Come Home

"Come Home"
5" x 7"
Oil on hardboard

There are places without houses that feel like home. Where comfort comes easily, thoughts never roil or distort. This place is one of them, and tonight I found comfort in painting this place that beckons … come home. 

Here's my favorite Colorado pond again. It brings me such comfort and joy.

Love,
Carol

Brushstrokes@comcast.net
CarolKeene.com
Dailypaintworks.com
Dailypainters.com

Spring at the Divide

"Spring at the Divide"
7" x 5"
Oil on hardboard

The Continental Divide near Winter Park, Colorado  is one of my favorite places to paint. Here it is in a spring green version of my normal late-summer take on it. 

Carol

Brushstrokes@comcast.net
CarolKeene.com
Dailypaintworks.com
Dailypainters.com

Lantern Bearing Pierrots

"Lantern Bearing Pierrots"
12" x 12"
Oil on wrapped canvas

I tackled a project that was over my head, yet I finished it. The original Maxfield Parrish painting from 1910, done in a very limited palette, has always intrigued me, so I thought I'd try to make a modern day version of it. Well, it was tough. I'm being brave in revealing my effort, but realize it is merely that… an effort.  

Carol

Brushstrokes@comcast.net
Carolkeene.com
Dailypainters.com
Dailypaintworks.com

Good Night Kiss

"Good Night Kiss"
6" x 6"
Oil on hardboard

Saturday scooped all of the color she collected from that day's sky and poured it into the lake — her lipsticked-kiss to bid him good night.

I hope to have the Lantern painting finished by tomorrow. 

Carol

Brushstrokes@comcast.net

Carolkeene.com

Dailypaintworks.com

Dailypainters.com

Wispy Dawn

"Wispy Dawn"
6" x 6"
Oil on hardboard

The sun was ready to peek through the low-lying clouds as I drove past the glimmer of a lake in the distance. If I had had a pole with me, I might have found my way to the shore and drowned a couple of worms.  

My "Lantern Bearers" painting, in the style of Maxfield Parrish is taking longer still than I expected. The faces and hands are the problems. I may give each pierrot a balloon head and mittened hands and call it a day.

Carol

Brushstrokes@comcast.net
CarolKeene.com
Dailypaintworks.com
Dailypainters.com

Adrift in Passion

"Adrift in Passion"
6" x 6"
Oil on hardboard

The color wouldn't last but a few heartbeats longer, so we stopped what we were doing and watched.  We absorbed the warmth and light of the moment then continued on, tending to the mundane aspects of our lives with renewed energy. 

I fabricated this sky tonight, to have something to post while I finish a larger piece that is taking longer than planned. It was painted purely from passion and remembering a sky that looked like this.

Carol

Brushstrokes@comcast.net
CarolKeene.com
Dailypaintworks.com
Dailypainters.com

Stacked

"Stacked"
12" x 12"
Oil on wrapped canvas

I hobbled barefooted across the smooth limestone rocks on the Lake Michigan beach, up on the northern shore of Door County, Wisconsin. For the most part, the rounded stones washed ashore and scattered randomly along a specific stretch of beach. But I found a cluster of them that had been stacked — by hands. Chubby, cherubic hands.  

The stones are so sensual. You can hear them before you see them as they rattle up to and away from the shore. They are a pale dove gray and feel like something you'd purchase in a spa shoppe to fondle away your woes.  They're so unique that they'r protected by law. You can't remove them from the beaches. None.  Just photos…

Carol

Brushstrokes@comcast.net
CarolKeene.com
Dailypainters.com
Dailypaintworks.com