Thursday 7th May 2009 - Ray's group

I painted these two about 18 months ago, pictures I liked but, with all I've learned, I felt could be just that bit better. I took them into Ray's group and worked on them some more. Ray, a big fan of bright colour, especially orange, urged me to lay in the bright orange of the adobe buildings behind the truck. I tried it (I can always paint over it!) and I really liked it.



Taos Truck - 12 x 12" - oil on canvas - $575
The Church at Ranchos - 12 x 12" - oil on canvas - $575

Thursday 14th January 2009 - Ray Vinella's class

A picture of the famous Ranchos de Taos church as painted by Georgia O'Keefe and many other famous painters, Ray Vinella included. I think it looks quite lovely in the snow.

Ranchos Church in the Snow - oil on canvas panel - 8 x 10" - $395

Thursday 17th July 2008 - Ray's Class

I painted this one last week and I was quite happy with it but I felt it could be stronger. so I took it to Ray's class and a bit more work and his guidance has made it a much better painting I think.



I'd started this one nearly a year ago on a trip to Wild River with Shari, we'd spent so much time driving around and exploring that by the time we got painting the sun was going down fast and we didn't have time to finish. I also ran out time at Ray's session so I may come back to this one.



Our Lady of Guadalupe Church with Hollyhocks - 16 x 12" - oil on canvas panel - $750
Wild River Gorge - 16 x 12" - oil on canvas panel - unfinished

Saturday 10th May 2008 - new gallery!

On Saturday morning I went to the portrait group and turned out something so bad (in my opinion) that I'm not posting it. It was the busiest the group has been in a while and we were all a little spaced out due to the turpentine fumes (that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it). I comforted myself with the fact that I was really pleased with the painting I did on Wednesday.

In the afternoon I went to see Donna Campbell at the Spanish Steps Gallery at it's new location and we got on really well. She felt that South-western style paintings were underrepresented in her gallery and she took all my gorge, old truck, hollyhocks and adobe and pueblo girl paintings - a massive 16 paintings! I went back the next day on an errand and was sorry to miss her and then I noticed that the full front window display was 2 of my large paintings! If you can see past the reflections in the windows, the one on the left is a square Gorge painting and the one on the right is a painting of a girl from the pueblo in full ceremonial attire.

Very exciting!

Monday 12th November 2007 - Ranchos Church

Shari and Jane and I met up at the St. Francis Church at Ranchos de Taos. This church was made famous by the paintings done of it by Georgia O'Keefe and many other atrists too. Once a year the whole community comes out to apply mud to the traditional adobe walls. Who knows if the walls were straight when they were built! Very Taos.

We decided to paint 2 smaller paintings instead of the usual one bigger one. This first spot had some nice shade for most of the painting time, so we didn't get too baked. The church gets lots of visitors and we had lots of conversations with locals and tourists alike who came over to see what we were doing.

I liked this view because of the mountains visible in the background and the statue of St. Francis in the foreground.

It was mid afternoon when we carried our eaself around to the back end of the church. This is the famous angle that has appeared in so many paintings. The sun wasn't so fierce and the light turned a pretty golden orange as the day wore on.

St. Francis - 10x8" - oil on canvas - $295
Ranchos - 8x10" - oil on canvas - $295