My First Art Show

The Edinburg Heritage Foundation in Edinburg, Virginia is hosting their annual Art Show at the Edinburg Mill next month. I am so happy to say that I will be participating in this one! Registration got mailed off and paintings are in the process of being framed out at Sun Studio Frames in Front Royal! So Exciting!!! I will be placing the following paintings in this show:

"Patience"

 "Coreopsis"

"Fog at Dickey Ridge" 

"Virtue" 

"My Beloved Blue Ridge" 

I have never participated in an art show before, at least, not as an adult. I am so very excited! While I do hope my paintings sell, I am really looking forward to this as a learning experience. What kind of paintings should I do for an event like this? What are people looking for when they go to an art show? Who else's work will I get to see?  It is all so exciting. I cannot wait!

Since May?

Really? I haven't posted since May? That is just wrong.

I think it is time to make a checklist and go by it each day...

     School Kids..... check

     Paint Picture.... check check

     UPDATE BLOG... triple check!!!

Since May I have done several paintings. Nowhere near enough, mind you; I would be quite content to sit at my easel and paint all day all of the time! But I have painted some and I had the pleasure of attending a workshop given by my mentor, Kay Witt (Check out her latest work at her website: http://wildwolfportraits.com )

Here is a rundown of some of the work I've done this summer:

I did a portrait of my friend's late brother. She wanted it to give to her remaining brother since they were so close:

"Buttercup"
This is my daughter, Lydia, learning how buttercups make your chin yellow if you love butter. I took the reference photo at Chancellorsville Battlefield in Fredericksburg.

"Landlocked"
A family member, Derek, was diagnosed with cancer this summer. We participated in a benefit to help him and his new bride pay for his treatment. I painted these landlocked boats for the auction. The reference photo for the boats was taken by Rob McEwen.

Mrs. Rogers had wanted a portrait of her sons and their best friends for the longest time. I wish I had a better photo of this painting. It is now beautifully framed and hung over their fireplace. Kudos to Sun Studio Framing in Front Royal for a beautiful job!

"Coreopsis"
I saw these lovely yellow flowers during a walk along the Miami River in Cincinnati. They were so lovely I had to paint them!

"Mr. Joe"

His widow was missing him so badly, so I painted this portrait of Mr. Joe to help bring her some comfort and help him stay near to her.

"Sunrise at the Outer Banks"
I love fiery sunrise pictures. I take so many of them any time I am near the beach. The reference photo was taken several years ago at Kill Devil Hills, NC.

"Stephen"
This is my son, Stephen. I took the reference photo for this picture about 4 years ago. He is now a tall teenager! When I painted this, I was so afraid to do the freckles for fear of making it look like he had chickenpox! I think it turned out very well, though. I cannot wait to get it framed!

"Sunset Over the Blue Ridge"
These mountains are probably my favorite landscape subject of all. Living here in the Shenandoah Valley, they are always within sight. I love the amazing sunsets we can capture over them!

"Julia"
My precious sister-in-law, Julia. I took the reference photo for this portrait the same day as the one for Stephen. Something was bugging me about this painting, though, and I realized as I was getting ready to frame it that I had cut off a small part of her chin, and it was making the whole painting look wrong!  I fixed it before giving it to them (after this photo was taken, unfortunately.)

"Horse and Foal"
This is a workshop piece I completed in a class taught by my sweet friend and mentor, Kay Witt. Every time I take a class from her I learn more and more and more. May I never stop learning!

So I will do my best to come and say "HI!" a whole lot more often. Be Blessed!

A Horse By Any Other Name

This week I painted a picture of a horse that my husband saw one day at work. He sees - and photographs - so many wonderful sights as he goes from job to job. I guess it is one of the many benefits of living out in the country. This horse caught my eye because of the look in his/hers... My aunt came to visit yesterday and we were talking about this portrait. I had posted a photo of it on Facebook and I was telling her how the camera just doesn't do justice to these portraits. It washes out the depth, the richness, the texture of them. She said she the color was great, it must just be my monitor - until she took a look at the actual painting. I think she was also taken by the richness of it. It just doesn't come through. So know that when you see each photo I post, you are not getting the whole picture.

This portrait is at this point 14x20; it will be cropped. I just don't know how much I will cut out. It is still unnamed - I am open to suggestions :)

Expression

I have always found myself tongue-tied whenever it came time to say something - anything - important. Whether it is defending my opinion, expressing the beauty I see, or describing deep emotion or praise, I find my words get twisted and I walk away feeling... stupid. There, I said it. No one seems to make me feel worse about myself than I do - so critical, so self defeating. For this reason above all others I find I am relieved and excited to have this new form of expression. I am starting to express myself through painting like I have not been able to with words.

I know, I know, I am only getting started and I have so much to learn. I don't find this concept limiting; rather I find it freeing. Painting, especially with pastels, is new and fresh and allows me to express myself like I can not with words. I would love to paint something every day. I would love to offer my mind this amazing release, to get the expression flowing, every single day of my life. I wonder - if I become better at expressing myself through art, will I find a way to do it better with words? Just a thought.


On the business side of things, I got my business cards in the mail today. Makes it feel official. I hope I do not seem pretentious by establishing myself as a professional artist this early in the learning process. I do not claim to have "arrived" or to do it better than anyone else - I DO claim to finally be able to express myself in a new way, one that I feel can bless you and your family for years to come. I am so happy to finally have a way to express life as I see it, Through My Own Eyes.

Learning So Much!

It seems the more I paint, the more I am learning, and the more I learn, the more I find there is to learn. I still can not believe how much I love pastels, and how much I find I want to do with them. I have a couple of commissions coming up, and that is really encouraging.

Since I have not been able to post here for a while, allow me to use this post to catch you up on what I have worked on these past few months. (And yes, I will try to post more often.) My desire to paint portraits started when I took a portrait workshop, taught by Kay Witt, back in January. We painted a picture of a precious little girl, and from that moment, I was hooked.

My whole life I had followed the idea that I "could not" paint a likeness of a person. I am so glad I found out I was wrong, and I hope to encourage anyone else who feels they "cannot" paint something to give it a try at the least. If all else fails, take a class. Don't quit before you try!


Before I painted my first commission, I felt it was important to bless someone I know with a portrait that they did not commission. There is a precious man in a nearby town who has been a huge inspiration to me. He has a mule named Amazing Grace and they go about spreading the love of Jesus wherever they go. I took a photograph that my husband had taken of them and painted it as a surprise. I do believe he was surprised... This is a painting of a not-so-rare tender moment between Steve and his mule.

After I painted the portrait of Steve and Gracie, I got my first commission. The lady at the frame shop I use (Sun Studio in Front Royal, VA) came up with the title: "Girl's Best Friend." This is my friend's granddaughter, Bella, and her pup, Samson. It is worked from several reference photos. I learned that it is not as easy as it looks to paint a white animal! and that I love painting hair on people. I learned that I need to get bolder with skin tones; that will take more and more practice.




Between commissions, I decided to practice by painting a picture of my new granddaughter, Noelle. My daughter, Rachel, had taken this photograph of her twin sister's baby girl, and it jumped out to me as the picture I should paint next.










My next commission was a painting of another friend's daughter. This beautiful young lady was graduating high school.. She had taken a fabulous selfie of herself. Her mom wanted a graduation drape to replace the street clothes, and she asked if I would add a necklace that meant a lot to her. This young lady's trademark hair has a darker red under layer and pink highlights. This was FUN! Again, more to learn. Get bolder with skin tones. Work on shadows. I am really happy with this piece, and still it encourages me to grow more and more. May I always be encouraged to learn...






In March I took a class where we learned to paint an Australian Shepherd. This little lassie is named "Sophie." She was a delight to paint!!!











 About 7 years ago I took a photograph of my friend Elvi holding her daughter during a picnic. It has remained my favorite photo I have ever taken ever since. Wanting to practice more, I decided to paint it for her in March/April. I LOVED working on this one. Loved it. I call it "El Amor de la Madre."






I have a dear friend who is moving at the end of this month. She is moving several states away. Since Virginia is not her home state to begin with, I wanted to paint a picture of Virginia landscape for her to take with her, so she would always have a piece of VA to remember. I saw a photo posted of a sunrise over Thornton Hollow from the overlook on Skyline Drive. This photo was taken by one of the park rangers and when I asked for permission to paint it, they let me know it was truly public domain and I could do whatever I wanted with it. This is painted in acrylics.

So that is my main work for the past few months. I am loving my job immensely! I have been invited to submit a painting or two the the Art in the Barn fundraiser out at Belle Grove Plantation in Middletown, VA in July. I intend to paint and submit two landscapes to that show. I have two more commissions coming up, and I am looking forward to that. With each piece I am learning. With each bit I learn, I am exposed to more that I want to learn. May I never stop learning!

Painting is So Much Fun!

I have had the opportunity to work on a few paintings. I finished the painting I was working on as a gift to my friend, but I won't get to deliver it until Wednesday. I will see if he minds me posting pics once he has seen it. After I finished and framed that one, I started on my very first commissioned piece! This is a portrait of a little girl and her puppy. They are adorable and I have had a blast painting them! I am almost done; tomorrow I want to spend some time making the puppy a little more 3-D. That will be accomplished with proper shading and making sure the hair (it looks like a Maltese to me, so yes, hair) is laying in the proper directions. This is a white dog - I never thought about how difficult it is to paint a white animal!

Next up is another commissioned piece which is to be a surprise for the subject of the portrait. Enough said about that! :)

I have a few other commissions in the works, and I am always ready to consider more. I am working with a highly skilled photographer until I get better lenses for my camera, and hopefully for longer, so we will be sure to have photos to work from which have good light and appropriate composition and detail.

I am LOVING my job!!! Have a blessed week!

Welcome to Through My Own Eyes!

My name is Tracy and, at nearly 50 years of age, I have finally decided what I want to be when I grow up. Throughout my life I have been creative. I have a self-diagnosed case of ADAD (Attention Deficit Artist Disorder.) Basically that means that am almost always creating something, but the medium is known to change rather frequently! My creative interests have, over the years, slimmed down, and I am grateful for that. I have been keeping my knitting going, of course, and it will be one of my loves forever! Another art that I love, though, and finally feel like I am growing in, even gifted to do, is painting.

I love to paint. I have painted landscapes for years, mostly in acrylics. Still-life subjects are okay, but I love the way God created this earth and enjoy documenting it on the canvas. I painted often as a child and young adult, then forgot about it for many years. Fortunately, I picked it back up for therapeutic reasons a few years ago. Still, I always had a specific subject and a specific recipient in mind whenever I painted, so I never built up a collection of my own work or even bothered photographing it. I had honestly forgotten how much I had painted for friends until they reminded me recently! Painting people or animals, though, was something I never tried. I really didn't believe I could do it.

Then came Kay Witt, friend and mentor. We met when I assisted her with painting a backdrop for our church play, and I became a sponge soaking up her pointers and techniques. She made me fall in love with painting again! Kay is an amazing artist who is known lately for her wolves that she has painted in pastels. They are so lifelike, you just want to run your fingers through their fur. You can see some of her work at http://wildwolfportraits.com. I had never painted in pastels and could not believe you could get something so lifelike from little sticks of color, so I signed up for one of the wolf workshops that she taught.

I. Was. HOOKED. I fell in love with the medium and started painting for real. I still didn't tackle painting portraits until I took a pastel portraits class from her a few weeks ago, and a new world has been opened up to me.

I love pastels. I'm talking LOVE. All I needed was a little encouragement and now I am off and running. I am enjoying myself and getting more and more inspired every day!

So why have I started taking commissions? Our family has been through a lot over the past years... My son had cancer in his spinal cord, and that captivated my attention for the year that he was in chemo. The cancer disappeared very quickly and stayed away until 2012, when he was rediagnosed with a new tumor in the same area just as I was being diagnosed with thyroid cancer. (I am cured and the cancer in my son has not grown any more in the past year.)  A few months ago I very nearly lost my husband to sepsis - VERY grateful that I still have him - but it caused him to be out of work for two months, all the while increasing the medical bills. Now the scoliosis in my son's back has gotten severe enough to warrant putting him in a back brace. He goes for a fitting in a few weeks. I tell you this only to point out that, due to medical expenses alone, finances have been rather grave, and I had been considering getting a job outside of the home for the first time in 17 years. That was NOT the answer I wanted, but I had to consider it, until now. I believe with everything in me that I need to be painting and using the money from the sales of my paintings to defeat the medical bills. Now that I have made it known that I am making this a profession,  I have friends telling me, "Well, duh!" or, "It's about time!" I never had the self confidence until now, so NOW IS THE TIME!

Thank you so much for stopping by! You can find me on Facebook ("Through My Own Eyes - Portrait Art by Tracy Ries".) I will be updating this blog as often as I can with the latest projects and news. And now I am off on my big adventure!

Have a blessed day! Come on back any time.