Forsythia Pair and More

Forsythia Pair and More

flowering in my yard on May 8, 2023, painted May 22, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$300

Spring Arrives, Yet, Spring Leaves

Spring Arrives, Yet, Spring Leaves

with lily leaves sprouting in my Shapleigh, Maine yard painted May 5, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$300

Spring Green Pushes Through

Spring Green Pushes Through

shadows of lily leaves sprouting in my Shapleigh, Maine yard painted May 5, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$300

Winter's Passing Memory

Winter's Passing Memory

with the last of the snow in my yard on April 16, 2023, painted May 5, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$300

Snow Tires Off

Snow Tires Off

Richard (owner, center) and Mike at Jim's Alignment in Springvale Maine on April 13, 2023, taking off my snow tires for the season painted April 17, 2023 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed, gifted to Richard for display at Jim's Alignment

Winter Coat in Spring Oh Deer

Winter Coat in Spring Oh Deer

outside my window at home on April 9, 2023, painted April 11, 2023 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 300 lbs. Arches cold press rough 100% cotton watercolor paper, framed.
$300

Tree Not There

Tree Not There

for five months behind my house at dusk on February 24, 2023, painted April 6, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$325

Sheepish Portrait of Citrus in Snow

Sheepish Portrait of Citrus in Snow

with a lemon and two Minneolas on a snowfield behind my home on February 24, 2023, painted April 8, 2023, 7" x 5" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$150

Oval Lemon Triangle Snow

Oval Lemon Triangle Snow 

on a plowed snow bank behind my home on February 26, 2023, painted April 6, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence on 140 lbs. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$300

Lemons in Snow

Lemons in Snow

dropped in a snowfield's depression behind my home in Shapleigh, Maine on February 24, 2023 painted April 6, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$300

Sunset Beyond Snow Going

Sunset Beyond Snow Going

in a back field behind my home painted plein air March 29, 2023, 7" x 5" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$150

Snow March to April

Snow March to April

in a back field behind my home painted plein air March 29, 2023, 14" x 11" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$500

Minneola Sun on Edge

Minneola Sun on Edge

at the edge of plowed snow and a snow field behind my home in the late afternoon on February 24, 2023, painted March 23, 2023, 11" x 14" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$800

Minneola on the Edge

Minneola on the Edge

of the plowed snow and a snow field behind my home in the late afternoon on February 24, 2023, painted March 24, 2023, 14" x 11" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$500

Art of Orange Blue in Watercolor 2023

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The Art of Orange and Blue
in Watercolor - Essay 2023

Featuring art from Belgium, Bulgaria, Britain, Finland, France, and the United States between 1823 and 2022

1
Study of Sea and Sky
Joseph Mallord William Turner (1775-1851), English
Watercolor on paper, 11" x 8" (w x h), circa 1823-1826
Tate Museum, London

Source: Tate, London
In the mid-1820s Turner worked on a set of twelve mezzotint plates, known as the Little Liber, or So-called Sequels to the Liber Studiorum, which all explore the dramatic effects of natural light. At least half of subjects are direct observation of the sea. The watercolor studies on which the prints were based are unusually freely executed and unresolved. When painting for translation into black and white prints Turner usually provided a greater level of detail to guide the engravers.

2
Blue Tangerine Feather
Klara, Bulgarian
Watercolor, Schmincke, on Saunders
Waterford paper, 8" x 11" (w x h), circa 2022
For sale on Etsy: $40 USD HERE

Source Etsy:
Klara lives in Sofia, Bulgaria. She graduated from the Sofia National Art Academy with a degree in textile and fashion and an ?? in Fashion Design at the Sofia National Academy. She works in pastels and watercolor with a focus on portraits and landscapes. She also paints scarves as original works of art. She a mother of two. Her website is HERE,

3
Rocks at Trayas
Henri-Edmond Cross (1856-1910), French
Watercolor on paper, 1902
Le Trayas is a small coastal village in the south France.

Source: Wiki
Henri-Edmond Cross, born Henri-Edmond-Joseph Delacroix, (1856-1910) was a French painter and printmaker. He is most acclaimed as a master of Neo-Impressionism and he played an important role in shaping the second phase of that movement. He was a friend of Theo van Rysselberghe (see the last watercolor in this selection). He was a significant influence on Henri Matisse and many other artists. His work was instrumental in the development of Fauvism. When Cross wanted to depict quick impressions, he created watercolor or colored pencil images in his sketchbooks.

He wrote of a rustic French outing: "Oh! What I saw in a split second while riding my bike tonight! I just had to jot down these fleeting things ... a rapid notation in watercolor and pencil: an informal daubing of contrasting colors, tones, and hues, all packed with information to make a lovely watercolor the next day in the quiet leisure of the studio."

In 1905 Galerie Druet in Paris mounted Cross's first solo exhibition, which featured thirty paintings and thirty watercolors.

4
Still Life with Blue Glass
Eileen Goodman (1937- ), American
Watercolor on paper, 26" x 33" (w x h), 1987
Woodmere Art Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Source: Woodmere Art Museum (edited)
Eileen Goodman (1937 - ) grew up in Montclair, NJ. She attended what was then called the Philadelphia College of Art (now University of the Arts), which didn't have a major in painting, though included noted serious painters and fellow student and former husband Sidney Goodman.

Experimenting with smaller watercolor versions of her oil paintings, Goodman was attracted to the work of Pennsylvania modernist Charles Demuth, who described form through outline with exuberant gesture and saturated color. Eventually in the early 90s Goodman painted a number of pieces measuring five feet across, a scale more commonly afforded oil paintings. Foregoing oils altogether, she found ways to make watercolor with tonality and texture. As with Demuth, properties which render and make real are energized by looseness in the brushwork and layering of color.

5
Egypt Night and Day #222
Keith Achepohl (1934- ), American
Watercolor with touches of blue and orange crayon,
over graphite, on white wove paper  13" x 19" (w x h), 1981
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois

Source: Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, University of Oregon
Keith Achepohl received a B.A. from Knox College, Galesburg, Illinois (1956), an M.F.A. from the University of Iowa (1960), and honorary doctorates from Pacific Lutheran University, Parkland, Washington (1989), and Knox College, Galesburg, Illinois (1996). He served as head of printmaking at the School of Art at the University of Iowa and director of the University of Iowa Summer in Venice. Among his numerous awards and recognitions are Fulbright grants in Egypt (1977) and Turkey (1984) and a National Endowment for the Arts grant (1994). Achepohl has exhibited extensively nationally and internationally. His works are held in the permanent collections of the National Gallery of Art and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C.; the Biblioteca Nacional in Madrid, Spain; the Kobe Art Museum in Japan; the Art Institute of Chicago, the Brooklyn Museum; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art; and many others. His work has realized auction prices ranging from $38 USD to $1,125 USD, depending on the size and medium.

6
Typewriter Eraser
Claes Oldenburg (1929-2022), Swedish /American and
Coosje van Bruggen (1942-2009), Dutch/American
Watercolor and crayon on paper, 11" x 17" (w x h), 1977
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, New York
Claes and Coosje / Husband and Wife

Source: Wiki
Oldenburg and van Bruggen's sculpture Typewriter Eraser (1976), the third piece from an edition of three, was sold for $2.2 million at Christie's New York in 2009. Constructed in 1999, these wors are located at the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C., with others at Seattle Center near the Museum of Pop Culture, Seattle Washington, and CityCenter, Paradise, Nevada. Typewriter Eraser, Scale X is on view at the Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, Florida.
Claes Oldenburg (1929-2022) was a Swedish-born American sculptor best known for his public art installations, typically featuring large replicas of everyday objects. Another theme in his work is soft sculpture versions of everyday objects. Many of his works were made in collaboration with his second wife, Coosje van Bruggen, who died in 2009; they had been married for 32 years. Oldenburg lived and worked in New York City. Oldenburg's brother, art historian Richard E. Oldenburg, was director of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, between 1972 and 1993, and later chairman of Sotheby's America.

Coosje van Bruggen (1942-2009) was a Dutch-born American sculptor, art historian, and critic. She collaborated extensively with her husband, Claes Oldenburg. Born to a physician in Denmark, she studied history of art at the University of Groningen. From 1967 to 1971, she worked at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. Van Bruggen married her first husband Paul Kapteyn, they had two children, Maartje Kapteyn and Paulus Kapteyn. In Amsterdam she worked with environmental artists like Doug Wheeler, Larry Bell, and the members of the Dutch avant-garde. Until 1976, van Bruggen taught at the Academy for Art and Industries in Enschede. She married her second husband, Claes Oldenburg, in 1977 and moved to New York the following year. In 1993 she became a United States citizen.

7
Untitled (Portrait of Mother) /
Nimetön (äidin muotokuva)
Kalervo Palsa (1947-1987), Finnish
Watercolor on paper, 16" x 19" (w x h), 1973
The State of Finland, Finnish National Gallery,
Helsinki, Finland

Source: Wiki
Huugo Kalervo Palsa, known as Kalle (1947-1987), was a Finnish artist whose style has been described as fantastic realism. Palsa was a native of Kittila in Lapland. While he lived there, his residence was a tiny studio cabin, closer to a shack than a house. It was connected to electricity by a long extension cable from a nearby house.
His two biggest supporters were his mother, and his soulmate/muse Maj-Lis Pitkänen, the sister of his childhood sweetheart Maaret. After his death Maj-Lis led a long-term campaign to install a memorial cenotaph for Palsa, which was sculpted by the Finnish artist, Pekka Pitkänen, Maj-Lis's husband. Although Kalervo's work did not draw significant attention in his lifetime, he's experienced a revival since the publication of critical works, a biography and two major retrospectives in Helsinki and Pori.

8
Cherries
Theo van Rysselberghe (1862-1926) Belgian
Watercolor on paper
Private Collection

Source: Wiki
Theophile "Theo" van Rysselberghe (1862-1926) was a Belgian neo-impressionist painter, who played a pivotal role in the European art scene at the turn of the century. Born in Ghent to a French-speaking bourgeois family, he studied first at the Academy of Ghent under Theo Canneel and from 1879 at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels under the directorship of Jean-François Portaels. The North African paintings of Portaels had started an orientalist fashion in Belgium. Their impact would strongly influence the young Théo van Rysselberghe. Between 1882 and 1888 he made three trips to Morocco, staying there a total of one year and half. He was a friend of Henri-Edmond Cross (see the third watercolor in this selection).

Sunset Glow Snow to Go

Sunset Glow Snow to Go

in a back field behind my home painted plein air on March 21, 2023, 10.75" x 8.25" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$400

The plein air setup as I finish at dusk on March 21, 2023

Snow Field Afternoon

Snow Field Afternoon

painted plein air in a field behind my home in Shapleigh, Maine, March 12, 2023, 7" x 5" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$150

The plein air setup...

Late Winter Opening

Late Winter Opening

in a back field behind my home painted plein air March 12, 2023, 7" x 5" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$200 - NFS Gift

Painted plein air March 12, 2023

Snow Pear Minneola Bank

Snow Pear Minneola Bank

Comice pear and Minneola on a snow bank behind my home March 6, 2023, painted March 10, 2023, 10" x 8" (w x h), Daniel Smith, Schmincke Horadam, and Winsor & Newton watercolors, selected for light fastness and permanence, and Uniball waterproof fade proof ink on 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico cold press rough 100% cotton extra white watercolor paper, framed.
$300

The Art of Green and Orange

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The Art of Green and Orange
Essay

1
Pears / Poires
Pierre-Auguste Renoir (1841-1919), French
Oil on canvas, 12" x 9" (w x h), circa 1890
Barnes Foundation, Philadelphia, PA

Source: Still Life in Painting from Antiquity to the Present Time by C. Sterling
"Nurtured on the traditions of eighteenth-century French painting, Renoir ... carried on the serene simplicity of Chardin (a great French painter). Pale shadows, light as a breath of air, faintly ripple across the perishable jewel of a ripe fruit. Renoir reconciles extreme discretion with extreme richness, and his full-bodied density is made up, it would seem, of colored air. This is a lyrical idiom hitherto unknown in still life, even in those of Chardin. Between these objects and us there floats a luminous haze through which we distinguish them, tenderly united in a subdued shimmer of light."

Source: Wiki, edited
In 1890, likely the year Renoir painted this, Renoir married Aline Victorine Charigot, a dressmaker twenty years his junior, who, along with a number of the artist's friends, had served as a model for Luncheon of the Boating Party in 1881. In 1885 they had their first of three sons. After marrying Renoir painted many scenes of his wife and daily family life including their children and their nurse, his wife's cousin Gabrielle Renard.

2
Child with Lamp
Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947), French
Lithograph printed in pink, green, brick red,
blue, and orange on light gray chine,
18" x 13" (w x h), 1897, 1897

Source: AIC Museum notes edited
Bonnard was sometimes called the Japanese Nabi, because he used the asymmetrical composition, elevated viewpoint, and bold colors of Japanese prints in his own work. Like Vuillard, Bonnard used children and his own family as favorite models for his early interiors. Attention centers on the lamp, Bonnard's symbolist interest in ordinary objects.

3
Orange Green
Ellsworth Kelly (1923-2015), American
One from a series of ten lithographs,
30" x 42" (w x h), 1970
MoMA, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY

Source: Wiki edited
Kelly's background in the military has been suggested as a source of the seriousness of his works. While serving time in the army, Kelly was exposed to and influenced by the camouflage with which his specific battalion worked. This taught him about the use of form and shadow, as well as the construction and deconstruction of the visible. It was fundamental to his early education as an artist. Ralph Coburn, a friend of Kelly's from Boston, introduced him to the technique of automatic drawing while visiting in Paris. Kelly embraced this technique of making an image without looking at the sheet of paper. These techniques helped Kelly in loosening his drawing style and broadened his acceptance of what he believed to be art. His introduction to Surrealism and Neo-Plasticism (Dutch origin "Nieuwe Beelding" /new image, abstract art that had been purified by applying the most elementary principles through plainly rational means, and practiced by Piet Mondrian) caused him to test the abstraction of geometric forms.

4
Halsingborg Suede (Swedish) Poster
Gunnar Christenson (1895-1997). Swedish
Painting for poster, 25" x 29" (w x h), circa 1930
The town of Halsingborg was renamed to
Helsingbord in the 1970s.

Source: Come to Sweden Publishing edited
Gunnar Christenson studied at the Technical School in Stockholm 1914-1919 and at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts 1920-1921. During the 1920s Christenson traveled on study trips around Europe, and in the late 1920s he worked as a drawing teacher at the school Helsingborgs Läroverk. From the buildings top floor you have a nice view of Kärnan, a medieval tower that once was part of a larger fortress, its ancient, burnt-orange brick structure looming imposingly over the rest of the seaside village. This was probably where he drew this poster over Kärnan and the landscape up towards Mölle.

Christenson later on combined his teaching with a successful artistic career. He had several exhibitions and is represented in museums.

5
Oranges on a Branch
Donald Sultan, (1951- ), American
Tar, spackle, and oil on tile over Masonite,
97" x 98" (w x h), 1992
Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, MI

Source: DIA museum notes
The boldly silhouetted oranges bursting with vivid color are in direct contrast to the thick black surface. The sense of drama in Sultan's works comes from his early interest in the theater, which he combines with his inspiration from other art movements, such as Abstract Expressionism, Color Field painting, and minimalism. Sultan abstracts, simplifies, and stylizes this representation of painted oranges against a background made of tar and oil. His unorthodox use of these industrial materials symbolizes American industry, reinforced by his incorporation of vinyl tiles taken from office and factory floors. Looking at art from the past for inspiration, Sultan struck upon the traditional still life for his subject matter, with his choice of oranges as a twist on his trademark lemons, originally inspired by a painting by Édouard Manet that he saw in a retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

6
Life already Prevailed Yesterday /
Elämä voitti jo eilen
Olli Lyytikäinen (1949-1987), Finnish
Crayon, 16" x 10" (w x h), 1973
Finnish National Gallery

Source: Kiasma Magazine and Ateneum in Helsinki
Olli Lyytikäinen (1949-1987) was a Finnish artist. In 1967 at 18 years old Olli and a friend took a boat to London. "We didn't have a penny when we arrived in London." Olli did some drawings which h sold to make ends meet." He went on to illustrate and paint in Finland. Many key Finnish galleries and museums, such as Ateneum art museum in Helsinki featured his work. In 1979 a devastating fire in his studio destroyed 500-4000 works (depending on the method of counting). In 1986 He was one of three Finnish representatives at the XLII Venice Biennale. He died the next year at home at 38-years-old. The record price for this artist at auction is $56,185 USD for Venetsialainen Variaatio, sold at Stockholms Auction House in 2012.

7
Green/2 Orange X Painting
Robert Mangold (1937- ), American
Acrylic and black pencil on canvas,
100" x 96" (w x h), 1983
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL

Source: AIC Museum Notes
Robert Mangold is an American Minimalist painter best known for painted canvases that incorporate drawn line, exalting simplified means and structure. Over the course of the last 50 years, he has employed a variety of geometric forms—circles, ellipses, squares, rectangles, trapezoids—as the support for his pared-down compositions. From 1980 to 1986, the artist created a series of paintings based on the letter X and the plus sign. Green/2 Orange X Painting is composed of three conjoined canvases of unequal size and three distinct colors—two oranges and a green. Drawn lines of unequal length mark the axis of the cross, replicating the overall shape within the plane and unifying the composition. Here the physical presence of the canvas edge becomes the central formal motif; the structural skeleton of painting becomes the subject of the work.

8
Untitled (Head with Orange and Green)
Sideo Fromboluti (1920-2014), American
Pastel and charcoal on paper, 21" x 16", 1990
MoMA, Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY

Source: NY Times Obituary and A Shared Life in art, Provincetown Gallery Catalogue edited:
Sideo Fromboluti was born in Hershey, PA of Italian immigrants in 1920. He was the first of his family to attend college having won the only scholarship offered by his high school to the Tyler College of Art. He earned a BFA and Masters degree.

Sideo and Nora Speyer met as art students at the Tyler School of Art, Temple University, Philadelphia. They were married in 1945. From the beginning of their lifetime married life, Nora and Sideo painted in the same studio and influenced each other's aesthetics. The couple moved to New York City in the late 1940s and they built a summer home and studio on Higgins Pond in Wellfleet, MA. In winter Sideo worked in an urban environment, his paintings and drawings leaning towards the figurative and capturing a subtle psychological dimension in his sitters.

He counted as his friends the artists who were major figures of the Abstract Expressionist movement. He had numerous solo shows, one at the Carnegie Museum of Art in 1998. He was represented by the Darthea Speyer Gallery in Paris, France for many years. He was a founding member of the Landmark Gallery in NYC and the Longpoint Gallery in Provincetown, MA.