Stewart Jones Art

This painting was a commission from a 100 year old photograph. The original photo was a sepia tinted image and I was asked to recreate the image and to use color. I liked the ornate trim around top of the wrap around porches.  I understand this house still exists in Dade City, FL. The little boy on the horse is the Great Uncle of the man who asked me to recreate the photo into a painting. I enjoy creating paintings of historic subjects. As I created the painting I wondered what it would be like to live in a time that was less congested and simpler.

In this watercolor painting sea oats are silhouetted against a colorful evening sunset. I traveled to the Gulf of Mexico north of St. Petersburg and found these dunes in the small town of Indian Rocks Beach. It took two trips to create this painting on location. This is the way I do a lot of my sunset paintings. I'll paint the sunset and some of the larger elements first. Then travel back another day after the watercolor has completely dried. Then I paint the details, darken some of the shapes and paint in the silhouettes. As I painted this scene some young people were near me at the beach listening to music and dancing on the beach. This made it more enjoyable for me to paint and listen to their music. They would occasionally come by to check out the progress of the painting. I finished this painting after the sun went down. Traveling back to my car in the dark, I hoped I didn't leave a brush or two behind. Doesn't this make you want to stay at the beach until the sun s

I enjoy a change of subject matter especially when it comes to industrial scenes. This particular subject is a production plant that produces kitty litter. The colors were adjusted to create a more pleasing composition and to reflect the colors of this particular kitty litter brand. Industrial scenes are more difficult to draw and paint usually requiring a lot more time to execute. This scene has more to it than a normal landscape; lots of shapes and lines taking your eye to different parts of the composition. I like the way this painting turned out and I look forward to finding my next industrial scene to compose.

This flower bouquet was originally designed by my daughter for a wedding in a nearby town. She operates a flower design company Stems & Things . I painted this arrangement with students in my painting class. We simplified the flower shapes and leaves to create the final painting. Watercolor is a great medium to paint flowers with. It is fun to paint the flowers with lost & found edges. I like to overlap flowers to show dimension. The flowers are white and orange ranunculus, pink garden roses, white rice balls and lavender. The greenery is bay leaves and eucalyptus leaves. I changed the vase from the original image because I wanted to show how stems appear to change direction when submerged into the water.

This week I painted with the Plein Air Colony of Pinellas at Galatea Garden in South Pasadena near the St. Petersburg, FL area. This was a small well manicured park with large garden urns full of flowers. A great subject to paint with watercolors in the morning light. The sunlight cast lively purple shadows across ground and created soft form shadows around the garden pots. In the park there is a wonderful sculpture of Galatea; an ancient Greek myth about a statue that came to life. I met a few other artist and painted with them in the park. There is also a small lily pond with a fountain which is the home to a few rather large bull frogs. They provided a delightful serenade as I painted into the afternoon warmth.

Last week I painted with 24 other artists at the Wekiva Plein-Air Paintout. This is my moonlight scene showing the cabins the artists stay in during the week long event. The weather was very good this year as compared to other years when a cold front usually catches us in early March and we spend a few chilly nights trying to keep warm. This painting was started from the porch of my cabin as the moon was rising. I finished it after the event ended. I haven't done many night scenes because it is difficult to paint in the dark with watercolors and they don't dry very quickly. This is one of my favorite paintings from the event this year and I look forward to doing my next nighttime painting. This painting is 15 x 11 and the framed size is 18 x 14.

I have been spending more time in Tampa, FL recently. I discovered a park near the Tampa airport which is quite close to where I stay. It has a small beach, sea oats, mangroves and a little marsh area. A little bit of paradise for an artist with just a short amount of time. I found this is a nice place to watch the sunset in the evenings. There are some birds that like to frequent this area also. Sometimes they are scared off by the airplanes that look like they are flying 100 feet off the ground as they land at the nearby international airport. Above; is a recently painted sunset which is 22 x 30 inches wide. I loved the purple colors contrasting with the orange lights. I've done a few sunset paintings and I liked this one most of all. SOLD