Groundhog

April 24, 2019 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ Leave a comment

This is a 6×4 pencil crayon drawing on pastel paper.

Now if you’re wondering what pencil crayons are, they are what Americans called coloured pencils. Even though I’ve lived in the States for many years and sometimes use color instead of colour, and I almost never say toque and I rarely drink a mickey or two-four… sure rarely sounds about right…anyway I can’t give up my pencil crayon terminology ..

Anyway here’s a grumpy groundhog. Not sure what he’s grumpy about unless he’s an American groundhog and would have preferred to be done with colored pencils. Sorry buddy..not in this house!

©Virginia Spencer, thepurpledogpaintingblog.com, 2019

My favorite acrylics of the year.

December 22, 2018December 22, 2018 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ Leave a comment

And yes to my Canadian relatives, I did spell “favourites” the American way.

A hot air balloon, 4×4 inches.

A still life, 5×7 inches.

A zombie that for some reason ended up looking like Patrick Swayze, 8 x 10 inches.

Another still life, 3×6 inches, I forgot to finish the lemon the left..ignore that please.

A sign for my house, 22 x 8 inches.

Some pizza, 3×3 inches

A fancy colorful sheep.

acrylic sheep animal colorful painting

And my favourite, an Ode to VanGogh and Space.

©Virginia Spencer, thepurpledogpaintingblog.com, 2018

My favorite watercolors of the year.

December 22, 2018December 22, 2018 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ 2 Comments

I haven’t wrote on here in awhile. I don’t know if people read blogs much anymore but I do enjoy writing so I’ll keep on keeping on even if I’m only entertaining myself.

To catch up, with everything I meant to post this year, I thought I’d do a couple of year blogs to showcase my favorite creations of the year.

These are some ATC’s, that is cards that measure 2.5 by 3.5 inches. These are all done with watercolor. These were done for a trade.

This is also a watercolor but is a little bigger at 7×4 inches.

Here’s a warmer watercolor, also a miniature at 4×6 inches.

And here’s a watercolor of a leaf and acorn. I think this one was 5×4 inches.

©Virginia Spencer, thepurpledogpaintingblog.com, 2018

Me me me me me!!

April 9, 2018April 9, 2018 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ Leave a comment

I recently participated in an art trading card (ATC) project.

The theme was “All About Me”

That’s right. Me me me me me..

The cards are all 2.5 by 3.5 inches and painted with acrylic.

This one is a still life of flowers. I love flowers.

I also love tea and grow my own mint.

These art deco bottles belonged to my grandmother.

My gardening shovel.

One of my oldest and dearest friends. His name is Spot and we went on many an adventure together.

One of the Lincoln dresses, from the display at the Lincoln Museum in Springfield.

My breakfast, blueberries and peanut butter on a waffle. That’s right, I eat that.

My favorite color of nail polish, green!

©Virginia Spencer, thepurpledogpaintingblog.com, 2018

Merry Christmas!

December 24, 2016December 24, 2016 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ 1 Comment

I wish you all the very Merriest of Christmases and a Happy New Year!

The following were done for a trade on WetCanvas.com.

I normally do many many cards at Christmas but am having some hand issues. If you didn’t get a hand drawn one this year, my apologies!

Ink, 4×6 inches.

©Virginia Spencer, thepurpledogpaintingblog.com, 2016

Elephants and Pumpkins

October 16, 2016October 16, 2016 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ 3 Comments

And no, this is not a political post.

Fall with it’s dramatic skies and dancing leaves is here with a vengeance. I really need to do some catching up on the blog.

This painting is a two inch square in acrylic and will most likely be bigger on your screen then in real life.

This ink is more than double the size at 5×5 inches. This was part of a monthly miniature challenge on WetCanvas. WetCanvas has a huge reference image library, it’s a fantastic resource. Thanks to the member that added the photo I used as a reference for this.

In the original photo the wall was brick and there were solar panels everywhere. I altered those which is always a good idea when you have discordant elements. You don’t have to paint or draw exactly what is in a photo or right in front of you. The pens are Microns.

This pumpkin in acrylic is from the same challenge. This quick study is 5×5 inches.

This is also from a photo reference from WetCanvas. This was a fun one, it was a challenge to use restricted palettes.

This is the Zorn palette which is Yellow Ochre, Cadmium Red Medium, Ivory Black and Titanium White.

Anders Zorn(February 18, 1860 – August 22, 1920) was a Swedish painter who generally painted people and figures. I’m not sure why he used such a restricted palette but after playing with it for awhile I can see the lure of the colors he used.

Fish on a plate, acrylic, 10×14 inches (not a mini!)

I found some interesting shadows on my walls.

And I fixed a staid apron by embroidering an elephant with a happy spoon on it.

Meanwhile back at the ranch..

Sampson had surgery and thoroughly enjoyed his meds.

Zeus also had surgery and was awfully affronted when I suggested that he was supposed to be sitting on the pillow on the floor not in my new chair.

They both recovered nicely.

My sunflowers grew over 12 feet tall.

We rescued these two birds.

This juvenile cedar waxwing was caught in a sudden heavy deluge of rain. he was fine after he dried off. Sorry about the fuzzy photo!

This red breasted nuthatch, I found upside down on the porch, I think he hit the window. He flew away fine after a drink and some warmth.

This came across our TV, then we had three very small tornadoes..

And there’s a frog living in my birdhouse. He’s been there since early July.

And I’ve taken at least one hundred photos of him,

And he is smiling in every single one.

🙂

©Virginia Spencer, thepurpledogpaintingblog.com, 2016

Waspppp Uppp!!

September 18, 2016 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ 5 Comments

That is…

Wasp up there!

Actually, it’s a hornet’s nest, a bald faced hornet. They’re pretty talented, look at those textures.

We’ve had a busy year in our gardens for insects. The insect world is an interesting one.

I don’t quite know what to make of whatever this bee is doing.

Is he fighting with that bug? Is he eating it? Do bees eat bugs?

I have no idea but this butterfly watched the whole thing and kept getting closer and closer until the bee buzzed at it.

I watched until the bee flew away with the creeper butterfly in tow. It was rather disconcerting and a bit gross so here’s a cute bee on a pretty flower to wash that taste out.

Then there’s the mason bee, they come in varying colors. This one is wearing a sassy blue metallic coat that she picked up at the recent New York Fashion week.

The bees and the wasps were all enjoying the various flowers and hummingbird feeders. The hummingbirds kept a wary eye…

..while Dummy hung out on a mushroom.

I wonder if he knows that he has a thread stuck in his neck joint.

I guess I’ll go tell him, if I can find him. He’s never around when I want him.

Here’s 4×6 pen and ink with watercolor of a Greenman. Thanks to graymare on WetCanvas for putting the photo in the Reference Image Library there.

©Virginia Spencer, thepurpledogpaintingblog.com, 2016

The heat is on..

June 14, 2016 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ Leave a comment

Recently I participated in an ATC trade. An ATC is a small card about the size of a playing card, that is 2.5 inches by 3.5 inches.

Most trades have themes, for this one the theme was “Warm Weather”.

I used ink and watercolor to make some scenes from various festivals and other warm weather activities. These will most likely appear bigger in your screen then they are in life. The color looks better in real life as well, my photography brain left me stranded when I took these.

“The Carousel”

There is a Carousel in Port Dalhousie, Ontario. The price is still only 5¢.

That carousel, has one of the five Loof lions that are left in North America. Their lion is the only left that has its head turned to look at the spectators, which for some reason has always made me happy. 🙂

“The Cherry Blossom Festival” is usually one of the first warm weather festivals and is the best smelling one to boot.

“The Flea Market”. My Dad, was not a shopping/ clothes minded guy . One day he wandered off at a flea market. He came back with a gigantic bag of factory castoff socks. He paid $2 for all those socks and it made him sooo happy. My mother who had just accidentally shrunk his pea green plaid suit by putting it the dryer fifty times was not so happy. Coincidence? I think not.

“The Hiking Trail”. With the upsurging popularity of the Parks system, it will be only a matter of time before Yeti becomes a bearded, top knot wearing hipster.. If he opens a coffee shop and hires a groovy ukulele playing singer, it could work out well for him.

“The Campground” where you go after hiking. It is also where the raccoons go. Once when we were out on a canoe trip, our campers were getting a little freaked out by raccoons who were making various.. um, love songs, let’s say. We told them to scare them off by making noise. Not too long afterwards, we heard an especially long “love song”. As soon as it stopped all our campers burst into claps and whistles. I swear that raccoon walked right into the clearing and gave a bow..

“The Strawberry Field”. I should have added a couple kids pelting each other with soft strawberries because as anyone who has been strawberry picking with my brothers knows..that happens.

“The Music Festival”. Those prices are getting out of control, man.

“The Garden Show”. I once spent a summer slightly adjusting and moving my neighbors gnomes every day. Ended up getting the whole neighborhood involved so she couldn’t figure out who was doing it. Drove her crazy….good times, good times.

“The Craft Show” where crafty people while never admitting it, go to get more ideas on crafts to craft..Crafty crafty crafting crafters.

“The Farmer’s Market” where the pies are sweet and the birdies say tweet.

“The Waterfront” or “Why I love boating”.

“The Renaissance Fair”. Cheers good Knight!

Under the knife..

December 4, 2015December 4, 2015 ~ thepurpledogpaintingblog ~ 3 Comments

I’ve been playing with knives.

Palette knives that is.

No one trusts me with the real kind…sigh.

This first one is acrylic, 11 x 14, inches This is the Wheatfield in Gettysburg, PA. where we visited recently.

The Wheatfield had during one day over 20,000 men fighting on her soil and ended with mass causalities. It’s not a terribly large area, I can’t imagine what they must have suffered through. It’s one of the many places on this earth where if you stand still for a moment you can feel the sorrow welling up.

With this painting I used the palette knife over a brushed in backdrop. The brushwork on the bottom layer was used to create the soft edges of the distant hills.

This tree was a fun sort of leftover paint attack. This was done solely and a bit souly with knives. I really enjoyed throwing the paint around on this. It’s in acrylic and is approximately 11 by 14 inches.

This one wasn’t done with a knife, just regular old brushes. My brushes are so beat up, I hold on to them until the very end. Acrylics are rough on brushes. Some people will tell you to spend a tonne of money on brushes but really as long as they’re not the kind where the hairs fall out, the cheap ones are fine. It’s 4×6 inches and I call it “Blue Christmas” ’cause I love Elvis.