TOO MUCH ART Sale: Day 8

For today: a fun flower image and a landscape painted in Santa Fe. Enjoy! Shipping is $5 per piece or email me to pick up. Thank you! 

SOLD “Spring Lilies”, handcolored print, matted 10” x 8”. Price $20 

This is a fun flower drawing, with a kind of “retro” 50’s/60’s feel to it—looser than my usual rendering style. Still, I couldn’t resist a few gold touches to highlight the stamens.

SOLD “Santa Fe Trees”, oil on Italian canvas panel, , 8 ”x 6” unframed. Price $35

Another plein air landscape, painted in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains above Santa Fe. That area is abundantly populated by ponderosa pines and aspens, a lovely cool spot to paint on a hot summer day. 

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Text and Images ©2021 Carol L Adamec. All rights reserved.

Plein Air...from the Studio

Graphite & color pencil

With the temperature and heat index over 100 degrees here in Florida, working outdoors is out of the question. However, I do have a very nice view of my neighbor's house from my studio. And my neighbors do have a nice tall palm tree in their front yard. So, why not just paint the view of out my window, sort of working en plein air from my nice cool studio? Works for me!

As I've mentioned in the past, when I am unhappy about how a painting is turning out, the problem is usually the drawing. I find that drawing is the best tool for really observing an object, getting the details, and gaining understanding of how a thing truly is. I find that I discover the beauty of an object just by drawing it.

So, I've begun my study of Florida trees with this drawing of my neighbor's palm. I'll be working up a small painting that I'll show you in my next post.

In the meantime, thanks for taking a look and stay cool this week.

Happy Father's Day to all the Dads out there, too!
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Text and image ©2010 Carol Adamec. All rights reserved.

Branching Out

In the Shadows
Original: oil, alkyd on gessoed panel
6" x 6" unframed
To purchase contact Artist

The Florida sunshine is so inviting for plein air painting, but the summer heat and humidity have kept me indoors for the past several weeks. In the meantime, I've been drawing, reading, and trying out some "experimental" stuff in the studio...most of which I will refrain from sharing with you, my dear readers. Let's just say, that some days I can't believe I actually learned anything in art school!

I did complete the little painting posted today. As mentioned in my last few posts, I have much to learn about painting the multitude of leafy greens in the Florida landscape.

Thanks for taking a look and keep cool this week.

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Text and image ©2010 Carol Adamec. All rights reserved.

More greens...

View of the Lake
Original: oil, alkyd on canvas panel
10 x 8"
To purchase contact Artist

My dad was from Minnesota, known for its motto, "Land of 10,000 Lakes." However, considering all the little lakes (and quite a few big ones, too), I think Florida could lay claim to that slogan as well.

A few weekends ago, I went out with the Central Florida Plein Air Artists again, this time to Lake Minnehaha Park, located in Maitland, a suburb of Orlando. It's quite a lovely city recreation site, with a boardwalk over a marshy area, winding sidewalks with manicured lawns, and nice trees providing plenty of shade throughout much of the park. I found a cool spot with a view of the lake.

Since I'll be staying in Florida for awhile, I have many opportunities to paint trees and water—views not readily available in the high desert of New Mexico.

Thanks for taking a look. Have a great week.
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Text & image ©2010 Carol Adamec. All rights reserved.

Success en plein air

Cottonwood Reflections

Original oil, alkyd on canvas panel
7" x 5"
SOLD

When I go out to paint, I usually prefer a sunny day....better to capture distinct lights and darks/sunlight and shadow. Saturday began as an overcast day with thick clouds overhead. Oh, well, as a plein air painter, you go anyway. That's part of the challenge, to see if you can get a decent painting out of whatever weather and natural elements are available on a given day.

Sandia Lakes is just a few miles north from where I live. I met my friend Carmen there and we drove around to select a spot with a good view. Because of the clouds, the great view of the Sandia Mountains was pretty hazy. So I picked a closer view of old cottonwood trees reflected in one of the man-made lakes. The issue was to keep the colors subtle yet interesting.

Fortunately I had brought a panel toned with a thin wash of burnt sienna, so I allowed that color to show through in places, providing a warm "highlight" here and there. After a couple of hours, the painting, as seen here, was done. I was happy with it ...a success en plein air for me!

Thanks for taking a look today. See you Thursday.
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Text and image ©2009 Carol Adamec. All rights reserved.

Happy Accidents

"Fingernail Moon"

by Carol Adamec
Original, "Mini-Painting"
Oil & alkyd on canvas panel
1.75" x 8" • SOLD

I have mostly wet paintings in the studio right now. So I chose to share this "mini-painting" with you today—since it was dry enough to put on the scanner. (Sometimes, what works is what gets done!)

The odd size is due to the fact that I had trimmed a canvas panel for another small painting, leaving this piece as a scrap. I painted some color on it one afternoon, and then added more paint the next afternoon. Voila! a sunset landscape appeared—sort of a "happy accident." I added a few details, like the sliver of moon, and the painting was finished.

Thanks for taking a quick look. See you Wednesday.

PS: If you only received the "Canyons" image from last Friday's post, I apologize. There was a outage on Blogger when I was uploading the entry, and the text was deleted when first published. Here's the link, if you wish to read it: http://caroladamec.blogspot.com/2008/10/wild-new-mexico.html
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Image & text © 2008 Carol Adamec. All rights reserved.

Exhibit Glimpse 4

Sondra Diepen

"Shadow Weavers"
Original archival digital print
25" x 19" framed • $350 + S&H

Today's post features the work of Sondra Diepen, who is originally from California but relocated to New Mexico in 1974. Sondra majored in art at University of California-Davis, where she befriended Louise Pryor, Ellen Van Fleet, and Joanne Kamiya—artists whom you've met in this blog over the past few weeks as exhibitors in the "Be Leaf It or Not" exhibit at the Harwood.

Sondra is a fine painter, a world traveler, and an wonderful photographer. I've spent many an evening enjoying slides of her adventures in New Mexico, Utah, Alaska, Florida, and her off-the-beaten-track trips to Mexico, Peru, Egypt, Turkey, and Nepal, to name a few.

Over the past few years, Sondra has focused mostly on producing photo-based digital prints. As exemplified by "Shadow Weavers" featured in today's post, Sondra has an intuitive sensitivity for color, pattern, and light that is deeply felt. In fact, I have worked up paintings of my own from several of Sondra's photographs that she has given me (along with permission) to use.

As the curator of "Be Leaf It or Not" Sondra's own personal love of Nature was the guiding force for this exhibit. As she states in her Artist Statement, "I love the vast landscape and the delicate detail Nature provides. A leaf edged in sunlight, a reflection captured in a sandstone pool, or light filtering through the rain forest prompts me to get out my camera and see if I can preserve that moment....When I see something extraordinarily beautiful, I have this strong desire to press it into my body. I want it to become a part of me. Photograph and painting are the closest I can get to doing that."

Thanks for taking a moment to read this entry (which I apologize for posting a day late). If you would like to leave a comment about Sondra's work, please do so by clicking the COMMENTS link below. Or you can email me and I'll forward it to her.

I hope you are enjoying a great weekend. See you Monday. ——————————————————————————————————————————— Image ©Sondra Diepen. Text ©Carol Adamec 2008. All rights reserved.

See You in September!

"Blue Chairs," 2006
Original, oil and alkyd
on canvas panel
10" x 8"
Original SOLD

Giclée and Art Prints Available

(See Info at end of blog)

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Hello, dear Readers,

Just a note to let you know that I am suspending my blog posts for the next few weeks, since I am moving from Florida to Albuquerque, New Mexico.

I certainly have enjoyed my stay in Florida—especially this past winter, far from the cold, snow, and ice storms of the Midwest. It was a healing respite to be cared for and supported in every way by my sister Karen and her husband John, and to have the time and space to focus on my painting. I am so grateful to them.

And, I am thrilled to be returning to the Southwest. As many of you know, I lived in Albuquerque from 1994 through 2003 and enjoyed a full and wonderful life as an artist. My son Erik will be traveling with me; and when we arrive in Albuquerque, he'll be lugging all my art supplies, art work, books, and Painted Ponies up to the second floor of the Harwood Art Center, where I have rented a studio. (I will treat him to many enchiladas and margaritas for all of his help!)

So, in about two weeks, I will be sitting in one of the clamback chairs pictured in the painting on today's post, enjoying the generous hospitality of my friend Sondra. As mentioned in a previous post, she has a fabulous adobe home with a postcard view of the Sandia Mountains. The painting of "Blue Chairs" depicts the adobe wall surrounding her home and patio. The original painting was rendered in oil and alkyd on 10" x 8" canvas panel, completed in 2006.

When I resume posting my blog in September, there'll be much news to tell and many adventures to report on thereafter: the September show at the Harwood; plein air paintings of New Mexico, art happenings in Santa Fe, visits to the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum....and so much more! It will be fun to share "The Land of Enchantment" with you!

Many thanks to all of you for reading this post and look at my paintings. Enjoy the rest of the summer. See you in September!
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"Blue Chairs" is available as:
• Limited Edition giclée on stretched canvas, 8" x 10" unframed: $65 + P&S
• Open Edition Art Print, 8.5" x 11" unframed: $24 + P&S
Please contact me via email to arrange purchase.
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Text, image, and painting ©Carol L Adamec. All rights reserved.

Back to Roma

Borghese Trees (Rome), 2008
Original, oil on stretched canvas
9" x 12" unframed
Contact Artist to purchase.
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Another place our travel group visited while in Rome was the Borghese Gallery. The museum was built between 1613-1616 as the villa of Cardinal Borghese, a nephew of Pope Paul V. The Cardinal had a good eye for the Baroque sculpture of Bernini, and paintings by Caravaggio, Titian, Rubens, Raphael, and Cranach, to mention a few. He filled his 2-story villa with very fine examples of antiquities, as well as the work of renown Renaissance and Baroque artists.

I very much enjoyed Bernini's exquisite sculptures—Apollo and Daphne, and The Abduction of Persephone by Pluto—two truly masterful works in marble.

The Borghese Gallery is surrounded by lovely grounds as well, with tall trees that provided cool shade on the warm October day we were there. Today's painting depicts the trees on the grounds of the Borghese Gallery, the second completed painting in my "Italian Series."

Thanks for taking a moment to read this post and see this painting. See you Friday!
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Text, images, and artwork ©Carol L Adamec. All rights reserved.