Simon Greets the Day

This painting is part of my series of watercolor portraits of old people. This portrait was done from a photo taken while traveling in the Caribbean. I tried to capture the sunlight warming his skin as he pushed the curtain back to look outside early in the morning.
I named this old fellow 'Simon' after the Simon that was pressed into service to help Jesus carry the cross. Simon was reluctant initially, but obediently helped carry Our Lord's burden for a while. I believe we are all like Simon - called to carry burdens - whatever they might be - in service of others. Even though the weight of those burdens are heavy and age us, we can choose to greet the day with a smile and a twinkle in our eye. 

Watercolor. 16 x 20 inches. 2002.

Poling the Flats

We jumped at the chance to crew aboard a sailboat traveling through the out islands of the Bahamas.  I love everything about the sea - the beaches and shallows, the flats, the reefs, surf and tide. . .all the way to deep blue water sailing. Just got it in my blood I guess, even though I grew up along the Mississippi River far from the sea.  This was done from a memory I have of watching an old guy quietly poling his boat in the flats.

Watercolor. 16 x 20 inches. 2002.

Marjory Stoneman Douglas

Marjory Stoneman Douglas was known as the "Mother of the Everglades." She was an independent thinker, an activist, and an environmentalist who worked tirelessly to save the Everglades at a time when most people thought it to be just a worthless swamp. She saw value and beauty in what she called A River of Grass and fought tooth and nail to save and preserve it. She was a wee bit of thing, but she took on lawyers and developers and the rowdiest of stone crabbers without any problem . She called herself "a tough old woman," and yet she could be gentle and loving as I've portrayed her here with her beloved cat.  She lived to be 108.

Watercolor. 16 x 20 inches. 2003.

"A painting is not about an experience.  It is an experience."

~ Mark Rothko

Enter With a Happy Heart

Have you ever noticed how old people are either grumpy and crotchety frowning at everything. . .or the most kind and gentle sweetly smiling folks?  I noticed this and made up my mind that I did not want to let life's sorrows turn me into a bitter old woman.  This, I found, was not an easy task.  Life is often not fair.  It is not a bed of roses and if you knew my story you might think I have every right to be an angry and resentful.  I am no Pollyanna. . .and yet, I seek each day to embrace life with joy in my heart, focusing on the things I can be grateful for. . .even if it is just an old rusting bike with no seat that has seen better days.  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Acrylic painting. 16 x 20 inches. 2006.

l

Great White Heron

I'm fascinated by birds.  Have been all my life. I credit my third grade teacher, Miss Leach's passion for birds as one of the reasons I love birds so much.  Teachers are entrusted with an amazing opportunity to make a profound difference in the way children view the world.  Decades have passed since I sat in her class and I still delight in observing birds in the wild.

Did you know that birds always do their best to look good?  It is an instinct they have that protects them from predators.  If you ever see a bird that looks unkempt or like it is having a bad day, it is probably near death.

Also bird's eyes take up 50% of a bird's head while our eyes take up only 5%.  Our eyes would have to be the size of baseballs to be proportionate to a bird's.

"Eating like a bird" is a misnomer.  Birds actually are big eaters and eat twice their weight in food each day. 

"God loved the birds and invented trees. Man loved the birds and invented cages."
~Jacques Deval,  Afin de vivre bel et bien

Watercolor on archival paper. 11 x 17 inches. 2004.

"I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn't say any other way -- things I had no words for."

~Georgia O'Keeffe

The Sixties Revisited

As a teenager during the sixties, I was strongly influenced by the thinking of the counter-culture. Ghandi, Martin Luther King's dream, Bob Dylan, JFK, the Beatles, the Peace Corp, the Viet Nam War, communes and equal rights, Rosa Parks, sputnik and one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind, peace and love. . . all were at the forefront of our minds. It was a world spinning out of control. Little did we know how the shifts in thought would affect the world now fifty years hence.

Mixed media drawing. 11 x 14 inches. 1976.

Gather Us In

"Here in this place new light is streaming,
now is the darkness vanished away;
see in this space our fears and our dreamings brought here to you in the light of this day.

Gather us in, the lost and forsaken,
gather us in, the blind and the lame;
call to us now, and we shall awaken,
we shall arise at the sound of our name.

We are the young, our lives are a mystery,
we are the old who yearn for your face;
we have been sung throughout all of history, 
called to be light to the whole human race."

The words of this Marty Haugen hymn were on my mind as I created this watercolor.

Watercolor. 16 x 20 inches. 2002.

Cellist

Putting pencil to paper and organizing the marks into some sort of thing is something I've always been interested in.  Combining lines with shaded areas, defining light and dark.  As the cellist draws the bow back and forth across the strings to produce sound, I move the pencil across the surface of the paper to produce something out of nothing.

 Pencil drawing. 8-1/2 x 11 inches. 2007.

The French Beekeeper

This is a portrait of C. P. Dadant who migrated with his father to the United States in the mid 1850's from France. They began beekeeping and built a business that still exists today five generations later. He is one of my ancestors.  I painted this from an old photograph taken in the early 1900's as he walked down the hill to work one morning.  The sky is reminiscent of the wonderful honey we got from the bees. 

Gouache painting.  11 x 17 inches. 2008.

Hear my cry, O God;
listen to my prayer.
From the ends of the earth I call to you,
I call as my heart grows faint;
lead me to the rock that is higher than I.
For you have been my refuge,
a strong tower against the foe
I long to dwell in your tent forever
and take refuge in the shelter of your wings.

Psalm of David - Psalms 61.1-4

 Mixed media drawing. 11 x 17 inches. 2005.