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Fountain at the Botanical Gardens - An original oil painting by George De Chiara

Fountain At The Botanical Garden

 I painted this over the weekend at the Fort Worth Botanical Gardens. This is the fountain that's at the end of the trellis in the Rose Garden. I was struck by the sharp contrast of the fountain water shooting through the air against the background that's mostly in shadow. Plus, there's the added benefit of the wonderful color of the fountain pool water. At first I passed this scene by, thinking it wouldn't make a good painting, or, rather, that I wouldn't be able to make a good painting out of it. I was worried about having the shooting water be such a dominant element in the composition. I knew if I didn't handle that correctly, it would take over the painting and possible divide my canvas. After looking around at a few other possible locations, I finally decided to just go for it and paint the scene that I really wanted to paint, which is the fountain. I noticed I painted a little slower and more deliberate than I normally do to make sure I had enough in the scene to support the shooting water when I painted it in. In fact, the shooting water was the last thing I painted after I had everything else worked out. In the end, I was happy I pushed myself to try something I wasn't sure would work and came out with a painting that I'm proud of. It's good to stretch, which is something I need to keep in mind more often.

Fountain at the Botanical Garden ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x8 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Lake Worth Harbor - An original oil painting by George De Chiara

Lake Worth Harbor

 I must have driven by Lake Worth a hundred times while my wife and I were dating. In order to get to her house from where I lived, I had to drive over the bridge that's just a stones throw from where I did this painting. Somehow, I forgot this lake existed after we got married and moved. Then, yesterday, I was in the mood to go out and paint, but where...? Whenever I get stuck with this question, I usually go to Google maps and do a virtual search for places to paint. That's when I noticed this lake again and the promising looking boat harbor, so I grabbed my painting gear and headed out. It turns out the harbor is private property, so I had to find a different location to paint from. I've gotten pretty use to running into situations like this, so I had already scouted out a few other possible locations to paint from on Google maps. Luckily, the public boat ramp isn't too far from the harbor, so that's where I painted from. A few minutes after I started painting, a gentlemen came up to introduce himself and see what I was doing. It turns out he's an artist too and invited me to paint from his house and pier when ever I want to. It looks like his pier has a great view of the lake, harbor and a few of the other boat houses on the lake. I can't wait to go back and paint from there. Until then, here's the painting I did from the shore.

Lake Worth Harbor ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x6 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Along County Road 256 - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Along Conty Road 256

 Over the weekend, my wife went to a baby shower for one of her friends that was way out in the country. Never one to pass up the opportunity to explore a new area and get in a little painting, I volunteered to drive her and our daughters to the shower. Once I dropped them off, I quickly went to work searching for a good location to paint. There where so many places I wanted to paint that my decision on what to paint came down to finding a good spot to park the car and paint from. For this spot, I found a nice little area on the shoulder of County Road 256, right under a nice live oak tree for some shade. There were many things that made me want to paint this view. First, was the great clouds we had in the sky. The added benefit of this was the wonderful cast shadows going across the foreground from them. And, finally, the occasional cow wandering through the field made me really want to capture this scene.

Along County Road 256 ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x8 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Pumpkin Trio - An original oil painting by George De Chiara

Pumpkin Trio

 I finished this painting late Friday night and had meant to post this entry sooner, but it's been a very busy weekend around here and this is the first chance I've gotten to write this blog. I really wanted to do one more painting of all the little pumpkins and gourds we bought this year. They really area a treat to paint because of their wonderful colors and variety, which keeps me on my painting toes. 

 We've tried for 2 years now to grow these pumpkins ourselves, but, so far, we haven't had much luck. The first year we tried our crop was destroyed by vine borers that we didn't catch in time. Really, we only had about a day to catch the little nasties before the damage was done and the plant dies. But gardening optimism never dies around this house, and, this year, we had a really promising crop going. We even had a rather nice medium-sized pumpkin ripening on the vine when a hungry racoon wandered by and ate it. Then, as you may have heard, Texas had a record-setting summer for heat and almost no rain. No matter how hard I tried to keep the patch going, the conditions where just too much for the plants and we lost everything towards the end of August.  The garden hose is just no substitute for rain and rain barrel systems are dependent on that magical nectar from the sky. I hoping next year, our third time trying, will be the charm.  We are, after all, ever optimistic.

Here's how this painting came to life:

This picture was taken at the end of my rough block-in. There's very little paint on the canvas at this point. Most of this is completed with a little color thinned down with turpentine. The biggest advantage of this approach is the paint is more or less dry when the turpentine evaporates and it really doesn't lift when I paint on top of it. I can also make changes very easily with just a paper towel dipped in turpentine. This is how most of the lighter areas are achieved.

Well, you have to start somewhere, and, for this painting, I started with the yellow and orange pumpkin in the back. This turned out to be the second most difficult one to paint, but more on that later. Once I had  a pretty good start, I started to work on the background and adjusting the shape of the pumpkin.

I continued to refine the background a bit more before starting on the white pumpkin. This one turned out to be the most difficult one to paint out of the three. I was seeing so many different colors in it that I really had to slow down and take my time with my mixing to get it. In the end, I'm not sure I got all the color variety I was actually seeing, but I'm pretty happy with it.

The finished painting:

Pumpkin Trio ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x6 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Howdy - An Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Howdy

 Last week, we were at the Fort Worth Stockyards. I couldn't help but take a few photographs of the cowboys riding around on their horses and getting ready to drive the cattle down the street. I rarely paint this type of subject matter, but it's good to stretch occasionally and push in new directions. With this in mind, I decided it was time to try to tackle the challenges presented by these two rugged figures of the cowboy and his horse. I loved the lighting in my reference image. It's very strong and cast a great shadow of the cowboy hat across his face. That and the wonderful contrast in the outfit he was wearing made this painting a joy to paint.

Below is how this painting came to life:

This is my block-in today. It's a bit more detailed than I normally do for this stage because I wanted to make sure I had the correct proportions of the figure and the horse. I also wanted to paint with simple, strong brush strokes where ever I could, and, without a pretty clear idea of where those brush strokes need to go, they inevitable get overworked with corrections.

I let the block-in dry, which only takes a few minutes since it's painted with paint that's thinned down with turpentine. Once the turpentine evaporates, the paint is fairly dry. I started with the cowboys face and hat because, well, might as well get the most difficult part out of the way first.

I continue to work on the cowboy and his horse getting the basic shapes and forms worked out before tackling the background. I'll use the background to help correct some of the drawing mistakes and adjust the edges of the cowboy and his horse.

Howdy ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x8 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

The Smaller Falls - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

The Smaller Falls

A few years ago, our paper ran a little story about some of the best but least known nature trails in the area (Tarrant County). I clipped the article out and taped it to the back of my studio door for safe keeping. Well, it must have been very safe because I sort of forgot about it until a few days ago when I noticed it hanging there again. One of the spots listed is a great looking waterfall in Westworth Village. With the recent rain we've had, I thought that it might be worth trying to find this spot since it would probably have water running through it. I grabbed the article and our GPS, packed up my painting gear and headed out to find it. The directions in the article were a little vague, with clues like "where the curb on the street is cut, turn". After a few wrong turns, I finally found the area the article talked about and after a short hike along the paved trail, the waterfalls. This spot turned out to be more than I could have hoped for. The waterfalls are stepped with about five different drops varying in size from a few inches to several feet. There's even a few benches right where some of the best views are! I went in the morning, but the sun was slow to shine on the falls. After a little exploring, I finally found an angle where the sun was shining on the top two falls, so that's what I focused on with this painting. I'm already planning my next trip to paint more of this wonderful little area soon. 

The Smaller Falls ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x8 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: Click here to bid.

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Natalie's Pumpkin - Original oil painting by George De Chiara

Natalie's Pumpkin

 Last year, I painted one of these small pumpkins and named it after my then one year old daughter, so it only seemed fitting that I use my newest daughter's name for this year's small pumpkin painting. She's way too young (2 months old) to have actually picked out this pumpkin, but it's the smallest one we have this year and it seemed fitting to name it after her. What attracted me to this little one was the stem. I loved that it had that little stringy bit and that I could pose it almost any way I wanted to for my painting.  I had to be careful though; I accidentally broke off one of the little vines off of it while working out this arrangement.

Below is how today's painting came to life:

First off, this photograph will show you what I was looking at while painting this today. I think I may have had my camera a little low when I took this image, but it's close. You might notice that I simplified the bit of vine that's still on the pumpkin in the painting. In the end, I felt that was just too busy and went with a simpler version of what was there.

This image was taken at the end of my rough block-in. Yes, it's very rough at this stage, but I wanted to see if I could keep things a little looser in the beginning and still get the result I wanted. With that in mind, I felt this was all the block-in I needed to before getting started with more defined painting.

I started with the pumpkin with large simple shapes once my rough block-in had dried a little bit. First, I defined the light areas and then the shadow areas. From there, I kept refining it by building up the form as I went along. I only painted the foreground colors when I needed to define and correct the outer edges of the pumpkin.

Natalie's Pumpkin ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x6 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

In the Flow - Original oil painting by George De Chiara

In the Flow

Painting scenes like this is one of my favorite things to do. I really enjoy the challenge of capturing the moving water and the reflections, so when I found this view at a local park, I knew this is what I'd be painting for the next few hours. I hiked down to the edge of the water to find a good angle to paint from. With all the rain we had over the last week and the cool morning causing a lot of dew on the grass, the river bank was very slick and muddy. Every time I took a step, I slid towards the water. To keep my easel from going into the water, I had to push the legs into the mud. Luckily, I also found a small board to stand on while painting so I didn't slip into the river. 

I must confess though, I've never tried to paint a scene like this from life until now. While painting these types of scenes from a photo makes seeing the movement of the water easier, the photo tends to hide a lot of the details I was able to observe while painting from life. Things like the rocks under the surface of the water and many of the subtle color reflections in the water just get lost in photographs. This is something I'll have to keep in mind the next time I work from photographs.

In the Flow ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x8 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Lakeside View - An original oil painting by George De Chiara

Lakeside View

For the last few days we've had either rain or a good chance of rain, and, with that, we've had these great puffy clouds filling our skies. I have to admit, I'm a bit of a cloud junkie. I'm always checking the sky every time I go out to see what kind of clouds we have for the day. When we get ones like these, I'm just itching to grab my supplies and go out and paint them. Yesterday I was able to do just that. During the late afternoon, I went down to a little park just down the road that has a nice small pond and found this view. Since I wanted to really paint the sky, I gave it a large portion of the painting. With the severe drought we've had here in Texas, I was actually standing where water is supposed to be. You can see just how low the water line is on the shore line I included in the painting. Normally, the water comes up to the grass. With any luck, our recent rain will continue and the lake will be back to its normal level soon.

 When I go out to paint, I usually have to carry so much equipment that I normally forget to bring along my camera so I can take pictures as I work. It's really something I need to try to make a better effort with, but I forgot it on this trip and don't have any progress pictures to share. Below is the finished painting.

Lakeside View ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 6x8 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Fragile - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Fragile

Fragile is the latest painting to roll out of the studio. I actually finished this one a few days ago, but things have been super busy here and I'm finally getting a chance to write my blog post about it now. I'm not really sure what inspired this one. I was playing around with a few different objects in my shadow box trying to come up with something that I liked when I noticed that most of the things I had grabbed were all glass. Hmm..., I thought, that might be an interesting idea. All glass! What do I have to lose? So I immediately went to work finding all the interesting glass objects in my collection of still life objects. I spent an hour or two trying a few different arrangements before focusing on and fine tuning this one. The last touch was to add a little colored water into bottle on the little plate. Then it was time to paint. Below is how this painting came to life:

First off, here's a photograph of approximately what I was looking at while painting. Some of the color is really lacking in this image. When I was painting from this arrangement, it seemed to me that the green bottle was a little lighter in color, with a lot more yellow in it and that blue bottle in the foreground was a lot darker. This is one of the reasons I prefer to paint from life when ever it's possible.

This image was taken at the end of my rough block-in, about 45 minutes of painting time. The goal at this stage for me is to make sure I can fit everything on the canvas that I want, and to get a very rough indication of the color and shape of each object. I'm using a mixture of paint thinned with turpentine, color mixtures with white added to them, and a paper towel dipped in turpentine to wipe out areas of the canvas to create shapes.

Once the block-in is finished, I give it a few minutes to dry so when I start to paint on top of it, the colors don't lift and blend. I'm starting with the glass bottle in the foreground. I think this is a good place to start since it has some of the lightest lights in it and some of the darkest darks. It's also the area I want to be my center of interest.

I more or less worked across the canvas, concentrating on the glass objects. I figured once I had those done, the rest of the painting should go pretty quickly. Once I got to this point, I felt I had all the glass objects well under control and mostly finished, so I concentrated on finishing up the foreground and then give everything one last once over.

Fragile ©

Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 9x12 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD

Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.