Ready to Pick Guava

Guava is one of my favorite fruit. Back in childhood I spent many hours climbing on guava tree and sitting on the tree until I felt full with the Guavas. This painting brings back those memories...
This is painted from a picture I took of a ripe Guava from my backyard tree. In So Cal its a blessing to have Guava tree at home. The picture was taken couple years ago and finally I took it up for painting it.
I started painting this as part of the Artist Demonstration in Chemer's gallery on May 6th and finished it after coming back home.
I have been doing more watercolors lately so definitely felt good getting back to oil to change it up.

click on image to view larger 

Ready to Pick Guava, 8x10 inches, Oil on canvas panel

Code# PK_17_013
Available - Click Here

Desert Jewel

First of all I love painting flowers and second, I love desert flowers!! Every spring we have wonderful blooms on the cacti in our neighborhood, on hikes specially. They look like jewels growing on the cacti plants. Here is an attempt to capture one such jewel. Can you feel the heat on these blooms?

click on image to view larger

Desert Jewel - 16 x 12 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

Code# PK_16_019 

Available - contact - preranap@hotmail.com

Dancing Joy

It was a joy to create this painting - my favorite Dance in combination with my favorite peacock feather!!
Many thanks to Sampada Deshpande for providing me photographs and allowing me to paint from her photographs.
For those who don't know this is Kathak dance - one of the classical dance forms of India. Click here to know more about this dance form on Wikipedia.
The speciality of this painting is that it is mixed media piece with peacock feather and stage painted in watercolor on arches paper; and the dancer is painted in traditional Oil paints on canvas panel.

click on image to view larger 

Dancing Joy, 16x12 inches, Mixed Media on Canvas Panel

Code# PK_16_018

Here is how I did it: I first sketched the dancer on canvas panel. Then traced the dancer outline on tracing paper. Used carbon paper and tracing paper on top to get the exact outline of the dancer on Arches Watercolor paper. Next I cut out the dancer shape from arches paper. Pasted the arches paper on canvas panel carefully matching the cutout to the drawn dancer on canvas panel. Once the paper was attached to the panel, I let it dry overnight with weights on it. 

I first painted the watercolor part i.e peacock feather and stage.  Once I was happy with the watercolor part, I let it dry throughly before starting with oils. Now the figure was painted similar to traditional oils but I always paint with palette knife, which is what I chose to do for it too. 

I am very happy with the piece and it is my very first mixed media painting!! Love it!

Ring on Blue River - SOLD

The scene is on Blue River in Colorado. This is a commission painting for her upcoming wedding!! It is the place where she got engaged.

It was fun and relaxing to paint this - my favorite time of the day - sunset, beautiful rocks, sound of river flowing, a bit chilly weather - perfect romantic atmosphere!!

click on image to view larger

Ring on Blue River - 16 x 20 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

SOLD

This picture is taken under studio lights, in daylight, the colors will look different.

Wild Strawberry Bloom - SOLD

In our backyard there was a very small plant of Strawberry and the gardner cleaned the rest. Between spring and now the whole empty patch is covered with this plant and it even has mini strawberries! Few plants still have such blooms and that inspired me to paint this on one of my mini canvas. This is #3 in the itty bitty series of paintings. It can be displayed on a mini canvas on a small easel or can be used as a christmas ornament!
Let me know how you like it.

Wild Strawberry Blossom - 3x3 inches, oil on canvas

SOLD

Contact me if you would like to have one of these. The other 2 in this series are:

Pansy - 3x3 inches, Oil on Canvas
http://celebrations-ppk.blogspot.com/2013/07/pansy.html



Tulip - Pink or Purple - 3x3 inches, Oil on Canvas
http://celebrations-ppk.blogspot.com/2012/01/tulip-pink-or-purple.html

Best Friends - Lorikeets

Their color inspired me to paint it, and their pose suggests as if they have been "best friends" since long time!

These are a pair of Rainbow Lorikeets are colorful parrots found in Australia, Indonesia... A lot of people have such Lorikeets as pets too. I am not sure if I am ready to have such pets, but I had fun fun fun painting them!

click on image to view larger

Best Friends - 8x10 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

Whimsy Hat

Care to try this Whimsical Hat? The photo reference is from one of the weekly challenges on Wetcanvas online artist community. This was very unique and interesting hat and so I had saved it for painting. I change the original picture as per my interpretation i.e I may sometimes crop the original pictue to create an interesting composition or I may change the shapes a bit or change colors as per my liking. In this case slightly cropped and also added some of my own colors, you can compare by looking at the original photo reference also posted below. Also I have 2 different versions of the picture, the first one is taken in daylight and the second one in studio light.

click on image to view larger

Whimsy Hat, 11x14 inches Oil on Canvas Panel. Picture taken in daylight

click on image to view larger 

Whimsy Hat, 11x14 inches Oil on Canvas Panel, Picture taken in studio light

Original Photo Reference: Wetcanvas



Original Photo reference from weekly challenge on Wetcanvas.

Leaning Over to see Myself

As I leaned over, it was a pleasant surprise to see myself – my reflection was beautiful! All this time I thought of myself as being quite ugly, being surrounded by murky water. It was a miracle to realize the beautiful world and all the wonderful blessings!

click on image to view larger

Leaning Over to see Myself - 11x14 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

Down the Shady Path

I painted this from Susan Sarback's book titled - Capturing Radiant Light & Color. It had been long time I had not tried out any demo from this book, so it was fun doing it.
After finishing and signing the painting, I felt I should have painted the first tree on the right, a little more shady; Painted a man sleeping under that tree with a basket on his side; and a few monkeys on tree with caps on. It would be a perfect illustration of the story "Cap seller and the Monkeys". Do you know this story? Ok, see the painting first and I have the story below it for you to read.

click on the image to view larger

Down the Shady Path - 8x10 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

Here's the story:  Cap seller and the Monkeys
Once a cap-seller was going to sell his caps in a village market. He was going through a forest. He was carrying a basket of caps on his head. It was very hot and he was tired, so he lay down under a tree to take rest. He put his basket on the ground. He fell asleep.
There were monkeys on that tree. They came down and took the caps. Then they climbed on the tree. When the cap-seller woke up, he was surprised to see that all the caps were gone from the basket. He looked up on the tree and saw monkeys were wearing his caps. He became sad. He thought of a plan. He threw his own cap on the ground. The monkeys also threw down their caps. He collected his caps and went away.
Moral: Wit works where strength fails.

Rainbow in Foothill Ranch

This is a result of one day "marathon" painting session. I had lot of fun doing the sky. I loved the contrast of light and dark in this painting and the inspiration photo too. And most of all I wanted to try paint a rainbow which I had never done before and did not know if I will have success painting it "wet in wet". I think it would have been easier if the underpainting was dry and then paint the rainbow over it - but I might try this next time. I am happy with this wet in wet result too. Everytime I put color in the rainbow, I thought I was going to ruin the whole painting... so I feel very accomplished after doing this.
I was in a time crunch too, since I had to submit this painting before the deadline time... I have submitted this painting for Viewpoints: Orange County juried exhibition, and keeping my fingers crossed until the results are out next Monday!

click on image to view larger

Rainbow in Foothill Ranch - 14x11 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

Here is the inspiration photo. I cropped the original picture in the painting.. This is from the back of my office, on a rainbow day. The picture was clicked by my friend - Marilou:

Illuminated Apple

This is a demo project for teaching Oil painting.
It is done using palette knife and with Winsor & Newton Artisan Water Mixable Oil and very limited palette: Cadmium Yellow Pale Hue, Permanent Alizarin Crimson, French Ultramarine, Phthalo Green (BS), Yellow Ochre, Titanium White.
click on the image to view larger

Illuminated Apple - 11x14 inches, Oil on canvas

Meow - SOLD

Friends, my new year 2013 paintings started with a Meow! Even if you are not a cat person - you will definately admire this little kitty.

Meow - 8x10 inches, Oil on canvas panel

SOLD

Hope you like it and I will love to have your comments.

Portrait of Anushka

I wanted to paint a portrait for this year and feel very accomplished. I probably will tweek a little here and there on this painting still, but this is 99.9% finished. Hope you like it and do send me your comments:

Portrait of Anushka - 11x14 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

Here is how the painting progressed:

Anushka - Stage1

Anushka - Two



Anushka - Three



Anushka - Final

A Glimpse of the Beach City

The air is sultry, noise level is high, hustle and bustle of people, and gray atmosphere could make someone dizzy. Nevertheless, against all odds, this is a city of opportunity – the commercial and entertainment capital of India – Mumbai. To balance out the “dizziness” there is this vast ocean where one can take a deep breath, look at the horizon and feel the promising air – a definite assurance of a bright future! So friends here is an attempt to capture a glimpse of the beach city.

Enjoy!

click on image to view larger

A Glimpse of the Beach City - 8x10 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

The Blossoming Dahlia - SOLD

Flowers bring hope, happiness and inspiration in our life. Look at this blossoming Dahlia - bright, cheerful, and gracefully unfolding each petal!

click on image to view larger

The Blossoming Dahlia - 9x12 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

SOLD

Common Coot with its Young

With this painting I have a riddle for you all. The young one of Duck is called Duckling, young of Hen is called Chick... Now here is a Common Coot - whats its young called? You can post your answers in the comments...
Spring is fast approaching, in US the official start of spring is on 20th March. So as you must have guessed, spring time is the inspiration for this painting.

click on the image to view larger

Common Coot with its Young - 16x20 inches, Oil on Canvas Panel

MetroCity - Mumbai Coastline

It always amazes me - tall buildings right next to ocean... This is an attempt to capture Mumbai coastline from a distance.

click on image to view larger

MetroCity - Mumbai Coastline - 8x10 inches, Oil on Canvas panel

Did you like it?

1...2...3...JUMP

I almost titled this painting as - Life is for having fun or Life is for enjoying! but 1..2...3...JUMP is the best I liked. There are lots of participants in the making of this painting - the jumping teenagers, having fun and someone who clicked their photo! Thanks to you all.
It was as exciting and fun to paint this as much as these friends jumping in the sand.
Let me know if you like the painting.

click on the image to view larger

1..2..3..JUMP! - 16x20 inches, Oil on Canvas panel

Tulip - Pink or Purple? - SOLD

Here's a miniature experiment - 3 x 3 inches oil painting. I thought I will finish this painting in a breeze. But no.. I realized that it is in reality harder to paint on such a small surface and so takes quite some time. I completed this in about 2 hours. And yet could not do it "alla prima" (- i.e wet on wet painting that is done in one single session). I could not manage to get straight 2 hours sitting time. I am itching to try this technique sometime...

click on image below to view larger (although you may then see it larger than its original size :)

Tulip - Pink or Purple? - 3x3 inches, Oil on Canvas

SOLD

The Boy’s gone fishing… - SOLD

Greetings everyone and Happy New Year!

Looks like this boy is fishing in solitude. Seems like he is throughly enjoying himself amidst the shimmering water.  Hope he does get a good catch!

I chose this reference photo on Wetcanvas weekly challenge.

click on the image to view larger

The Boy's gone fishing - 5 x 7 inches, Oil on canvas panel