Painting fabric

This is my preliminary sketch for the piece that I will paint in Houston at Make it U's open studios.

After I get the pencil drawing worked out to my satisfaction, I draw over the lines with a fine point pen and then erase the pencil. It is very easy to see the lines through a piece of white cotton fabric and trace them with pencil onto the fabric.
I know in 2 hours of working and chatting I will not make fast progress, so I wanted to get it started so people would have something to look at besides a white piece of fabric. I have worked out some of the more complex color decisions before hand by painting the birds. This will make it much easier for me to talk and paint without having to concentrate so much on the actual painting.



This seaweed painting is 5" x 10" and will be used for a different project than the other little paintings. I will reveal more about them in a couple days. I was asked to contribute a postcard size quilt representative of my work for a Quilting Arts project.


I spent most of my life living near the ocean in Maine and California. I have a particular fondness for seaweed. I love its various shapes and colors. Unfortunately I am horribly allergic to it.
4" x 6"