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Small River Falls

 I'm testing out FASO's new blog postings to Facebook. I'm hoping this works better then network blogs, which I've never been happy with. Anyway, this is just a test post to see if it picks up. Please ignore it.

Spring Blooms - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Spring Blooms

 Right around the end of February when the weather started to turn nice here in Texas, my wife and I bought a few flowers for our garden. In the past, we have not done well with flowers. I'm not sure why since our vegetable garden seems to do well. This year we vowed to do better with them. I planted them into clay pots with the hopes of keeping them alive long enough to paint once or twice. Well, I'm happy to report that not only did we manage to keep them alive, they are thriving. All of them have more than doubled in size and blooms. This is the third time I've been able to paint these since we got them. They are going strong and so far haven't shown any signs of slowing down. One of the reasons I think they are doing so well is my 18 month old daughter just loves to dead head them (picking off the flowers that died). Of course she also get's a lot of flowers that are still in their prime, but it seems to be working. Now I only wish I had used larger clay pots since these might be maxed out in their current planters.

Spring Blooms

 
Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 5 inches x 7 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: Click here to bid.
Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Sunday Tradition - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Sunday Tradition

This painting reminds me of my childhood. Growing up in an Italian home, every Sunday we had pasta for dinner. All day long the sauce (red lead, gravy, Sunday sauce - take your pick) would simmer on the stove with rest of the ingredients sitting close by to be added at the proper time. Cans of tomatoes, garlic, onions and olive oil would all wait their turn to flavor the meal. A pinch of this, a little more of that, let it simmer for an hour, taste and repeat. On and on it goes for hours. It's a tradition that my wife and I continue to this day, especially since this has turned out to be my little girl's favorite meal of the week.  

This is one of my few attempts at painting transparent glass.  Representing the reflectiveness of the bottle and the translucency of the olive oil has been one of the most interesting technical challenges I have given myself in a long time. I had to continue to remind myself to squint at the bottle and then paint what I see. The contrast between the transparent bottle and the color of the veggies really captures the liveliness of Sunday and this cooking ritual.

Sunday Tradition

 
Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 9 inches x 12 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: Click here to bid.
Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Anchored at Johnson Park - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Anchored at Johnson Park

This is another painting I did in Marble Falls during the Paint the Town Plein Air Festival. I actually painted this scene twice; the first one I wiped off after about 90 minutes of painting. I just wasn't happy with the direction the painting was heading and sometimes it's just easier to start over rather than continue to struggle.  After a short break for lunch (back to the Bluebonnet!), I returned to the park and tried this scene again from a different angle. This time I was happier with my results even though the boat moved so much on the water that it proved to be a real challenge to paint. It never stayed in one spot. The wind, which was very strong that day, just kept blowing it around. In fact, I had to remove my umbrella from my easel since the wind almost carried it away at one point. In order to paint the boat, I had to wait for it to return to the sweet spot, paint a little of it, watch it shift, and then wait again for about five minutes.  That's committment to the subject, but what a day...!

Anchored at Johnson Park

 
Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 9 inches x 12 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: Click here to bid.
Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Across the Shore, Lake Marble Falls - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Across the Shore, Lake Mable Falls

 Last weekend, I participated in the 6th Annual Paint the Town plein air festival in Marble Falls where I managed to get three paintings done over two days. This one is the smallest painting I did at 5x7 inches. I woke up early on Saturday morning, anxious to get started. Initially, I set out to paint a different location, but at that time in the morning the light wasn't very good so I decided to head down to the river. As soon as I saw this scene, I was really happy I made that decision. The early morning light hitting the tree on the edge of the bank drew me in immediately and the water was very calm and reflective. I quickly set up my easel and got painting, capturing as much of the light as possible. In what felt like a blink of an eye, a few hours had passed and this painting was done. Satisfied, I headed off for a hearty breakfast at the Bluebonnet cafe and my next location to paint.  On Sunday, I was delighted to find out that this painting sold during the auction Saturday night. I only wish I had a better photograph of it. This one seems to show the texture of the canvas a lot more than in real life.

Across the Shore, Lake Marble Falls

 
Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 5 inches x 7 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: SOLD
 

Fruit Bowl - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Fruit Bowl

 We've had this bowl of fruit in the kitchen for a few weeks now. Every week or so the fruit gets changed out, as we eat what's in the bowl and refill it. I've thought about painting it off and on, but could never seem to come up with a composition that I liked. I think the problem was that I kept trying to use just the bowl with the fruit to come up with something. This time, I added in more objects to make a more complete composition. It took an hour or two  to come up with an arrangement that worked with this bowl of fruit, but in the end, I was happy, which made the painting much easier to complete.

Fruit Bowl

 
Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 9 inches x 12 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: Click here to bid.
Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.

Whadda We Do Now? - Original Oil Painting by George De Chiara

Whadda We Do Now?

 Is it too soon for Easter paintings? I hope not, because I'm in the mood to try a few this week. In this painting, I imagined that the chocolate bunnies knocked over the easter basket and got one of the eggs out, but once they got it, none of them had any idea what to do. I can just imagine the conversation they had with each other, "How do we get it out? There seems to be some kind of protective shield on it." I wonder what the peeps think of all this? Maybe we'll find out later this week.

 On a totally different note, I'm once again experimenting with different supports. This one is done on Centurion deluxe oil primed linen panels. So far my impression with these panels is very good. They are fairly inexpensive, but seem to perform as well, if not better, then their more expensive competition. The linen has a nice non-uniform pattern to it that takes paint very well. I also really like the way the paint seems to sit on top of the linen. I can wipe it off and get to a clean surface very easily. I'm going to continue to work with these panels for the next few weeks and see if I continue to enjoy them. I'll report back my thoughts on them.

Whadda We Do Now?

 
Painting Details:
Larger Version available here
Size: 5 inches x 7 inches on canvas panel. 
Medium: Original Oil Painting
Frame: none
Availability: Click here to bid.
Signed on front. Signed and dated on back.