Join Us

 

Click Here to Purchase - $200 - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Always nice when a friendly group of apples welcomes a newcomer. : )

Student Teacher

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x8in. - oil on panel

Here's another little still life that I painted a while back. I had been to the store looking for bottles with colorful labels to add to my scenes. But I think the apples stole the show. Or is it the pitcher?

Gathering

 

Click Here to Purchase for $200 - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Here's another little painting I did a few months ago when I was still able. I'm looking forward to doing some new stuff and have a ton of ideas. I keep a million little post-it notepads around the house for jotting down ideas, and lately I've also been using the Google Notes app on my phone. I love it.

Conspiring

 

Click Here to Purchase for $200 - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Thank you all SO MUCH for the outpouring of love and support after telling my story a couple of days ago. An artist's life is mostly solitary, and I can sometimes forget I'm not alone.

You make me feel loved. 💗 And it is very much appreciated.

Hello There

 

Click Here to Purchase for $200 - 6x8in. - oil on panel

I mentioned a while ago that I was suffering from a health issue, and I am happy to report that it is finally being resolved! I would like to share my saga, if only that it might help someone else.

Some of you might remember I had a cervical herniated disc years ago, and a fusion surgery in 2022. Afterwards I improved slowly, but about a year ago started to have problems again. They were similar in that my neck hurt constantly and I got terrible headaches, but otherwise the symptoms were (apparently) odd.

I began seeing doctors here in Missoula. Right away they found that I had another herniated disc in my neck, one below the previous one (I think it's a genetic issue). But the message I got was: it just doesn't look bad enough for surgery, despite the fact that I got terrible headaches when I sat, and so I didn't ... sit. They said my symptoms weren't "textbook." I got a steroid shot, which helped tremendously, but only for a week. I tried everything else commonly recommended: PT, massage, etc. Nothing helped, and I continued to get worse.

Over 10 months I saw 4 surgeons, 4 other doctors, and was rejected by the Mayo Clinic twice. They listened to me tell them that my hands and feet hurt constantly, the headaches were unbearable, my digestion and temperature regulation were wacky, my eyes hurt all the time, and if I sat or did anything remotely strenuous my mouth and arms went numb and everything else got worse. And the answer was: the disc isn't causing your problems. Some added that I must be "oversensitive," or "have emotional issues" because I'm a woman. Yes, at this point I wanted to kick these men in the ....

They ran a million tests. Which all cost a fortune, of course. Insurance only paid for some of it. And they didn't find anything that could explain my pain.

My husband and I were completely baffled. It seemed like their goal was to get me out of the office as quickly as possible. But these were appointments that took weeks or months to get, so time was passing painfully, and after each dismissal we found ourselves back to square one.

All through this my husband was searching online, trying to find answers. Before each appointment he compiled lists of symptoms (in case we forgot any), and a timeline. We thought that if we just saw one more doctor, they would be a little smarter and figure out my problem.

Finally, towards the end, my husband found a place near Seattle that had a sitting MRI. All the other MRI's I'd had were laying down, and all my symptoms got better when I laid down, so we reasoned a sitting MRI might show something different. No doctor we saw knew anything about this, btw.

When I got the new MRI, the radiologist's report said that the herniated disc was flattening my spinal cord. This is called myelopathy. When we looked it up we found that it could cause ALL the symptoms I was having! The spinal cord brings messages from the brain to the rest of the body, and when this is disrupted it can cause problems with the autonomic nervous system, which regulates the things in your body that you can't directly control: heart rate, blood pressure, respiration, digestion, etc., which were all things I was having trouble with. For the last 2 months in fact, I was almost completely bed-ridden. If I stood for more than 10 minutes my heart would race and I would feel like I was going to pass out.

The physical medicine doctor I was seeing at the time sent off urgent messages to the surgeons I had already seen, and one by one they dismissed the new MRI! It still didn't look bad enough, they said.

So the phys-med doc referred us to one more neurosurgeon, a Dr. Larson in Coeur d'Alene, ID (3 hours from Missoula). We were dismayed to see that he didn't take insurance, but at that point were desperate. We met with him and he quickly said - surgery is an absolute no-brainer. He got me in two weeks later for surgery. Once inside he found that the disc was worse than it looked in every MRI - part of it had broken off and was lodged against my spinal cord. When I woke up, except for the pain from the surgery itself, I was completely better!!

In hindsight we believe that the first 4 surgeons must have been restricted by the hospitals/clinics they worked for, and the insurance companies. We believe they had a checklist, and my case was unusual enough not to check all the boxes quite right, even though the suffering was very real. It doesn’t seem that they are allowed to think outside of those boxes. They consistently recited statistics, rather than treating me as an individual. The doctor who finally helped me says the reason he doesn't take insurance is because it allows him to “focus on what’s best for each patient.”

The worst part of the last 11 months was the emotional toll. I lost hope over and over. But I was lucky. My husband was by my side through it all, often waiting on me hand and foot. He was even NICE about it, the whole time. Even when I wasn't. Haha. My little dog, Meep, was glued to my side night and day - best nursemaid ever. My son regaled me with stories from the outside, which provided much needed distraction. My family and friends kept checking on me, despite so many months of listening to me complain and despair.

I am now 3 weeks post surgery. Every day I feel a little better. At 6 weeks I can start doing physical therapy, and can address the muscles in my back and neck that have been busy guarding my “injury” for so long that they will need to be retaught how to operate. I have been visiting my studio a little more each day, doing as much as I can. Painting requires more turning of my head than I can do at the moment, so I’ll do that when I am able. Meanwhile I will share some paintings from back when I could still do them. Thank you for reading!

The Long Green Shadow

 

Click Here to Purchase for $200 - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Glass and apples: two of my favorite things to paint. And green: my all-time, favorite color. Throw in a few lost edges and I'm in painting heaven.

Drawn to Red

Click Here to Purchase for $200 - 6x6in. - oil on panel

I enjoy when I can pull off a red/green composition without it looking like Christmas.

Culling the Herd

Click Here to Purchase for $200 - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Apples seem to proliferate in my studio. I brought in the pigs to help control the population. They're doing a fine job.

Splashy Apples

 

Click Here to Purchase for $200 - 6x6in. - oil on panel

Even though I have already painted 391 apple paintings (and probably more), I cannot stay away. They are just so perfect: colorful, usually shiny (great highlights!), no two the same, and yummy.

Eloped

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil on panel - starts at $100

This one reminds me of my own wedding. We went to a local JP with just my husband's two little girls. We have exactly one picture, that we took ourselves, with the girls hamming it up in the background.

And speaking of kids, a friend of mine wrote a very cute book called, "Welcome Home, Margot Flamingo," a sweet lesson about getting a new dog. It makes a great gift. : )

See Thru Blu

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil on panel - starts at $100

These apples though they were the stars, but the blue bowl ended up outshining them. IMHO.

Cozy Up to Red

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x8in. - Oil on panel - Starts at $100

This is one of my favorites of late. I'm not sure why. It just all came together for me. Gotta love those.

Aimless Apples

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil on panel - starts at $100

Lately I've been thinking about how much the "rules" of art help us, vs. intuition/feelings. I've pretty much decided that it has to be a balance, and personally I have to monitor that balance often. When I start getting tight and rigid and afraid I remind myself - "Carol, don't overthink it." And that helps me remember to play. Because if I don't play then I don't get unexpected things, and it's the unexpected things that lead me to new ideas and growth. It can also lead to me falling on my face, but if that's the price I pay for growth then I'll pay it.

Bystander

 

Click Here to Bid - 5x7in. - Oil on panel - starts at $100

Lately I've been focusing a lot on me. That probably sounds weird, and it feels funny to write. But in terms of art I've been asking myself - rather than what other people might like, or what might sell - what I actually enjoy painting. Maybe second to that is what I might enjoy seeing as a result. And one of the things I enjoy most is a technical challenge. And fun colors. So this is me being self-indulgent.

Teacher's Lounge

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil on panel - starts at $100

Often my apples are on the move, but today they were just sitting around chatting. A nice, quiet day.

Hogging the Yellow Plate

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil on panel - starts at $100

I have to admit, I just let them do their thing and when they get in a good spot I yell "freeze!" and paint them.

Where's My Soup?

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil - starts at $100

It's a nice time of year for soup.

Apples Toplit

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil - starts at $100

Here is the second version of this composition, lit more from above. Really changes the mood, huh? (see the first version)

Apples Backlit

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil - starts at $100

I painted this scene twice, in different kinds of light (this is number one - tune in tomorrow for number two). For this one I pointed the light behind the bowl for a backlit effect. I love what happened to the color of the blue paper, and the subtle reflections on the bowl and fork.

Shiny Happy Apples

 

Click Here to Bid - 6x6in. - Oil - bid starts at $100

The other day someone wrote and asked me how I make things look glossy. I decided to share my answer:

I think there are two things to focus on to make things look glossy.

First is highlights. Whatever a highlight sits on needs to be darker than the highlight. This isn't to say you need to darken that bit more than what you see, just to make sure that value relationship is accurate. We have a tendency to look at the "light side" of an object and paint it lighter than it really is. Especially when it comes to white objects, because our brain thinks "white". But in order for the highlight to pop, it has to be lighter than that light side. Hopefully that makes sense.

Second is reflected light. This is the light that is reflected back onto the object from anything around it. The value of the reflected light is hard to get right. It is (almost) never as light as what it's reflecting from. But it's also usually a little lighter than the darkest part of the form shadow (the shadow ON the object). It can help to take a black and white picture of your scene to better see the value relationships. And to squint.

BTW, getting accurate value relationships is the THE biggest thing I help students with in my workshops. It is the KEY to creating realistic work.