cows

Progress on Spring. Big paintings, big paint.

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Detail of Spring. In the background, there is a nice heard of cows. I’m really happy with how the colors and shapes are coming together.


Detail of Spring. I love cows! I’m working on finding the right amount of personality for these lovelies. I want them to be discoverable. As in, I want them to not jump out at the viewer immediately, but to be enjoyable to find.


Spring. 48 x 72 inches, oil on canvas. In progress.

I’ve been thinking a lot about painting size recently.

I’ve been painting for about 30 years. Most of that time I have painted in a variety of sizes, but from 2009-2012 I was a “daily painter” working almost exclusively in a 6 x 6 inch format. I painted daily and finished about two or three 6-inch paintings each week.

Focusing on painting small taught me a lot of technical skills, and about what I want to say as an artist.

So here I am today working at the other end of the size spectrum.

I recently finished a series of 40 x 40-inch paintings, and am currently working on a series of 48 x 72-inch paintings. Working large is great. It has a new set of challenges and rewards.

When I go into the studio in the morning, I squeeze onto my pallet what looks like as much paint as I used for a year of painting 6-inch paintings. So, of course, I wondered if that could be right?

I thought you might find the answer interesting. I could fit ninety-six 6-inch paintings into one of the paintings that are currently on my easel. 96!

So, no, I’m probably not squeezing a whole year’s worth of painting onto my pallet every day. It might take me about 2 weeks now to go through a year’s worth of paint then.

Pretty wild, right?

What do you think?

Cow painting (available). Minnesota and South Dakota landscape paintings.

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Happy Valentines Day! I’m feeling super grateful for my wonderful husband, son, family and friends.

This morning I finished Girl Next Door. This is another luxuriously thick painting with a lot of brush strokes and pallet knife marks. I uploaded the detail photo to show the thickness and texture. Click here for more info.

The giveaway for this Friday will be a print of this painting! I’m really trying to grow my newsletter subscribership, so PLEASE share with your friends! I’ll draw from all newsletter subscribers – girl-next-door-detail

Cow and farm painting. Minnesota and South Dakota landscape paintings.

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I was so excited when these cows moved in next door last year. Recently several of them have had babies (2 are in this painting) and they’re so neat to watch growing up. I’ve been surprised how different these girls look from their busty cousins that I usually paint. What do you think?

Detail (mom and baby on the lower right):

girl-next-door-detail

Full painting in full light:

girl-next-door-500light

Campanile, Brookings, SDSU. Minnesota and South Dakota landscape paintings.

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This is “Campanile on a clear March day” (Can you suggest a better name?). For some reason this painting isn’t photographing well. The trees are very dark and have a lot of red in them, and the snow a cool color. I’ll try again later for a better photo.  That person walking looked to me like a teacher on their way to teach class.

I’m planning a whole series of that building in different weather and light, as part of a painting journal of Brookings, SD, which I’m hoping to publish into a book when I make enough of them. The paintings will be at SD Art Museum as soon as they’re framed up.

Camponiel_clear-winter-500

The second painting is a Afternoon Stroll getting boxed up and shipped out (Thanks Janet!). I really like that painting. I’m going to keep trying at that idea.

afternoon-stroll-wrapped

Cow Clouds looked very lovely framed, and also shipped out yesterday (Thanks Ann!). I forgot to take a picture of it framed up, though. I received a lot of great feedback / compliments about this painting, and am really excited about how it turned out.

cow-clouds-550

Please share this post with people who would be interested.

Cow painting: Cow Clouds (Sold). Minnesota and South Dakota landscape paintings.

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Here is a South Dakota scene with cows grazing on a hill and purple hills receding in the background, and a bright blue sky. I wanted the clouds to reflect the cows and landscape’s shapes. The paint is really thick on this painting – I went around and around with the clouds, and ended up painting around them with pure tube cerulean blue. This painting will be available in a few weeks through a gallery.

cow-clouds--detail

 

On a personal note, we’re home educating this year, and after I publish the post, I’m off to organize our day. 🙂

Cow painting – Afternoon Stroll, 6×6 inch oil painting of cows grazing in South Dakota (Sold)

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I love cows, and this painting shows them out sitting and milling around in a lush field. I wanted to track the movement of the red one in the center – to say that cow is walking over to visit her friend, but the rest of the girls are still.

Painting Detail: 
afternoon-stroll-detail

cow painting in SD.

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Any suggestions for what I should name this painting? I was thinking something about drinking water or farming… I don’t know.

It’s 18×24″, and it’s almost  done. I want to finesse the woman – her face especially.

Here’s a detail photo of the woman and a few cows behind her. There’s a group on the upper right as well. farm-detail-rasche

 

 

Cow painting. SOLD. Landscape painting of cows. “Cold Noses”

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Cold Noses

I really love painting cows, especially in the snow. The most challenging part of this painting was trying to get the shadows and highlights the right values. If you look closely you’ll see some subtle value and temperature shifts in the highlights of these cows. I am planning to paint a large painting based on this one.

Thank you for viewing my art!

painting of cows in the snow