Artwork: Paintings in acrylic and oil

SOLD

SOLD

$400 Framed

  

 Strings - 24"x36" acrylic on canvas, Toni Youngblood, unframed $950

White Heat - 30"x24" acrylic on canvas, Toni Youngblood framed $800

 

Red Winter Sky - 36"x24" acrylic on canvas, Toni Youngblood 2015., custom tabernacle frame included. Inquire

 For Anna Mariea, Acrylic on canvas, 36"x24", Toni Youngblood 2013©  Not For Sale

 Private Commission 30"x40" acrylic on canvas (not for sale)

 Cottage Sunflowers, Gauche and tempera on paper,  12"x16", Toni Youngblood 2013© $150 unframed

 Goose with Peacock Aspirations, Acrylic on canvas, 11"x14" Toni Youngblood, 2010© $600 framed

 Street Conversation  - Acrylic on Canvas - Toni Youngblood 2013©   SOLD

 See Spot  - Acrylic on Canvas, 12"x9" - Toni Youngblood 2013©  SOLD

 Sugar Magnolia, Acrylic on canvas, 12"x12", Toni Youngblood ©  $150 unframed  SOLD

 Above: Toni Youngblood, Abandoned Construction Site #1, 9 x 12", Toni Youngblood ©  Inquire

 Above: Toni Youngblood, Abandoned Construction Site #2, 9 x 12", 2009©  NFS

 Above: Toni Youngblood, Watusi, 9 x 12",Toni Youngblood © SOLD

Above: Toni Youngblood, Navigating Bliss, 9 x 12", 2009©  SOLD

Above: Toni Youngblood, Calligraffiti One, 2009©  $350 framed
Above: Toni Youngblood, Calligraffiti Two, 9 x 12", 2009©   $350 framed
Above: Toni Youngblood, Calligraffiti Three, 9 x 12", 2009© $350 framed

Artwork, Design, Creativity & Wonder: Front Porch Musings versus Backyard Deeds

Front Porch Musings and Back Yard Deeds
I find it so much easier to become inspired---get new ideas--- than to follow through and produce the "child" that is the offspring of inspiration. Inspiration versus perspiration---yep, enabling the idea into the product takes good old just-do-it-iveness! Artist Chuck Close describes it in the film and book Wisdom (http://www.wisdombook.org/), "I always thought that inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lightening to strike you in the brain, you’re not going to make an awful lot of work."

In following through on an idea, I learn so much in process, running into unanticpated blips and problems and developing solutions along the way. In architecture school we called it "talk-a-tecture" versus "architecture"---it's one thing to describe in words what you are going to do, quite another to put it down on paper, work through all the pieces of the problem and actually get it to work as a building. Often the "big idea" proves to be impossible in the physical world, given constraints. With that being said, during the process wonderful surprises and opportunities can be discovered that may lead to a more delightful outcome than the original vision. Many times off-shoot ideas pop up that can be used in future pieces. To stick with it can be daunting. An "ugly" painting can be "fixed", but stepping back and letting go of such a judgement helps to facilitate the fix. (Maybe fixing a watercolor painting is more challenging than re-working opaque media, but letting go and going with the flow while the flow is flowing is a good lesson there).

Instead of throwing a piece in the trash, I make myself stop and put it away for awhile. Later, it either looks better to me or is still "ugly". If it's still ugly, I dive in and see what I can do to make it into something else. Getting to the point of not having to be in love with every piece helps me try lots of things that may just be fun and may be something I would never consider doing to a piece that I love. In this, I make discoveries beyond my pre-composed notions! Re-painting the painting, re-writing the story, "finding beauty in a broken world" (Terry Tempest Williams), creating a refreshing new path in a dusty life or just fixing an ugly painting---serendipities let loose---every true artist transforms the front porch muse into the backyard deed by showing up and getting to work. - Sparky

Artwork, Design, Creativity and Wonder: Drawing on the Wall

 



When I was a pre-schooler, my mother mixed primary paint colors for me in a recipe that contained sifted all-purpose baking flour, water, egg yolks and food coloring. The color paints were placed in three corresponding red, yellow and blue colored Dixie cups. She gave paper to me and taught me the basics of color theory by mixing the different color paints. Thus began a successful diversion from my previous occupation of drawing on the walls . . . WALLMARKS.

The acrylic painting shown above was created using wax as frisket to mask and later reveal (as the wax was removed) previously applied layers of paint. It was painted in memory of my mother and titled Mama Made My First Set of Paints. -Sparky

This blog is dedicated to my mom and dad.


Mom, who gave me my first art-making tools, always remarked that I played well by myself.  (A very important trait in a mother's mind, as my much older siblings were not at home much!)   Thanks for immersing me in paint, Mama!

Photo Left:  Mama

My dad, who had the most wonderful woodworking and metalworking shop in which he spent his free time executing his creative and problem-solving ideas into things that amazed me.  I think he was so good at it because he played well by himself.



Photo Above:  Daddy making apple juice with the press that he made and apples that he grew.