Painting 204. Tree Swallow in Early Spring on Rusted Steel Post
(watercolor)
...another painting for Laure Ferlita's 100 Paintings Challenge. If you're an artist looking for a challenge, join up!
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Tree Swallows in the early spring...
Friday it was 62 degrees F in Cincy...and sunny! It's often below zero this time of the year, and thick grey clouds so low in the sky you can almost reach up and touch them can lock us in for months on end, so sunny and blue and warm is a gift I'm glad Mama Nature is handing out. The daffodils have pushed through the earth in our front yard, and it feels like spring, which made me think of one of our earliest spring migrants, the Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolor). Every March I anticipate their return, watching and waiting for them to swoop down and into the nest boxes at VOA Park and Pine Hills Lakes. With the spring-like weather and blue, sunny skies, I couldn't help but have these sweet birds on my mind, so I went through old photos for inspiration for this painting...
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16 comments:
Delightful! I, too, anticipate the arrival of the tree swallows. I have 2.5 acres of wet meadow by the ocean and this past spring, I started putting up nesting boxes. I enjoyed my tree swallow fix each morning. If I couldn't see them, and I called out to them, they'd appear, almost as if they heard and understood!!
gorgeous! you got his smug little personality downpat!
It is beautiful. I had no idea you loved swallows as I do too. Lovely. Carol
Just beautiful! Love your paintings.
A beautiful Swallow painting. I love it.
Beautiful painting. I just saw thousands of tree swallows in Florida.
Kelly,
We were in Cincy between Christmas and New Years, spent most of the time in a retirement home with my mother. My experience with tree swallows at Fisherman Island in VA was awesome. Upwards of 50,000 of them landed near me, they would take flight and land again unbelievable experience. The Nature Conservancy radar guy told me of watching these donuts on the radar exploding over and over, I was there with the swallows....
Lovely painting Kelly, the colors are perfect
Swallows are a true sign of summer here usually May. I rather like your painting.
Lovely painting, Kelly. Just this past summer, tree swallows took up residence in a nesting box in the field...one usually used by the Eastern Bluebirds...waiting to see which returns to it this spring!
Hi Kelly
You really captured that swallow look and the blue with the orange background colour really sets off the scene.
Guy
You really captured the beautiful color they have...that cobalt blueish green look. I love to watch swallows. Such pretty birds.
Lovely painting. I like its round little body and pointed wings. Love the blue and white too. It's so strange to be thinking about spring when it has barely felt like winter....not that I'm complaining!
Oh, very nice!
Beautiful! You are such a gifted photographer, and then to see you transfer that image with paint and paper is awesome. I feel so privileged to be able to enjoy seeing this transformation. Thank you so much for sharing...You always brighten my day.
...thanks, everyone!! It sounds like we all love these little birds. Of course, how could we not? Their aerial displays and their incredible beauty make them hard to resist.
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