In the Groove again!

In November, I saw an invitation to artists to submit work for an exhibit at Gallery Eleven, an art cooperative in my home town.  All pieces had to be in an 8 by 8 inch format, and I just happened to have the one that I did in a workshop last July with Toni Kelly.  I had been thinking of doing a companion piece, so this gave me the nudge I needed to start painting again.  On these first two pieces, I used scanned copies of drawings from my nature journal and quotations on the themes of Hope and Joy.

This was so much fun that I did two more pieces to enter in the show.  I didn't have any more birdie drawings that lent themselves to something similar, so the next two pieces were more abstract.  My favorite way to start a painting is to lay down some texture with tissue or molding paste and then see where that takes me.  These are the results:

 

The exhibit opened on January 12, and a few days later, I got a call saying that one of my pieces had sold!  It was the very bright abstract in my favorite colors of red, orange, pink and turquoise, which I had named "Alive!"  I was thrilled and feeling validated as an artist.

Now I have a couple more abstracts nearly finished and am just bubbling over with the urge to paint every day.  It feels so good to be back in the groove!!