Paint By Numbers
Gouache on panel, 14″ x 11″
I painted this one at the Mendocino Coast Botanical Gardens. I love to chat with passers-by, and I really don’t need them to compliment my works in progress. But I have to say I was taken aback when a woman asked me, “Is that Paint By Numbers?”
Motel 6, Fort Bragg, CA
Acryla Gouache on panel, 14″ x 11″
Winner of James Gurney’s Paint a Parking Lot Challenge.
I painted this one entirely on site over the course of 3 days. The people at the Motel 6 were interested and chatty and really delightful. I talked about painting and heard about travels, grandchildren, cars, and what it’s like to have a pet pot-bellied pig. (The pig, who must have weighed 200 lbs, was getting a break from her hotel room and enjoying a walk in the parking lot!)
Sunset on the Big Island
Gouache on paper, 10″ x 7″
We stayed at a resort on the west side of the Big Island. I did a grocery store run at sunset, and I felt like I was on Mars. There was nothing but lava and these yellow grasses that somehow managed to grow on the lava, and the angled light made the grasses glow.
The next day, I painted the line where that wild natural environment met the green grass and palm trees of the resort. It was sunset then too, and I especially enjoyed the colors in the distance.