Brande Arno Art

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard -  Click to Bid This piece was painted for the October Creatures of the Night, Nibblesfest Art Contest, or NFAC.  The bidding starts at just .99 cents and is through ebay.  Ends October 27.  Good luck!

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard  - $ 75. Purchase This being a foreshortened pose made it difficult to paint the depth.  Especially the cute face.  Had to set it just right on that cute fat little body. 

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard  $ 75.- Purchase When pondering what to paint today, another Berkshire piglet came to mind.  I love their markings and the challenge to paint black & white mixing my own blackish tones.  

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard - NFAC - Sold Nibblefest Art Contest Starting September, 20, 2015  I totally enjoyed painting this piece.  Nibblefest has a dragonfly theme for September and what better reason for the artist license to come out of hiding?  Like all Nibblefest auctions on ebay, the bidding starts at just 99 cents.  The link will go live at 12 noon EST, 9/20/2015

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard  Sold - Thank you! Was in the mood to paint something cute today. 

4 x 4 inches - NFAC Nibblefest Art Contest Sold This little piece was painted today for the Nibblefest Art Contest and like always, starts on the 20th of the month and bidding starts at only .99 cents.  I probably over did it eating tea biscuits while painting this.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard Click for Purchase This painting was a personal challenge for me.  The challenge was to make every stroke of my palette knife and brush count and that means thinking before painting.  I was hoping that I'd get through the entire painting without any scrapes, but that didn't happen.  However, the amount of scrapes was greatly reduced, so I'm happy.  I also continued with my exploration of mixing browns from Yellow, Red and Blue.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard Click to Bid It's been quite the summer and like most everyone else, I feel it's flying by.  I've been busy on a commission that I hope to finish tomorrow.  However, I did take a break from the commission to paint this little gal.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard Click to Bid I really wanted to paint another mouse.  I looked through my sources to come up with an unusual pose.   This mouse is definitely wanting to stop on a dime. I'll be traveling over a long weekend to visit family for a happy occasion.  It's nice to get away, but I know me...I'll be wanting to use my brushes sooner than later.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard - Sold I've been very busy enjoying the company of my granddaughter.  We are doing things like going to the Mall, taking archery lessons, going to the ice cream stand.  She shops the malls just like me:  Get in, get out.  I prefer shopping on-line and having all delivered right to my door. This morning, while she was still sleeping, I was able to sneak in some studio time.  I'm feeling balanced.

Indigo Bunting, 4 x 4 inches, Oil on Board Click to Bid I'm fortunate to have a mated pair of Indigo Buntings visiting my bird feeder.  I say that because I've had the bird feeder for over 10 years and my first sighting was last week.  The male of this species sports stunning ocean blue feathers...some teal in there also. I paint with a very limited palette, so I was challenged to come up with the right mixtures.  But it wasn't very long before I realized that mixing the right "Indigo" color wouldn't be enough.  So I subdued everything else, to include his cute little beak.

Nibblefest Art Contest -Sold 4 x 4 inches, Oil on Panel This month's Nibblefest Art Contest or NFAC, has a Space/Planets/Stars theme.  So don't you know the first thing that came to mind was the "Lost in Space" TV Show. Then the B-9 Robot.  But really, space is not cute, and I like to make cute paintings for Nibblefest.   See how I talk to myself? So looking closer at what I think is cute, the top of the list are mice.  Although let it be known right here and now,  not a one of them are welcomed in my house.   What goes with mice...cheese.  Mice and cheese,  like toast and tea.  Somewhere in my childhood, I learned that the moon was made of swiss cheese.  So there you have it!  A cute mouse, on the moon and nibbling on the abundant supply of swiss cheese, with the earth off to the side.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard  Bid Now This is the homework for a on-line course and the facebook link is  Here  to show the full homework.  The course link is  Here This will focus on being comfortable talking about my art, the process and inspiration.  Taking advantage of social media, creating a mailing list for newsletters...in other words, get up- to- date. There was inspiration and process noted on the facebook links.  Please click one or both if you're curious.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard - Sold I've been exercising lately.  My hope is to get some flexibility and muscle strength.  I've given up on loosing weight...but enough about that because today, I want to focus on the Easter Bunny.   Children really enjoy the special talents of the Easter bunny.  How he comes up with all kinds of hiding places for Easter Baskets and eggs.   I have wonderful memories of said activities stretching (pun intended) from my childhood to watching my granddaughter.  So in honor of the yearly work of the Easter Bunny and my ever increasing need of exercise, I created Palates Bunny .  Why not combine the two? Thinking more about the Easter Bunny, I wonder why he stops hiding eggs when the youngest child gets wise to him.  The last Easter Egg hunt I had was in 2011, when the Easter Bunny asked this grandma to hide all the freshly dyed eggs.  I didn't count or keep track of their location.  We ended...

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard-Sold This is my favorite shed in the neighborhood.  It's worse for wear, but has so much character because of it.  Yesterday was such a sunny day, in spite of being April Fool's day.  I was driving home from an appointment and passed this shed.  The sun light on this shed made me turn around. Maybe if it wasn't the first real nice sunny day, I would have drove by, but not yesterday.  Enjoyed just looking at the shed and then took a few pictures, knowing that today, I'd be making a painting of it.  Which makes it the sixth or so painting of this shed.  Different seasons, same shed.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard - Sold It's been snowing again in Western NY.  Not much accumulation, but winter just won't take the hint and leave.   But, the Canadian Geese have been flying in formation and honking all the way.  And a sensitive nose or beak can detect the smell of Spring.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard  Sold - Thank you This painting will be part of the Nibblefest Art Contest that will start March 20, 2015.  The theme is Flowers and what better flower than the daisy.  While I was trying to make a simple composition, the inspiration came to include a Big-Bottomed Bee.   Nibblefest Art Contests are held on ebay with bidding starting at just .99 cents.   The link that is included with this post will be live shortly after midnight on March 20.  The auction will run for seven days.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard Sold Both Monday and Tuesday's paintings were scrapers.  I prefer to wipe away a failed attempt and usually do better with the second try.  But two days in a row...I went to bed last night thinking my painting career was over.  The photo reference for this painting was taken November, 2014.  What caught my eye was the contrast between the dusting of snow against a hill darkened with trees.  Perfect setting to insure those bales stand out.  Where are the trees in this painting you ask?  I  pulled an artist license and switched those trees out for pretty blue sky instead.   

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard Click to bid From Pinterest, I found the Daily Otter blog.  One of the posts was a short video of a grouping of otters trying to catch a butterfly.  The way they tracked the butterfly reminded me of cats.  After looking at a few Pinterest boards featuring all manner of otters, I got inspired to paint another.

4 x 4 inches, Oil on Gessoboard Click to Bid I've said this before, but it's worth rubbing in again:  I live where paintings are just outside my door!  I'm so blessed to live in Western New York, where old barns, shacks and outbuildings can still be easily found.  In real life, this shack lives next to two large maple trees, but in this painting, they are reduced to just saplings.  Artist' s license at work.