The Causeway to Atlantic Beach-SOLD

Well.... its the last time i'll post this year. hard to believe. wonder how many i did this year?
i think of all the seasons. last winter painting my soup bowl and fooling with object still lifes. then spring with the trip to key west and charleston, summer painting marshes and boats in blistering heat. then the fall with its cooler temps, bluebird blue skies, and then back inside these days painting from studies, photos, and still life stuff again. i remember fondly the wonderful people who took my workshops this year and all the customers who bought my art in galleries and on this blog. you paid my bills, encouraged me to paint, paint, and paint some more! Lotsa folks came to the half dozen or so shows i had in 08 and i loved meeting them and watching them connect with what i created. thats why painters paint!
its been a wild ride for sure and 09 guarantees to have its ups and downs as well. but i "fear no evil for He is with me" and when i get scared i'll paint. when i get down i'll just paint. when i want to quit i'll just paint. when its good and i dont think it'll get any better, i'll paint. its the only thing i can control this coming year. hey....that works for me!

Morning in Charleston-SOLD

Got homesick for Charleston SC last night and decided i hadnt painted enough yesterday (only three small ones) so i jumped up and painted it.

Its funny how painting from a photograph of a place brings back all the sights, smell, sounds and atmosphere you were experiencing that day.

the photo reference was taken in march, on my way back from Key West, and is the second trip i've taken to paint Charleston. i'm hoping to get in a really great gallery in hilton head (Morris Whiteside) and they want plein air pieces of there and charleston as well as savannah. i hope i get the gig! he's supposed to let me know this spring.

maybe i'll be going there on a regular 'paid' basis!

its a very charming city and i'll never run out of things to paint there.

Interiors Times Two-Both SOLD

The Chandelier- 6x6- oil on canvasboard

SOLD

Old Bed- 8x8- oil on canvasboard

SOLD

Today it rained most of the day and so i painted some more interiors. i'm really liking how loose they are and dreamy, something i'm always striving for. the razors edge between loose and abstract and enough reality to tell what it is and portray a mood.

Berts Surf Shop-SOLD

Stayed close to home and did this icon in Surf City, Bert's Surf Shop. this place is packed 24/7 during tourist season. this day there wasnt but two cars in the lot. well it is winter time at the beach after all.

Intimate Bedroom-SOLD

Taking a little break from the cherries. what can i say... i bore easily

i liked the way the lamp threw around warm light in contrast to the cool light coming from the unseen righthand window. had to say that in paint
this is the kind of place you'd like to spend a cold rainy weekend, right?

Cherries Part Two-SOLD

Part two of the cherry paintings. they really are challenging because theyre so reflective and the skins are transluscent and dark. i still want to do another one (or two) to see if i can nail that cherry skin!

Winter Has Arrived

Life is a Bowl- 6x6- oil on canvasboard

Available- $45

to purchase- be the first to contact me

Winter is here in eastern NC with a vengeance- what? 32 for a daytime high. no painting outside today, so i went to the grocery store to find something to paint and these little Bing cherries caught my eye. the luscious red, shiny and transluscent skin was irresistable. i love to eat em and they are so much fun to paint.

When choosing the color combo for this one i knew i wanted green to be in the mix (red's complement) but didnt want to be so simplistic. so i went with blue-green in the bowl. gives it that little zing i think this one has.
i'll be doing a few more cherry paintings in the next few days, while the Bings look (and taste) so good, and while its freezing outside.

Back in the Swing of Things

Repainting of the El-Ann- 16x20- oil on canvasboard

Available- $550 framed, $450 unframed

to purchase- contact me before it goes to Tidewater Gallery in Swansboro

Here's one that was 7 months in the making.

no i didnt paint on it that long but it feels like it.

this was started back in june on location and i meant to come back to that spot to finish it but for this reason, and that, didnt get back for several weeks. and guess what? the boat was gone, off the stanchions it was on, when they were painting her underside. good thing i had shot a photo of it, just in case.

this painting has stared at me in my studio everyday since june, screaming
"finish me!". like the item on your to-do list that never seems to get done, taunting you everyday, making you feel bad for procrastinating so long.

well,, finally yesterday i threw it on the easel, put the photo on the computer screen and finished it! man, i was so proud of myself for getting it done finally. really liked how it came out too. thats an added bonus.

in other news.... i've sent my blog for submission to the Daily Painters Gallery, the internets most highly publicized and popular "daily painter" websites with thousands of hits a day. its very hard to get into their group and they'll let me know in January if i get accepted. will be very good for me (the group will be featured on Oprah soon) and will give me a thousand times the exposure i'm getting now.

keeping my fingers crossed.

they require you to paint one painting daily, which i'm "almost" doing now. so that shouldnt be a problem.

more on what they tell me later.....

Will the Circle be Unbroken

This month is the 1st anniversary of the "mike rooney studios-a painting ALMOST everyday" blog. applause noise inserted here,,,,,
"first i'd like to thank,,,," LOL

no seriously, just as i get all sentimental and reflective on january first of every year, this blogging anniversary made me want to reflect, in words, on what it has meant, as it relates to my life as an artist. heres what i came up with.....

Todays post is going to be about blogging. the upside, the downside, the sideways stuff that i have found after doing it one whole year.

as you know, other than the last couple of months, because of events beyond my control, i have posted ALMOST every day for nearly a year. thats alot of paintings, alot of words, and inane thoughts to float around in cyberspace (they say) forever and ever. heres what ive found listed by category, from worst to greatest....

Downright sucks about blogging-
when youre tired from painting all day and it was 100 degrees and all you want to do is eat because its 9 pm, you have to shoot that days painting, making sure there's no glare on it, its not blurry, photoshop the image to make the colors truer, contrast better, hurry i'm about to faint from hunger. remember?
post the photo to blogger, think of a title, write something interesting that people wont fall asleep reading. did i mention that i'm tired and sleepy, as well as hungry LOL
then hit 'publish post', go back and see if it all looks right and you didnt mispell anything. whewwwww! glad that parts done. oh yeah gotta check email while i pop a pop tart in the microwave for supper. done for the day. wow,,,,, 10 o'clock already?

people who dont blog have no idea the time it takes to do online lessons like susan greaves, or write up a post that could go into an instructional manual on painting like frank gardner, or post every (i mean every) day like stephen magsig.
we do it because we love to do it but its grueling! and if you take a week off you feel like youre letting everybody down. your readers, your fellow artists, and mostly yourself because youre a daily painter. thats alot of pressure.

The cool thing about blogging-

Doing small daily paintings is immediate gratification. you paint the little sucker, you take a pic of it, upload it and BOOM your little baby is on the worldwide web for anybody with a computer and internet access from Eastern NC to Mars to see. some want to buy it, some artists want to copy it, some galleries want to hang it, some want to email you and tell you what it reminds them of in their childhood.
another thing i noticed was the comraderie of the blogging community of artists ive met since doing this. theyre from all over. texas, virgin islands, two hours from me in durham, nc, all over. and when i had my small absence they all wrote and encouraged me and told me things that only us artists know, because we are artists. they know the joys, the insecurities, the dedication needed to succeed, and its pitfalls. as only a fellow brother or sister of the brush could know.
thanks you guys!

i also know that blogging is good for the art business and a painters career. that blogging doesnt stop gallery sales, but enhances it. how do i know this?
well take today for example. i sold some small daily paintings to a gallery owner. i have sold tons to gallery owners and their employees.
i was asked once did i think that selling the small dailies would hurt my gallery business. i responded a resounding "no". these little gems are (what some bloggers have dubbed) appetizers and not the main course, when it comes to works of art. they sell cheap, most are small studies for larger works that will be in galleries at a substantially higher cost. so NO they wont hurt gallery sales.
then later today i sold a bunch of large gallery paintings to one of my daily painting collectors, thus closing the circle and completing the circuit. some want to start off small and very affordably and build up to buying one of my more expensive and more substantial pieces. so today was cool in the fact that i sold a gallery owner some small ones, and someone who had small ones bought several of my bigger ones from a gallery.
this is what blogging has meant to me this year. and thanks for sticking with this long post as the cardinal rule is keep a post short or they wont read it. hopefully if you stayed this long you enjoyed my take on this crazy world of blogging.
i'd like to thank those of you who have bought my paintings over the last year, and those of you who tell me you stop by several days a week to see where i'm painting or what i've painted. thanks to my blogging artist buddies who have encouraged me, and inspired me with your beautiful view of the world around you. it has enriched me tremendously.

i'm hungry and tired now and must sign off till tomorrow, bye LOL

RR Crossing

Near the Tracks- 6x6-oil on canvasboard

SOLD

here's another one from my downtown ENC series.
in all of our small towns there are these railroad crossings that run right thru the business districts and neighborhoods.
this is a classic Eastern NC townscape in the fall.

if you'd like to purchase the Painting NC Plein Air book i'm in click here to get more info on this great gift for those on your Christmas list who are living out of state, or love art. sells for $29.99 plus $8 shipping. it has 27 other plein air artists from NC painting our great state from Murphy to Manteo.
email me if you'd like a copy. if i mail it this weekend you can get it before Christmas.

Also heard that i made it into Artist Magazine in December. No they didnt write me up.... it was just an ad from Jerry's Artarama plugging my instructional DVD's. that i'd even be in my favorite magazine for that, blows me away, considering i've only been at this painting thing a couple of years. thanks Jerry's!

Three Paintings-SOLD

These were painted several weeks ago

and weren't posted. the cosmetics painting is a tribute to the queen of

cosmetic paintings- Peggi Kroll-Roberts

both SOLD

ENC Afternoon- 6x6- oil on canvasboard

SOLD

This was my first painting after a long layoff (see posts below) and i was pleasantly surprised that it didnt take me long to get back in the swing of things. i liked the orange buildings and the blue shadows, and the light on the sidewalk. Looks very 'fallish' and late in the day.

Wilmington Riverview-SOLD

Port City Riverview (Wilmington)-6x8- oil on canvasboard

This is one i did several weeks back in wilmington. the clear fall air made the colors wonderful. the deep blue water, orange brick buildings and the cereleun blue and dusty rose sky were gorgeous as i looked back towards the city to paint.

the day i painted this, i remember almost losing my brand new plein air umbrella i ordered from EasyL. i tied the top part to the tripod like the instructions said to do. a huge gust of wind hit, lifted the umbrella, and it started heading for the river 12 feet below me. lucky i had it tied off or i'd have lost it for sure.
i highly recommend the EasyL umbrella if you like one when you paint. i used to use a beach umbrella with stakes in the ground but this one is way easier to use and can stand up to winds around 15 mph. when a gust hits, instead of it dragging your easel over, the top flies off and is attached (thank goodness) to the easel with an elastic cord. great idea whoever thought of it!

Knifed Glass

Blue Glass, Green Glass- 8x10- oil on canvasboard

Available- to purchase contact me before it goes to a gallery

I'm hooked on painting colored glass. i love all the subtle differences in color even tho' it might be all blue, or all green, etc.

But for me its about showing that sparkling light... warm and light against the darker, cooler shadows and some midtones.

Loved the retro green coaster i bought somewhere, but its got a weird shape and so i turned it into an ashtray instead. every shape on the green glass was either warmer, cooler, more intense or grayer than the one next to it. this is the fun and challenge of painting!

Surf City Crab-SOLD

Thought i'd fill everybody in on my recent off and on absence. hope'd you couldn't tell but fellow blogger and cyber friend frank gardner caught me.

Not many know that back in 1996 i started a homeless shelter, where i used to live in goldsboro, nc. when i went fulltime several years ago i ran the shelter, and two thrift stores that support it, thru a few managers when i was out painting.

A month ago or so the CPA gave me the bad news that the rescue mission was about to go under financially for several reasons. those several reasons turned out to be theft and misappropriation by employees, people not doing their jobs, and poor management, in general. i am just as much to blame, as i'm the guy who was supposed to be steering the ship and i was asleep at the wheel.

That my friends is the Readers Digest version for sake of brevity.

So i went back and devoted a few weeks to getting the rescue mission back on firm footing... new policies, new personell, with me firmly at the helm.

Funny thing was, that all the while this was going on, i didnt have much desire to paint everyday, which you have to know was abnormal for me. i found it hard to create when my brain was trying so hard to figure out a way to save the non-profit from going under. i didnt know if it would last until New Years at one point. Twelve years of hard work down the drain, putting homeless men back out on the street during the holidays, employees without jobs, on and on!

The minute i got the thing running in the black again the desire to paint returned instantly. its like my brain switched from right brain thinking to left brain autopilot that couldnt wait to paint.

I did a little warmup urban scene yesterday just to get the cobwebs out of my head and i felt rusty but not as bad as i thought it would be.

Here's my second painting and i feel like i'm back in the groove.

Now more than ever i know that a bad day painting is better than a good day not painting! i'm so glad to be back!

Bowl in the Sun

Amber Glass II- 8x10-oil on canvasboard

SOLD

Here's one i did a few weeks ago. i set up one of my favorite glass bowls on a table outside and mostly knifed it (although there is some brushwork) . i like the feeling of sunlite and the warm reflections juxtaposed against the cool shadow. i'm enjoying painting these bowls in the sunlite alot. we'll see if art buyers like them too. i hope so!

Cold and Flu Season Remedy

Cold Medicine- 8x6- oil on canvasboard

to purchase contact me by email with title in subject line

$=make me an offer

Sky Study over Atlantic Beach II-SOLD

Another in the two part series of interesting clouds over the Atlantic Beach Causeway between AB and Morehead City.

Sky Study Over Atlantic Beach-SOLD

Did this little cloud study as it drifted over the Atlantic Beach causeway. like the pink underpainting peeking out everwhere on this one. there will be another companion pc. that will look great with this one hanging together. what a great gift for someone on your Christmas list.