Seattle Under Attack! The Space Needle

Don't be afraid, it's only Cthulhu saying hello to the Space Needle. He loves Seattle so much, he wants to give us a big hug. 

See? 

It's OK, really... Just another rainy day in Seattle. Nothing special...


16" x 20"
Acrylic on Canvas
$275

Watercolors: Camping at Wild Sky Wilderness

I went camping with a couple good friends last weekend and decided to bring my watercolors out as an experiment. I first taught myself to paint with watercolors sometime back when I was in high school. It was inexpensive and I had some watercolors at my disposal. And, my mom and grandfather were both watercolor painters, so it's in the blood. In about 2003, I started painting with acrylics and never thought I would go back. 

"Watercolors are hard!" I told myself, "You don't have that skill," I could hear my inner voice telling me. I put the paints away and concentrated on other mediums. But I pulled out the watercolors again last weekend because they would be easier to clean while out camping. I bought myself a new pad of watercolor paper and brought it all out on the camping trip. I painted with the river water. It felt like rediscovering an old friend. I was comforted by the sound of the river, and the paints spread more easily than I remembered. There is still a lot to learn, but I like the way that these paints feel. I'll be doing more of this soon.

Morning in the Forest

I find inspiration in many different places. National Geographic Magazine is a tremendous source of images that I use to spur creativity. I found this photo online and fell in love:

I used that as an impetus to create this painting:

This piece took a total of about 12 hours to complete. I spent about 4 hours working on blending the colors for the sky in the background, then I spent about another 4 hours on the trees and leaves. Yesterday, I set up my easel on the back porch for about 4 hours to work in the sunlight, and completed the deer and plant life in the foreground.

At 30" x 36", this is the largest canvas I have worked on yet.

Art Panels for Burning Man

I can't go to Burning Man this year, but I'm sending some art out to the desert. My friend Christina asked me to spend the day with her a couple weeks ago, working on some art panels that will become part of a maze that they are installing as their project, the Seattle CORE Project.

Each panel in the maze is 2' x 8', and we painted both sides of one panel, which took most of the day. It was great to spend the day out, collaborating together. I think that our styles and ideas meshed pretty well, too.

We came up with the idea to have a fire theme on one side and a water theme on the other side:

I love that I can't even tell where her art began and mine ended. We were able to mesh it together very nicely, which is not a super easy task, if you have ever worked on a project with other people. But this worked out quite nicely, and even though I cannot attend the actual event, I am happy that a small part of me will be there and be enjoyed by other attendees. 

I love the idea of temporary art. That is one of the main things that drew me to Burning Man initially; the idea that everything is temporary, and we must make the most of the precious time that we have here on this temporal plane. As an artist, I want to create beautiful things, and I crave the company of other creative humans. I often get very attached to my work, but I am learning one of the labors in life is letting go of that which you are attached to and moving forward to new discoveries, new creations, and new realizations, whilst holding on to that which makes you a vital, essential human... Every day is a new experience, and we build upon what we feel is important while leaving behind what we deem of lesser value. And that is different for every human, so we are constantly striving to balance our needs and values, both with and against other humans' needs and values.

These wood panels will be installed for the week of the event at the end of August, then everything will be burned in a huge effigy, as is tradition. The desert is slowly transformed from a barren ancient lakebed, to a beautiful thriving city, to a lakebed again, with no trace of the event that took place there. It is an annual reminder of the temporal, momentary nature of our lives. I love the poetry in that.

Seattle Under Attack! The Monster of South Lake Union

A couple of weeks ago, I went down to Gasworks Park and painted the view of downtown from there:

It was a very peaceful, beautiful day. Until that pesky sea monster decided to come out again!

While this is actually a freshwater lake, I happen to know that this is a very smart sea monster. It came in through the Ballard Locks.



Acrylic on Canvas
22" x 28"
$450

Fremont Solstice Parade

On June 22, 2013 several friends gathered to paint ourselves and ride bikes through Fremont, as is tradition for the start of the Fremont Solstice Parade. My friend Alex Garland was there and took tons of great photos, though we missed each other in the swarms of people. 

While there was an "official" painting party in Fremont before the start of the race, we hosted a smaller event at my house where my friends and I could paint each other in a smaller, quieter setting while we soothed our anxious our nerves. 

The paintings turned out great! There are some incredibly creative people here in Seattle. In our group alone, we had several themes: me, as my art; a shark; Rosie the Riveter; and a peacock:

I went as my own art. I covered myself in blue paint, and then I asked my friends to paint me as their interpretations of my art. This is the result: 

One of my friends asked me to paint him as the earth and sky with a big sun across the shoulder:

Inspired by my Jellyfish painting, one of my friends added a great jellyfish to my leg: 

One of the highlights of the day for me was meeting the artist Henry. I love this man's work, and it was really inspiring to meet him.

Dinos de los Muertos

A couple of weeks ago, I bought some paper mache dinosaurs at a local artist supply shop and started painting them. I am calling the series "Dinos de los Muertos". These are the first dinos I have done, and I am pretty satisfied with the effect. I want to make enough of these to be able to sell them at the next Punk Rock Flea Market in December. 

Now Showing at Makeda Coffee!

I just installed my paintings at Makeda Coffee in Greenwood the other day. What a warm, inviting space! I love the layout, and the overall vibe is just wonderful. I hope you all can come in and check it out, it will be up for the next month.

Also, I will be at the coffee shop for the next Greenwood Art Walk on Friday, June 14th. There will be beer and wine available, and tons of art! Come stop by, say hello, and check out the great local art and shops in the area!

Snail and Grasshopper

I just finished this painting last week... I feel like this photo does not do it justice, but it gives the idea. I found this photograph in a National Geographic Magazine from 2007 and could not resist painting it. I love how both creatures are just chilling out, like they're having a deep conversation on the leaves.

More than one person has said that this piece reminds them of an illustration from a children's book, which I think is really cool.


9" x 12"
acrylic on canvas

Early art from 1996

I took my first drawing classes at Grossmont Community College in Spring 1996. I have always drawn and painted, but I started to feel like I wanted to learn more about perspective and channeling creativity in a more advanced way than just doing it on my own. Doing art on your own is wonderful, and a vital way to explore your inner workings, but sometimes being challenged by someone A.) who exists outside our realm of previous existence and B.) is experienced / accomplished in the field that you want to study, is a powerful way learn and grow as an artist / human. Also, sometimes being challenged to explore life outside of your own comfort zone is the best way to grow as a human. I knew that my personal experiences fresh out of high school were incredibly limited by the culture and environment in which I grew up, and I needed to expand outside of that.  Taking art classes was one way of challenging myself to expand and push my own experiences. 

In 1996, I was fresh out of high school and eager to soak up as much knowledge about the world as I could. That, and I wanted to balance out my class load of general education courses with something fun and creative. So I decided to take a drawing class to learn more about perspective and improve my basic drawing skills. 

So, fast-forward to the present. I had left all of my art at my dad's house. He recently did a huge purge and got rid of many, many of our old items at the house. My brother had the foresight to save my art folder and brought it to his house for me. These are a few of the pieces he saved for me. 

Leaves

pen and ink on paper

24" x 20"

 Untitled

chalk and charcoal on paper

20" x 24" 

Skeleton

pen and ink on paper

24" x 20"

Phinney Art Walk -- The Big One!

Image via
 

Next weekend -- May 10 and 11, 2013 will be The Big One! Art Walk in Greenwood! What is The Big One? According to the ArtUp PhinneyWood website:

“The Big One” is big because of the history behind it, the fact that it spans 2-days, and it simply has the largest number of participants with 80 venues spanning from 87th & Greenwood Ave to 59th & Phinney Ave N.

 

The full list of participating artists and venues is available here. I'm #45 on the list, at A la Mode Pies. It's a super cute little pie shop, and I bought myself a piece of the most amazing pie when I stopped by last week. I'm really excited about being involved in this Art Walk, and super excited about PIE!

The event will be held on Friday, May 10th, from 6 - 9 pm, and Saturday, May 11th, from 12 - 5 pm. I should be there most of the time, but I might step out to check out some of the other artists on Saturday afternoon. I'll be nearby though! Hope to see you there!

Jellyfish

My roommate suggested that I paint a jellyfish, so I did.

18" x 24"

Night Sky

I painted this as as practice piece for the live painting at the Fremont Abbey event I participated in last week. I love the colors and the tranquility of this scene. I imagine camping, listening to the cries of the birds as the evening sets in and the moon slowly rises over the landscape.

18" x 24"
April 2013

(updated 03August 2014)
I recently added more stars to the night sky. I like this new version much more:

Pink Tentacles

This is one of my favorites. It's small, but I love the colors and the patterns in the water. I'm using this on the front of my new business cards.

8" x 8"
Acrylic on canvas

Heartbreaker

I painted this for Valentine's day this year. It's a hard time of year, and I wanted to bring a little levity to it. I thought it was hilarious; my roommates were concerned for me!

9" x 12" 

February 2013

Turtles

I love the story behind this piece, and for that it is one of the pieces that I am most proud of.

In 2010, my friend Kim's home in West Seattle burned down while they were camping. They were able  to rescue some of the animals, but they lost their turtles. It was so tragic, but they were able to move to a new house and begin to rebuild. Kim and her then girlfriend (now wife!) love their turtles, and she asked me to paint them for her in remembrance, and to represent their lives together. She requested a red-eared slider (right) and an African tortoise (left).

When I presented the painting to Kim, it brought tears to her eyes. She gave it to her wife as a wedding gift, and it now hangs in the front entryway of their new home.

12" x 36"
February 2013

Swimming Fishes

February 2013
12" x 36"

Flowers in A Vase

I bought myself some flowers and placed them in a vase an old housemate gave me several years back. This painting was more of a practice piece so I could could practice painting from reality. I usually don't paint still-lifes but they are a good way to keep up some skills. I actually do like the way this turned out though.

October 2012
9" x 16"

Sexy Octopus

A couple of years back, I picked up these unfinished wood produce trays. They sat around my house for a long time while I thought about what I wanted to do with them. I finally came up with the idea to paint an octopus, with the body on the base and the tentacles wrapping over the sides into the center of the serving tray.

I first covered the tray with Gesso, then I painted the octopus ad finally filled in the background when that was complete. It was an involved process and was almost like making 2 different paintings, because I painted the front and the back. The sides were probably the most challenging part, because they were so narrow, but I still wanted the tentacles to look like they were curling over the sides. I really like the way it turned out though. Finally, I covered the final paintings with a clear acrylic matte sealant to protect the paint. It's functional AND pretty.

12" x 16" x 1.5"
Acrylic on wood

Cranes at Dawn

The inspiration for this piece was found in an old National Geographic Magazine. I came across this photograph and loved the motion and colors and knew I had to paint this scene.


May 2012
16" x 20"

Pisces and Cancer

Last year, my friend Colleen was in a horrible car accident and went through several surgeries and a lot of very expensive hospitalization. A group of Burners and friends got together to have a party and auction off whatever we could offer to help raise some cash for her. I made three paintings for the auction, incorporating images from a book of X-rays I have. I was inspired by all of the X-Rays she was getting and decided to incorporate that into some art.

I used an X-acto knife to cut out the X-ray images I wanted to use, and I placed them down on a canvas and added paint, and used Mod Podge to glue the pictures down. Then I added the design that was inspired by Aboriginal Art. This is the only piece out of 3 that I have photos of because the other 2 paintings sold before I could photograph them.


12" x 16"
paper and acrylic on canvas

Live Painting At Fremont Abbey

Last Tuesday, April 9th, I was honored to be asked to create a painting during for The Round 95. My dad flew up from San Diego to attend the show, and several good friends came out as well. I painted a night scene while 3 different musicians sang and played music in a round-robin style.

The music was amazing and so inspiring, it made painting in front of a crowd of 100+ people much easier! The musicians were Bradford Loomis , Zarni, and Mychal Cohen from Campfire OK. They were all really great and I highly recommend going to their shows or at least listening to some of their music, but live music is so much better. And to add the the awesome, there was an amazing poet too. (Unfortunately I can't recall his name, and he was a last minute addition, as the original poet who was lined up came down ill.) My friends really liked him. There was so much talent in one room, it was almost overwhelming, but it was such a fantastic experience, I'm really glad I was able to do it.

Crows

This was a painting that was commissioned by a friend as a gift to her boyfriend. She wanted something with crows, and she said that his favorite color is green. I did an internet search for crow images and painted a couple that I liked best.

approx. 16" x 20"
SOLD

Golden Fish

I painted this for a couple of friends who were starting a massage studio together. They requested a golden fish specifically to use for their business cards, and they also hung it up outside of the studio.


spring 2010

Blue Girl

I made this as a birthday gift to my brother a couple of years ago. I found this amazing photograph on a postcard of this girl covered in blue paint. I have no idea who she is or why she was painted blue, which makes the image a little more mysterious and intriguing.


November 2011
approx. 9"x11"

Underwater

I didn't have any idea how this piece would turn out until it was finished, years after I started it. I first set up the background because I love those colors. Then I used a copper paint for the lines across the center. I wanted to incorporate Australian Aboriginal style as an inspiration, so I tried to let the shapes flow organically. It was hard though, and I got really frustrated and put this piece in a corner for a long time. I'd bring it out and add some more dots and lines and then put it away again after awhile.

Eventually, I started to see bands of kelp in the copper paint. The sea creatures emerged later. This was quite possibly the piece that has taken me the longest to complete.

Blue Seahorse

I was beginning to experiment with painting sea creatures, and with using non-natural colors. This was an experiment, but I do like how it turned out.

January 2009
15" x 20"

Dragonfly

My friend Hank is an amazing photographer, and he's alway coming up with new and interesting projects. One project that he proposed was to set up a still camera to shoot a photo every 10 seconds while I made a painting. This is the result.

Sunflower

16" x 20"

oil on canvas

2008

Tentacles

This piece took several months to complete. I don't even know how long it took because I worked on it intermittently for a long time. I started with the 8 orange tentacles spreading out over the canvas, then once those were complete, I added the layers of blues, line by line. The final step was to add the suckers to the tentacles. The pattern wraps around the sides of the canvas, too. I love the colors and the motion in this piece!

16" x 20"
oil on canvas
2008

Kangaroo for my Mum

I painted this as a remembrance for my mum. I was so incredibly sad for a long, long time. But painting helped in my grieving process. When I painted this piece, I filled it with all the good memories I had of her, and I made this painting on her first birthday after her death, so it is a very emotional piece for me. 

I am very inspired by Australian Aboriginal Dreamtime. My mum was Australian, and I grew up reading the fascinating mythological stories about the ancient times in Australia, and my family had a few aboriginal artifacts. The art of creating the complex lines and patterns is sacred, spiritual and very meditative, and takes years of training and practice to master. In true Aboriginal culture, each line and every dot has significance and consists of an intricate storytelling method that I cannot even begin to come close to doing justice to the real thing. 

While my family and I were on a journey to bring my mum's ashes back to her home in rural Western Australia in 2007, my sister and I took a walk together one day. We happened to walk into an art gallery that was run by a family of Aboriginal women. We started talking with the woman who was painting and watching the gallery and when we told her what we were doing, she said: "Your mother will never leave you if you spread her ashes to the wind and allow her to come back to you. She will follow you even back to America, and she will be with you always." 

6" x 8"

acrylic on canvas

June 2007

Women in Nature

This painting was another assignment from my art class. The project was to create a tryptic, which is a piece that has an image on the left, a central image, and an image on the right, all with one central theme. One famous example is Hieronymus Bosh's Garden of Earthly Delights, which deptics the Garden of Eden on the left, a dream-like vision of Utopia in the center, and Hell on the left.
This painting is much more simplistic. Our assignment was to choose three different images to paint together as a tryptic with a central theme on one large canvas. The images had to come from a classic piece, a modern piece, and one of our own choice. On the far left, I found inspiration from Henri Rousseau's Il Sogno / The Dream. I chose to illustrate the nude woman reclining in the forest because she stood out as a figure of bliss and connection with the elements around her. As the central, modern image, I chose an piece by an artist called James Christensen. I loved the way that he portrayed an angel flying delicately but without wings, as if she was just taking a stroll. The image is a poor representation of the actual work, but I was attempting to do justice to the piece I found, called An Angel Following a Flying Fish Through a Forest of Mushrooms. As you can see, it does not quite do the original justice, but this was an early attempt. The last image on the far right was from a photograph I took of my friend Rachel at the beach one day. She's holding a tiny seashell in her fingers. I loved the way that the color of the beads on her necklace almost perfectly matched the colors of the ocean behind her, so that's why I chose this piece. I remember having great difficulties painting her smile, until my art teacher suggested to turn everything upside down and paint only the shapes and shades. I think her advice worked pretty well. I don't know what happened to the original photograph; it must have gotten lost in the shuffle.

I wanted to paint women in nature as a central theme for this tryptic because I have always felt very comfortable outside, and I also felt like women are under-represented in strong roles outside of the home / social confines. The irony is that the first two images were created by men; it was a photograph that I took that was the final piece. Nonetheless, I wanted to make the connection between women and earth / spirituality.

The funny thing about this painting is that I almost forget that I even have it. It has hung in my home for so long, in very conspicuous places, that it has become a part of my background and a part of my own habitat.

Acrylic on canvas.
April 2004
24" x 36"

Mendocino Coast, California

This is another photograph I used as a model for a painting. I was at a college roommate's wedding when I took this photo in 2000 and painted it in 2004, after keeping it close for a number of years. I really like the tiny flowers in the foreground here and the varying blue/green hues in the background. This was still an early painting for me, so I was learning technique, but I remember really enjoying the layering of colors and shades here.

Acrylic on canvas.
March 2004
18"x24"

Fetish Flowers

This was also an assignment for my art class in San Diego. The assignment was to create a rendering of  a fetish object using various color palates. This painting took several hours to create, due to all of the color palates involved; I painted this as 6 different paintings on one larger canvas. It was a great study to understand the use of contrasting colors and the interplay of shades.

Acrylic on canvas.
February 2004
18" x 24"

Sequoia Kings Canyon River Dreaming

I started painting with acrylics in 2003, shortly after I finished college. I'll be using this blog to show the art that I have created, in mostly chronological order, and using this blog to give a brief background of the processes involved in creating art here. 

This is one of my first paintings, from December 2003. This is my surreal landscape; I took a photograph of this scene at sunrise in Sequoia Kings Canyon on a camping trip during the late 1990s and held onto the photo for years. Later, in my first art class at San Diego City College, one of our early assignments was to render a painting of a surrealist landscape that defined ourselves. I included the footprints to signify the feeling I had at the time of wandering and seeking my way in life. The butterfly illustrates how I felt that I was metamorphosing -- I was in my mid-twenties and I knew my life was changing in unpredictable ways. At the same time, I was optimistic about changes occurring in my life. The door in the mountain also literally illustrates the door to the unknown.


Acrylic on canvas.
December 2003
18" x 24"