as of 1•5•2024
I took an online class from Joseph Patric Daniels at Udemy, which is a website of classes, and as impersonal as that form of learning was, he taught me about layering, transparency, precise color mixing, and the importance of confidence and patience in realistic painting.
The class took me several months to complete, and this painting of a grapefruit (2023) was one of the final class exercises after painting eggs, a balloon and a chrome teapot.
I used those class skills to paint this woodpecker parent and child (2023). This painting is about connections. I loved the symbolic message in the bit of drool connecting young with old. Baby woodpeckers are altricial, meaning they are born underdeveloped and helpless. Their feathers begin as dark blacks and browns, but gradually they acquire the magnificent adult-like red and orange coloring which also connects them to each other. This acrylic painting is 15 by 20.
