An Artist's Journal:Paintings by Felicia Marshall

8 x 10 acrylic on hardboard I took this one from a family photo.  The back of the photo had a few sentences indicating that the picture was taken after church services. The couple had just become a deacon and a deaconess. This is quite an honor for Southern Baptists. I originally left a lot of white behind the two figures, which stayed true to the original photograph, but it just wasn't working. My son walked through and offered his opinion, which he never does because he could care less about art, and painting, and creating.  Girl stuff is how he would describe what I do. He is a young man of simple words and he did not let me down this time. He looked at the painting on his way to the kitchen and said, "It needs more depth." He had never been so right, nailed it!  It needed more depth, so I added more shadows in the background.  We often laugh about him getting a "B" in Art.  He wears his "B" like a badge of honor, because his mother is an a...

8 x 10 acrylic on hardboard I am still working on portraits and light.  I finally got tired of mixing this specific pinkish rosy color every time  I had to use it, which was often.  It never occurred to me that I could just premix an entire bottle or tube of the color.   That was until I read an article that had a painter describing her process.  She mixed some of her own colors so that they would be ready and waiting for her to use. "Duh! how brilliant, simple, and efficient." I went out and purchased some empty paint tubes.  I was shocked that they make these.  "Empty paint tubes!...duh!  It's my new favorite thing. SOLD

8 x 10 acrylic on hardboard I'm really working hard with trying different colors in my palate. I naturally would've painted the little girl's shirt a light brown, maybe a brownish yellow, or a calming blue.  Here you can see, I chose green. It went well with the scenery in which she sits. I'm taking baby steps. I'm also working hard at not modeling everything way too much.  I keep having to remind myself that, sometimes less is more.  I'm fascinated by artists that can show great detail and visual information with a few simple brushstrokes. "That takes great skill!" Here the little girl is sitting on the swing and fort set, which gave her great height, almost putting her above the fence line, which is where the sun was setting. This allowed me to create a fantastic halo around her hair. The swing's gone as of a few summers ago, when a tree remover miscalculated his angle and demolished it. One by one each kid stood at the window in disbeli...

5 x 7 acrylic on hardboard I'm still raiding our family photo album. How can you resist this fabulous smile. It's larger-than-life.   This is one of my grandfather's sisters.  He came from a large family, having eight siblings.  I wanted to be bold with the background, but that didn't work, so I went with a nice calm green.  At least, it's not taking away from the portrait.  I think I wrote before, how hard backgrounds were for me. I guess I'll try to be bold again next time. In the end I went with the soft green. I thought of the colors of my grandmother's bedrooms. When I was growing up, one was a soft pastel green. The other a soft pink. It always seemed dated and never changed. Then at the age of about eighty, she painted every room, and I do mean every room in her house white. When I went to visit and saw what she had done, I asked, who had helped her? She told me her niece, who was seventy years old at the time. $100

5"x 7" acrylic on hardboard I was looking for inspiration for a painting, so I raided our family photo album.  This I was told was a family friend.   $100