My painting, Willie’s Chicken Shack, will be heading down to New Orleans for the Louisiana Watercolor Society’s 56th Annual International Exhibition! Thanks to the LWS and juror Matthew Bird for accepting my piece into the exhibition. The show will be exhibited in Place St. Charles, New Orleans and run from May 4th through May 22nd.
Many thanks to juror Shari Blaukopf for accepting my painting, Color Burst, into the Vermont Watercolor Society Springtide show. The show will take place at the T.W. Wood Museum in Montpelier, VT, April 3rd through May 23rd.
I received some fantastic news over the weekend! My painting Vivid Tangle was accepted into the 2026 Transparent Watercolor Society of America 50th Annual Exhibition. The exhibition is being held at the Kenosha Public Museum, 5500 First Avenue in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and will be hung from May 2nd to August 2nd. Many thanks to the jurors, Carrie Waller and Stewart White, who accepted my painting into this exhibition. It’s such an honor to be accepted into this prestigious transparent watercolor show.
Here is my latest transparent watercolor painting entitled Fading History. The image is depicting the wall sign for the long-gone Kiley’s Pharmacy in Glens Falls, NY. I photographed the sign several months ago when they began the South Street revitalization project. I love how the paint is flaking away to reveal other layers of paint. Some parts of the sign are mostly illegible, but I managed to figure out what it used to say. All around the old building there are reconstruction projects and new buildings, but as of today, the Kiley’s Pharmacy wall sign is still there.
This was perhaps the most difficult drawing I’ve done to date. Working from a photograph, it took me over 14 hours just to sketch out the image. As you will notice from my work-in-progress photos, I skipped the corner bricks by the fire escape, as it was just too confusing to draw in all the details at this point. I painted the fire escape first, then proceeded to draw in the bricks and shadows. The perspective was a real challenge, as the bricks slanted away from the viewer and got smaller as they moved to the right side of the paper. The same is true for all the lettering.
The bricks were the fun part. I mixed Burnt Umber, Alizarin Crimson, Siena, and Rose Madder to create four unique brick colors. Each brick was painted wet on wet blending the mixed colors. The fire escape shadows are my favorite part of this painting.
Then I began painting the actual sign. The green paint has worn off the wall quite a bit, so some bricks were painted with a blend of green and brick color. The lower text was challenging as well. The paint is rubbed off in places and there are hidden words beneath the top layer of painting on the wall.
I spent over a week tweaking and finalizing the painting. In total, this painting took me over 100 hours to create. My work-in-progress photos of the painting are below.
Women in Watercolor presents its online member’s show to support and encourage female artists around the world! Rack ‘Em Up is part of this online showcase. You can vote online for your favorite paintings (choose up to 10 different paintings). Here is the link to vote. https://womeninwatercolor.com/2026-members-only-exhibition-viewers-choice-awards/
To view Rack ‘Em Up in person, visit LARAC in Glens Falls, NY, which is displaying local artists’ work until February 18th.
The 2026 Members Show, SHOW I : Where It Belongs opens tonight (5-7 pm) at the LARAC (Lower Adirondack Regional Arts Council) Gallery in Glens Falls, NY. My watercolor painting “Rack ‘Em Up” will be on display, along with over 150 local artists! The show will run tonight through February 18th. LARAC hours are Monday – Saturday, 10 am – 3 pm, Thursdays until 6 pm, closed on Sundays.
Now that Christmas has passed, I can post this little transparent watercolor that I painted this past autumn! Happy Holidays everyone!
I come from a long line of quilters. And although I have quilted myself several times, quilting is very time consuming, and I prefer to paint. I appreciate the time and effort that goes into quilting and all the attention to details required, both for piecing the patterns and the actual quilting.
When I got married, in 1997, my grandmother (Elizabeth Phillips) gifted me a quilt that had been worked on by three generations of my family. My great grandmother (Maria Hansen) began piecing the quilt using fabric from the 1940s and 1950s, but never finished it. My grandmother had the pieced squares for several years before she decided to work on the quilt, adding fabric she had from 1960s and 1970s. Helping my grandmother finish the quilt, my mother (Merideth Maloy) worked on the quilting. The result is a mix of fabrics (some 80+ years old) and colors in the basic basket design. In honor of generations of quilters in my family, I decided to do a painting of this quilt.
I’m calling my latest watercolor, Blue Cascade, not only after the waterfall of fabric pooling at the bottom, but also the second definition of cascade which is, “a process whereby something, typically information and knowledge, is successively passed on.”
The following is a slide show, followed by a description of my work in progress.
I draped the quilt on a chair outside and took many photographs, rearranging the fabric until I found an abstract composition that I liked. Working from that photo, I began my painting.
For the first couple weeks I used only three colors. Starting with washes of Phthalo Blue to find my shapes, I then used Prussian Blue to start defining the shadows. I used Indigo Blue last, deepening the shadows and building up the texture of the fabric. I finished with a light wash of Cadmium Yellow to warm up the lighter areas where the sun shined on the fabric.
Next, I started blocking in the other colors. This was the fun part – painting all the patterns in the fabric. Since several of the fabric pieces were light patterns on dark backgrounds, I had to work in reverse (negative painting) to create my patterns.
The “baskets” were then painted in a pale blue, not matching but close, to the solid teal blue squares. I tried to stay true to the colors of the original fabrics as much as possible.
Lastly, I painted the remaining white fabric. The bright whites were left unpainted, but I added several layers of watercolor to create the shadows. Some additional tweaking of the shadows throughout the painting and Blue Cascade was finished.
Wonderful trip to Kent, Connecticut yesterday for the 49th Annual North East Watercolor Society (NEWS) Awards! Sincere thanks to Soon Warren, juror of awards, and the NEWS board. I really appreciated all the kind words said about my painting, Threads of Friendship. It was a fantastic showing of artwork from across the United States. Congratulations to everyone who was accepted into the show and the other award winners!
The North East Watercolor Society’s 49th Annual Juried National Exhibition is now open for viewing. Come see these amazing watercolor paintings in person! The exhibition runs October 5th – 25th, at The Gallery at Kent Art Association in Kent, Connecticut. Gallery hours are Thursday – Saturday 1-5 pm and Sundays 12-4 pm.
Cindi Handy 