End Of A Chapter

Often approaching summer, my focus shifts towards spending more time in nature and on fitness.  Now that my commissioned paintings are completed, taking a break from making videos and blogging will create the space needed for me to enjoy summer and to work on my own personal projects.  I hope to return in a few months to share more artwork as well as a new channel next year perhaps.  I thank you all for your views, comments and messages both on my YouTube channel and here.  I wish you all a wonderful summer.  Love and peace!

"They deem me mad because I will not sell my days for gold; and I deem them mad because they think my days have a price."

-Khalil Gibran

Sanctuary

 

"The world's big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark."
-John Muir

Friendship

 

"Be slow to fall into friendship, but when you are in, continue firm and constant."
-Socrates

Nature Walk

Just a few warm sunny days followed by refreshing spring rain have completely transformed the landscape.  The yellow dandelions like radiant suns amid a sky of green have already turned into magical fluffy spheres dancing in the wind.   

My morning nature walks are my favorite part of the day when I feel most present and at home. When in nature, one may observe that the overall beauty does not just emanate from isolated individual parts, rather from an intimate interconnection between all things.

"This grand show is eternal.  It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising.  Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on sea and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls."

-John Muir

Simple Pleasures

"The dreamer - if you want an exact definition - is not a human being, but a creature of an intermediate sort."

-Dostoevsky

The Dream

"Sorrow compressed my heart, and I felt I would die, and then … Well, then I woke up."
- Dostoevsky

Spring Rain

On this day, the drizzling rain was an invitation to stay indoors.  They listened in silence ...

Nature Meditations

At last the grey melancholic days of winter are over. This morning on my way to the pond, I noticed the magnolia tree once again in bloom giving unconditionally and igniting an inner smile.  

Inspired by nature's beauty, I painted a scene using the chalk dust that I had collected when sharpening the pastel pencil, for the initial tonal values.  I used a soft watercolor brush to apply very small amounts and then used the pencil to add sharper lines for precision.  Lastly, I added a bit of white for the lightest values.

Happy Spring!

 

"Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards."

-Kierkegaard

Light and Shade

 

"We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us."

-Marcel Proust

Value Sketch

The Abduction of Psyche (1895)

The Monk

Prismacolor Pencil on Toned Paper

"I wait with silent passion

for one gesture

one glance

from you."

-Rumi

Another Day

"I need solitude for my writing; not 'like a hermit' - that wouldn't be enough - but like a dead man."

-Franz Kafka