FROM IPHONE TO CANVAS

"Flatland Cloud Burst" 24" x 30" oil/canvas

One of the side benefits of putting up with 100 degree weather all summer is we get these incredible late afternoon cloud formations. I'm sure my artist friends in New Mexico see these things all the time so it is no big deal, but here in north Texas they are a bit rare. In the past I have chewed myself out (you know, when you slap yourself on the forehead and walk around saying "stupid...stupid...stupid") for not carrying a camera with me at all times because I used to see the clouds and rush home to get a camera only to have it disappear or it would get too dark to take the shot.

Well thanks to modern technology and these nice little cameras in our cell phones, I no longer have that problem and the flat spot in my forehead has healed. I shot the cloud for this painting with my iphone while filling up with gas. The landscape at the bottom is mostly made up and became a design more than a real location. The rain dropping from the clouds gives the whole painting a little drama.

The funny thing is as I stood there at the gas station, with my hands on my hips staring at the clouds, I suddenly realized that other people who had been walking by had stopped and were looking up into the sky to see what I was looking at. I had a bunch of people rubbernecking at the clouds. I left the station with a little chuckle knowing I had just improved the quality of life around me with a little appreciation for the beauty of a cloud formation. In celebration of nature, that's what I'm talking about.






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