Jenna Likes Cats

It's been a while since I've shown work by my favorite artist (my daughter Jenna!)  She's in her second year of art school right now, but she did all the work shown here during high school.

We have four cats, so it's no surprise that they have shown up in Jenna's paintings. She works mostly from photographs, and these paintings are all done with acrylic paints.

 First, our male Siamese, Sake, sitting in a stack of boxes.  I love the shadings of color in his fur:

Next, our female Siamese, Suki, gazing out the window onto our back yard.  This is a favorite location for our indoor cats.  The vine is a pretty weed that grew up the side of the house and across the screen.  I love the calm feeling of this painting:

We currently have a large tabby names Juniper, whom we rescued from the animal shelter when our previous    equally-large tabby died.  Jenna hasn't painted Juniper yet, but the two tabbies look so similar that this painting of Toulouse works for both!  I love the slightly abstract quality of this one:

And now we come to the world's most excellent cat:  Q-tip.  We rescued her at the same time as Juniper. Q-tip is Jenna's cat, and she is her favorite thing in the whole world.  This painting was done for a class assignment.  This painting is so fun to look at!

Oh--hi, Q-tip!

For another class assignment, Jenna piled all our cats on top of each other (in clay form), going from large to small.  Her favorite Q-tip is queen of the hill!  (This sculpture cracks me up every time I see it!)

Front view:

Side view (Juniper's face is visible):

The other side view (the Siamese cats' faces are visible):

Nice work, Jenna!

In the Kitchen with Jenna

Back in February I introduced you to my favorite artist--my daughter, Jenna.  Since I want to include a little more "art" in this blog (it does have that word in the title, after all!), today I am featuring some of Jenna's paintings.  All these paintings are acrylics on canvas, and all of them were painted from photographs that Jenna took in our kitchen.

This painting, below, is possibly my favorite thing she has ever done.  Jenna came into the kitchen with her camera when I had just walked into the house with some flowers.  I grabbed the first thing I could find to plop them into--an old plastic pitcher--and Jenna snapped the photo.  I love everything about this painting, from the colors to the brushstrokes to the somewhat impressionistic quality.  It's quite large, about 24" x 40".

I love this paiting too--it's the same kitchen counter, and Jenna lined up some of the random things that were sitting around that day.  The little bottle in the center was actually hot sauce, but the artist took the liberty of turning it into a tiny vial of poison!  The reflection of the Coke cans on the countertop is amazing.

This painting is birthday cupcakes on the kitchen table.  I love these colors, and how every element of the painting is so realistic--the cupcakes, the cooling rack, and the table.

This is a smaller painting, about 10" x 12".  These pears are lined up on the kitchen stove top.  The subject matter is simple, but it is very interesting because of the arrangement of the fruit...they seem to be standing in line, waiting for something!

This is another beautiful little still-life, of nectarines on the dining room table.  Oh!  I just realized that this one doesn't fit the theme because it's in the dining room!  But it goes with the pears, so it's staying in!  This too is a simple but compelling painting because of it's realistic quality, and the off-kilter tiles of the table under the fruit that give it movement.

There's more artwork where all these came from!  Next month I'll show you more.

My Favorite Artist

It has occurred to me more than once, that with the word "Art" in the title of my blog, I ought to be showing you more of that!  So today I want to introduce you to my favorite artist:  my daughter, Jenna.  I plan to post her artwork regularly, perhaps once a month or so.

Jenna is currently a freshman in the School of Art at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Virginia.  She's always been artistic and creative, and when she entered high school she already knew that she wanted to pursue art as a career.

Here she is at her Senior Art Show last spring at her high school, surrounded by her work:

 She is fabulously talented as a painter on canvas, and as a digital artist on the computer.  On her left you can see a painting of her cat, Q-Tip, done in the style of a painting by an artist whose name she can no longer recall!

Jenna has a unique personal style that is quirky and offbeat.  She doesn't always paint fluffy white kittens; usually the tone of her art is more like these highly-detailed, painted ping-pong balls (which I set on spools of thread so they wouldn't roll away during the photo session!)

Front view:

Back view:

On the left, the Monster from the Black Lagoon; on the right, a "lovely" mermaid:

On the left, a vampire; on the right, a mummy:

I think these are amazing!  I especially love the mermaid, because it is completely opposite of the "average" mermaid, with her missing tooth and over-done makeup.  I'm also impressed with the mummy's wrappings, which extend smoothly around the entire ball.

Next time I will show you a couple of Jenna's sculptures...they are really cool...!