Tag Archives: stones

After Walking the Dog table

This little table is about 12″ square and 3 feet tall. It is painted in Trompe L’oeil style to look like someone has left behind evidence of walking the dog.   Looking down on the top of the table you see the leash that was ‘dropped’ there along with a few pretty stones which the walker collected. The leash was painted to resemble the actual leash owned by the client.  One of the stones on the table top is a piece of soapstone, another is river polished marble.   On the lower shelf is the old tennis ball the dog was playing with, along with a maple leaf.   I used the original red surface and only embellished it with objects.  Just a little surprise; ants crawling up the side! Have you noticed I try to have some sort of critter somewhere in everything I paint?   Sometimes you will find a lady bug or dragon fly beside my signature, which in this case is inside the drawer.

Stones on a Vanity Table

What a joy it was to paint this table!  I worked from real stones and photographs of real stones. It was a challenge to make the randomness of the stones both natural and artistically placed.  Painting realistic stones takes a combination of technique, patience and old brushes that can be handled ‘roughly.’ Doing the stripes that naturally occur in some stones is not easy, if done wrong the stripe would seem painted’ on the outside.   The client requested “No pink or brown stones”, but the piece needed the hints of rust, yellow and green or else the all gray palette would have been too cold.   Of course there has to be a bug on the stones! A delicate Damselfly was perfect for what appears to be a scene from the water’s edge.  Everyone who has seen this table points to a different stone as their favorite. Which one is your favorite?   I painted the legs in four alternating shades of gray.  When this table was originally brought to me it was painted an ugly bright yellow, what a transformation!

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