30 Paintings Challenge Day 25: The Air

The White River from Broad Ripple Park
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Acrylic on Canvas 16" x 20"
SOLD

I would like to be the air that inhabits you for a moment only. 

I would like to be that unnoticed and that necessary. 

-Margaret Atwood

30 Painting Challenge Day 24: Sunset Over Indianapolis

Sunset Over Indianapolis
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Acrylic on Canvas 9" x 12"

“Dusk is just an illusion because the sun is either above the horizon or below it. And that means that day and night are linked in a way that few things are there cannot be one without the other yet they cannot exist at the same time. How would it feel I remember wondering to be always together yet forever apart?”

-Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook

30 Painting Challenge Day 23: Cloud Study

Cloud Study
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Acrylic on Canvas 9" x 12"

"Nature is a mutable cloud which is always and never the same."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

30 Painting Challenge Day 22: Bright Morning Stars are Rising

Bright Morning Stars are Rising
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 18" x 24"

Bright morning stars are rising

 Bright morning stars are rising

Day is breaking in my soul.

Where are our dear mothers?

 Where are our dear mothers?

Day is breaking in my soul.

Where are our dear fathers?

 Where are our dear fathers?

Day is breaking in my soul.

Where are our dear sisters?

 Where are our dear sisters?

Day is breaking in my soul.

And where are our dear brothers?

 And where are our dear brothers?

Day is breaking in my soul.

They are in the valley singing

They are in the valley singing

That day is a breaking in their souls.

Listen and hear them singing

Hear them singing

It sounds an echo in our souls.

-American Folk Song, Original words anonymous

When I sang this folksong to my daughter as a lullaby I changed the lyrics to say that the people were in the valley singing.  A subtle difference but I thought it made more sense with the singer questioning where everyone was, then realizing that they are singing in the valley just as she is.

I give full permission to any musicians who want to sing this version of the song to please sing it!  Folksongs must be passed on to come alive.

Close up of Bright Morning Stars Painting by Hirschten

30 Paintings Challenge Day 21: Sunset on Lake Lemon

Sunset on Lake Lemon
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 12" x 24"
Original Available on Etsy

"There's a sunrise and a sunset every single day,

and they're absolutely free.

Don't miss so many of them."

- Jo Walton

30 Painting Challenge Day 20: For the Beauty of the Skies

For the Beauty of the Skies
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 12" x 24"

For the beauty of the earth,

For the beauty of the skies,

For the love which from our birth,

Over and around us lies,

For the beauty of each hour,

Of the day and of the night,

Hill and vale, and tree and flower,

Sun and moon, and stars of light.

For the joy of human love,

Brother, sister, parent child,

Friends on earth, and friends above,

For all gentle thoughts and mild,

Lord of all to thee we raise

this our hymn of grateful praise

-Folliott S. Pierpoint

30 Painting Challenge Day 19: The Nuthatch

The Nuthatch
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 5" x 7"

"I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself. 

A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough without ever having felt sorry for itself."
-D.H. Lawrence

Alchemy of Art Podcast, Episode 19: Interview with Trisha Adams

Trisha Adams with two of her *amazing* commissioned paintings
www.trishaadams.com

Podcast also available on iTunes

Join us for the “Alchemy of Art” podcast.  Today's episode features an interview with Contemporary Impressionist painter, Trisha Adams.   Find out more about Trisha's work at:  www.trishaadams.com.

The story of the day is on "Impressionism," how the term was coined and the beginnings of the art movement.This story and many others are found in the book, "The Alchemy of Art: Stories for the Classroom."

30 Painting Challenge Day 18: The Pet Squirrel

The Pet Squirrel
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"

"Animals are such agreeable friends- 

they ask no questions; they pass no criticisms."
-George Eliot

30 Paintings Challenge Day 17: Sunshine in a Bottle

Sunshine in a Bottle
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Acrylic on Canvas 8" x 10"

No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.

-Charles Dickens

30 Paintings Challenge Day 16: The Barn Cat

The Barn Cat
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"

"Happiness is like a cat, 

If you try to coax it or call it, it will avoid you; it will never come. 

But if you pay not attention to it and go about your business, 

you'll find it rubbing against your legs and jumping into your lap."
-William Bennett

30 Paintings Challenge Day 15: The Yellowthroated Warbler

Yellowthroated Warbler
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 5" x 7"
SOLD

How did it happen that their lips came together? 

How does it happen that birds sing, 

that snow melts, that the rose unfolds, 

that the dawn whitens behind the stark shapes of trees on the quivering summit of the hill? 

A kiss, and all was said.
-Victor Hugo

30 Paintings Challenge Day 14: Red Bellied Woodpecker

Red Bellied Woodpecker
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 8" x 10"
Original Available on Etsy

It is not only fine feathers that make fine birds.

-Aesop

30 Painting Challenge Day 13: Finch

Finch
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 5' x 7"

Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.

-Zhuangzi

30 Painting Challenge Day 12: The Happy Dog

The Happy Dog
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
Original Available on Etsy
Prints available on Fine Art America 

“Dogs are our link to paradise. 

They don't know evil or jealousy or discontent. 

To sit with a dog on a hillside on a glorious afternoon is to be back in Eden, 

where doing nothing was not boring--

it was peace.”

- Milan Kundera

30 Paintings Challenge Day 11: Golf in the Fall

Golf in the Fall
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
SOLD

We cling to our own point of view, as though everything depended on it. 

Yet our opinions have no permanence;

like autumn and winter,

they gradually pass away.

-Zhuangzi

30 Painting Challenge Day 10: The Crane

Galapagos Island Crane
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
Original Painting Available on Etsy

"When you have seen one ant, 

one bird, 

one tree, 

you have NOT seen them all."
-E.O. Wilson

30 Paintings Challenge Day 9: The Littlest Bird

The Littlest Bird
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 16" x 20"

This Painting is inspired by William Morris' fabric design, "The Strawberry Thief."  

Here the bird is placed in the form of a window as if he is honored as divine creature.  

Perhaps more small things should be.

The littlest birds sing the prettiest songs

Well, it's times like these, I feel so small and wild

But I'm not too blue to fly

-From a song by the Be Good Tanyas

30 Paintings Challenge Day 8: Birds in the Thicket

Birds in the Thicket
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Acrylic on Canvas 24" x 36"
Available on Etsy 
Prints Available on Fine Art America

There are 8 birds in this tree.  Can you find them all?

Know'st thou the land where the lemon-trees bloom, 

Where the gold orange glows in the deep thicket's gloom,

Where a wind ever soft from the blue heaven blows,

And the groves are of laurel and myrtle and rose

-Johann von Goethe

30 Paintings Challenge Day 7: The Rainbow

The Rainbow
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
Available on Etsy

But pleasures are like poppies spread,

You seize the flower; its bloom is shed;

Or like the snow falls in the river;

A moment white- then melts forever;

Or like the borealis rays,

That flit ere you can point their place.

-Robert Burns, Tam O'Shanter

30 Paintings Challenge Day 6: Mr. Squirrel

Mr. Squirrel
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Acrylic on Canvas 11" x 14"
SOLD

The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.

-Bertrand Russell 

Alchemy of Art Podcast, Episode 18: Interview with Jessica Kaufman

Kaufman wearing a sweater she designed!
(See it explained on Ravelry!)

Podcast also available on iTunes

Join us for the “Alchemy of Art” podcast.  Today's episode features an interview with Jessica Kaufman and the story of William Morris and the Arts and Crafts Movement.   Find out more about Jessica's work at:  www.happygocrafty.com.

The story of the day is on "William Morris and the Arts and Crafts Movement." This story and many others are found in the book, "The Alchemy of Art: Stories for the Classroom."

30 Paintings Challenge Day 5: Kitten with Milk

Kitten with Milk
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
Available on Etsy

It is a very inconvenient habit of kittens 

that whatever you say to them, they always purr.

-Lewis Carrol, Through the Looking Glass

30 Paintings Challenge Day 4: Seagull in the Air

Seagull in the Air
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
Available on Etsy

He was not bone and feather but a perfect idea of freedom and flight, 

limited by nothing at all.

-Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull

30 Paintings Challenge Day 3: Yellow Roses

Yellow Roses
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
Available on Etsy

It is not what you look at that matters.  It is what you see.

-Thoreau

30 Paintings Challenge Day 2: The Waiting Bird

The Waiting Bird
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Oil on Canvas 11" x 14"
SOLD

A hush is over everything, 

Silent as those waiting for love;

The world is waiting for spring.

-Sara Teasdale

30 Paintings Challenge Day 1: Keep Flying

Keep Flying
Copyright 2016 Hirschten
Acrylic on Canvas 11" x 14"
SOLD

Once you have tasted flight, 

you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, 

for there you have been, 

and there you will always long to return.

-Leonardo da Vinci

Alchemy of Art Podcast, Episode 17: Interview with Artist Sonja Brooks

Sonja Brooks teaching with Sisohpromatem

Podcast also available on iTunes
 
Join us for the “Alchemy of Art” podcast. Today's episode features an interview with artist and teacher, Sonja Brooks and the folktale, "The Vinegar Bottle." Find out more about Sonja's work at: http://www.art4edu.org.

The story of the day is "The Mama Cat," a folktale from Wales. This story and many others are found in the book, "The Alchemy of Art: Stories for the Classroom."

Join me at the Winter Sale!

Find a wide variety of holiday gifts created by the faculty at the Indianapolis Art Center this Friday and Saturday.
Find out more at:   Indianapolis Art Center Winter Sale

Hope to see you there!

Art and Soul Retreat Workshops

Yes it's true!  I will be teaching two workshops at the Art and Soul Retreat, Virginia Beach 2016. These will be all day, intensive, rejuvenating workshops.  I'm told that the atmosphere at Art and Soul is fun-loving and refreshing.

Register before January 1st for a reduced rate.  I hope to see you there!

Victorian Flower Painting September 29-30, 2016
In this class we will learn to create watercolor floral paintings using simple Victorian design methods. After this class you will be able to use these patterns to decorate anything from greeting cards to furniture!

Did you know that adult coloring books are not a new invention? During the Victorian era people loved hand painting botanical flower books.  Find out what flower represents you and your personality according to the Victorian symbolism.

On the second day we will create our own flower design paintings using real plants as inspiration. Techniques for rendering flowers realistically and/or stylistically will be discussed. Beginning and advanced painters welcome.

The Secret Language of Symbols October 1, 2016

Symbolism has been used to communicate values and messages by artists since the beginning of time. In this workshop we will create paintings using a range of symbols and images. Symbols are everywhere from colors, to tattoos, to graffiti, to pirate flags, to paintings. Join us as we explore the art of using symbols to express yourself.

First we will create a mini collage of symbols found in magazines and the instructor’s symbol cards. This collage will inspire your main project, your symbolist painting. Using acrylic paints and collage materials we will layer images onto our canvases forming patterns rich with meaning.