I have a Facebook page now

http://www.facebook.com/MarlaLaubischStudio

Now you can follow me on Facebook without having to know me!

"OMG Julia...!"

8" x 6"
oil on hardboard

You can view or purchase this painting here.


Another in the Virtual Paintout's Lido di Jeloso location. Out in the countryside again, I came across this little flock of geese gathered around a tiny pond—it looks like they have their own diving board and everything. I loved the shape their necks are making against the dark greenery, and the gorgeous Italian countryside.

They are so obviously having an important discussion, and I imagine the subject is the people who live in that farmhouse...

Via Lio Maggiore

8" x 10"
oil on hardboard

You can view and purchase this painting here.

This is my second entry into the Virtual Paintout's Lido di Jeloso location. I found this country lane on a small island. It seems to be the only road, in fact. There's some sort of agritourism hotel just around the bend—looks like a nice place.

Progress photos:

Block in with Burnt Sienna

Shadows on the uprights

Starting the sunlit areas

Amazing how a little bit of sky sets everything in place

Everything blocked in.

Breaking up the basic shapes with light/darks

Start 27 and 28

I'm not sure these are technically Starts, but I'm going to count them.

It's so grey and drizzly and depressing, I'm having a hard time painting. Apparently I'm not the only one; Mike Rooney writes about the same thing. So I took his advice and did some value studies of other artist's paintings. Since he's one of my favorite painters, I did a couple of his. The top one is hanging in my living room; the bottom is one of my favorites of his larger works.

These are limited-value studies: I used 3 shades of grey; white; and black; so there's not as much variation as in the real paintings, naturally.

I learned that he paints mostly in the mid-tones, with the lightest and darkest values for accent. There's a lot of sense in this: you can draw the eye toward a focal point in the scene, even if the compositional shapes are complicated or conflicting, by using the brightest or darkest spots there. Which is making me reevaluate the painting I was going to post today; I think I need to make a couple tweaks.

Spectator Sport

oil on hardboard
6" x 8" inches

You can view and bid for this painting here.

This is my entry into this month's Virtual Paintout in Lido di Jeloso—a small island near Venice. The area consists of hotels or countryside, not much else. Lots of farms, lots of corn. I found this scene at the end of a country road out in the boondocks. A group of cyclists were convened, whether resting, starting, or finishing, I couldn't tell. This dog caught my eye; dogs always think their contributions are valued and appreciated :-)

This was definitely a stretch for me—I don't usually paint humans or animals. Or bicycles.

VAE entry accepted

My painting "Line of Pines" has been accepted into the show "SCOPE: The NC Landscape" at the Visual Art Exchange in Raleigh! The show runs June 7–27.

South Saunders Street

8"x10"
oil on hardboard

You can view and purchase this painting here.

I like this view of South Saunders in Raleigh. This little slice looks like it's out in the country; in reality this old garage is surrounded by other buildings and housing developments.

I took some progress shots at first, but then forgot to keep up with it: