Hope everyone had a wonderful holiday weekend. We had a quiet Christmas so I finally had a chance to paint something for myself after painting many commissioned Christmas pieces from photos. I truly hate working from photographs but they are necessary if the subject is not available I suppose.

This is a "paint over". I have a lot of pieces I don't like and would never sell because I don't think they are any good so I recycle the canvases. Many times the texture underneath adds something to the new painting. This is a knife painting and it was fun to just waste a lot of paint and see what happened. It's a different kind of technique to me because I don't use my knives very often unless I'm working with edges or adding sharp lines so this was a challenge. If we don't challenge ourselves as artists though I'm not sure we can ever truly grow. I don't want the stuff I am painting ten years from now to look like the stuff I am doing today.

12" x 16" oil on canvas

Vibrating Pears - Small 6" x 8" pear paintings that celebrate color

These are the first two in a series of 6" x 8" pear paintings that explore and celebrate complementary color. The goal is to "push" the color while maintaining the realistic aspects of the pears. I find myself ignoring any imperfections in the pears as I concentrate on colro, value and form to maintain the illusion.