Max - We met this Border Collie while visiting England. Max was super intelligent, had a collection
of close to 20 toys and he knew every one of them. This was a gift for his owners, who opened
their home to us for a few nights, giving Max and I a chance to become great buddies.

London Still Life -This was the scene we sat down to when we went to lunch at the restaurant in the
London National Gallery of Art. I knew right away it would be my first still life and grabbed my camera to preserve it.
It was everything I wanted to expand my skills; an exercise in perspective drawing, the challenge of multiple light
sources of varying strengths, multiple shadows, more work with fabric and working with glass and water. It also
represents a new step forward for me, in that I painted some from my imagination, instead of just what
was in the photo. The mirror above the long booth was so dark in the photo you can’t see anything,
so I had to work to subtly add the reflections of the chairs, the glassware on the tables
and the reflection of the couple down at the end. Also the arch and velvet rope and stanchion
replace another table. I wanted to even up the framing and put in a shape that forced your eye back to
the focus of the picture. I also focused on little details like napkins and place settings on the receding tables,
and the distortions in all the glassware, including the far ones in the back. (SOLD)

Amber - This painting originated from the nicest compliment I could hope to get; my sister, after seeing my other paintings, asked me to paint her favorite little feline friend, named Amber. When I compared this completed work to my first painting at the top left of the page of my own cat, Mr. Al, I felt a great sense of accomplishment and growth in my work. While I completely captured Mr. Al's personality, (which is the greatest task, I think) my clear advance in technique was reassuring. Another big step for me is that the cloth background was wholly created, moving me another step beyond painting only what I see.

 

Australian Wild Horses - One of my favorites images and memories from our Australian trip. We went camping in the Kakadu National Forest outside of Darwin and each morning and evening, the wild horses came out to feed and water at the bilabong. I chose this to paint because the evening misted background would push me to paint loosely and with an impressionistic touch, while the foreground would still let me work on my realism. The horses offered me my first living subjects not dogs or cats! (SOLD)

Secret Beach, Maui - This painting was a gift for two friends who got married at sunset at this beach on Maui. I took dozens of photographs but it was only years later, when looking through the images, that I noticed the two paddlers silhouetted against the waves. I hadn't even seen them when taking the photo! This painting was an exercise in furthering my handling of clouds, and new challenges were ocean waves, the panopoly of sunset colors, and depicting wet sand. This is one of those paintings that comes together the farther away you stand from it.

Duck in Water - Made for a friend's 3 year-old grandchild, who has a little one's obession; with ducks. For me, the work offered a chance to work more with water, reflections and liquid patterns, as well as a different kind of animal.

Pictures at an Exhibition - This painting is my 1st original composition from my imagination, as you can see. I wanted to do something that built on everything I learned in my previous 10 works; color mixing and blending, brush techniques, perspective drawing, and overall composition. I also worked very hard in the beginning on the composition; the placing of the types and styles of the individual paintings, and especially of the various museum visitors, to keep the eye moving in and around the picture. I also wanted to try painting in a variety of styles, which called for pictures within pictures. Above all, I wanted to create something that would make you smile when you looked at it. (SOLD)

Manet's Secret Workshop - This painting is my 2nd original composition. I have admired many of Édouard Manet's paintings because he achieved a realism that's warm and accurate without being photographic, super-realism. The painting on which this is based, Manet's Olympia, shocked viewers at the 1865 Salon. Representing a lower-class prostitute, it was purposefully provocative. Olympia confronted the bourgeois viewer of the late 1800's with a hidden, but well-known, reality; a rather informal and individual portrait of a woman unashamed of her body. This painting gave me the opportunity to not only paint in his style (background, bed linens, fabrics,the attending cat's dress and flower bouquet,) but to explore other styles as I continued paintings within a painting (as in Pictures at an Exhibition). It also helped me to work more on depicting animals and to work again on perspective and on the overall composition. And of course, the painting as a whole, and a 2nd joke within are intended to give you something to make you smile. You can also just make out my own GC signature on the bottom right of one of the paintings in work.

I entered "Pictures at an Exhibition" and "Manet's Secret Workshop" both original paintings in a juried art contest at the East End Arts Gallery in Long Island, NY in 2016. And while I did not place in the Top 3 cash award-paying positions, out of 730 entries, "Pictures at an Exhibition" placed in the Top 60, and was displayed in a slide show on a flat screen in the gallery during the 5-week run of the show's winners. "Manet's Secret Workshop" placed in the Top 30 and was on display in the gallery for the 5 week run. This was not only very gratifying, but a big confidence booster for me as I explore this new art form.

Duncan - My first painting since relocating to Santa Fe, NM. This was a gift for my sister, a companion piece for the portrait of her other cat, Amber, above. After 9 months of no creative outlet due to our long distance move, this was a great way to warm up, and I was relieved to see that my handling of fur had improved.

Folies Santa Fe - My first original painting in Santa Fe. With what I think is my last nod to Mr. Manet,
one inspiration for this painting was his last major work, the classic "Folies Bergere" (see below). I always
loved this painting; the detail in the champagne bottles, the looseness of the crowd reflected in the mirror,
the doleful expression on the bar maid's face. But I wanted to do something more with the reflection.
We also talked with local artists about how important (or not) it is to "paint for the market". I decided I could
do that and still paint for myself. In Santa Fe, few people let their cats outdoors due to the large coyote population.
So "Folies Santa Fe" depicts a mythical bar where felines and coyotes can put aside their differences and just have a good time...
and maybe fall in love. And of course, it's meant to bring a smile to the viewer's face. (SOLD)

 

Our neighbors here in Santa Fe have a back yard enclosed with a running adobe wall that rises at some places to 5-6 feet and drops in other places to waist high. A momma bobcat, shortly after giving birth to two kits, began dropping the little ones in the backyard next door and leaving them in this safe place while she went out to hunt. Needless to say, our friends would watch the two kits from the safety of indoors, and often refer to their place as the "Atkin's Bobcat Ranch". Now that the bobcats are older, the two kits cruise the neighborhood and occasionally pay us a visit as well. The two paintings, left and right, are my attempt to advance my skills while capturing these fascinating young critters, and create some new images here in our new home in the Southwest high desert.



I've Got My Eye on You (SOLD)

 

Bob & Robert (SOLD)

Bringing Up Baby - My first effort at portraying New Mexico skies and landscape and sense of distance
and scale here, as well as the placid feel of the land.

Hemingway Cats, Ritz Bar, Madrid, Spain

 

Rainy Day, Paris
(with a nod and thanks to Gustave Caillebotte)

 

Winter Wonderland (SOLD)

Kitten Guarding Mcloskey's Oranges (SOLD)

s

Playing Mouse & Cat

Home Sweet Home

 

Couch Clique

Chimney Rock, Ghost Ranch, New Mexico - My first foray into working with a palette knife.

The Secret Life of Mr. Jack (SOLD)

Pet Portrait commission: Jack's family sent me the photo of him surveying his kingdom under a surreal sunset sky. I said I could see why they liked it, but suggested most people want a pose that shows the expressiveness in the eyes especially, plus face and ears. They then sent me a great face shot to work from. But after looking at the two images, I was finally able to come up with something that captured Jack and allowed me to have a lot of fun! (SOLD)

 

Angle of Curiosity

"The Artist's Apprentice" - 8" x 16" acrylic on canvas board.
In thinking about my next painting, all I knew was I wanted to do something with warmth, but a feeling of serenity. That's when I walked out to my easel and art cart and saw my little furry assistant, Django, calmly living what I'd only seen in my head.

Best Friends"" - 12" x 18" acrylic on canvas board. (SOLD)
This was a commission painting for a dear friend who only has old Polaroid prints to remember her dear, deaprted pal, Zeppelin, one of the all-time great dogs.

"Fast Memories" - 8" x 16" acrylic on canvas board. (SOLD)
This was a commission painting for a friend who used to race this car in SCCA regional competitions. It still exists, but in boxes of parts and a thick layer of dust in his garage. In the driver's window, he has taped up a speeding ticket he got in Colorado; 140 in a 65 zone. This was my first attempt at painting a car; metal and its sheen. Not the greatest, but he loved it, said I got the body color right, and I learned so much.

Home in the Woods - 11" x 14" acrylic on canvas board.
This was a broken shack we saw in the Blue Ridge mountains, and I knew it would make a good photograph. But then when I was looking for something new to paint, I remembered this image. It was inspired by three facets; when watching the Sky
Arts Landscape Artist of the Year show, they were talking about how it's so hard to paint the varying shades of green in the average landscape, so I wanted to try a "green" painting. I also wanted to try something unlike anything I've ever painted. Lastly, years ago, we saw the painting to the right, Gauguin's "Two Dogs in a Field". I loved how you don't see the title subject until you've looked at the painting for awhile, and wanted to incorporate that type of element into my "green" painting.

Paul Gauguin - "Two Dogs in a Field"

"Romeo" - 8" x 10" acrylic on canvas board. (SOLD)
This was a commission painting for dear friends in upstate New York. I tried to capture how Romeo is the King of All That He Surveys. He has the run of their lovely house in the woods that includes a huge garden,
maple groves, maple syrup "sugar shack" and a cool creek that runs behind the house. he is a mighty hunter, so gave him a sneaking little Eastern Bluebird for company.

New mixed medium, three dimensional shadow box! Click on the image to see more.