Winter in the High Desert

Winter solstice is still a couple of weeks away. But the weather here suggests winter is here!


We got snowed on ...

...and we have had mornings with dramatic clouds.

While it hasn't been as cold as other parts of the country, it has dropped below freezing at night, and it's been cold and (often) windy during the day.

All of this will lead to making some paintings. But it has been a little uncomfortable these days.

ANYthing for art, right?

Autumn in the Desert

The Big Morongo Preserve is a marshy area in the middle of the desert. It's located about 20 minutes north of Palm Springs, CA.

Lots of cottonwood trees, close relatives of aspens, grow in this natural oasis. Fall arrives here later than in many other places of the country -- the cottonwoods are pretty much at their color peak. Some of the color will linger until Christmas.

There really aren't that many opportunities to paint the desert in a way that uses bright hues. As much as I love the place, deserts can be rather drab most of the year. So the golden yellows of the cottonwoods are a welcome change.

Desert Painting in the Dutch Tradition

It was time for a desert painting that emphasized drama over "prettiness"!

Even More ACEOs

This is a grouping of newly-completed art cards. I showed some to the local nature museum, and they want to buy ten of these!

So I finished up the seven seen here, and they already have three that I showed them when I talked with them last week.

Let's hope sales will continue to pick up!

More ACEOs

A long time ago, I posted some info about ACEOs (Art Card Originals and Editions). I still make these little guys, and I even have some on eBay right now.

Besides eBay, I managed to get the gift shop in a local nature museum interested in buying ten art cards from me! So Ill be busy trying to get these ACEOs done ASAP so I'll have some $$$ to put in the bank!

Above is a sampling of what I've been up to.

In the meantime, one of my galleries asked for a local (Palm Springs area) scene that would be really dramatic. It's a large painting, so I'm trying to get it done, too.

And I must be worn out -- I feel sleepy all the time. What's up with that?

Well, it'll all get finished -- hopefully soon, but eventually in any case.

Another Lizard

Another lizard painting, that is.

This seems to be a popular lizard around here. At the Open Studio tours two weeks ago, I displayed my first version of this little guy (or girl -- not sure which). Since then, I've made two other versions of that piece, making slight changes to the images, mostly by curving the tail.

By request, then, I painted this!

Autumn -- but Not in the Desert

Last Sunday, The Wiffee and I took a trip to the mountains for a few days. It's been very busy for both of us, and although I, especially, still had much to do, we agreed a change of scenery (and getting away from this sweatshop!) would be a good idea.

So we stayed in a cabin owned by a friend in the Lake Arrowhead region. While not an area that could be described as having utterly awe-inspiring vistas, it still was beautiful, and I could see paintings coming out of this in the future.

Even better were the fall colors we saw. Granted -- the colors were not as rich and varied as a maple forest in Vermont or as fluorescent as the golden leaves of aspen in the Rockies. In fact, oak trees ranged brown-yellow to yellow green. But they added another dimension to the dull greens of pine and cedar.

This picture shows a different species of oak that was planted in one of the mountain towns. Most of the leaves on this and similar trees were a deep rich red, suitable for Christmas if not the fall holidays.

While the desert gets fall colors of its own, they're nothing like this oak tree. As much as I love the Mojave, sometimes one needs to go where traditional fall colors shine in all their electric glory.