Purple Irises

In watercolor
Spring 2000

These irises from my backyard are native Louisiana irises (Iris hexogona). I planted them fall 1999 and they bloomed in the spring. I found that irises are wonderful and fun to paint! On this particular piece, I wanted the flowers to show up strongly so I contrasted when with a yellow background. This is also my first iris painting.

Wild Louisiana Irises

In watercolor
Spring 2000

These showy yellow flowers of Iris pseudacorus grow where there's a lot of water. They can be found in many places in Coastal Louisiana. The brilliant yellow flowers of the irises show up every spring. They are a sign of approaching spring. Eventhough they are not native, they still make very nice subjects for painting and remains one of my most favorite flowers. In this piece I again wanted to focus on the flowers so I painted the background a mottled blue.

Swamp

In oil
Summer 2001

This one required the use of a lot of green and black. It is based on a few scenes that I put together from memory of the places that I've been in South Louisiana. These are the places where the waters are calm and the undergrowth seems dark and ominous with trees that are covered in mossy beards and wrinkled with age. I don't think I quite captured it here. It's not swampy enough!

Campsis radicans - Trumpet Vine

In watecolor
Summer 2001

My first botanical drawing. This one took an excruciatingly long time to produce because of the many fine brush strokes that was needed to give the plant the natural veining pattern. Plus, this was my first one. I am quite proud of this one for being my first.

Melancholy Lake

In watecolor/acrylic
Summer 2001

As my learning journey progress, I learned about monotones. This piece started out as a practice for such style. It however evolved a little bit further and became tri-tones. The mood is somber although it speaks of something mysterious as well. The foreground is acrylic.

>> Collection of Jessica Rosson <<
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Chrysanthemums

In watercolor
Fall 2001

I was perusing a local paint store and found a Chinese bamboo brush which spured my interest in learning more about Chinese style painting. I found a book at the local library to be quite helpful. It really is an interesting style with single brushstrokes and where simplicity is transformed into something elegant and complicated at the same time. And the timing was right because Chrysanthemums are one of the hallmark of autumn. The bright golden layers to the rich dark maroon against green foliage always brings the feel of autumn to me. But here, the flowers are transformed into Chinese style.

Bamboo

In watercolor
Fall 2001

Another piece of Chinese style painting of bamboos. This one I enjoyed a lot and there had been many visitors who wanted to use it in their art/design work.

Visitors (in chronological order): Andrew B. Sprague - Senior Art Director/Production Manager (www.niic.net), Indiana. | Antonio Salas - Membership & Chapter Development Manager (www.aaja.org). | Lap Dinh - Westpac Database Services DBA (www.westpac.com.au) used this painting on his wedding invitations. | Elena Udovina Cleveland, OH - 12th grader in Spring 2004, used the painting in her collection of short stories written in French entitled "Fairy Tales of the World - Contes de fees du monde". I very much appreciated a copy of her work!!

Golden Magnolia

In acrylic
Summer 2000

This is one of my first pieces using watercolor techniques with acrylic paint. I used the high contrasting colors to strengthen the flower.

Magnolias

In acrylic
Summer 2000

The magnolia inspiration strikes me during this time and and I painted these magnolias following the last one. The subjects were taken from a gardening magazine where this was one of the cultivars with golden petals.

Bridge

In watercolor
Spring 2001

This piece is the first building structure that I painted using watercolor. I was actually practicing to paint buildings. I still need a lot of work to get the shadows right. Painting water is not the easiest thing but I am satisfy with the overall results. To this day this remians one of my better watercolor paintings of man-made structures. But perhaps the other reason is that I don't paint man-made structures too often.

Dawn Behind the Trees

In watercolor
Summer 2001

This was one of my most favorite watercolor landscape pieces. The purple, yellow, and black just combines very effectively. Close up it isn't very impressive but once it's framed and take a step back, tt looks great on the wall!

Mountain Lakes

In oil
Summer 2001

I am very proud of this painting because it is my first sucessful oil piece. It is one of my best ones yet. The style is of course, Bob Ross'. I painted some "happy little trees" and gave the lonely ones a little friend as well!

Fall Mountains

In oil
Summer 2001

This one is nice but there's something mystical about it that I can't quite put my fingers on. Maybe it's because of the color...It is the autumnal days of this land beneath the mountains.

Tulips

In oil
Summer 2001

This was my first true still life piece. It was interesting and was fun to do. Oil paint really makes still life painting a lot easier. It also gives it a lot of texture as well.

Sails at Dusk

In acrylic
Summer 2001

I saw a photograph of this scene one day and decided that I must paint it. I used dramatic colors contrasted by the black of the stone cliffs. It didn't take a very long time to paint and the result is a very bold piece. This piece makes quite a statement to a room when it is hung on a small wall by itself.

Midnight Sea

In acrylic
Summer 2001

I don't think that I've done a piece that is simpler than this one. The only problem that I ran into was getting enough black paint to cover the background. The rest required only a few strokes of white and yellow. It's one of those pieces that don't look very good close up but pretty nice far away. The other curious thing is that the more the image is shrunk, the better it looks! I think this has something to do with the illusion of being far away.

Hidden Valley

In watecolor
Summer 2001

Based on a painting from a book, I practiced the few new technique of landscape painting in watercolor. I have discovered that my skills are more refined when it comes to painting actual objects rather than imaginary scenes such as this one. Landscape in watercolor is very difficult for me.

Wildflowers

In acrylic
Fall 2002

In this one, I'm exploring the very swift and thick brushstrokes, almost impressionistic. In many case, the closer look is not as nice as a farther look. The background is made by thin and swift lifts of the brush. It creates a somewhat rough and grassy background.

Northern Dawn

In watercolor/acrylic
Spring 2002

This one is a fairly simple one. It didn't take too much time to complete. The only trouble I had was blending the different colors of the sky and water together. My friend who lives in Finland says the scene is somewhat Finnish.