RMW Ramblings

  A Miniature Garden Going through my eclectic assortment of frames, I found a little set of tiny unfinished wood frames I bought on a whim at Ikea several years ago.  The openings are only two inches high.  I cut little panels to fit and painted them with a ground coat of ultramarine blue and tinted the frames with metallic gold paint.  The stylized flowers were done with a fine point gold paint marker and an assortment of cheap nail polish, five dollars for the set from Five Below. The flowers are based loosely on ancient Greek decorative motifs.   I had started to  paint flowers in this style when painting The Secret Garden , the subject of my July 21 post ( https://rmw-ramblings.blogspot.com/2024/07/over-mantle-secret-garden.htm) but abandoned the idea because the contrast was poor on my copper-toned ground.  Here's a detail before I painted over... Several years ago I used the same style in a detail in the group  Erodios ( https://rmw-ramblin...

  Heron Redux Painted yesterday, Heron Redux is 4 x 6 inches acrylic on canvasboard.  Mary commented that I paint a lot of herons.  That remark inspired the title.

  Over the Mantel The Secret Garden Several years ago we bought an oak frame for use over our cottage mantle at an antique mall in North East.  While our intent was to use the frame for my art, to be painted to fit the frame dimensions.  The print in the frame was pleasant enough that I decided to not discard it, have it both ways.  Display my paintings sometimes, and the original print sometimes.  To do this I fabricated wood turnbuttons that would allow me to mount a painting on hardboard (Masonite is the common brand) in front of the glass covering the print thus avoid disturbing the print: Here's the framed print over the mantle: Often the print is displayed over the winter, and one year it was visible in our Christmas card: One picture I painted for this frame is Osprey : A second painting is Girl of the Susquehanna , depicting a young Indian woman canoeing with a baby, along with graphics based on petroglyphs found along the lower Susquehanna and upper Ch...

  Coinin This sculptural rabbit is painted with copper pigment.  His name, Coinin, is an Irish word for rabbit, since he is modeled on the rabbit image on a three pence Irish coin from the 1920s.  

  Looking Back As in the paintings in my last post, here I've used elements of metallic paint, gold and a bit of copper.  I have taken liberties with the coloration of the goldfinch.  This 8 x 8 inch painting is on temporary display on the ledge by the Goldbug paintings in my last post.

  Goldbugs A quartet of golden insects   This set of golden insects are sitting here below an earlier painting by Mary.  They are each approximately 5 x 7 inches on artboard cut to fit a set of frames of Hawaiian koa wood.  I discarded the tourist souvenir pictures that were in the thrift store find frames. Metallic gold paint and touches of iridescent blue-tinted glaze on the wings give the paintings a glow in the changing light and from different viewing angles. Here are the little paintings individually:   Golden Mayfly     Golden Bee   Golden Dragonfly     Golden Firefly      

  The Last Boat   In the 1940s and '50s there were no longer amusement parks in the immediate Wilmington area.  Brandywine Springs and Shellpot Park were long gone.  But for a kid in the summer, Lenape Park near West Chester was accessible by an energetic bike ride, and Riverview Beach Park in Pennsville, NJ could be reached by boat.  With friends I took the number 5 trolley to Church St., walked to the Wilson Line terminal by Fourth St., and cruised to the dock right at Riverview Beach Park.  Take in the rides, swimming pool, and food, and then a late boat back to Wilmington. One year Tasty Kakes had a promotion in connection with Riverview.  Local grocery stores gave out strips with detachable discount coupons for many of the rides.  The bottom coupon was good for one free ride on any of the Riverview rides.  We loaded up on the promotional strips, tore off the free coupons. and discarded the rest.  Riverview was overrun with kids. T...