"Turning Point"

16 x 20

I don't want to be melodramatic, but one of my babies is leaving. Not my real kids. One of my paintings. Sometimes you feel that way as an artist. Getting paintings sold is kind of the point. Most times it's an easy process, but there are some paintings that you really like and when someone expresses interest in one of those paintings you have to pause and think. This paintings is one of those. I have a lot of memories of State Road 46 and the drive from Titusville to Lake Harney. This subject is seemingly a very simple, flat part of Florida, but there is so much there. It's constantly changing based on the water levels. It has distance. Vastness.

This painting is called "Turning Point", not for some deeper meaning. Actually, my Dad use to own and fly a Cessna 182. When he saw this painting, he explained to me that this stand of palms in the middle of the St. Johns River Valley was used by pilots flying a pattern at Dunn Airpark in Titusville. When you got to the palms you turned back to the airport. Turning Point.

How much longer will you be able to look out across this vastness and see nothing but nature?

"Turning Point" is going to a nice home in Jacksonville. A couple who already has a painting of mine wants another, and they love this one. Repeat customers are the best. It has to mean you must be doing something right. So you pack up the painting and ship it off because you realize that if someone else can enjoy something you created, its a good thing to let it go.

Thanks for looking.

Two and a Half

11 x 14

"Two and a Half" because this is at the two and a half mile mark of our local cross country course. My kids ran cross country at their high school. They had a great coach who demanded a lot of commitment to the sport. He was very demanding. Anyway it just so happened that their ages resulted in my involvement with Chiles Cross Country for ten straight years. During that time we won five state championships. It was a blast!!

We had a great cross country course at the Miccosukee Greenway park in Tallahassee. It was picturesque and challenging. Almost every time I went out there I would see a painting. This is just one of those vistas that a normal persons looks at and just passes over. Me, . . . I look at the value changes and the color and try to figure out an interesting composition and a way to get into the painting. (It's a curse sometimes).

Thanks for looking

"Sliver of Morning"

8 x 10 (plein air)

Early morning sunrise, Lake Weir, week after Christmas. Smell the coffee. Feel the warmth of the cup. Hear the muffle of cars behind me rolling down CR 25. A slight layer of fog rolling up off the water. Stillness otherwise. Just stillness.

Thanks for looking

"One Masterpiece, One Painting"

16 x 20 "Gadsden County Morning"

Here's the painting. Morning shadows fingering across a hay field in Gadsden County. . . . . And below is the masterpiece. My first grandson: Camp Macauley Andrews. Born Sunday January 30 at 12:21pm. 8 lbs 14.4 oz. Mom and Dad and Camp are all doing great. Granddad and Grandma are doing fantastic!

Camp Macauley Andrews

Thanks for looking.