Beautiful work, Linda. Luscious paint application!

Michelle, your twenty bucks are in the mail. :) I especially appreciate this from you since I know you earned your dues on the street drawing passersby, as did I. You know, I really am taking entirely too much credit here for the knockout beauty of this model. The way the light hit that jaw - it just blew me out of the water. I've been painting in life classes and open studios for ... hmmm... maybe fifteen years, nine of them here in the Valley where I have good access to models. When things click it is a huge rush of endorphins.

Speedy painting from life like this is probably kind of a parlor trick, like juggling or maybe flipping your eyelids back on top of your eyeballs.

Mischa, you are very kind to say this, and I'm really enjoying your wit and talent here on the Forum.

Julie, I also enjoy your work, and thank you for these kind comments!

Okay - now that I think about it, the question is sort of dorky. I'm referring to the palette you hold, and even dorkier - how do you transport your stuff to and from the studio? (Where's that red-faced embarrassed smilie?)

Can you do that? My 12 year old son does it - it's so gross it freaks me out.

Linda, Linda, Linda!
 

I really don't know WHAT to add to the kudos except that I think it is amazing.

I personally love uplighting and this is a wonderful and fresh example of how effective it can be done with restraint and talent.

Again, I would STILL be looking for my yellow ochre.

Oh Linda, how did I miss this! I'm most blown away by her neck! That is an incredibly graceful and powerful line. Then I noticed everything else, and the attitude. She really has that "retinal burn" factor. I won't even mention the 3 hours.

Jean

Your son is very talented! Everybody should have at least one freakish gift to liven up dull parties, board meetings, etc. Actually, I can vibrate my irises very rapidly, not that this has ever made me popular, I have to say.

About the set up - I put blobs of my paint in a flattish Tupperware container and keep it in the freezer (I put paint left over from a day's painting session in with the blobs) and take it to open studio. When I get there I just transfer the blobs to my handheld palette. If I had a bigger freezer I would just keep the whole palette in there (with the mixing area always scraped clean). I have two palettes going by the way, one with my outside colors and one with my inside colors. I once had a very beautiful Turtlewood palette (found at Michael Shane Neal's site) but I gave it away to another artist (I can't believe I did that, it was beautiful).

For the rest, I keep a big canvas shopping bag with art supplies in it, ready to go. I keep a checklist taped to the bag so that I can go through and make sure I have everything I need and I don't leave home without something. I keep around three or four 24" x 30" Masonite panels with taped linen canvas to them so that I can just grab one and go, either to open studio or a landscape.

Sharon, get back down here soon and do a great setup for us all!

Jean, there is always so much drama in your own work, and thank you for your nice comments.