Too Much Candy!

 

9x12in. oil on Ampersand Gessobord - available soon

Oh no! This pumpkin got too sick eating all of that candy! Poor guy.

Papaya Still Here Still Life

 

10x10in. oil on canvas - available soon

A still life fruit from the instagram account Still Here Still Life. I bought their book a few years ago and they came with these Polaroid prints - one of them I fell in love with and had to do a study of my own. Check out their account for some really cool compositions!

Blue Hydrangeas Study

 

12x9in. oil on canvas - available soon

Another Paint Coach study in the books! This one is a still life of blue hydrangeas, an orange and some grapes. I wanted to practice grapes for my own fruit composition, and the study really helped.

3 Sunflowers Study

8x6in. oil on Ampersand Gessobord - sold

I'm currently working on some floral scenes for some cute heart-shaped panels I purchased from Trekell and I wanted to boost my floral skills. Naturally I turned to a Paint Coach Patreon tutorial for practice. My big plans for these heart-shaped panels are from a Valentine's Day bouquet I received as well as some flowers from Target. I definitely have some under my belt, but one of the areas of study I'd like to focus on are florals as a still life. I really like painting floral scenes and I hope that I do more in the future. Apologies for the grainy photo.

I Love You, Cupcake!

6x6in. oil on Ampersand Gessobord - sold; click to purchase stickers here

To celebrate Valentine's Day this year I wanted to do a still life painting of a Valentine's Day plushie I purchased last year. He's very cute! I love these little tenacious facial reactions, like how Mintie looks in my "Goochy, Mintie and Momo" painting. When I went back to Walgreens this year I saw the same plushie but with a different color frosting, and I think I still prefer the cute teal. Valentine's Day is quite precious to me and I love that I was able to celebrate in style with this lil boy. I hope you had a fantastic Valentine's Day and that you remember that you are loved!

Goochy, Mintie and Momo

7x5in. oil on canvas panel - click to purchase here; click to purchase stickers here

These three little plushies keep me company at my desk while I work my day job and spend my nights editing photos, videos and performing admin work for my art business. My husband gifted me the cute octopus Goochy one year for Christmas and I love his cute little face. I picked up Mintie this year from Michaels - he's one of those Moosh Moosh plushies that you can turn inside out. I love this flipped side of him because his expression makes me think of "determination!" Topping my three-man stack is a cute little keychain of the cat Momo, made famous from the Cream Heroes YouTube channel. Momo is one of my favorites, and the voice that his owner has for him is very cute. 11/52

Autumnal Feast

8x8in. oil on Ampersand Gessobord - click to purchase here

I had great fun setting up this still life! I've been slowly building a collection of still life props - like the above fake grapes and orange pot from Michaels and the velvet pumpkin from Target - and wanted to give them a spin. For the month of November I was kind of "accidentally" only painting still life set-ups from my studio and I'm glad I got some good practice in. What started out like a normal still life painting ended up morphing into a 5-hour-long painting that took me multiple sessions to paint. This painting really brought me out of my comfort zone and I am really pleased with it. I even love the velvet look of the pumpkin! I will say, though, that I've never tried painting grapes before and went into it blind - and I'm glad that I had the opportunity to try to figure it out myself. Here's to continuing to learn and grow!

Candy Corn

7x5in. oil on canvas panel - click to purchase here; click to purchase prints here

I love candy corn! I was shopping around Michaels when I saw this cute glass pumpkin and knew I wanted to fill it with candy corn and paint it. To be honest, this composition was incredibly daunting to me. I really didn't know how I was going to approach painting the candy corn inside the glass pumpkin and near the end it was just blobs of yellow, orange and white. Trusting myself to squint my eyes and paint what I saw, everything really started pulling together when I painted on the dark lines to represent the folds in the glass. I filmed the progress of this painting and will be available to watch on my Instagram, Tik Tok and Facebook! Completing this painting inspired an upcoming painting that will consist of various Halloween candies that I enjoy. 10/52

Lil Pun

7x5in. oil on canvas panel - click to purchase here; click to purchase stickers here

I picked up the most adorable mini pumpkin at Target earlier in the season and knew I wanted to paint it as a still life. Orange is absolutely my favorite color and I love the contrast between the orange body and the blue surface. This time I set up my still life on my desk that can turn into a standing desk and it really made it easy for me to stand up and paint. I recorded a process video and posted a minute-long version of it on my Instagram and Tik Tok! 9/52

Radiant Pumpkin

7x5in. oil on canvas panel - click to purchase here; click to purchase prints here; click to purchase stickers here

This was my first attempt at painting strong, dramatic lighting alla prima. I had this cute pumpkin glass jar and I tucked fairy lights into it while I set up my black box in my bathroom to give the appropriate level of darkness to let this piece shine. The fairy lights were these beautiful specks against the glass and made the glass warp in delicious ways. I liked choosing to put the subject against the corner of my blackbox, the way that the seams between panels point towards the subject really draw your attention even more to the light source. 8/52

Sunflowers & Roses

7x5in. oil on canvas panel - click to purchase prints here

Valentine's Day is a big celebration in my house due to my birthday being the following day. My husband always gets me a gorgeous bouquet of flowers and I wanted to try my hand at my first-ever still life set up painting session! It was really difficult but it's such an important exercise. Excited to do more of these! 6/52