the big one - 12" square

I know I said I was transitioning to my website blog but I finished this and thought I would get it up here since I'm not going to go onto my website today. I took some photos when I went to Edisto Beach last week and this scene is from one of the photos I took. I like the angle since there is some elevation - something I can't get at the beaches near my house.

two in hand - 20" square

This one took longer than I had planned - in fact one day I swear I spent the entire afternoon on a couple of square inches! We had a tropical storm last weekend and lost power and internet for all of Friday and some of Saturday, I had to do a shift at the Gallery on Sunday so when I got back to the studio on Monday I was a little surprised I was still working on it since it seemed like ages since I'd started it - time is weird. At any rate, I will be moving this blog to my new website:patriciaawalsh.com this week after exploring options to somehow combine the two. I have been working on completing the portions of the website that I hadn't had time to finish.

Edisto field trip - 16x12"

Despite the fact that the heat hasn't really broken here, I just had to get out of the studio on Sunday. I decided to take a field trip to Edisto Island - a car ride of approximately two hours in each direction. The funny thing is that I can see Edisto from my neighborhood beach and it is about six miles away by boat. Here on the Sea Islands one has to drive from the coast inland to reach route 17, drive north (or south) then turn off and drive to the coast again - Edisto is about twenty miles east of route 17. I was really glad I did, the clouds were awesome and it was windy and wonderful.

I also did this little study in the studio this past week - kind of rough but still life is not my usual subject. All of the zinnias were pretty much dead so I figured I had best get going before the relentless heat totally killed them!

fav 15% - sunhat

Wow, was I excited when I got an email from FASO (fine art studios online) that this painting was included in July's favorite 15%! It's not a prize but it was exciting anyway. Just thought I would share my excitement.

a new water garden

My son was here for the past couple of weeks and we put in a water garden with a waterfall.............something that I have wanted for as long as I can remember. I now have six goldfish and one koi (all tiny). I painted it yesterday but it didn't come out very well and I wiped it down. The light is pretty changeable and I'm certain there will be a learning curve since it's such different subject matter for me. I have recently been studying Sorolla's garden paintings and, though my little spot can't compare, I am really in love with the entire concept. 

This painting is one that I have been working on in the studio - it's 20" square and I'm making progress. The striped back of the dress has been challenging to say the least but I really didn't want to just paint it solid and give up since I found the stripes so illuminating for the form of the woman......it's been a balancing act back and forth between the planes and the stripes but I felt like I got somewhere today - scraping and reevaluating the values.

sheer linen shirt - 14x18"

I am almost done with this painting but something bugs me about it - I'll have to put it on the wall until I figure out what that might be. There are always things that bug me even when I think I am done but this is a little different. Really, I'm chafing at the heat and want to go outside to paint again so maybe I am just cranky! Even the poor garden can't take much more - despite watering every day. I've taken to looking at all of the old-timers' gardens around here (St. Helena Island is a very agricultural spot) and don't feel too badly since all that seems to be doing well in the fields is okra (which I didn't plant this year).

learning umbrella - 24x12"

I know that's a weird title for a blog post but after trying to complete one of the paintings in my last post, I realized that I needed some practice. This painting also (in addition to way too many umbrellas for one picture) illustrates one of the things I find interesting about the beach at Hunting Island. Because of the incredible amount of erosion and zero rock, they have installed these metal barriers from the tree line way out to the lowest low tide point into the water at periodic places along the beach - these metal walls are called "groins." Coming from New England where there are plenty of rocks, I found this very strange at first, most often eliminating them from any of the paintings I do at the beach. Recently I have discovered that, because the sand seems to collect along one side of the groin and gets pulled from the other, it creates a multi-leveled beach. That is also why it appears that I have somehow buried into the sand to paint this painting. I still have a few areas that need resolution but I kind of like what I've got so far - I'm a sucker for an unusual view.