Lately I have been experimenting with something quite different from my usual photography and digital work: colored pencils, markers, ink, and paper. The experiments began with a simple question: What would happen if I took some of my original photographs and reduced them to lines, shapes, and areas of color that I could work with by hand? AI became one of the tools that helped me answer that question. Rather than asking AI to create finished artwork for me, I used it as part

Every so often I realize that my studio contains an extraordinary number of things I have saved because I was certain I would eventually find a use for them. Old photographs. Postage stamps. Pieces of patterned paper. Bits of correspondence. Marks and impressions from rubber stamps. Scraps that weren't quite important enough to organize but were much too interesting to throw away. I'm currently trying to clean up some of those odds and ends that have been squirreled away arou

The Same Shapes Keep Coming Back One of the first things I noticed was repetition. Circles. Loops. Dots. Irregular rectangles. Heavy black outlines. Long vertical and horizontal lines. Compartments. Grids. Wavy bands. Small marks gathered into larger clusters. They appear again and again. In my sketchbooks, these shapes can be playful and organic. Circles grow into other circles. Forms connect like cells under a microscope. Lines wander through different areas of the page. Pa

Knowing When a Painting Is Finished One of the hardest questions in making art is also one of the simplest: How do you know when a painting is finished? I've been working on this large mixed-media abstract for some time now, building it gradually through paint, collage, drawing, line, texture and repeated layers. At this stage, I think I am almost finished. Almost. And sometimes that is the most dangerous stage of a painting. Earlier in the process, decisions are relatively e

Exploring My Art on Fine Art America Over the years, my photography and artwork have grown into a very large and wonderfully varied collection. My Fine Art America gallery has become one of the places where I can bring all of those different interests together — photography, vintage imagery, automobiles, architecture, landscapes, abstract work, restoration, and newer digitally reimagined pieces. At the moment, my Fine Art America portfolio contains more than 14,000 images org

There is something very different about standing in front of a seven-foot canvas. At 7 feet tall and 4 feet wide, this piece is large enough that I can’t really approach it the same way I would a smaller painting. I have to move around it, stand back from it, come forward again, and continually look at how one area relates to another. At this scale, painting becomes almost physical. I thought it would be interesting to document this one as it develops rather than waiting unti

Long before smartphones and social media, a community photograph was an event. Someone would spread the word that the photographer was coming. Families dressed in their best clothes, children tried their hardest to sit still, musicians carried their instruments, and neighbors gathered together in front of the largest building available—often a church, school, or community hall. These three photographs appear to capture one of those moments. The American flags and patriotic bu

Every once in a while, while scanning another box of old negatives or glass slides, I come across an image that makes me stop. This was one of those moments. As I placed this century-old glass plate negative on the scanner, I wasn't expecting much. The plate had been broken years ago, leaving a large section missing from one corner. Time had added scratches, stains, fading, and countless imperfections. At first glance, it looked like another photograph that history had claime

This is a really common (and legitimate) practice, and Kird Barken looks like a textbook example of it. Here's how the pipeline typically works: Lately I have been using a brand of pencils, Kird Barken, that I purchased from Amazon. I really like them. The colors are bright they don't crumble and they sharpen well. So I did a deep dive ....read below so you can share my surprise about the origination of these types of pencils: (essentially these types of pencils are man

One of the most rewarding—and occasionally frustrating—parts of creating my website has been learning to build and refine it myself. Every page represents not only my artwork but also countless hours of experimentation, problem solving, and discovering how Wix works behind the scenes. There are days when everything falls into place, and there are days when a single mysterious problem can consume an entire afternoon. Yesterday was one of those days. I spent hours trying to tra

Visitors occasionally ask why some photographs appear on my website but aren't available on my Fine Art America print gallery. The answer is simple: while the two sites complement one another, they serve very different purposes. My website is my creative home. It brings together original photography, restored vintage photographs, digital artwork, mixed media, travel images, works in progress, and the stories behind many of the images. It is where I can share projects that int

Nearly twenty years ago, I stumbled into the world of vintage photographs quite by accident. At the time, I was working in a demanding and often stressful career, and searching through boxes of old photographs, slides, and negatives became an unexpected escape. What began as simple curiosity soon grew into a lifelong passion. Each image represented a moment that could never be recreated—a family celebration, a quiet country road, a neighborhood now transformed, or an ordinary

Finding Joy in the Chaos of Art Supplies Over the past six months, I’ve been on a mission: to finally organize the mountains of art...

Wow time flies. This has been my biggest procrastination project ever. My last blog post was in 2020 well a lot happened then didn't...

crazy about Abstract art ....

Love painting trees....this is my most recent work.

All original art work by me !

About my art that is ...but that being said I am starting to like my work more every day. Its a good idea to document your work as you...

Using the techniques that Donna teaches in her workshop I am able to finish two or three pieces to completion. This is one. This...

Inspired by a class a took from Donna Downey I created these abstract figurative paintings. This first example is a mixed media painting...