Leaving for a trip to Spain

Looking forward to three weeks at Costa Del Sol in Spain, have my camera and my watercolor supplies packed and hope to get a lot of inspirations for paintings while there. This is only our second trip to Europe, five years ago had a wonderful experience in Italy. Hopefully, we will avoid getting ill from the plane ride and being in tour bus this trip.

An update on Brownsville Museum of Fine Art.

Good News and Bad News

In the past few months accommodations have been made for the member artists to have studio space to paint together. We are presently using the room designated as the Children's Room on Tues, Wed, and Thurs. but plans are being made to give us our own space in the now empty gift shop area or in the area that was one a catering kitchen ( rarely used). The kitchen equipment has been sold and this room is large, no carpet and has sinks so hopefully this eventually will be our space.

In the past we have been partially funded by the City of Brownsville but this year our grant was cut from $250,000 to $93,000 ($43,000 for utilities of building). What does this really say about our city supporting art and culture? We only hope that our competent Director, Barry Horn will be able to stay with us this next year. Hours of operation and staff cuts have been made in response to the funding cuts.

Attention: Art Organizations
Dreams Can Become Nightmares


This is the Brownsville Museum of Fine Art at 6Th and Ringgold. This beautiful building has been open for about four years. It stands here because of a few ladies who got together in 1935 to paint as a group. They first met in homes and then acquired the old morgue at Fort Brown as a meeting place. Later the Neale family donated the historic home of William Neale to the group )then chartered as the Brownsville Art League )as a meeting place. Later an Art Museum was constructed beside the Neale House near the levee of the Rio Grande River. The Neale House and the old museum now belongs to the University of Texas at Brownsville.


Past Board of Directors planned this new building and raised funds from many local donors as well as obtaining a large mortgage
This beautiful new building has a huge catering kitchen which is not in use.
This beautiful new building had a large gift shop area which is now closed.
This beautiful new building does not have a loading dock to receive large artworks for display.
This beautiful new building does not have a driveway anyway near the front steps/ramp for handicapped access.

This beautiful new building has no classroom, workshop or storage space for working artist members!

I have belonged to this organization for over 20 years and have been the membership chairman for many few years and find it almost impossible to believe the situation we are in today At the present we have classroom and open studio space at the beautiful new building in one small room which is the Children's Art Gallery. We have no running water in this room, no storage space for supplies, no area available for our matcutter, teaching mirror, still life setup items or a printing press.

The voices of the working artsits were not heard by the past Board's of Directors or the Architect of this beautiful new building even though we are the core organization.
Beware art organizations. Don't dream so big that your dreams become nightmares!

Wow, it is really hot in Brownsville, Texas this week. We are having humidity and temps in the 90's. Thank goodness for our coastal breeze! Spent most of yesterday at the Brownsville Art Museum's studio annex for artists. We had eight of us enjoying the day painting in varied media, oil, acrylic, watercolor, gouche and pastel. I worked on some old watercolor paintings from my stash and resolved some problems by looking at them with a "fresh eye" after they had laid idle for many months. I always tell my students not to toss away paintings they feel have failed. Put them away for awhile and then take a new look at them, maybe they need more work with the brush or maybe they need more work with scissors! I use different size mats to critique the work and almost always can find a part of the painting that is worth saving.
One should enjoy the process of creating and not always be concerned with the product. Who says we can't have fun making mistakes!!

Here it is the last day of April. Time is flying by and I am not getting any new art created! It seems this month was spent taking care of medical problems, think I have been in Dr.'s offices or having tests done twice a week. It isn't any fun to feel like you are 30 mentally and realize that your body isn't that age anymore.

This posted watercolor is an example of creating a total painting with the negative painting method and it was completed a few years ago. The lightest color is the first wash on the paper and each leaf was brought forward by painting behind it, layer after layer creating the feeling of depth. Negative painting is a key element in almost all watercolors. In negative painting you never paint the subject but always define the subject by painting behind it.

Comments anyone??

This is one of my recent abstract paintings that I am fairly happy the results. It may need some darker blue on the left side for better balance. What does anyone else think? It was done with FW Acrylic Inks and Bombay Inks for the most part. I attended two workshops the past three months, one by Pat Dews and another by Emilio Abuargarde, a Mexican artist. Both emphasized structure and composition in abstract painting and collage. I tend to concentrate on color in my works and do need to pay much more attention to composition principals.

This is a painting done with watercolor crayons. I like the wet on wet as well as the feeling of a drawing in this painting.

My problem recently is I seem too busy to get down to work in my studio to do more playing around with my varied media. I seem to have it all and not enough disipline to make the time to play with them! I have oil, acrylics, (tube & liquid) varied watercolor brands and too many colors, acrylic inks, Bombay inks, watercolor pencils and crayons, pastels, (soft, hard, & pencils) printing inks, numerous brands of watercolor paper, printing paper, Yupo paper. Now I must make time to play with them all and CREATE!

I have not had academic art training. I was only able to dive in headfirst into art when I retired at the age of 50 to raise a grandson. Then I became addicted and attended any class and workshop that I could find in the area. Myself and three friends started an Art Club where we could paint every week and hired a professional artist as our instructor.
I would now describe my art as being experimental and creative with a love for color and texture evident in most of my work. I enjoy the process of creating rather than worry about the product. My art is a playful experience rather than laboring to capture the exact predetermined subject. I want to let loose and let go and have my intuition lead my through the stages of creating a painting. I don't fear failures as they are learning experiences and some of my "failures" end up as successful paintings after being reworked or collaged.

Just attended a four day workshop with Pat Dews. She has written two books and has a video " Designing Great Starts with Texture and Forms" She really knows about design and composition and I picked up a lot of tips. I have been using texture in many of my paintings but have not pulled together the design principles very well in the past. Hopefully I will be much more aware of them in my future works.

I would welcome comments from anyone who has attended her workshops or those interested in learning more about her workshop.