News

Yesterday began the first of several trips I'll be taking in the next few weeks to coastal Georgia! With a LOT of help from a very good friend, we got a 17 foot truck loaded with furniture, boxes and more "small stuff" than I knew existed. And after a long drive through Georgia, we arrived at my new destination for art! Darien is located in the low country with an abundance of Spanish moss hanging from the trees. The laid back atmosphere of a small fishing town and an abundance of scenery stretching for miles across the marshes.

About seven years ago, I arrived in this small town to depart for an uninhabited island to paint for a week with a group of eleven other artist friends. From the first moment standing on the dock looking out over the river curling its way through the lush marsh grasses, I felt the call of home on my heart. I've revisited the area many times during the past seven years, painting, getting to know the locals, and eating some of the best seafood ever! I dreamed of living in the Darien area, painting the marshes every day, having a studio open to other artists, and spending the rest of my life soaking up the low country atmosphere. And now that dream is coming true! Of course, all the packing, loading and driving is a challenge, but what are dreams without the reality of achieving them.

So, if you're following this blog, soon you'll find a new improved version of my transition to a low country painter who is still hooked on outdoor painting and following the dreams of my heart. Hope you will enjoy the journey along with me and come down to visit sometime! Until next time......

carly

A New Chapter

Well, that's what you usually call a change in one's life...beginning a new chapter. Somehow I feel as if I'm actually moving toward finishing a chapter rather than beginning a new one. Over the past few years my life has changed from day to day. I seldom knew what the next day might hold! So writing chapters, or much less a blog, on a day to day basis became somewhat of a chore instead of a fun thing. As of today, I have determined to close that chapter of upheaval and settle down to a much less hectic pace. If I were more of a list maker, at the top of the page would be...write more and talk less. LOL! Perhaps, that could become a New Year's resolution or my birthday wish for next week.

Yep, I'll be celebrating another "year of remembrance" next week. No party...no gifts...just a few friends who will give me hugs and I will appreciate and love them even more for the quiet embraces.

I have obviously waxed melancholy tonight but I am allowed one such evening in my life - am I not? If you were here, we would share a glass of wine, watch the fire burn down, and toast one another as artists, as friends, and as ageless spirits for whom birthdays do not exist...

Painting the Chattahoochee

A friend and I met to paint at the Jones Bridge Park in Norcross, GA. a week ago. I bravely took my oil pastels to the site since the weather had turned a bit cooler. While painting I took pics of each step so that I could create a demo from the painting. Of course one never knows when one begins if the painting will be worthy of a demo or not....but no matter. The light was clear, the sky cloudy, the wind breezy but not too strong, and winter geese flew in an around us as we painted. Wonderful autumn weather! Here are a few pics that better tell the story....



The Scene and the Setup....



The outcome....



The entire demo will be available online at the Oil Pastel Society. http://oilpastelsociety.com in a few days! Check it out!

Plein Air Northwest

This summer Marsha Savage and I made a trip to the Pacific Northwest. Visiting my sister, brother, and another artist friend, Denise Champion, we packed two states into a two week adventure. Although a lot of time was spent site-seeing and driving, we both managed to get in some painting along the way. Here's a few of the ones that I managed to get at my brother's place in the Williamette Valley.







That morning Jim invited us out, and little did we know that, upon arriving, we would be given buckets for picking plums! Once the plums were gathered, we took the produce to a wonderful open air farmer's market. The beauty of the fields blooming with sunflowers and fresh produce ready for gathering was awe inspiring! Hopefully on future trips, I'll plan a day to paint there too!

My Goodness!

Another six months has passed and here I am again blogging! Keeping up with my blog is much like keeping up with all the passwords that one accumulates on the web! Since my last post, much has happened....I moved home after three years in the Tannery Row Artist Colony. My studio now takes up "all" of my double garage! However, the move has some advantages...no more driving an hour to work! sleeping later in the mornings...haha! Like that ever happens! and being able to keep my granddaughter, Sophie, on occasion. She, however, is not much help in the studio, but she does some really mean scribbles with her crayons! And of course, I can paint in my pj's! Drop by any day to visit!!

The highlight of this month was a workshop with Ann Templeton, internationally known pastellist and oil painter. She has two books out that I recommend to every artist who wants to break out of the realist approach to painting and learn more about how to abstract the landscape. And if you can take one of her workshops, even better! Every day began with a lecture (more like a conversation time) and a demonstration. She showed how working from a photo is only a stepping off point to creating a painting. Her technique focused on keeping the darker values transparent and working as long as possible with the darks before going to more opaque lights. When I told her that I had a problem with knowing when to go more opaque, she said, "then keep working the darks until you have nothing left to do but add the lights". I'm trying to remember that!

I have a new website which focuses on paintings only. http://carlyhardy.com
and if you want to email me, it's carly@carlyhardy.com. Let me know if you visit.

Until next time (I'll get some of my workshop paintings scanned for you) keep your brushes wet and pastels dry!

Hotlanta Summer!

Yep, you guessed it. The weather is steamy and hot this summer in Atlanta and I'm missing painting outdoors!! The past couple of days have seen cooler temps (in the low 90's) but I'm still dreaming of those cool fall nights that won't appear again until some time in October! But enough about the weather!

Our summer show, "SunnySide UP!", is now up and running at the Tannery. If you'd like to view some of the newest art by the Tannery artists and our guests from Southern Colours Art Association, drop by, Tuesday thru Saturday, noon to 5 pm. We're located at 554 West Main Street in Historic Buford, Georgia.

My painting in this show is called "Decisions". It's rather abstract but if you look closely, you'll find figures turned in several directions, appearing to revolve around a broken urn...perhaps searching for the answer to a life question. Ever find yourself in that type of situation or mood? As an artist, my life questions are often answered thru my paintings, sometimes without my realizing it. Let me know if you have ever experienced this!

The painting below won 4th place in the Historic Buford Plein Air Festival held April 24/25th this spring. The scene caught my eye from several streets over and it took me almost thirty minutes to find how to get behind the trailer so I could paint it! It's not easy to follow winding streets up and down hills when you can't see where you're going and just try putting "trailer with clothes on line" in your gps!!

Birthdays

I'm sure the title of today's blog tells the story. Today is my birthday! which is one of those days that I usually just quietly live thru since it falls in a wintry month of the year. Cold temperatures and gray days blended with less sunlight tend to make me a bit depressed. So each year during this time, I forgo the birthday party for a quieter evening. However, today was an exception. Upon leaving the studio, I mentioned to a fellow artist if she knew of a place to get a good bowl of soup (that sounded like a nice quiet thing to do) and she said maybe....and that she was free for dinner if I wanted company. I thought how nice that would be to share my quiet dinner with her, so I told her that it was my birthday but that she was not to tell anyone else. Well then we decided to ask another artist friend if she would also like to join us...and the party was on!

Over a great meal the three of us laughed, they sang the happy birthday song, and told the waitress it was my birthday, who brought out a very large piece of cheesecake topped with whipped cream and drizzled with chocolate sauce, which we all shared.

I've decided that from this day forward my birthday will be spent with a couple of friends, sharing conversation and great cheesecake, and laughing my way past another year. Sure beats the heck out of a quiet bowl of soup for one!

Birthdays are not really about getting older, you know. They are about taking stock of your life and deciding how you want to spend the next year.....looking back or moving forward toward new adventures. I think my friends would tell me to "move on"!

Thanks "ladies" for a great birthday gift!
carly