Desert Landscape

"Just as Beautiful"

24" x 36" x 1.5" acrylic on gallery-wrapped canvas

$225

This painting was completed for the Calypso Moon Artist Movement February assignment to paint a winter landscape.

Yes, this is a winter landscape. Kind of.

We live near the west Texas town of Del Rio, where the Sonoran desert meets the Chihuahuan. There are millions of acres of rolling hills, flat expanses, and jagged ancient mountaintops peeking over every horizon. The trees are short, if at all, the bushes low and thorny, and the animals tough.

And a sky overhead that never ends, that wraps you in a blanket of blue warmth, that stirs the soul and awakens the senses.

At least that's what I see.

Most people who come here see desolation, isolation, harsh environs, and BROWN. "Where are the trees? There's no green here! How can you stand it? It's just so, so, so BROWN."

Yes, yes it is brown, and yes, most of us would consider brown to be a supportive color, not one to gaze upon longingly. But why? Why is brown bad?

True, there are some nasty things that are brown, like mud on the carpet and certain bodily necessities. Eww. Sorry. But there are wonderful things that are brown, too. Chocolate, coffee, soil, potatoes, and brownies. So why is brown bad?

Growing up in the east, I have lived my entire life surrounded by green. Green is great, really it is. But in the Spring and Summer when everything is in bloom, EVERYTHING is green. There is so much green that all of the other colors get washed away, overlooked, neglected. Only the reddest rose will stand out, the most shocking pink azalea can catch your gaze, the most daring yellow sunflower can win your attention. The rest is GREEN.

But not here in the desert. Sure, there is some green to be seen during each season, but the other colors, all ROY G. BIV of them, get their own chance to shine. When your backdrop is brown, you as a color can really show your stuff!

For this painting I wanted to share, in my own little way, the beauty of my desert in all of it's brown glory. Each section represents a season. As you can see, the underlying colors are the same, shades of brown, tan, white, and gray. But each season brings it's own palette of lovely accent colors that in any other green landscape would be completely upstaged.

In Spring, the wettest months with almost 6 inches of rain total, there may be thunderheads building in the never-ending blue skies. The prickly pears awaken from their winter slumber and plump up their pads and become a beautiful, rich, decedent green. On top of these nopales, pads, gorgeous magenta/yellow/red/pink flowers burst forth getting ready for the fruits growing beneath.

The low lying bushes, many of which are Purple Sage, spring to life and with their lavender hues entirely transform the scenery into a bubblegum chorus line. The purple goes on, and on, and on.

There are many, very many small delicate flowers, no larger than your fingernail, that spring to life, their colors adding to the rich web of beauty.

If there was all of that green, none of these other colors would ever be seen.


In Summer, when the cumulus clouds fight for space against the continual blue sky, the rain stops falling and the desert dries up. The last of the sage blooms in purple protest, the cactus lose some of their green pop, and the prickly pear flowers make way for the blood red fruit, called tuna, that top the cactus like crowns.

Sunflower-like weeds grow to glorious heights, straining against the burning sun. The small weed flowers still blossom incredibly, even with temperatures above 110 degrees. The mix of colors shimmer and dance in the radiant heat from the ground.

If there was more green, the sunflowers would be lost in the mix and couldn't give us strength with their determination to beat the sun.


In Fall, there are no clouds. Because of the yearlong low levels of humidity, the sky remains this shade of blue year round. Don't believe me? I invite you to come for a visit and see for yourself. I'll even pick you up from the airport or train station.

The color of the sky at the apex is the deepest cobalt blue, and fades to the horizon in the most stunning display of Carolina blue you have ever seen.

I have been frozen in my tracks many times during my daily run when I take my eyes off of the ground in front of me (spotting for nasty critters), and look up into that glorious sky.

"For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities-his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God." -Romans 1:20

The prickly pear fruits become ready for harvest as they turn a deep reddish purple and begin to fall from the cactus. The small flowers still bloom and the shrubs lose their last hints of purple and begin to slowly change into yellow.

If it were all green no one could see the prickly pear fruits or the tiny yellow flowers on the ground, or the soft gray leaves getting ready for the Winter.


In Winter, the sky is dry and full of high cirrus clouds. The threat of bad weather hangs occasionally in the sky, usually on it's way to the East leaving this desert dry and dormant.

The prickly pears lose their green and turn a deep, sleeping brick red. Some droop and shrivel to the ground while others hold firm, ready for the short winter to be over. The weeds finally stop their show of baby blooms, and the the shrubs sport yellow and orange leaves. Across the vista is a sea of gold.

Who needs green when you can have gold?

My Favorite Painting

Over the years, I have painted many, many, oh so many paintings. Many I have given away to family and friends, a few I have sold, and most I have kept. Some hang on my walls, others are waiting for their day in the sun, as it were.

But of all of the paintings in my house, this one of the grapes is my favorite.

I love the abstract quality of the grapes; the mound of fruit with only a few grapes defined by shape and color. I love the multiple hues of brown, orange, and black in the bowl. I love the way the grapes hang asymmetrically off the bowl, but only slightly so. I love the shadows on the bowl and grapes. I love the purpley-blues.




I love that this painting was not done by me but by a really good friend of mine.

I love that this friend is also my daughter.

I love that my daughter painted this using Crayola watercolor paints.

I love that my daughter was only 5 years old when she painted this.

What's not to love?

Daisy Dance Line

"Daisy Dance Line"

20" x 24" x 1.4" Acrylic on Gallery-wrapped canvas

I completed this painting for January's Calypso Moon Artist Movement challenge. Last month we were tasked with creating a website, opening an etsy.com store, or other online avenue in which to sell our art. Done.

Next, we were to create a painting and put it up for sale on our chosen sales arena. I have a website for my art, www.paulareynoldsart.com, and this blog that I am listing this painting for sale. (I also have an etsy shop but it is empty right now. One day soon I'll get it going again.)

I came up with this idea from a painting I saw in a restaurant of abstract horses on a black background. Don't ask me how I got from horses to blue daisies. I really wanted to experiment using a black background and painting backwards, dark to light, but this didn't really end up that way. Sometimes when you have one idea for a painting, another sneaky idea will pop into your head and completely take over. Like mold. Or cellulite.

But prettier!

It took me quiet a while to paint this simply because of the small brushwork. But it's fun, colorful, and really adds a lot of color, drama, and POP to an otherwise boring wall!

Happy blue daisies everyone!

(Look for my art at The Firehouse; the home of the Del Rio Council for the Arts. My show will be the entire month of May, with an open-house and meet-and-greet the artist, ME!, on the first Friday of May.

Oh, and wine and cheese will be served. See you there!)

Horizontal Wispiness

Winter, Part I

16" x 40" x 1.5" acrylic on gallery wrapped canvas
(My goodness, the blues aren't this blue, though. More subdued.)

This is the first of a four part series of abstract paintings I'm doing for our new house/art show. This style of painting I learned while trying my hand at learning abstract "vertical wispiness". When I first started selling my art and taking commissions, I had a friend who trusted me to paint her a triptych with these instructions: "Vertical wispiness".

Um, what?

She found a painting, actually from the set of the movie "Twilight: New Moon", that she wanted me to try and duplicate using her color palette. I had never painted anything abstract. I had never painted anything that was supposed to be free and wispy, yet organized and "finished".

I have just used a whole lot of """" in this post. I don't know the real "artsy" terms for "wispiness", "finished", or any thing else so please forgive my """"'s.

Anyway. I tried a thousand different techniques and finally came up with one that blended the colors gradually yet retained the deep values of each tone. I tried to make them airy and light, though I think the final product was a tad too heavy and not cloud-like enough.

A few months ago, I painted a triptych for my mom using the same technique using greens, browns, and gold. This time, I used a modeling paste to lay down a scroll pattern on the canvas (using a stencil), that I painted over. When the wispy colors were dry, I touched up the raised scroll design with gold paint, varnished the whole thing, and BAM! awesomeness was achieved.

(I lost all of the pictures I took of those paintings or else I would share them.)

For our new house, I wanted a wall of "horizontal wispy" paintings that could be a focal point in our government beige appointed house. I have chosen to do four paintings of equal size, one for each season, and hang them one atop the other.

I also am doing the 3D effect in each painting. Winter has "snowflake" shapes (shh! Don't remind me that snowflakes are supposed to be different from each other. I couldn't find any snowflake patterns!) Spring will be pastels with a few flowers; summer will be bright colors and a sun; fall will be, well, fall colors and 3D leaves.

I'm hoping for a Wow! wow factor in our low-ceiling-ed base house.

Here are a few close-ups of the snowflake and the wispy color application.

Seeing it one the computer, I don't really like how the white and black looks like clouds. I meant for it to be more stripey.

Dang.

Bold Butterfly

Paige's last day of public school was last week, and while in the school un-enrolling her, I noticed how wonderful the art projects were hanging up and down the hallways.

I remember elementary school art class as being the best thing ever. Better than Santa. Better than popcorn. Better than ANYTHING. Like Paige, my art was always the one by the front door of the school, usually with a blue ribbon attached to it.

Then I grew up just enough to stop doing art except when absolutely necessary. Sure, I always got 100's on the projects I made for class, and yeah, you need an exact replica of this drawing? Sure, I can do that, too. But I never thought anything of it. Yes, I'm a good at art. So what?

Fast forward too many years and I add to my very, very short list of regrets the fact that I missed so many opportunities to take art classes. My high school had a nationally recognized art program. Did I take a single art class? Nope.

I graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill (Go Heels!), which is as liberally "art"sy as they come. Did I take one measly little art class? Nope. Not one. Not one in four years plus three summers of continual higher education.

I took advanced evolutionary mechanics, embryology, and genetic diversity classes instead.

Those were awesome classes, don't get me wrong. But had I known, had I had one inkling of what my adult life would really be like, I would have dropped organic chemistry level 401 and taken Drawing 101.

What's the point? I've lost my train of thought......

Oh, yes. Elementary art education.

Because I took so little art instruction classes, my mind is limited to what I can come up with as new art projects for my children and myself. I will be homeschooling in the spring so I need ideas for cool art projects. I will be, amongst many other things, the art teacher.

While waiting for the paperwork at the school, I walked up and down the hallway snapping pictures of the many art projects the kids had done. I won't put any online because I don't have permission, but this butterfly I did is an example of one the projects they did. Each child drew an animal and then filled in the open areas with blocks of patterns using many bright and wonderful colors. Paige made a snake that I'll post here soon.

Point of my ramblings: If you have the opportunity, whether young or old, to take an art class, do it! Life is short, art is precious, and evo devo is limited in potential applications.

A Gift for Grandma

I painted this orange half for my grandmother for Christmas. Every summer of my youth my sister and I would spend a month or so living the sweet life in the care of this wonderful woman.

A daily routine during these summer days was to enjoy an orange, eaten with one of her tiny collecting spoons of which she has hundreds. My sister and I would stand on tip toes and stare into her spoon cabinet, searching, searching for the perfect spoon to eat our perfect orange. One day it would be the New Zealand spoon, another day a spoon from D. C. No matter your mood she would have a spoon to match.

My grandmother is 88 now and just this past summer my kids enjoyed selecting "their" spoon from her collection to eat their orange halves. As did I.

When someone is 88, they don't need more stuff, more things to decide what to do with. So I painted her something I hope will mean something a little bit more. A thank you, in acrylics, for all of the love, memories, and oranges she has given me over the years.

I don't think she reads this blog, but if you do, Grandma, Merry Christmas! I love you!

(Oh, and I couldn't find an image of any spoon that I know for sure she has, so I made one up, using the Connecticut flag as my inspiration.)

Snow Globe Christmas

"Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow Globe!"

6" x 9" acrylic on canvas

This is my submission to the December Calypso Moon Artist Movement challenge. We were to paint a Christmas/Holiday card with the option of exchanging our cards with another artist from the challenge. This assignment worked out well as I was planning on doing a painting for our Christmas card this year anyway.

I got the idea to paint a snow globe from another contributor at CMAM. I loved the bright colors and simplicity of this snow globe I found for a buck at the Dollar Store.

I left the background white to make the painting stand out, but now it looks too washed out for a Christmas card. I may try to add a background if I can find time before the Christmas cards will need to go out.

My problem is that I do not have a very good camera or location to photograph my art so the images never come out nearly as well as the real thing. I always photograph my art outside in a neutral shaded spot or wait for an overcast day (kind of hard sometimes here in San Antonio), but even then the true feeling of the painting is lost.

I don't know how well this image will translate to paper. I'll take it to Kinko's later and see what they can do.

Any suggestions?