Yellow Rose of CostaTexaRica

I was born in Houston about the same time dirt was made. Houston was a lot smaller and safer then, and my childhood memories of growing up there have a kind of magical quality to them. I won't bore you with recounting them, because each of you had a childhood too, or you wouldn't be sitting there reading this, and the last thing you wanna do is read about somebody else's childhood. But I do want to dwell a second on Texas. I painted the yellow rose above and for three weeks went around mentally humming "The Yellow Rose of Texas", ...I came very close to crossing the border into LooneyBirdLand. It must have showed, cause people would come up and ask me if I needed to lay down and take a few aspirin.
Here in Costa Rica, I meet a lot of tourists from everywhere...lots of Europeans and Asians. Whether stemming from a deep sense of concern for others, or just plain being nosy, I ask a lot of questions. One of my favorite questions is "Where all have ya been on your travels"? I'm amazed how many folks have been to Texas and equally amazed at their impressions of the state, from "really sucks" to " absolutely, wonderfully fantastic". Well now, what a conundrum. But, thinking about it. Texas IS so diverse, those reactions are understandable. If a person was blindfolded and set down in South Texas, he might think he was in a tropical paradise. Set down in Galveston or Padre Island, ...Texas is white beaches by the sea. Set down in East Texas...thick woods and hiking trails. Houston or Dallas...the Metropolitan scene. Big Bend..the Grand Canyon. Abilene in February...the Arctic. El Paso...the desert. Lubbock...Mars on a bad day. So I painted this yellow rose as a salute to Texas.
I usually paint wildlife, so this rose was a bit of a challenge. I experimented around with something called Interference color. It's a pearl textured medium you mix in with your paint and it lends a somewhat iridescent quality to the painting. Not sure I like it. It sure doesn't photograph or scan well and you can notice the effect on the right of the rose. It's called interference because it "interferes" with the transmission of color and results in this lustrous image. They really are doing some neat things in the science world with visual effects. I managed to get hold of some of that material they're developing for cloaking and invisibility and mixed some in with my acrylics. I did a frog painting with it, but I haven't been able to find it, so I don't know how it turned out. Think I'll just stick with my little plastic paints.

Who Dat?

The DSFDF project had a bit different year-end assignment for participating artists. Those artists that chose to participate were asked to submit a photo of themselves and in return, receive a photo of another participating artist from which they would render a portrait. I have never painted a portrait of anyone and when I received my assignment, I immediately questioned myself whether I left my brain somewhere out in the rainforest. But, always game to try almost anything once, I grabbed a canvas and some paints. The photo of my victim was a gentleman whose face was halfway submerged into shadow. The administrator of the DSFDF project didn't tell who it was I about to insult with my acrylics, so I went to past projects, snooping....using my fantastic powers of intuition and dumb luck. When I went to the week before's workboot project and ran across a painting of the subject boots filled with a little fellow who looked like "anything but happy", done by an artist named Adebanji Alade, I knew I hit paydirt. I was so confident that it was him that I was painting, I incorporatded his painting behind him in the portrait I was doing. When finished I sent an E-Mail with attached portrait to Adebanji. Sure nuff, it was him, and he was well satisfied with my attempt, even tho it made him look older. This was a really fun project.