'All Things Southern' Feature: "Pigskin"

"Pigskin"

10" x 8"  Oil on Board

 

There may be a Southern states peach rivalry and a Southern states barbecue rivalry....

but NOTHING compares to the Football Rivalry.

I capitalize it because it deserves it.

I know it's intense across the Southeast, but I've only lived in Alabama.  I can only truly speak for Alabama, but I think it's pretty well understood that there is no other rivalry quite like

Alabama and Auburn football.

It goes on all year, of course, but this weekend is BIG!  This little pigskin becomes all important this Saturday and it won't stop for quite a while.  Oh, who am I kidding?  It never stops!!

However, I'll stop now because I'll just get in trouble if I keep typing. 

 

If you are interested in purchasing this painting, please click this link to go to my website:

http://barbaradavisart.com/works/1252417/pigskin

....and thanks, as always, for looking and reading!

 

 

 

 

'All Things Southern' Feature: "Just Peachy"

"Just Peachy"

16"x12"

Oil on Panel

 

What do peaches & barbecue have in common?  Rivalry!  (Oh, yeah, and they're both delicious!)

Just say your state has the best and watch it fly!

 

So, we all know Georgia is the Peach State and in Atlanta on New Year's Eve "The Peach Drop" rings in the new year.  Did you know South Carolina - according to an article I read - is nudging Georgia out in peach production?  Here in Alabama our claim to "peach fame" resides in Chilton County.  Stop by Durbin Farms or Peach Park on your way up or down I-65 and grab a basket...or a peach milkshake!

 

We just love them down here....peach cobbler, peach ice cream or sliced and tossed in a salad.  Then there's the peach festival where Miss Peach is crowned, and Miss Junior Peach, and Little Miss Peach, and Real Little Miss Peach....and... 

 

I find them really hard to paint because the skin is sort of mottled and ranges from yellow-green, to bright yellow, to orange, to reddish-pink, to purply (Purply is too a word!)  Then you also have the 'peach fuzz' issue which gives a lavender gray highlight to some areas.  If you put too much highlight they can look glossy like an apple and then, boom, you've lost your peach.  It's been a subject for many artists including some of my favorites Pierre Auguste Renoir, Claude Monet, Edouard Manet, and Van Gogh.  Sure would have been nice to run into one of these guys at Peach Park so I could ask them how they handled it! :)

If you are interested in purchasing this painting, please click here for information:
http://barbaradavisart.com/works/1247065/just-peachy
Thanks for looking!

'All Things Southern' Feature: "Southern Sip"

"Southern Sip"

12" x 4"

Oil on Canvas

 

So here's the deal.....we don't call it "soda"; we don't call it "pop"; we don't call it "soda pop"....we call it "Coke".  Well, we actually call 'them' "Coke".  If you're asked to bring the cokes to a picnic, you better ask what kind because that could be Dr. Pepper, Pepsi, Sprite, Mountain Dew, whatever.  See, they all fall into the subset of "cokes".  "Coke" doesn't always just mean 'big daddy Coke' aka "The Real Thing" which is often referred to as "Co-Cola", but could be any of these tasty beverages.....which, interestingly, have mostly been invented in the South! (How's that for a long sentence?)

Coke - invented in Atlanta, Georgia

Dr. Pepper - invented in Waco, Texas

Pepsi - invented in New Bern, North Carolina

RC Cola - invented in Columbus, Georgia

Mountain Dew - invented in Knoxville, Tennessee

 Pretty cool, huh?

Thirsty now?

 

If you are interested in purchasing this painting, please click on this link which will take you to my website:

 http://barbaradavis.fineartstudioonline.com/works/1241446/southern-sip

Thanks for looking!

'All Things Southern' Feature: "Marsh Twilight"

"MarshTwilight"

11"x14"

Oil on Board

 

The marshes of Georgia and South Carolina have to be one of my favorite things about the South.  The winding waterways make lovely compositions for paintings and the light on the changing grasses is breathtaking! 

 

I graduated from Sidney Lanier High School in Montgomery.  The school was named for Sidney Lanier, the poet who wrote "The Marshes of Glynn" about the marshes of Glynn County, Georgia.  An excerpt of his beautiful poem follows:

 

And the sea lends large, as the marsh: lo, out of his plenty the sea

Pours fast: full soon the time of the flood-tide must be:

Look how the grace of the sea doth go

About and about through the intricate channels that flow

        Here and there,

                        Everywhere,

Till his waters have flooded the uttermost creeks and the low-lying lanes,

And the marsh is meshed with a million veins,

That like as with rosy and silvery essences flow

  In the rose-and-silver evening glow.

                        Farewell, my lord Sun!

The creeks overflow: a thousand rivulets run

'Twixt the roots of the sod; the blades of the marsh-grass stir;

Passeth a hurrying sound of wings that westward whirr;

Passeth, and all is still; and the currents cease to run;

And the sea and the marsh are one. .......

And I would I could know what swimmeth below when the tide comes in

On the length and the breadth of the marvellous marshes of Glynn.

So, can you see why I'm proud to be a "Sidney Lanier Poet" and a Southern girl? 

 

If you are interested in purchasing this painting, please click here on a link that will take you to my website:  http://barbaradavisart.com/works/1235296/twilight-marsh