First Painting at TAFA--oil, 16x12"

My first painting assignment at the Texas Academy of Figurative Arts in Fort Worth, Ron Cheek, Director. This represents two three-hour sessions. I had time to paint in lights and darks in the whole figure, but it is fairly rough , no refinement.

This is the approach for beginning figure painting instruction, where a very limited palette is used, in this case only black, white, and raw umber,

Old Blanco County Courthouse (Study) oil, 8x10"

Hopefully I'll get around to doing a larger and more detailed version of this 1886 courthouse in Blanco, Texas, which is no longer used for its original purpose. The county seat moved to Johnson City in 1890 and this building is now a museum. My parents lived in Blanco for many years, and to me this has always seemed a very peaceful and beautiful little community on the Blanco River in the Texas hill country.

The history of the building can be found at http://www.historicblanco.org/history.htm

Heidi Outdoors - study oil, 10x8"

I posed my daughter outdoors for a portrait; took a lot of pictures, and did a color study in oil. The oil didn't turn out good, so I did this from the oil and one of the photographs. I will do a larger more finished one now that I have a better idea of the outdoor colors on her face.

Painting people outdoors really gives you different colors and values, and few shadows in some cases, which make it hard to show the structure of the face. I saw lots of blue reflections from the sky in her face, but painting them looked out of place, they are much more subtle than I saw them, I had to tone them down.