Limited Palette

Good Morning!  I am all fixed up with two new knees(and in 2014, two new shoulders!).  I should be good to go for quite awhile now.

I haven't posted for many months. But wanted to show you one photo of my backyard after our Halloween snow yesterday.
I also have a mixed media painting that I finished recently called "Just Passing Through."

Happy Paint Party Friday!

"Limited Palette"

"Just Passing Through"

Have a great day!

Gloria 

Gloria J Zucaro's "In A Nest Of Leaves"

8"H x 8"W Original Oil on Raymar Canvas Panel

$55.00 Framed in Floater 
To Purchase- PayPal Through Daily Paintworks

This is my little bird figurine from my sister-in-law.  He is sweetly seated in a little pile of leaves. I again use orange and aqua as my choices for a crisp Fall day.  

Gloria J Zucaro's "Golden Opportunity"

This my entry for Paint Party Friday, a weekly display from about 85 artists from all over the globe.  The site is hosted by Kristin and Eva,  Thank you, Ladies!
My painting today has undergone many changes.  I first painted it about 4 years ago.  I had all cornstalks in the background, and a very dark black shadow under the crow and all strokes on the pumpkin going one way, and a stem bottom showing on the pumpkin towards the right side of the canvas.  On Monday of this week Susan Ploughe who is one of the instructors at Mainstreet Art Center (where I go to paint with my artists friends a couple of times a week) asked us to all bring in a couple of our "duds", the paintings that did not work out as planned.  So I took my crow and pumpkin.  It was predominately orange and yellow over the whole painting, the pumpkin, the ground, the background of cornstalks.  There was some green in the leaves and some of the cornstalks, but otherwise all orange & yellow!  Susan had a sneaky idea up her sleeve!  She had us trade our paintings with someone else and we were each to work on the other person's painting, so that the painting would be looked at with a new perspective.  Susan told us that if we didn't like what the other person did with our painting we could just wipe it off with turp, since all our paintings were dry long ago.  Well, I worked on Corrine's Napa Valley painting and she worked on my crow.  Corrine merged all the cornstalks together with some different background colors that were impressionistic, and the painting was so much better, but it was still oranges, yellows and greens.  After I went home, I thought about it and decided that blue might be good with the orange, since they are compliments.  So today I changed the shape of the pumpkin, changed the direction of the strokes on the pumpkin, lightened the really dark shadow, as suggested by Ann Feldman, added many different colors to the leaves, made the broken piece of pumpkin shell the right value, and got rid of all the orange in the background with sky blue.  Oh, what a relief it is! ( I am singing this part!) LOL!

11"H x 14"W Original Oil on Stretched Canvas

Gloria J Zucaro's "Autumn" and "Manet"

Here is the final version of our third portrait class with Ann Feldman.  After last week's drawing and adding shadows with charcoal, we had sprayed our portraits with fixative.  This week we used burnt umber to cover the entire surface with a wash, then wiped out the lighter areas of the face and neck that were not in shadow with a paper towel or small brush around the nose and eyes.  We then put in all the darker areas with our burnt umber.  I think it is a really neat technique.  
I thought you might like to see the front courtyard of my townhouse.(Three pictures)  I love this time of year, Autumn, when the trees are falling asleep, leaves blowing in the wind, and all the beautiful grasses are turning golden, too. All photos may be enlarged for better detail by clicking on the image.  In case I don't finish another painting today, this post will be my entry to Paint Party Friday.  Be sure to visit!

My Front Entry Courtyard

 The Front Door Area

My Asian Fountain.  It is turned off now and will have the pump removed on Saturday.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Multi-Media Journal Page One"

Today I am showing you my first ever attempt at making a mixed media journal page for entry into "Fall Fearless and Fly".  I really had fun using ink, watercolor Silks Acrylic Glaze, Twinkling H2o's and colored pencil & paper, matte medium.etc!  My theme, one of three suggested was "Inventing the Future" 5, 10 and 15 years down the life road.

Check out the Fearless sight to see what other artists have done.

Click on images for larger photos and more detail.

Slanted to see more of the shimmer

 

Straight on to see the words more clearly.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Silent Moon"

8"H x 8"W original Oil     $105.00  Framed

S&H to your ZIP

                                   To Purchase, email me at gloria@gloriajzucaro.com                                             

I had fun with this one by under-painting with acrylic gold glitter paint which shows through in selected areas. This cat that has a glittery surface is one of my Halloween decorations, as are my Fall leaves that are edged with glitter.   I needed something else in the upper left corner, especially because the cat appeared to be looking at something.  I really liked the moon.  I hope you do too!  

Gloria J Zucaro's "Fall Flavors"

 8"H x 8"W Original Oil on Raymar Canvas Panel

$105.00 Framed    S&H to your ZIP
To Purchase, email me at gloria@gloriajzucaro.com

The Pantone color of the year for 2012 is "Tangerine Tango"  I happen to love orange...red, ...yellow, aqua.  Ah well, I digress!   So I will be doing more paintings with ORANGE!