From the archives...Still Life With Pears.

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At a recent art fair I ran into some lovely customers that I have not seen in quite awhile. This is a commissioned painting that I created for them back in 2004: "Still LIfe With Pears". I started drawing still life compositions at an art retreat with my friends Erica Huntzinger and Rachel Weaver-Rivera in 2001...that was the start of a whole series of new work. Tomorrow I head up to WI for another long over due art retreat weekend with them. It's exciting to know that some other new theme may develop on this trip so many years later...

Back from paradise

Rich and I took a long weekend trip out to see my brother and his wife in Washington State at their beautiful lakeside cabin in the mountains. We had a great time: lots of relaxation, amazing food and kayaking...! 

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My two favorite guys...next to my new favorite lake: Wenatchee

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Rich found this fossilized rock on the beach...

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I'm a big fan of the duo impromptu self shot photo...my brother Carl & I have been taking these for years...we have such a good time together if only we didn't live so far apart...

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of course Rich managed to find the one musical instrument on the premises!

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Kicking back, watching beautiful blue striped dragon flies..little did I know that a short time later I would be a crazy lady caught up in a paddling frenzy trying to escape a swarm of mosquitos!

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Happy hiking family...Linda & Carl with my smiling canine nephew, Willy!

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The offerings at the Plain "Farmer" Market...this was a fun joke as there is only one farmer at the Plain Farmer's Market. We enjoyed these beets and fuschia colored carrots for dinner...served up with a side of goat cheese. Yum. I had never seen carrots of this color before, the farmer said they were "speciated".

Dogs Rule Art

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This was the secret project I blogged about the other day...I was asked by Jill  Beninato of www.sitstaysmile.com to be part of a 'fat book' called 'Dogs Rule'. "Fat books" are small books of a certain size that contain pages created by a pre-determined group of artists. They are called fat books because the pages are often embellished with ephemera that make the final book fat when it is bound. Embellishment is optional... Since I was really stretched for time I couldn't take the risk of trying something new...instead I stuck with what I do best. That's Alice with my 14 pages...all original paintings on matte board, a lot of work but it was fun! There are 13 other amazing artists who will contribute, we each get a book filled with pages from one another and the 14th one will be auctioned off on ebay with the proceeds going to artist Bernie Berlin's charity A Place To Bark please visit her links to find out about the amazing work she is doing to save homeless pets, rehab them and find them homes (she is a remarkable human being and artist). Stay tuned for more info on the auction & finished books!

Magnificent View...

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...from the Magnificent Mile - had a wonderful show over the weekend here in Chicago. Met people from all over the world...one of my pieces is on it's way to a new home in Slovakia! Great weather and wonderful artists all around me. This was the view from behind my booth...that's the new Trump Tower obstructing the view behind the Wrigley Building (which always was so beautiful to see with it's white facade against the brilliant blue sky...oh well, maybe Mr. Trump will buy one of my large cityscapes for his new Tower!)

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I just bought these spiffy new bamboo-ish rugs for my booth at CostPlus...Adds a nice touch...what do you think?

Canine Muses...

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And you wonder why I paint dogs...this photo is a perfect example.

If you don't have one (or more)...I encourage you to adopt one as soon as possible. Not only will it make every day of your life that much sweeter but there are a tremendous number of homeless pets waiting in shelters at this very minute. Yesterday alone, Chicago Canine Rescue (Alice's Guardian Angels) received over 200 requests to take in destitute animals throughout the Midwest. Many are coming from the flood zone, animal hoarder situations, and from Tennessee where the HSUS seized over 700 animals from a puppy mill. They desperately need adopters and foster homes so they can help more dogs. Wherever you are there are animals waiting for homes and you can find them quickly at PetFinder.com. This little gal could be yours, she is waiting for you at Chicago Canine Rescue:

Magnificent Mile Art Festival This Weekend in Chicago!

Magmilethisweekend

Chicago Tribune Magnificent Mile Art Festival

July 11, 12 & 13, Friday & Saturday 10am-6pm - Sunday 10am-5pm

Visit Us in Booth #59 in Pioneer Court between the Tribune Tower and the NBC Building

Lost in Translation...German Pet Portrait Press!

I am represented by The Dogs-Gallery (Ihr Hund Als Kunstwerk) in Germany, they just sent me this press clipping from "location-magazin" of the WAZ in Essen. They also mentioned a new connection with a gallery in Berlin...so perhaps soon I'll be painting more European Pups...!  

Feed Your Soul With Art...

Today during what I like to call 'productive procrastination' I decided to clean out the 'drafts' folder in my email program...I found many forgotten little notes to myself: Some reference people or companies I would like to do business with (in most cases I had actually written an email to send to them, then chickened out, these have been waiting all this time for me to muster courage) other ones reference artists who I would like to meet and that I found particularly inspiring ... Mary Jones is one of those, this piece is called "Betty", her paintings are so detailed and fun. She has a very clever, whimsical view of the world. So instead of deleting emails I ended up taking a delightful visual cyber trip and then a nice bike ride to the lake. Newly inspired I'm now back to work!