "teen years," when everything seems awkward and slightly "off." In particular, I'm missing the energy of the sketch. But I guess we'll carry on and see where we end up.

10" x 14"

Ss: Sorority Reunion Cover

I just designed the 2026 Sorority Reunion Cover in Manila using my 2017 painting of Canadian Rockies train ride. The painting was scanned by my friendly printer, thus I know now, the problem device is my cellphone! Happy Painting to All!

Summer Was Hanging On

 My front yard is jumbled and so is this

Then an image of Ocean Springs popped up and I had the right colors spilled out so…

More of the same….

 

I think all three of these are finished. I did another version of the banana plant and pot in class as a birthday card, but I forgot to photograph it before mailing it. I actually think it was a little better than this one. The middle panting is another version of the tree, which I like better than the first one (see last weeks feed) but it’s much different, so it’s hard to compare them. The sunset painting is done, imo, and I’m pretty happy with it. I put a blue wash over the sky, which really took it back in intensity and helped immensely. The girls and the bush are at different intensities, but I like that.

Couple trees

I like the action and the roughness in this one.

 

Some goofy stuff going on with this one.  Maybe a little touchup is needed for those clouds.

Ss Fixit111025

November 8, 2025 — Elaine O.

Two things to show this week. First, I've finished this and I'm happy with it. I like the play of light on his face and the tree. It just feels like a lazy, sunny summer day—and he's got green reflected light on his face without looking sick. 

14" x 11"

Then there's this one. Right now, I'm playing in my sketchbook, trying to figure out the story I want to tell. I was originally drawn to the vibrant colors in the crisp autumn sunlight. Then, there's the security guard watching his phone instead of the open door (although, to be fair, he was actually alert and not just lounging around). In the end, I may have a couple of different paintings. 

approx. 8" sq.