mollie jones

Lemons and Limes

2012-06-02T19:10:00.001-07:00

This week I'm working on trying to come up with some good paintings for my summer trip to Florida with some friends from our forum PaintingFriends. We're going to be painting silver as well as crystal and I'm just playing around with some color. Silver can be really cool unless you're bouncing some good reflections. This "cloth" is actually one of my shirts that had wonderful color...really matched the hues in the limes beautifully. I always forget to check my closets when I'm looking for good cloth for setup photos. This is actually a really small portion of a larger painting with a silver teapot...was just trying out the colors before I went much further...I think this will work just fine.

RedWine and Cherries

2012-05-16T07:14:00.000-07:00

Hopefully this will be the last post of this decantur and cherries...sure has taken me longer to finish than usual. I'll admit though, I was only working on this at art retreat, and that's a crazy place to do really delicate or focus needing work...we have too much giggling and talking going on. I've darkened the burgundy colors considerably, but the reds are still a problem on my new monitor...they're not this bright in real life. It's always a learning curve when you're not a "techie". I needed to get this one finished so I could concentrate on the demos I'm giving when our PaintingFriends group meets again this summer in Florida. They want to paint crystal again, and this round we're adding some silver, a bit of collage that Suzy Powell (from way out in West Texas came here to teach), and also some weaving techniques that Suzy taught. It looks like I've got a busy few weeks ahead of me for sure.

Red Wine and Cherries

2012-05-10T05:36:00.000-07:00

Things are getting pretty much wound up on this painting of crystal. I have some value corrections and edges to clean up, but I'll live with the burgundy area of the decantur for a few days and decide just how much to darken the colors. I'm thinking two or three values deeper in the burgundy. It's amazing what we can see once the piece is condensed in the posting process...and it's right in front of me all along. It's been a bit of a challenge with all the angles and facets, but I always love painting crystal and anything reds...with cherries and strawberries being my favorites.

Sweet As Sugar

2012-04-20T14:58:00.000-07:00

Earlier this week I found a fabulous silver tea set at a little neighborhood antique shop (and my neighborhood is out in the country). I was looking for a piece of silver to use in a demo for our PaintingFriends group when we go back to Florida for a week of painting and fun this summer. Since I'm doing a demo of crystal, I thought I'd kill two birds with one stone by adding a piece of silver to the composition as my artist friends also wanted a silver demo. Unbelieveably, I found this fabulous ornate set...coffee pot, tea pot, cream and sugar...price $37.50. That is a wonderful price for a set of props that we all think we need to collect for our setups. I have a whole closet full of glass and crystal, and now I have some silver. This sugar bowl has not been polished, so I just painted what I saw...next time anything is used it'll be bright and shiny. I love the way the reflections move in crystal and glass and silver as you don't really need to explain anything...just paint what you see. One thing...I did paint myself out of the reflection that was caught with my camera...didn't want to paint myself.

Monochromatic Exercise

2012-04-16T07:40:00.003-07:00

Here is a little fun exercise I did yesterday for a challenge on PaintingFriends...a monochromatic painting using just one color. I chose DS phalo blue and sorta cheated in that I just used one of the poppies I'd finished painting for another challenge. Seems like we're always doing something on that forum. It's funny how you see things easier when you've already painting a particular subject once. I did have to think about what I was doing a bit more than my usual spontaneous way of painting in that the values must be done carefully and the glazes must be done on completely dry previous washes so they won't lift and turn grainy. The yellow tint there on the left is my camera acting up. This was fun. Now...I really must get back to that crystal decantur...

Poppies

2012-04-11T14:16:00.001-07:00

Here's the finished painting of my poppy challenge for PaintingFriends. This was lots of fun as my palette was really limited, and I don't paint florals very much (I can probably count the number on my right hand...ha) so this was a switch from the crystal decantur that I've got to get back to now. These poppies...along with some gorgeous red peony poppies...are near 4'-5' tall this season...and the larkspur in several colors are even taller. Our winter rains really made all the difference. As you can see, I've taken artistic liberties with the centers of these poppies, as they're really solid green at this stage, but I couldn't help adding a bit of interesting color. Just wish they lasted as cut flowers...

Poppy Challenge WIP

2012-04-10T16:44:00.000-07:00

I was hoping to get finished today at art retreat, but seems like something always gets in the way...like giggling and talking and girl talk stuff so maybe tomorrow will be the day. My idea is to finish the bottom poppy and then see what I need to do in the way of balancing values and colors in the greens and background. Don't want to kill too many of the whites until I see how glaring they are and deciding just how much I want to tone it down a notch. I find that leaving lots of whites here and there is becoming a habit with me, but you can always kill them. Gosh...sure hate to kill whites...

Poppy Challenge WIP

2012-04-10T06:17:00.001-07:00

Well, I have 2 WIP's going right now. On my forum, www.paintingfriends.com, I put up a challenge to paint some of the gorgeous poppies that are blooming in my yard right now, and since I put the challenge up I need to paint it myself. I posted 2 photos of different poppies and combined the drawings into a quarter sheet. Added some unopened buds and a seed head and leaves to the composition. I'm especially having fun with the centers of these beauties. You are welcome to take a look at the challenge and join in if you'd like.

I'll try to finish up today so I can get back to my crystal decantur and that one finished up also...

Red Wine and Cherries WIP

2012-04-03T13:36:00.003-07:00

Since we had a going away party for one of our artists who's moving to Venice, Florida next week, I didn't get too far with my painting today. I did play with some colors for a dark background and tried to use a mix of all the colors I have going in the painting. Now I've got to do some tweaking here and there and I'll get more done tomorrow...at least that's what I'm telling myself. My first thoughts for this painting was to have an analogous palette and I'm trying to stay somewhat with that. Still haven't decided on a table top or table cloth, but there's plenty of room yet. I'll probably crop that left side in to run the bowl off the page so there won't be much in the way of tabletop decisions hopefully...and then...if I like what "happens" I may leave it as a full painting. We'll see what happens.

Red Wine and Cherries WIP

2012-03-27T16:43:00.003-07:00

Here's where I stopped today. I haven't worked on this painting for the past two weeks...it's an early spring in Texas and all my flowerbeds were calling my name. It's a real shame that we have to sleep at night when there are so many wonderful things to get done.

Anyway, I've stopped here after introducing some blue into the stopper facets because I really need to decided on my dark background there on either side of the bowl before going any further. I was laying in different reds in the bowl to start on the fan facet, but decided I'd better work the darkest darks first. It's been rather challenging coming up with reds and purple/burgundy colors that don't fight each other. Started to throw the crystal on the gray side, but opted for soft blues instead as I'm thinking of a Midnight Blue kind of background to get some really dramatic darks in. It'll also make the blues more pale as the contract will be greater. Haven't decided on the cloth yet, but there's plenty of time for that.

Red Wine and Cherries WIP

2012-03-09T18:08:00.003-08:00

Earlier this week I decided I wanted to paint crystal again and had this drawing done. Painting glass and crystal is somehow very calming and soothing to me. I jokingly say it's really "paint by numbers", but when you see detail and love to paint detail...that's about true. I wanted this to be with analogous colors so I've changed the chardonnay to red wine and I'm having to explore some new reds. I've found that my bright transparent reds don't really work cohesively with the purples and magentas of the red wine. I also realize now that there will be lots of glazing going on to establish the wine level in the decantur realistically and I can't do that until I really settle on the right colors. Sure is nice to be able to make adjustments and live with it for a little bit...this one may take me a few more days than I had planned. And, I'm not all that good at glazes so we'll just see what happens here.

Fruit Plate

2012-03-01T05:43:00.002-08:00

Here is a small painting completed yesterday for my continuing little monthly blurb on PaintingFriends forum. Since I am really crazy for detail and paint from photos, this was a little exercise in sharing what I'm looking for and see when I paint a setup. Of course, I had to come up with something with reds in it...and cherries are always my first choice...sure wish they were a bit less expensive in the grocery right now...they're almost too expensive to swallow and enjoy. We've been working on color palettes and this one is just red, yellow, and blue...primaries are always fun as you can go so many different ways or just stay with the basics.

"Sunlit"

2012-02-21T14:44:00.000-08:00

On my PaintingFriends forum, we have a monthly challenge we call YOP (Year of Painting) where Ann Buckner from Oklahoma puts up a challenge every month and we are to paint whatever we want from a couple of reference photos and post it on the 20th of each month. This has been such fun, and it's amazing how many different takes one bunch of artists can come up with for the challenge. This one was a cluster of grapes...and guess who's never painted grapes??? Right...me.

Of all our challenges, I think I've learned most from this one because I had to really install into my painting head that you can't mix purple and yellow without getting MUD. My first attempt did turn into deep ugly mud and is living in my waste basket in about a million pieces. But, after many attempts with colors, I did come up with quin magenta, cabozale purple, quin perm rose, cobalt blue, WN orange, and gamboge and came out with a variety of acceptable grape colors. The main trick seems to be to let whatever you put down completely dry before going back in with another color...regardless of the color. Good lesson learned. When I can get my act together, I'm going to do a little demo on the forum for anybody who might want to take a look...www.paintingfriends.com. Come visit us...we're always painting something...

Colors of Indian Rocks Beach

2012-02-16T10:15:00.000-08:00

Last summer I had a really fun filled week in Indian Rocks Beach, Florida with a group of artists from the PaintingFriends forum. http://www.paintingfriends.com/. We painted and played on the beach and painted some more and got to know each other as most of us (other than the Florida gals) had never met. While there we found these darling little beach cottages...probably from the 40's and 50's...and couldn't resist the photo ops that abounded. They were sorbet colors...oranges, pinks, turquoise, yellow...you name it and they painted it that color...and each had all this "stuff" around...and best of all, they were just a short hop through the dunes and to the beach. We're going back again in August so I'm sure we'll find more of these cuties to paint. The bright sun and the bright colors were really fun to try to capture on paper.

"The Last Six'

2012-02-11T10:22:00.000-08:00

Finally decided on a title, and I'm thinking that I'm done here. As usual, I'll live with the painting for a day or two as I see a few tweaks I could make...maybe yes, maybe no...but I always see stuff when I post that I didn't see earlier. The lids were lots of fun to paint...even more than smushing the reds around...can't believe I even said that. They do look pretty shiney so I may bring that shine down a bit...I'll just have to sleep on it. My friend who canned these beauties tells me that this batch is almost gone...sure wish I lived close enough to have furnished the chips...good salsa to a Texan is like sunshine...thanks, Judy.

Tomato Jars WIP

2012-02-10T16:08:00.000-08:00

The background went in today so I could make some value judgments...that 6th jar was a question as to the shadow line so I decided to go ahead with a background. Now I'll have trouble with a title as this reminds me of the storm cellar that my grandmother used for all her canning veggies and pickles...the shelves were old and rather beaten up looking...guess I'll have to think about this some more. Hopefully, I'll get back to the shadows and making my tweaks on the reds tomorrow...it's evening in Texas now and I don't enjoy painting at night any more...my colors aren't true even with good painting lights.

Tomato Jars WIP

2012-02-09T14:17:00.000-08:00

Here's where I am today...thought I'd get finished, but life always gets in the way it seems. It's good to post WIP's in that once it comes up on the monitor, it seems that I can see things that were right in front of me that I need to adjust. There will definitely be some glazing done to round the jars better, and some value shifts here and there. Still don't have my background settled in my head...maybe I need to give it another day...

Tomato Salsa WIP

2012-02-09T07:41:00.001-08:00

Yesterday I started a new painting from a ref photo from one of my friends, Judy Buckingham, from PaintingFriends forum. Judy always cans in the summer and these jars of salsa were too pretty not to paint. Don't know what my background will be just yet, but it'll come. The jar lids are actually silver in the ref photo and I started to paint them that brassy color, but, Judy wouldn't use old looking lids so I'm sticking true to life. The reds are a combo of Poppy, Aliz orange, WN red, and AJ gamboge. When I've finished all six jars, I'll go back with deeper red here and there...hope to get this finished this afternoon. I'm thinking that this will work for my "red challenge" for Artcolony and I'm determined not to wait until the last day of the challenge like January.

"Got Milk?"

2012-01-31T18:03:00.001-08:00

This is my painting for our Artcolony "white challenge" that was due the first of January and I'm just now getting it done. Why do we artists put stuff off until the last minute? I seem to like to work under pressure...crazy, huh? While I was drinking my little glass of milk this morning I got the idea to paint milk...it's white...it'd work for the challenge. So, I got out a blue napkin, photo'ed the setup, painted it today at Greta's art retreat and made the deadline. It's only 5x7 but it was a fun paint. Next month our challenge will be something RED. I really thought about putting a Hershey's white wrapped Mr.Goodbar with little red hearts they have out for Valentines at the base of the glass, but the AC gals would accuse me of cheating...so I thought better of it. I did eat the chocolate instead.

"Cuppa with Suzy"

2012-01-22T20:49:00.000-08:00

This weekend we had a marvelous torn paper collage workshop with Suzy Powell from Plains, Texas. Since my favorite color is red, I'm certain nobody is surprised at this collage. This was my first attempt at the medium, and I must say that I'm very pleased with this one. Suzy is a wonderful teacher and the 14 who were in her class all finished at least one collage...and several did two. We held the workshop at fellow artist Greta Faulkinberry's art retreat in Bullard, Texas...which is right down the road from me here in Noonday. Suzy is also one of my artist friends our Artcolony blog. I'm also thrilled to say that Suzy posted a gorgeous collage recently of two sparkling wine glasses, "A Touch of Red", on Artcolony and it now lives at my house. For any of you who have admired collage, but just haven't tried it...jump in! It is soooo much fun, and you can use all the creativity you can muster. My next one is a piece lemon maringue pie...and it'll have photos of diamonds in it's makeup...doesn't that sound like fun.

Pears

2011-12-30T17:41:00.001-08:00

Just thought I'd post a better photo of the pear collage...I really enjoy how the colors mingle and blend...and I'll admit that I did eat the setup...we had received a box of gorgeous pears from friends for Christmas and I couldn't resist painting them.

"smushing" technique

2011-12-30T10:51:00.000-08:00

This is a demo of a technique we'll call "smushing" for lack of a better explanation. It's simply mopping colors around letting the water do the work for you and giving the mingling of colors time to work before going back in with your brush and making mud. I'm doing this for my PaintFriendsForum for a little monthly blurp I try to do. This is actually the first time I've also tried to put a collage together so this is somewhat of a learning experience for me...we'll see what happens when I click the post. I've also done a step by step of the background and that'll be posted next.

My New Treasure

2011-12-28T08:42:00.000-08:00

This is the drop dead gorgeous painting I received from my dear friend, Cindy Agan, from our Artcolony Christmas painting exchange. Each year, we draw names to see who we are sending an original painting to from our little group and this year I hit the jackpot again!! Cindy's painting is just gorgeous and she told me that she worked the red in just for me...I'm a bonafide RED nut and my friends know this to be a real "sickness"...usually, if it doesn't have red in it somewhere I don't like it. I might add that it was sent framed in a beautiful gold frame with a beautiful white embossed mat of tiny leaves...it's just gorgeous and I'm over the moon I love it so. Thanks, Cindy...I can't believe I own a Cindy Agan original!! While in Chicago last summer we all met and played for a week and it was such fun meeting Cindy IRL...

Christmas Kisses

2011-12-14T10:56:00.000-08:00

This morning I was looking at my friend Christiane Kingsley's blog and happened to notice that from looking at her blog roll that I hadn't posted anything here in the last 5 weeks. Goodness...Santa isn't going to stop by our house this year if I don't shape my act up. I have been painting, but just small things and the large things I'm working on aren't even in the WIP stage just yet. I guess my life is getting in the way around here.

This was a painting I did a while back for one of our Artcolony challenges that asked for something "green and red"...what else could I come up with other than foil wrapped green and red kisses that would have been any better for Christmas cheer? And, you can bet I ate the setup after clicking that picture...I have absolutely no willpower when it comes to chocolate.

If I don't get anything else posted here (and there is one more painting floating around out there that's a Christmas theme that I can't post yet because it's gone to one of my friends on Painting Friends Forum...and it hasn't arrived yet!) I'll wish everybody a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Here's hoping that you all have wonderful times with family and friends.

Tea for Three

2011-11-02T17:13:00.000-07:00

This is a little silver painting demo I have posted on "paintingfriends.com" which came about from a little "blurp" I'd written about silver on that neat forum. Next to painting crystal,glass, and red stuff, I think painting silver and reflective objects would probably be next on my list. It may be my love for detail...who knows? Anyway, jump over to the site and take a peek if you have time. I have this wonderful black teapot and it throws really dramatic colors on anything silver. This is another of those paintings where I must work from a reference photo and really pay attention to saving whites...much like painting crystal.