Lisa McShane Art

Above: Clouds and Fields. Oil on Canvas. 30" x 40". 2009 Lisa McShane SOLD Below: Untitled. Acrylic on Wood. Lucas Vidana Babes and Byways! This Friday, December 4th, 6pm to 10pm. One night only! Location: 1220 Bay Street, corner of Bay and Holly in downtown Bellingham Stop by for great art, live music, champagne, wine and snacks. This is an exciting two person show put on by fifthonsixth featuring Lisa McShane and Lucas Vidana. The show will feature sweeping landscapes and charming fruit paintings by Lisa McShane and Lucas Vidana's large mixed media images of women. 5% of all proceeds goes directly to Conservation Northwest . Conservation Northwest is a nonprofit that works to preserve old growth forests and other natural areas from the shores of Washington to the Canadian Rockies. These areas are vital to relationships between humans and wildlife. If you're in Bellingham, I'd love to see you there!

North Cascades Highway 3. Oil on Canvas. 18" x 22". SOLD There were a few times when I was growing up that my family took long drives home for the holidays. I remember one epic road trip from San Bernadino, California home to Kennewick, Washington. We stopped at a big store in eastern Oregon to buy gloves and hats because it was snowing. My mom liked to sing and when we got near Kennewick she'd sing "Over the river and through the woods to Grandmother's house we'd go!" I loved it. Even today that's the theme song in my head when I'm getting ready for the long drive to Kennewick. This painting is of the North Cascades Highway. It has it's own story, of the trips I took across the pass to Lake Pearygin, but tomorrow is Thanksgiving and it's time to pack the car.

Two Mangoes. Oil on Linen on Board. 6 x 8". These are from a local store but mangoes always remind me of a road trip my husband, our daughter and I took more than 20 years ago. We had an old diesel Volkswagen Rabbit and decided to drive to Chiapas from California. Yes, Chiapas, the far south of Mexico. Yes, that was crazy. Yes, my mother was worried. We made it as far as Puerto Angel along the Pacific Coast but had to turn east towards Oaxaca and Puebla because our car kept breaking down. Wonderful people rebuilt it at the Volkswagen factory in Puebla. We had many great adventures but back to mangoes - We were driving south along the Pacific just north of Acapulco. We were the only car on the highway but lining the road for approximately 2 miles were people sitting with boxes of mangoes. All for sale. But no buyers. Miles of mangoes. It was a striking image and I think of that everytime I see a box of mangoes at the store. Finally - buyers.

Pomegranate 3. Oil on Gessobord. 5 x 7. Another pomegranate! It's been a little slow in my studio for a week now partly because it's cold and damp out. I've had 7 medium to large paintings, all in various stages of wet and/or sticky, hanging from every hook. Each day I paint my small daily painting (pomegranates rock!) then start another large landscape so that I have a painting to work on. We've had crazy weather here in western Washington with heavy rain and nights of howling 60 mph winds. Yesterday morning the basement had water in the low spots and there was water seeping into the crawl space underneath my studio. So I put the dehumidifier in the studio hallway and today all my large paintings were no longer sticky! It seems a little drying out goes a long way.

Seckel Pears. Oil on Gessobord. 5 x 5". SOLD Friday night I went out at 11 (way past bedtime!) to pick our son up from a friend's house. We stopped at Haggen's grocery store so I could buy more fruits for painting. They had the most beautiful selection of pears, apples and pomegranites, including these cute little pears. Seckel pears sound like something out of 19th century Europe. Small, charming, chartreuse flushed with rose. The clerk commented on how pink and cute they were. I'm currently working on six medium to large landscapes but with fall moving into winter here, nothing dries in my studio. That's why I have six wet paintings: unable to finish any of them, I just start more. In the meanwhile, I'll paint more small paintings.

Dan's November Tomato Harvest We live in the Pacific Northwest, on the coast just south of the Canadian border. Not a hot spot in the tomato growing world. To compensate for our general lack of heat units and sunshine, gardeners come up with creative ways to grow what we treasure most: tomatoes. My husband has nailed it. Last year I was working in Seattle and so in late September he pulled the tomato plants out of the ground and hung them upside down in my studio. It was a mess! But it worked. This year he hung them under the deep eaves outside my big glass doors. For nearly two months I've had a shriveling green curtain with ripening tomatoes as my view. When my son told me about a remarkable sunset on Friday I told him I saw bits of it through the tomatoes! But it's paid off: these were picked yesterday. Amazing!

Red Bartlett 1. Oil on Linen on Board. 6 x 8. Red Bartlett 2. Oil on Linen on Board. 6 x 8. This is a rugged, large pear, painted from two different angles. My husband, the brilliant art consultant/geologist, suggested I paint my fruit paintings in groups. Since I'm always inclined to paint two of everything (I have no idea why I do that) it made sense. So I started with this wonderful pear.

101 Turn. Oil on Canvas. 16 x 20. This is another painting from Highway 101 along the California Coast. I spent all day in my studio today organizing, then painting. I went through and divided everything up into 3 piles: the finished paintings that I like and are ready for framing, the ones that I'll tear off the stretcher bars to reuse and then three small ones that went straight into the garbage can with my rags. Yes, it's a sad thing but not all paintings are successful. I painted 4 paintings, which I'll start posting tomorrow. It was too late by the time I was done to photograph them. The thing about Saturdays in the studio is the great NPR lineup. I love to paint and listen to Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me and This American Life. What could be better?

Persimmons 1. Oil on linen on board. 5 x 7. Each fall I buy persimmons and they ripen for a month or more in the kitchen. No-one else will touch them but I think they're fantastic. One of my favorite fruits.

Pomegranates 2. Oil on Linen on Board. 5 x 7. I painted the pomegranates again. They're starting to wrinkle a bit so I'm off in search of more. Such a beautiful, odd fruit.

Pomegranates 1. Oil on Linen on Board. 5 x 7. This is my first painting of pomegranates and there will be several. I've decided to use a photo of one of my paintings for Christmas cards this year and I've always loved seeing pomegranates this time of year. Beautiful, round and red.

Loup Loup Highway. Oil on Canvas. 16 x 20. This is part of the Similkameen series, again the road heading west. It's odd, but I'm painting these in reverse order. I read catalogs that way too. From the back to the front. As if it's unraveling. I love this stretch of road and can remember clearly each trip across this and through the pass. Partly because I love the name: Loup Loup. What can be better than Loup Loup?

Another Study for After Pissarro. Oil on Canvas. 8 x 10. I took another shot at this painting yesterday and I'm happy now with the result. It needed a thick application of paint to work.

3 Cherries. Oil on Gessobord. 5 x 7. SOLD This Friday there are two shows hanging at the Blue Horse Gallery in Bellingham and I have a painting in both. First up is 3 Cherries, above. This is a donation to a silent auction, Friends of the Blue Horse Gallery. I checked out the other donated pieces when I dropped off my painting and there were amazing things by Tom Wood, John Cole's estate, Ron Patten, Lanny Little, Laurie Potter and others. Beautiful paintings. These are sold in a silent auction where you put in a sealed bid and the highest one on Saturday wins the painting. The Bellingham Art Walk on Friday should be fun!