She Was an Artist & The World Was Her Canvas

These are some of my Watercolors....

These are some of my oil paintings.....

A colored Pencil piece...Some Acrylics...

This one was inspired by George Rodrigue's Blue Dog, These are My 3 Dogs!

This is called Pineapple Upside Down Cat! I finished him Yesterday

I just finished this one today in Memory of Lee Ann Hughes

I also finished this little thing today. It is just bright and fun!

I have a picture hanging in my bathroom with the quote "She was an artist and the world was her canvas!" on it. Every day when I brush my hair, or my teeth I look up at it and think... Yes it is! The world is my canvas. I know that art is completely subjective, some people will look at my work, and say, "Wow it looks like something out of my greatest dreams!" The next person may walk by and say, "This is crap! A cat on acid could do better work!" Negative responses used to discourage me, but then I realized... most people who make them have never picked up a brush. It takes a lot of guts to approach a canvas, and pour out what's in your heart, soul, and imagination. I don't feel like I have to justify my work. It is fun, I love it, and I plan to do it for the rest of my life.

These are some works in Progress all of them are oil....

I love Antique stores!

You never know what you will find in an antique store. Yesterday I got the little blue treasure for $5. It is an old Wedgwood style cameo pill box. It is a bride and groom walking through a garden-very romantic. The cameo pin on the left is the first one my Mom got me when I was a teenager, and until recently it was the only one I had. The cameo pill box on the right came in the mail from England last week (it actually took less time to get here from Buckingham shire, than it takes a letter to reach Idabel from Texarkana-which is only an hour's drive... does anyone understand our postal system?). I won it in an eBay auction for $12 shipping included, and get this... it is the real thing! A real shell cameo pill box- just like the one I wished I had gotten in Pompeii. Sometimes I go about getting my souvenirs the back way.

Canton Treasures

Last spring we went all over Europe, and I have thought that there are a few places I need to go back to because I have this mental shopping list. On this list is a georgous ornate handpainted chess set I saw in Florence, at least a dozen of the pretty souvenir ink pens from Harrods in London, but most of all... A Cameo Pin or a Cameo Pill box. DUH I'm still smacking myself in the head! I spent an afternoon in Pompeii-Naples, and went to a factory where they make and sell them. I saw thousands of them all over the place, and also in Casino, Italy. The top two pictures are cameos I saw in Europe, and if you're a real sharp cookie you'll think I've seen that top picture before. (I drew it with prismacolor pencils, and it's in my post about the spring art show.

At the time I felt like I shouldn't buy one as a way to boycott the Camarerro, which is what the Italians call the mainland mafia. Yes I had a conscience about buying one because I learned that the entire Italian cameo business is run by Camarerro. Ugh, no one would ever buy anything from Italy if they grew a conscience because the entire country is crooked. I think I'm over my whole personal boycott idea. Why in the heck did I not just cough up 50 euro and bring home a whole sack full? Real cameos are truly the most exquisite form of jewelry you can own. A cameo requires more skill, artistic ability, time, energy, a work than anything else you'll ever put in your jewelry box (except maybe a Rolex since those are made one at a time as well). I rate pearls in second place because those take a long time to grow and hand string.
I'm also a little sentimental about cameos because my Mom wore them on her's and dad's wedding day, and they were stolen when their house was broken into while they were newlyweds in Tulsa. I'm sure some jerk out there took them, pawned them, and hasn't given it a second thought. If she still had them, I would have worn them in my wedding. Oh well, can't dwell on things like that.
So the conclusion of this story is I got 5 beautiful cameos in Canton, TX at First Monday this weekend. Those are the ones in the two bottom pictures. Two of them are real shell, and one is on lava rock, the other two are costume, but I think they're pretty anyways, and they are all antique. I think they look like they ought to be in the next Victoria Bliss magazine. By they way I Love that magazine, and if they ever decide they need someone else to go around taking pictures of beautiful things I think they might be able to twist my arm (ok I'd be the one doing the arm twisting).

The Art Show

We had the spring art show up at the college last week. I just thought I'd post some of my entries. I'm almost finished teaching for the semester. There has been a lot going on around here. I am so glad it rained the other night, it has helped the allergies a lot.