The Emperor's New Clothes

Thanks especially to the Allreds and their extended family for posing as all the onlooker townspeople, and to the actors at Valley Center Playhouse for posing as the emperor, the pole-bearers, and the tailors. You're awesome!The first painting, The Tailors, is a throwback to my first real "style" I came up with in college. I really admired Mercer Mayer and Maurice Sendak's illustrations, so I practiced drawing like them for a while, and it sort of evolved into my own style.The second painting, The Parade, sort of merges my old style with my newer, softer style.
Somehow I managed to paint these while sick with a 24-hour flu bug.

Did You Hear The Bird Sing?

Our good friend Sylvia helped me out with these pictures. When I received this assignment, my husband immediately thought of her to pose for it.
Her cute son Adam was a great actor as well!

I was delighted to find a prolific photo documentary of these Chicago monk parrots on the internet.

My Father's World

Maltbie Babcock, a talented priest in New York in the 1890s, would often take breaks from his job during the day to walk, hike, or run through the wilderness. He felt he could be closest to God when he was surrounded by his beautiful creations. I often feel that way too. Babcock wrote the hymn, "This is My Father's World."

Keep Going

This could be a painting of Agnes Caldwell, a nine-year-old pioneer girl who trekked across hundreds of miles to reach Zion. Or, it could be a portrait of anyone who has wanted to give up, but has kept going, and met their challenges head on and won.

The Song of the Land

I just picked this up today from the American Fork Steel Days art show, where it received 1st place in the professional drawing division. Hooray!

Walt Whitman wrote "Leaves of Grass" over a century ago, yet he really had a grasp of the unity that we'd need to feel as a people today. He praised the laboring people of the land using the metaphor of music. He wrote of the sweeping strains and pulsating rhythms of a mighty nation at work and at play. “I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,” Whitman proclaimed. He acknowledged mechanics, carpenters, masons, shoemakers, woodcutters, mothers, “each singing what belongs to him or her and to none else, . . . singing with open mouths their strong melodious songs.”


--"I Hear America Singing" from Leaves of Grass.

The Star Spangled Banner

The Dawn's Early Light

If you're a fan of Francis Scott Key (as I am), I hope you like this one. I enjoyed trying to create the colors of the morning, but still having remnants of the battle at Fort McHenry that happened that night.

Try Again Tomorrow

Did They Pay You, Father?
Amos Bronson Alcott, father of Louisa May Alcott, came home one winter night from a job. The family really needed the money to carry them through. They greeted their tired father, then May finally asked if they had paid him.











I Call That Doing Very Well
Bronson pulled out a single dollar bill and apologized, saying he'd do better next time. His wife threw her arms around him and said, "I call that doing very well."

I was excited to do this series, having seen "Little Women," which is based so closely upon Louisa's life. I have always wanted to paint a warm interior with a cold exterior, something I am still working at perfecting.

Willingness to Wait

Betsy's Flower Patch

My beautiful neighbor Betsy posed for this one. It's about a girl who wants to plant a grand and wonderful flower patch, but plants the seedlings too densely, so they all die. She realizes she needed to be willing to wait for the good things in life, and not try to force them all at once.

Amazing Grace

Amazing Grace

A progression of the life of John Newton, from slave ship captain, to priest, to abolitionist.

Music of the Heart

Good Ol' Folk Music

This is an old-time portrait of my husband and his old buddies as field hands, taking a break from haying to have a good time singing and making up folk tunes.

The Queen Mum

Portrait of a Queen
I learned a lot about Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother during this piece. Here she is before her Buckingham Palace in about 1940. A few years later, her palace was bombed during the war, but she refused to leave for Canada, choosing instead to help those suffering in her country. She was an amazing woman.

The Queen Mum Visits the Red Cross

This is what the Queen Mother spent a lot of her time during the war, visiting bombed out cities and wounded soldiers.

A Lifetime of Learning

A Lifetime of Learning

I am grateful to Tom, an old friend of my parents, and the father of one of my husband's best friends, for posing for this picture of continued love learning throughout your life. This was my first attempt at painting cabinetry in watercolor. I almost felt like a carpenter, building the drawers and shelves with water and pigment. It was quite fun.

The Joys of Creation

Not Very Talented (The Classroom)

This story is about an eight-year-old girl who is told by her teacher in art class, "You're not very talented, are you?" These words embarrassed her and severely damaged her confidence.

The Studio

It took the girl over five decades to finally realize that artists don't paint to be praised of the world; they create because they love it, because they want it to exist.

Open Our Hearts

The Plumber

This is a story about a learned professor who sort of thinks he knows everything. And yet, after a long day at work, he comes home to a problem with his pipes. He watches the plumber and realizes that, despite all his knowledge, he doesn't know anything about plumbing. A reminder to open our hearts and not let petty competition and pride get in the way of relationships.

Chain of Goodwill

Rear View

The story goes that a young man waited at a fast food drive thru for his order, and the man behind him became impatient and started throwing a fit. My neighbor Scott, a very nice person, played angry for me, while my friend's brother Braden got to be the guy being yelled at. Painting cars was quite a challenge for me. I do better at organic things, that don't have straight lines or machined parts.

Drive Thru

Instead of retaliating, Braden ends up paying for Scott's meal. My neighbor Chad let us pose in front of his Taco Time drive thru, and his employee Francine was her friendly self in this picture.

Chain of Goodwill

When Scott learns what Braden did, his whole attitude changes, and he pays for the next vehicle, who pays for the one behind them, and the chain goes on all day. Thanks to my friend Chevy for taking some extra photos for this picture.

New Life and New Hope

C. S. Lewis said: “You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you. It is easy to say you believe a rope to be strong and sound as long as you are merely using it to cord a box.



















But suppose you had to hang by that rope over a precipice. Wouldn’t you then first discover how much you really trusted it? . . . Only a real risk tests the reality of a belief.” Although this was a stretch for an Easter theme, I tried to incorporate Easter colors in the backgrounds, which are my favorite parts of the paintings.

The Pilgrims' Voyage

Mayflower Crossing

I was very pleased with how this turned out, since, unlike most paintings, it ended up as good as I imagined it. My husband helped make sure I made the sky dramatic enough, yet I left some sun shining through the clouds as an offering of hope. You may notice the tiny person I have being seasick over the side of the ship. I put him in for my sister.

Pilgrims' Landing

I often see paintings of these heroic pilgrims walking onto Plymouth Rock after their 100-day voyage of storms, sickness and death. I wanted to show that they were very grateful, but also very tired. I wanted to tell some stories with these people, like the sick and pregnant wife, and how Miles Standish, the first one on the beach, was so excited to reach land that he dropped his oar.

John Bushman's Dam

The Stream Dam

John Bushman and several other pioneers tried to settle in the Arizona desert, so they needed to build a dam to divert the stream water to their crops. Unfortunately, the dam constantly broke, and they had to keep fixing it. Thanks to my husband Brian, Todd R., and Mike R., who is in this painting twice. Thanks also to Anya A., who always lends me the best costumes.

The Joshua Tree

Bushman taught a lesson in patience and faith, however. He wrote in his journal, "The dam broke again today. We are not discouraged." Thanks Mike for being a great model.

The Chinese Pear Thief

Prison

This was my first series commissioned by Music and the Spoken Word. It is a Chinese folk tale about a man who stole a pear and was thrown into prison, where he finished eating it and saved a seed. I wanted to be really true to the Chinese style of painting as much as I could, so I checked out several Chinese children's books and art history books and gazed at them for hours to "feel" like a Chinese artist. I hope it worked.

Pear Tree (or He Who is Without Sin)At his trial, the thief offered the pear seed to the emperor, saying that it would grow into a magical golden pear tree if it were planted by someone who had never cheated, stolen, or lied. I was especially impressed when watching the beginning of "Mulan" while I researched this piece, and wanted to give the landscape that feel. This is one of my favorite paintings.

The Emperor's Court

In the story, the thief offered the seed to everyone in the court, but each looked into his heart and had to turn it down, and eventually they decided to let him go.