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Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

If you drive south for a couple of hours from San Francisco along California's picturesque Pacific coast, you'll find Monterey, the historic seaside stop made famous in John Steinbeck's classic novel, Cannery Row. I was there not long ago and discovered this nostalgic scene -- a makeshift fishing shack perched precariously over the bay's blue waters. The shack's corrugated steel walls and rusty roof harken back to those old sardine canning days when the folk here had rough hands and rougher manners.

If you listen real close, you might still hear 'em...

Title: Monterey Lore
Painted: November 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 10"x14"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

The scout ship landed hard, bouncing across the valley floor. A dust cloud billowed up from the trench it dug. It lurched to a violent stop.

The pilot peered out of a cracked, pitted viewport.

Her nav chart said this was Planet Four. She knew nothing else about it.

"Anyone home?" she wondered out loud. But all was still on the blue slopes around her. The orange sky was empty -- for now.

Ensign Starlark snapped her helmet on and reached for the hatch release. "Can't stay here, I'm a sitting duck."

Whoosh.

She jumped out, blast-rifle ready...

Title: Planet Four Lore
Painted: November 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

If you rode north just far enough,
you might find this idyllic scene --
a lake the likes of Brigadoon.
Or Xanadu.
Sky blue, gold, green.

Who knew El Dorado
was in New Hampshire,
on this shore of lore...

Title: Autumn Shore Lore
Painted: October 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

Morning.
Spring.
An abandoned pueblo of sandstone and spirits.
One witness -- a lore tree.

What does a red sky rising mean?
A god-sign?
An omen?
A warning?

We'll see...

Title: Red Sky Lore
Painted: October 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

How about something whimsical? This colorful landscape is loosely based on the ancient pueblos of the Wupatki National Monument near Flagstaff, Arizona. Of course I've used a bit of artistic license (well, maybe a lot) to surround these iconic ruins with a wildly "painted desert", but how else can you convey the spirit of such a storied land?

Title: Pueblo Lore
Painted: April 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 10"x14"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

Many years ago on an epic quest, I came across this friendly donkey in the Black Hills of South Dakota, not far from Mount Rushmore. But in this painting, she's made her way a thousand miles southwest to the edge of a Utah canyon where she seems right at home on a narrow trail in the morning sun. Anyone want a ride? Hop on!

Title: Burro Lore
Painted: August 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

This is a watercolor based on a sketch I made of an early Mount Vernon, the great estate of General and Mrs. Washington on the hilly green banks of the wide Potomac. But in contrast to the black and white starkness of the drawing, I chose to color the painting with a gentle palette, something a bit more Martha than George. After all, who do you think really ran the house?!

Title: Martha's House of Lore
Painted: July 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

I made this spartan sketch in preparation for a watercolor painting of General Washington's legendary home at Mount Vernon, Virginia. It reflects an earlier phase of the mansion's history, circa 1770, prior to the construction of the adjoining colonnades and circular forecourt that you'd see on a visit there today.

I love the bold beauty of the building's neoclassical design -- a style known as Palladian after the influential Italian architect Andrea Palladio. Those elements are especially plain to see in such a simple blueprint as this.

Title: House of Lore
Sketched: July 2017
Medium: Pencil on paper

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

I was thinking about contour maps when I dreamed up this one -- a Seuss-like scene of fanciful foothills and colorful cacti set in the distant future, or ancient past, of an imagined Arizona. But those four-layer shapes took on a life of their own once I put them down on paper. Sometimes I see seven green islands on a ruddy sea. Or a bumper car race. Even a maze.

Who knows what you'll find in "them thar hills"?!

Title: Seven Hill Lore
Painted: June 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, rough, 140lb 12"x16"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

Scotland's Isle of Skye is a place of wonder and lore -- especially at night. Imagine the bedtime tales you'd hear in this classic cottage, curled up by the warm, glowing peat fire as cold shadows dance in the moonlight outside.

That's not just smoke in the air. It's magic.

Title: Night Skye Lore
Painted: June 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

In Hyde Park, New York, next to the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum, there's a beautiful hidden garden -- the Beatrix Farrand Garden at Bellefield -- that I had the good fortune to wander into one fine summer day. It's a serene place with a storybook look -- emerald-green grass, vine-covered walls, and arched stone gateways worthy of the worlds of Narnia or Middle Earth. This painting is my impression of one of them.

What wonderland do you spy on the other side?

Title: Garden Lore
Painted: June 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

This painting features a favorite motif of mine -- the remarkable Wukoki Pueblo from the Wupatki National Monument in Arizona. It's one of a few surviving dwellings built a thousand years ago by the Sinaqua people using the red layered sandstone that the land provided them.

This time I went back to my original photographs from 1984 and recreated the scene as faithfully as possible while applying a classic impressionist style borrowed from the 20th century American painter A. B. Davies in his later watercolors. I've been looking to try this style for a while now and this seemed like the perfect subject. I hope you enjoy it!

Title: Sandstone Lore
Painted: May 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

It's off to Scotland's Ayrshire county for a scene from the farming life. This one features a four-legged friend we met years ago -- a young Jersey bull -- happily grazing in a hillside pasture that sloped down to the edge of the North Atlantic, whose waters you see in the distance here. What beautiful animals, he and his herd! I hope I did him justice.

Title: Jersey Lore
Painted: May 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!

Hello friends and art fans! Here's a little Art of Lore...

This idyllic scene comes from the shores of Oaxaca on Mexico's wild but beautiful southwest coast. The jungle begins not far from where I found this surreal windowed wall. You can see it encroaching on the stuccoed structure, reaching to reclaim the ocean vista it once commanded all alone.

Title: Tropical Lore
Painted: May 2017
Paints: Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours
Paper: Arches Watercolor Block, cold pressed, 140lb 9"x12"

May the Lore be with you!