Ms. Dana Elizabeth

Sometimes I wonder where my hunger for color comes from. There are days where I would like to do nothing more than paint a giant bright orange stripe across the watercolor sheet. Then of course I would have to spend hours layer more orange and red and yellow into various parts. And maybe some bright blue would be thrown in because those two colors together make something inside me jump in delight. Is it the grey winters in the Northwest that drives my color starvation? I am not a colorful dresser by any means. Look into my closet and greyish greens fades into blacks and browns with the occasional orange scarf. I heard something wonderful the other day in the caboose. There shouldn't be greys and blacks in paintings. It just makes them muddy. Take a closer look at a shadow or a dark spot and you will see the brightest colors. Metephor for life? Perhaps. Color for a grey March morning:   (An eye candy that will have to wait until my Kenya show is finished.)

It pedal to the metal time or rather brush to the canvas because I took a giant leap and scheduled an art show for December 2011. That's 10 months away, but in watercolor time its like three seconds. So I am back painting in the caboose, I have a table set up at home and in between my two/threeish jobs I am a painting fool! In 2005 and 2006 when I spent the summer in Miwani, Kenya, I drew every night with the kids and taught art classes at a local school. All these drawings came home with me along with a promise to put on an art show to raise money for the community. Well its finally going to happen! I have until December to frame all their pieces and finish mine. Once the time gets closer I am hoping to run an article in the newspaper and get a little publicity afterall December is the "season of giving" right? The show is going to be at a restaurant on the Island that has ample wall space, maybe too much, but I am determined to finish at least three big pieces this year...