Snow Birds

"Flight" 6x6 Paper collage

Passages is this month's Girls Just Wanna Paint topic. 
Since it is only a week before we "snowbirds" will be departing for Naples, Florida, a birds in flight theme seems like a good metaphor.
I used some craft paper for the background and then drew and cut out birds shapes from tissue paper to create a little paper collage on watercolor paper. It takes quite a long time for me to figure out the balance in the cutting and pasting, but I like the feeling of this one.

Rusty the Boardwalk Cat

 Rusty, The Boardwalk Cat 

8x8 oil on birch panel 

$400

This was last month's theme for Girls Just Wanna Paint. We had a lovely dinner meeting at Sally Dean Mello's awesome, artsy house and you can see the paintings here.
Rusty lives under the Atlantic City Boardwalk. He and his feline friends are cared for by volunteers from Ally Cat Allies. Rusty's human friend, Tim, told me that through the trap, neuter, release program, they've completely eliminated the birth of kittens in the Boardwalk area. 
Rusty's left ear is tipped, to identify him as neutered. I left that in.

Monhegan Vista

Monhegan Church View

 6x12 watercolor and ink on Arches paper

I first painted this in oil, from the stair top deck of Monhegan House Hotel.
It's my favorite place to stay because they have little one room "garrets" on the fourth floor. 
Very cozy!
This watercolor and ink painting was done from a photo taken from the deck. 
There is a great book called "Monhegan, The Artist's Island". Check out the works of many famous artists who have painted on the island.

My garret far right 

 View of The Island Inn from Monhegan House

 Sunflower and garret

Girls Just Wanna Paint August Challenge: Edges

"Edges" paper collage 5x7

Cut paper has edges and I enjoy a little cutting and 

pasting now and then.

Check out Girls Just Wanna Paint to see this month's interpretations.

Fundraiser for The Trustees at South Street Gallery

 "Queen Anne's Lace at Two Mile Farm"

6x12 oil on panel 
SOLD

Acquiring, maintaining and protecting the beautiful marsh land here along the North and South Rivers is at the top of my environmental list. 
This is my entry for South Street Gallery's Paint to Preserve silent auction which is up until August 17. 
You can see all of the paintings HERE.

Girls Just Wanna Paint Monthly Challenge

"Anxiety" 

6x6 Watercolor

This month the Girls Just Wanna Paint topic was "Anxiety" which made me sort of anxious. 

I came through, though, with this watercolor. The blue green background is the calm and the "static" in the lower part of the painting is the anxiety.

Actually, anxiety is static.

Provincetown Art Association Silent Auction Online

The Red Dory

12"x12"

SOLD

This is my entry for the Provincetown Art Association's annual 12x12 silent auction Fundraiser.

This year, the bidding is online!

Click on This Link to see the Auction Home Page and follow the directions to view the paintings and bid.

Standish Shore

 Standish Shore

9x12 oil on panel

$350 Buy With PayPal

I painted this view many years ago when these old buildings were still on the land. Across the far shore is the old chimney at Plymouth Cordage, where ropes were made. 

It's officially summer and we're at the tail end of a heat wave. 
Stay cool everyone.

 Our backyard oasis

Hawks Road, Parrsboro Nova Scotia

"Hawks Road" 12x12 oil on panel

$350 Buy With PayPal

The topic for this month's Girls Just Wanna Paint challenge is 'calm'.  

Here we have bright sunlight casting tree shadows over the sandy road. This first glimpse of the Bay of Fundy comes into view at the end of Hawks Road, through a short stint of woods, where we have rented a cottage for the past 20 years. 

It is Heavenly.

Cottage at Second Beach

Osprey Obsession

Our Girls Just Wanna Paint challenge is COLOR.
How can you go wrong? 
This is my interpretation.
I photographed an Osprey nest from my jetski and made this painting from it!

Everglades Palmetto

10x10 acrylic on Raymar panel
Buy now with PayPal

Tree is this month's Girls Just Wanna Paint challenge topic.
I've included the reference photo this was painted from.
It's easy to see that I edited the scene quite a bit, adding the clump of background trees and creating water in the foreground.
I painted this in acrylics, which I find that I really love working with.

Tools Too

Tools Too
6x6 oil on panel 
$125
Buy With PayPal

 

Painting these studio "props" was so much fun that I felt like doing this again. So I did. 
Check out my Gallery in Daily Paintworks.

Meanwhile, I had a great day today with my friend and Everglades painter,  JoAnn Sanborn.
We took a drive out to Fakahatchee Strand to stoke our painting mojo and take some photographs. 

JoAnn Sanborn, Everglades Artist

Tools - Girls Just Wanna Paint Challenge

"Painter's Tools"

6x6 oil on canvas panel
SOLD

The Girls Just Wanna Paint subject was tools.

I've arranged my "tools", including a tube of paint, several brushes, palette knife and my turps cups, on a backdrop and played with the color. I almost did not include the lettering on the tube but felt it was necessary.

It's been quite a while since I set up a still life of this nature and I really enjoyed it.

Look for other paintings in this series and check out the GJWP here.

My block in

Luxury 2 and Life Lessons

"Morning Tea"

Class Demo NFS

The subject is Luxury

morning tea

painting 

a warm bed

beloved pets

real friends 

being loved

beautiful music

Check out the interpretations by my homies @ Girls Just Wanna Paint. 

Beach Day

Beach Day

8x8 oil on panel

COMMISSION SOLD

This painting, Beach Day, is my entry for the Girls Just Wanna Paint December challenge "luxury". 
I was sketching this couple on the beach in July of 2014 and she noticed and came over to see the sketch. 
Recently, she emailed me and asked if I'd ever done a painting from the sketch. I hadn't, so I did.
I sent her the image and she loved it but, told me that her husband had passed after a long neurological illness he'd been suffering from even as I did the sketch.
It saddened me as I'd been thinking that she'd give it to him for Christmas. Sitting on the beach in the summer is a wonderful luxury, but time is the luxury we forget we have.

Happy New Year to all. 

Live. Love. Laugh. Paint. Do.

Peace

"In flight"

6x6 oil on panel

My favorite thing to see is what's called a murmuration. 
It's a large flock of birds flying together and abruptly changing direction in unison. Many times the birds will land en masse on the utility wires, light for a few minutes and burst forth into flight again.
I began this painting by putting the shapes of the birds in with burnt umber and then painted the sky against them to create vibrant edges. I wanted to capture the motion of the birds as they flit about the wires.
This is my painting for Girls Just Wanna Paint's November challenge "peace".  

Little Italy, Philadelphia

"little Italy, Philadelphia

6x6 oil on panel

Don and I took an awesome vacation to…. wait…. New Jersey!

We stayed at the deluxe Marriott Fairways Villas in Galloway and among the many activities we could choose from was a day trip to Philadelphia.

I haven't seen Independence Hall or the Liberty Bell since I was 10 and the Liberty Bell was still outside in the rain, but it was fantastic! 

Yes, we did the Rocky steps which is what the steps to the Philadelphia Museum of Art are now called.

Anyway, I digress. 

This is my entry for the Girls Just Wanna Paint October Challenge, "Chiaroscuro".

It's a dramatically lit (that's what chiaroscuro means) doorway in Philadelphia's 9th Street, Italian neighborhood

Expressive Brushwork Workshop

South River Marsh, Late Afternoon

12x16 oil on canvas board
SOLD
 You may have to tilt the screen to see the range of color in the sky in this late afternoon plein air painting done at the marsh on 3A in Scituate. I had such fun blocking this in loosely and applying lively, energetic brushstrokes in broken color to finish it.

I've been focusing on loose brush work and will be teaching a one day workshop featuring this topic, in my studio on Saturday, November 11, 2017 from 10 - 4.

6 students maximum

Email me for details.

WENDL15@verizon.net 

Nocturne

Truro Dune Shack
6x8 oil on panel

This month's Girls Just Wanna Paint challenge is nocturne, which means a night time painting. I dug into the archives for this painting of a full moon over Truro in the winter, reflected in Pilgrim Lake.
I've hit a speed bump this summer, having lost my Irish Twin (13 months apart) Anna Marie to pancreatic cancer in June, a short 8 weeks from her diagnosis. I don't mind sharing this because cancer is the disease that touches us all. 
I am blessed to have my GJWP painting "sisters" who lift me up, make me laugh and carry me through the rough patches.
I'll be posting some of my new work so stay tuned and thanks for hanging with me for all of these years.

My "Irish twin" sister Anna Marie and I with her first grandson, Winthrop Davies Cottrell

January 2013

Lily Pads

"Lily Pads"

12x12 

$350

This compilation of acrylic, watercolor, sharpie and metal leaf is my entry for our Girls Just Wanna Paint monthly challenge. 

Click here to see the Girls' interpretations of Still Life. 

This is my first in a series of 12x12 canvases of organic subjects, this one being lily pads.