Pastel painting of woods covered in snow

Pastel painting 5 inches x 7 inches $80   SOLD

Please contact me if you are interested in similar artwork.

My last homage to winter. I’m looking forward to spring. I painted this pastel painting right after our latest storm and I’m hoping its the last one of a long, snowy season. I must say that I’ve really enjoyed painting winter landscapes this year. I’ve realized that there really is very little white in snow–but lots of blue, purple, pink and yellow. It all depends on the light!

Pastel painting 6.5 inches x 10 inches $100

Please contact me if you are interested in similar artwork.

Every year we spend a long weekend in Charlevoix, Michigan. We natives call this area “Up North”. Although it is a vacation area, it is much less populated than “Down State” and there are lots of beautiful scenes to paint. While the boys golf, I wander around and park it when I find something that inspires me. This plein air pastel landscape painting captures a lonely bush in the sun on the beach on Lake Michigan. We are looking forward to our visit this year!

Pastel painting of a young woman

Pastel painting 10 inches x 14 inches $200

Please contact me if you are interested in similar artwork.

I visited a new portrait session on Monday and had a great time painting with the group! This young woman, although not a professional model, was so patient with all of the artists and held the pose for over two hours with only a few breaks. I understand that sometimes the models for this group come in costume! Absolutely cool! I’m very interested in continuing to work on pastel portraits so this will be a great chance for me to practice.

Pastel portrait of a beautiful young woman

Please contact me if you are interested in portraits of people or animals!   SOLD

This is the pastel portrait of my oldest niece, Jessica. I really like to do portrait work from life, but these days, it seems that no one is willing to sit for hours while I layer the color on paper. Not even my own family!  I took multiple photos of each of the girls at Christmas break and used various shots to come up with their final portraits. I know them both well and I loved capturing the little sparkles in their eyes…

Pastel portrait of a young woman

Please contact me if you are interested in portraits of people or animals!   SOLD

A while ago, I painted two pastel portraits of my nieces for my sisters birthday. I finally had a chance to give them to her last week so I thought I would post them. Portraits are fun to do but really  have to be “right on”. My sister loved them and her daughters were happy with them, too. They want giclee prints for their own homes!

I will post Jess’ portrait next…

Pastel painting of a grove of palm trees and a path down to the ocean

Pastel painting 5.5 inches x 7.5 inches $100 + shipping

Please contact me if you are interested in this artwork or a commission

This was the colorful view from our condo window down on Sanibel Island. The hues were so bright they almost seemed psychodelic compared to the more subtle colors of Michigan–especially in winter!

This was the first trip that I brought my pastels along. I usually paint watercolor landscapes when I travel. I am much more comfortable with that medium and the finished paintings are easier to transport. But I found that if I wrapped the pastel sketches in wax paper, they made it home just fine.

Close up pastel painting of a potted palm

Pastel painting 5.5 inches x 7.5 inches $100 + shipping

Please contact me if you are interested in this artwork or a commission

The patterns that palms make fascinate me. They are so rhythmic and yet each one is very individual. For this pastel painting, i focused my attention on a single pot sitting on a restaurant deck. Sometimes zooming in a on the “micro landscapes” around us can be just as interesting as the big view scenes. And of course, the bright sun and shadows really make this piece sing!

Pastel painting of a palm tree against an ocean background

Pastel painting 6 inches x 9 inches $100 + shipping

Please contact me if you are interested in this artwork or a commission

I’ll be taking a little getaway to paint in the warm weather soon. Last year I did a lot of plein air pastel paintings on Sanibel Island in Florida. I couldn’t wait to get down there and start sketching, but to my surprise, I had a very hard time of it. The bright sun, colors and atmosphere down south is very different than Michigan. I took me a couple of days to “get the hang of it”. To get me in the mood again, I will be posting some of my favorite little Florida pastel landscapes.

Pastel painting of water rushing over rocks in a creek bed

Pastel painting 12.5 inches x 25.5 inches $850    (Giclee prints are available)

Please contact me if you are interested in this or similar artwork.

Here is the companion to the pastel painting I posted the other day. It is another “micro landscape” in my RiverStone series. Everywhere I travel, I take photos of rocks in riverbeds and streams. Back in the studio, I crop tightly on the images, sometimes adding or deleting elements to make the composition flow better. In these paintings, I eliminated a lot of extraneous information that I felt took away from the feeling of rushing water that I wanted to portray.

Pastel painting of white maltese dog

Pastel painting 8.5 inches x 10 inches      SOLD

Please contact me if you are interested in similar artwork or a commission.

My sister, Beth, was jealous of the pastel painting I did of my Australian Shepard, Roxy. She wanted a portrait of her  Maltese, Tucker. So I took a series of photographs to find just the right pose for the little guy. Hes a furry little thing with lots of personality and it was difficult to get him to sit still long enough to photograph him. I ended up combining a bunch of different references to get to this piece….And she likes it, she likes it!

Pastel painting of Angell Hall at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor

Pastel painting 5 inches x 7 inches $100 + shipping

Please contact me if you are interested in this artwork or a commission.

Ann Arbor is full of beautiful architecture, much of it related to the University of Michigan.  One hot, sunny day last summer, I photographed this view of Angell Hall peeping through an umbrella of trees. I try not to recreate the “official-postcard” scenes of campus in my pastel paintings. In this small piece I wanted to simplify, simplify, simplify to capture only the essential elements of the scene.

Pastel painting 12.5 inches x 25.5 inches $850   (Giclees are available)

Please contact me if you are interested in this or similar artwork.

I just put the finishing touches on this new pastel painting in my Treescape series. This old oak is down near the pond in our neighborhood. I always notice it when I walk along the water with Roxy, so, early one morning in August, I took a bunch of research photos. It is such an ancient, impressive specimen, I couldn’t resist callling it Forte!