Small changes = Aha! and the happy artist

 

Snow on Cherrywood

Acrylic on canvas

8 x 8 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

This little painting is one of several that's been
cooking all winter.  I finished it, and something
bothered me.  Other projects took up my time and
then it hit me one day -- it's the blue car on the street.
It has to be red.  Presto -- pop -- done. 

A friend in my art group, Peter, says that sometimes
all that's needed is the smallest of changes.  And I
know he's right.  In the city this look is gone --
maybe for good this season.  The huge, rock hard snow
 drifts of last week have almost disappeared, and I saw my
first dandelion, peaking up through a bit of remaining
snow today.  Those guys definitely work right through
their winter holidays. 

When I began this just looked like a landscape -- the
one out my front door -- now with the muddy season
upon us, it looks romantic.

Have a loving-the-place-you-live-in day.

Stand Back for the Pie -- and the taste of summer condensed

Stand Back for the Pie

Acrylic on canvas

24 x 24 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

I started this painting at the end of January.  We were deep
in winter, and I wanted the feeling of summer to be in
my studio.  It has been a great project, but I think I am
finished.  I may see one or two more things I want to
adjust tomorrow -- but I am happy looking at it.  It says
me, and my life.

This is what a summer table in my kitchen could look
like -- glutted with flowers, reeling with the pure
joy of all the bounty the summer offers.  And then
sour cherries are ready, and Steven, my sweet husband
bakes a pie.  This is usually an annual event, but last
summer our tree did not produce, and we were
desperate.  If you know someone in the Toronto
area who grows sour cherry trees, and expects to have
too many please let me know.

Cherry pie is a taste I love, that will always make me think
of my mother who baked one for me from the cherries
in our backyard at a different house when Christopher
was born, and of Steven -- our pie man.

When the first pie (he usually bakes several) is set
on the table, everything else moves back and lets
the pie take a bow (something the peonies find almost
impossible to do) -- but nothing beats Steven's cherry pie.

Have a-loving-the-thought-of-the-taste-of-summer day.

The freedom of the quick sketch painting

 

 More later

Art group sketch

Acrylic on canvas

12 x 16 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

I've been meaning to post this for a few days now.
I did this quick portrait sketch with my art group
last Tuesday.  The challenge for me was getting
something done in about an hour.  So here she
is.  The model had wonderful hair and looked
lively though she was posing absolutely still.

I learn a lot from these sessions from the other
artists there.  The paintings are usually pretty
textural because I paint one over another, over
another.  These are most definitely sketches,
not finished work -- and all the more fun to
do because that's true.

Have a letting-yourself-play day.

The Lost Hour and the feeling of spring

Happy spring (Work in progress)

Stage 3

Adding lights and darks

Acrylic on birch panel

5 x 7 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

People (my family) do not react well to time changes -- jumping forward
or backwards through the time loop.  That's why we moved
our clocks ahead last night --a whole day ahead.  On Monday
morning we will not be zombies, we'll be old hands at the
new time -- and the lost hour.

Happy spring (Work in progress)

Stage 2

Blocking in the colour

Acrylic on birch panel

5 x 7 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

I can never understand how the animals switch to the new
time with no warning, and were ready for supper
tonight one hour early.  Well if Zoey, Timbah and Fiona
can switch so easily, what is our excuse?

Happy spring (Work in progress)

Stage 1

Orange Ground, and drawing in

charcoal

Acrylic on birch panel

5 x 7 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

I started a little painting on a birch panel of some lovely
tulips in a pot I bought today.  They are easily one of the
cheeriest flowers going.  Here are a couple of the stages.

Have a being-a-joyous-time-traveller day.

Happy International Women's Day and always drawing

Hi everyone.  Happy International Women's Day, and I
hope it was a good day for all of us. We spent the evening
with my husband's mother, who is a very special woman.

Pie

Black marker on Fabriano notebook paper

6 1/2 x 8 1/4 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

(I am working on putting a pie in

one of my paintings and this

drawing is prep work.)

I've missed you, but somehow been caught up
in the details of painting, organizing commissions, and
whew a week's gone by.  So today I am posting some of
the sketches I've done in the past week.  Whatever else
is going on, in every still moment my pen is working
at capturing what I see.

Tulips in a Victorian Jug

Black marker on Fabriano notebook paper

6 1/2 x 8 1/4 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

(Spring is coming -- Tulips

will be coming up soon.)

Have a celebrating the women in your life day.

Five years of blogging and Happy Birthday to My Dad

At the wedding

black marker on Arches watercolour paper

10 1/4 x 14 1/8 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

I started this blog five years ago on February 18 -- five years
and ten days ago.  I can hardly believe it's been that long,
because for me those years have sped by and been so full
of wonder -- it has seemed like no time at all.  I wish my
Dad were here to witness the marvels of the past five years,
innovations and developments in the world, and in our
family that would astound him, and make him proud too.

Today is my father's birthday, but he is not in the world alas.
I think of him every year on this day, and as I said to a friend
every day, probably many times in a day.  He is definitely
alive in my heart and vivid in memory.

In this portrait of him he's at a wedding -- ours, Steven and mine,
and here he is dressed in his tux outside the church, surveying
the crowd, and perhaps worrying about what had to happen next,
how to tell people the directions to the reception.  He was an
elegant man, and it made me feel good to find a picture today
of him in a tux, because he was the kind of man who was
always well dressed.

So Dad -- I've been writing this blog for just over five years,
carrying on your roots in writing, and your love of painting.
And to my kind readers, and artist and collector friends,
a huge thank you for this tremendous time.  Five years -- that
deserves a cake, a party, champagne, celebrations!

Have a celebrating-the-joys-of-celebrating day!

Car accident and keeping it going on the iPad

 Happy Memory

iPad drawing

8 x 10 inches

Barbara Muir © 2013

Last night we were heading home from shopping with
our son in the car, stopped at a stoplight, and BAM!
The loudest bang I think I've ever heard short of
I don't know what.  We were rear ended by the car
behind the car behind us and sent into the intersection.
I would bet the girl who slammed into us at what felt
like at least 60 k was texting, because it's pretty
easy to see red stoplights at night. 

Steven, Sam and I all have whiplash, and have been
 lying very low today, nursing our aches and pains. 
But I can't stand it -- not doing some art -- so I did
a little portrait on my iPad, of a girl I drew a few years
 back on Skype -- one of my very first Skype portrait
jobs for a New York firm. It was fun then, and fun now,
trying to draw her with my finger.  I feel grateful for the
 iPad, and for seatbelts, and that we are all going to be fine.

Please don't text, or talk on the phone in your car.  We
were lucky, the next people might not be.

Have a keeping-your-eyes-on-the-road day