"Purple Cabbage" -- oil on canvas -- 24x24" -- Margie Guyot

Cabbages are so weird-looking when you cut them open! Don't these halves look like something from the depths of the ocean? I forgot why I bought this little cabbage originally, but was looking around for something to paint. This tablecloth seemed to go perfectly with the cabbage halves, echoing the deep alizarin crimson tones. The blue swirly-glass bowls I've painted several times. Those swirls are tough! Even getting the color right is a challenge. In the past I've tried mixing viridian with a bit of blue. This time I relied on an old tube of manganese blue. So old, I had to hold a lighted match on the cap to warm up the hardened paint in order to unscrew it.

We finally had about 1 1/2 days of sun here, so I was furiously painting in the patterns of sunlight and shadow as quickly as possible.

Waste not, want not: I brought the cabbage into the house this afternoon and used in the "Russian Cabbage Borscht" recipe from the original Moosewood Cookbook.

"Todd's Truck" -- plein air field study -- oil on canvas panel -- Margie Guyot

Friends and I went over to sculptor Todd Warner's house today and visited. Some of us got out our easels. So much to choose from -- he lives in the most interesting house I've ever seen, with quite a menagerie. Still, this red truck caught my eye.

I only had 2 reds with me: cadmium red light and alizarin, plus no small brushes. I think I painted 95% of this with my favorite #8 flat brush. The sun was only out for about the first 20 minutes, so I kind of had to wing it as far as the lights went. And Todd had to leave before I was finished, so that's the excuse I'm using if anybody has any criticism!

The only bad thing was that this truck was parked right next to his poultry pen. We're talking Peeee-yoooooooo when the wind was just right!

"Epiphyllum" -- 0il on canvas -- 40x60" -- Margie Guyot

I thought of calling this "Stripes". Ha ha. The epiphyllum is the strange plant that is hanging out over half the painting. Also known as "the rickrack plant", it's an orchid cactus. Technically a succulent, when it finally gets big enough to bloom, it's spectacular. I'm a big fan of epiphyllums. There are a bunch of this type of plant in the greenhouse down on Belle Isle. When they bloom, the flowers are large as dinner plates and range in color from hot pink to screaming orange, white, red, etc. Give me spectacular, give me opulence! Give me screaming orange, especially!

Then OK, I guess I must also admit I love tough challenges. I tell people that doing a big still life is like doing a big crossword puzzle, only you have to make up the design and pieces for it all by yourself. This striped fabric, all wrinkled, with folds and in shadow & sunlight -- it about wore my eyeballs out! This still life took longer to finish than most of my paintings because of the difficulty. For a while there I didn't know if it would turn out. I may leave it set a while & might change things later, as I see fit.

Robert Bateman once told us that he felt very depressed during the first 95% of his painting; it was only during the final 5% of it that he got excited again. It was kind of like that with this one.

I think I'm going to do a series of smaller still lifes for a while. I really liked the look of that green Depression glass plate on the lower right. The striped fabric underneath got such interesting distortions, I think I'll have to do a small one with that combination. It's a good excuse to go buy some pretty cupcakes!

Often I like to place yummy-looking sweets on a plate in my paintings. But since I moved up to the sticks, yummy-looking cookies & cupcakes are very hard to find. About all I see in the store down the street are bags of Oreos. Nothing oozing and to-die-for. However, maybe I should think about doing a still life with Cheetos? Cheetos & beer? Or pizza? Plenty of those down at the IGA.

Let me explain that monstrous green glass torpedo-shaped bowl in the center. Naturally, it was a garage-sale find. I got it for about 50 cents ten or fifteen years ago. Of course it's butt-ugly, but it's a siren, beckoning me to pull out once every 10 years to try to paint. I liked how it cast blue and green hues onto the white stripes of the cloth.

I used almost an entire tube of alizarin crimson on this painting! But it was a good thing: a few months ago I'd lost the cap to the tube, so I had to do something to use it all up before it dried in the tube. Waste not, want not.....

Day #6 -- "White Duck" -- oil on canvas -- 30x40" -- Margie Guyot

Here we are at day #6 of working on this painting. And you'll soon learn 2 things about me: I eat roadkill and I use black!

As usual, it was another day of constant interruptions: a visit from a notary (signing refinancing papers) and dealing with the rodent situation. Red squirrels have gotten into my studio, where they have been climbing around, knocking my glass vases to the floor. Oy vey! Well -- I've got a plan for those little boogers! I'm going to buy a rat trap. When I catch them I'll skin & gut them. Stick the meat into a ziplock freezer bag. When it's full, it's squirrel stew, baby!

Today's session involved painting in the little details in the black & white fabric backdrop. That black paint is still pretty wet (after 2 days), so I might have to touch up here and there because the whites were wanting to smear. Usually you think of white paint taking a long time to dry, but black also takes a surprisingly long time.

Black paint: yes, I use it. Some consider it total sacrilege, but it is OK to use -- if you know how. Mix in some ultramarine blue or alizarin crimson and you'll get a rich, deep black. Used alone, black is said to be flat and lifeless. But sometimes just a little touch of black can be effective in dulling-down a mix, which might be just exactly what you want. Some people are horrified at the thought of using alizarin crimson, too. It's a good mixer color. I think it's OK to experiment with colors. You won't go to Hell if you use black. Try it. You might like it.