Birds

Valentine’s Day Paintings 2017

Posted by Cranford

For Valentine’s Day, this year, I painted on 6″ x 6″ stretched canvasses for each of our five grandchildren. It was not planned this way, but as it turned out, they all have purple or lavender in them. They say purple is the most provocative of colors. I think it is fun. These paintings have been well received on Facebook. Here goes!

Asters, etc.

“Asters, etc.” is for Brigitta, age 9. She loves green and is a very good, abstract artist in her own right (better than me). In art, anyway, I find it hard to break free from physical reality. This is a freestyle interpretation of asters, with a couple of undefined, red weed flowers blooming, above the jumble of mixed foliage below.

Goldfinch with pulple coneflowers

“Goldfinch” is for Elijah, age 9. He loves it! It is based on a photograph I had taken through the front door window of our house on Front Street. It was the same goldfinch who had serenaded me at arm’s length while I paused on my morning walk just after my open heart surgery.

Lavender Sunflower

My painting for Isabella is of a  sunflower, but with lavender petals. When she saw it, she said, “Poppop, you are a genius!” I surmise she likes it.

Bizaro Skittles

Jacob’s 11th birthday is next week. He wants a cat. His dad does not want any more animals in addition to his three sons in the house. So I painted him “Bizaro Skittles.” It is a portrait of my cat, mirrored, in purple and pale green.

yes!

“yes!” is for our 12-year-old grandson Aidan. I wrote around the sides: “Even when the answer is No, it says YES! I love you. 2 Corinthians 1:19”
It came to me that he is of the age and temperament that he needs to hear this. When his parents or other adults tell him no, it is not because they don’t want him to have fun, it is because they love him and want him to have a long and happy life. I explained this to him when I gave him the painting. He gave me a huge, tight, long hug-of-war hug.

Hope #12 Peace

Posted by Cranford
Hope #12 Peace

Twelfth in my 31 images of hope for Perkasie Fun-A-Day 2018 is this dove of Peace.

Painting is acrylic on 6″ x 6″ x 1.75″ stretched canvas.

Price: $25 reduced to $10 plus postage

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Carousel Swan

Posted by Cranford
Carousel Swan

The first thing you may notice about this carousel animal is that it is facing left. I guess it must be on a British merry-go-round! It also is not simply nailed down to the deck like the swan benches I have ridden in. It is round-bottomed and mounted on a little deck that gently tips backward and forward as the carousel goes around. The seat is only big enough for two children or two ‘very close friends’ to snuggle together in a semi-reclined position.

Painting is acrylic on 6″ x 6″ stretched canvas.

Price: $30 plus postage

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Carousel Peacock

Posted by Cranford
Carousel Peacock

This is a carousel Peacock painted as my fourth Fun-A-Day warm up piece. Peacocks are male Peafowl. This is an Indian Blue Peafowl. There are three species of peafowl.

Painting is acrylic on 6″ x 6″ stretched canvas.

Price: $30 plus postage

Fill out the form below so we can arrange payment and delivery. I take PayPal, so all credit or debit cards are accepted.

Carousel Tanager

Posted by Cranford
Carousel Tanager

This is a Green-headed Tanager (Tangara seledon). He/she’s way out of scale compared to the painted ponies he/she’s obscuring on the carousel. The Green-headed Tanager is found in the Atlantic Forest in southeastern Brazil, far eastern Paraguay and Misiones, Argentina. It is about 13.5cm or 5-1/4″ long. This one is saddled up and ready to ride on a fantastic carousel.

Painting is acrylic on 12″ x 12″ stretched canvas.

Price: $60 plus postage

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Carousel Flamingo

Posted by Cranford

I determined to paint carousel animals for my project for the 2018 Perkasie Fun-A-Day. I am supposed to wait and just do it in January. I did some research on Sunday. I found more than 31 carousel critters from zoo carousels built in the late 19th century, without including a single horse or pony! This is more fun than one month can contain. I just had to get the ball rolling. I also decided to not limit myself to 6″x6″. On Monday, I painted a Carousel Flamingo in acrylics on a 16″ x 20″ stretched canvas.

Carousel Flamingo

Price: $150 plus postage

Fill out the form below so we can arrange payment and delivery. I take PayPal, so all credit or debit cards are accepted.

Plywood Goldfinch

Posted by Cranford
Plywood Goldfinch

This is the Goldfinch I just painted and hung on my shed. It is based on a photo I took through the window of the front door of our house. It is about 2′ 9″ from beak to tail. I painted this in the same yellow that is the trim color on our shed. I can adjust the shades on these to match your trim or siding, within reason. It is mounted on a 1×3 to provide dimension or to give the option of mounting it on a steel fence stake in your yard or garden.

Price: $100. Pick up at my place in Perkasie, PA.

Fill out the form below so we can arrange payment and delivery. I take PayPal, so all credit or debit cards are accepted.

Parrot In Flight

Posted by Cranford
Parrot in Flight

This Parrot In Flight is not promoting any cause other than  to celebrate color and life!

Painting is acrylic on 16″ x 20″ stretched canvas.

Price: $100 plus postage.

Fill out the form below so we can arrange payment and delivery. I take PayPal, so all credit or debit cards are accepted.

Ruby-throated Hummingbird

Posted by Cranford
Ruby-throated Hummingbird

I painted this Ruby-throated Hummingbird on coarse canvas to echo the one I painted on the cinder block wall as part of the Birds of Perkasie mural that I painted the summer of 2018. This is Bethann’s favorite. I painted the Beebalm in shades of lavender instead of pink. This is closer to the color ours was. This is now pasted on one of the bedroom walls, where I live. I was on the hallway wall of the house we rented on Ridge Ave. I simply used warm water and a sponge to peel it off without damaging it or the wall. The clay based, wallpaper paste remains water-soluble forever.

The painting is acrylic on a 25-3/4″ diameter canvas.

Price: $200 plus postage.

Fill out the form below so we can arrange payment and delivery. I take PayPal, so all credit or debit cards are accepted.

Chickadee

Posted by Cranford
Chickdee

This is a painting of a Chickadee clinging to a hanging pine branch on a tree in front of our house. Last year and through the winter, Blue Jays dominated the huge, sprawling pine. This Spring, the Chickadees drove them out! They are now sharing the far pine at the right, front corner of the lot with a small flock of intrepid Mourning Doves.

The painting is acrylic on 6″ x 6″ stretched canvas.

Price: $40 plus postage.

SOLD

Great Blue Heron

Posted by Cranford
Great Blue Heron

I may have mentioned before, that I grew up in Minnesota. In my day, there was a strong and booming middle class, thanks to an aggressive, progressive income tax structure on both the federal and state levels. On weekends, holidays and vacations (Working people actually took vacations back then), it seemed just about anybody and everybody went “to the lake”. That is what we all said. Our cars’ license plates advertised “10,000 Lakes”. The Almanac counted 12,512 lakes plus a few thousand ponds. One did not have to leave “the Cities”, short for “the Twin Cities”, Minneapolis and St. Paul, to go to a lake. Mpls. is a mash-up of Sioux and Greek meaning “City of Lakes” and has 25 lakes within the city limits, including one manmade one, since they just needed to round up, I guess.

When I was in junior high, my folks bought a lake place just across the river in Wisconsin. I learned the cheeseheads called Minnesotans “swampies”. But this article was supposed to be about my painting of a Great Blue Heron. I grew up seeing these beautiful, fishing birds on the edges of lakes and swooping down and diving into them all of my young life, growing up in Minnesota and Wisconsin. I have seen them occasionally, if only fleetingly, in PA.

Painting is acrylic on 10″ x 10″ stretched canvas.

Price: $90 plus postage.

SOLD