Virtually Social

March 25, 2020

It's a great time to spend in the good company of our own thoughts,

To visit with our old friends in those classic books on our shelf,

To get to know the neighborhood of birds in our back yard,

And to do the sketching, painting, writing, or brain surgery we've said we wanted to do if only we had the time.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

Springtime Comes to the Valley

March 18, 2020

Signs of spring in some parts of the land...

Barn swallows doing Blue Angel aerobatics as they dip and dive for bits of nest-building mud,

Melodies issue forth from treetop and bush, doing their best to imitate Ethel Merman's enthusiasm,

Deer scamper and skitter in silly play, then blast off for a graceful run at top speed,

One can hear the glittering notes of spontaneous spring melt,

And sunny yellow faces of cheer turn their gaze skyward as they dot the land in celebration.

8" x 10"  oil on linen panel   $370 sold    

Citizen

March 11, 2020

How to stand out in a crowd?

Be the only one not looking at your phone.

Sketching people in public places used to be a great way to sharpen one's eye and skills. People used to engage in conversation, read the newspaper, crack open a book, or write a letter. 

Now, it's pretty hard to find interesting subjects.

Makes me wonder about future images to be found in art history books. Yikes.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

Day Light

March 4, 2020

For the seasonally affected...

Whether you're in the land of Harry Potter,

Or the land of eternal midnight,

Or it's just a frame of mind...

What's the line?

We'll leave the light on for you.

5" x 7"  oil on linen panel   $260     Art in the Morning special

Sparkling Winter River

February 26, 2020

Winter, my favorite season.

Rivers, my favorite stream of consciousness.

Sunlight, my favorite mood elevator.

Quiet, my favorite backdrop to the birds.

10" x 12"  oil on linen panel   $465 sold    

Firelight Glow

February 19, 2020

I love the tilt-a-world nature of glass, the way I can amp it up or tone it down. Pushing things to recede or come forward in a razzle-dazzle game of space and light is one of my favorite sports.

I love the surprise and the risk as I attempt to hold on as we come fast around the curve.

20" x 22" x 1.5" oil on canvas   $1260   Art in the Morning special

Cumulo-luminous

February 12, 2020

Lost in the clouds is a great place to be.... Full of ever-changing beauty and light, expansion and disappearance and re-assemblage on the magic carpet of air currents.

Water made visible in gas and ice and pressure, who knew it would be such a rich and fanciful medium for transport of one's thoughts and dreams and romances.

Like lightening, you can't put it in a jar. But you can enjoy the ride.

8" x 8"  oil on panel   $330    Art in the Morning special

Oak Tree

February 5, 2020

The world would benefit from more time spent contemplating trees.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

Sunrise Studio

January 29, 2020

Painting brings all kinds of "weather."

The process of finding new ways to see and tell the familiar, the joy and challenge of messing with space, the serendipitous detours of invention and experimentation can lead to high winds and white outs and the occasional crossing on a moonless night.

The trick is to stay with the adventure until it resolves to a peach-colored sunrise.

6" x 6" oil on panel   $230   Art in the Morning special

Quiet Now

January 22, 2020

Queue Tommy Flanagan for rich mahogany tones.

Or Oscar Peterson if you want a bit of brightwork with your oceanic rumblings.

Let the music carry you to the quiet.

5" x 7" oil on panel   $230   Art in the Morning special

Sunlight, Snowlight

January 15, 2020

Radiant light, quiet world.

Water in the bank.

A medium for play.

An embossed record of footprints and hatchmarks to tell us what the critters are up to.

A reflecting blanket for the full moon to bounce its light against.

6" x 8"  oil on linen panel    nfs  

Lamp Carnation

January 8, 2020

Life on the road means I often don't know just where I am when I awake.

It also means I get to draw stuff I don't normally see!

When I look back in my sketch, I know exactly where I was.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

Old Fashion

January 1, 2020

Wishing you an old fashioned new year...

A year of community and conversations over the fence, cats floating to pies on the window sill like in cartoons of old, finding wonder watching fish swim in a deep emerald pond, looking up to see a hawk soar against a backlit cloud overhead, reading aloud to a friend your favorite passage in a book.

Here's to quiet moments of creating, and savoring the good.

6" x 6" oil on panel   sold  

Baroque Ensemble

December 25, 2019

Gilt edges and whirly whirls, doo-dads and daubs and glitters of light, the snap of stripes going 'round the curve and music in the air...

I enjoyed my own bit of conducting with my brush.

Wishing you peace and cheer and music every day.

6" x 6" oil on panel   sold  

Morning Glow

Setting a place for Santa, full of magic and mystery.

8" x 8"  oil on linen panel   $340    Art in the Morning special

Classic '56

December 11, 2019

Like a sunny day, some things just make you smile.

8" x 10"  oil on panel   sold    

Studio Break

Break time in the studio means I turn my painting upside down and take a walk about.

When I return, I see the abstract shapes of color and value, contrast and light. It lets me see what's really there, instead of what I think is there.

Whether literal or metaphorical, turning things on their head for a fresh perspective seems a pretty good practice.

8" x 10"  oil on panel   $340   sold    

Evening

Evening... the perfect envelope of quiet.

A chance to pause and appreciate the kindness, the persistence, the courage of others.

Their example helps me find my better self.

6" x 6" oil on panel   $230   Art in the Morning special

Marlowe Takes up Painting

November 20, 2019

The low light and spare composition feels a bit noirish to me. I thought, Hey! Maybe that shamus Philip Marlowe took up painting.

Dark streets and alley ways in atmospheric light can be found in one's painting and on one's palette.

The beautiful dame strung tight like a bow is up to your imagination.

See? The viewer does complete it.

6" x 6" oil on panel   $230   Art in the Morning special

Clippy Gizmos

November 13, 2019

'Tis the season for those with the skill, to preserve. (I'm more familiar with the skill of perseverance.)

I love the mix of glass and hardware, the hint of science and the homemade.

And that splash of orange gasket is just the ticket.

8" x 10"  oil on panel   $340    Art in the Morning special

Autumn River Glow

November 6, 2019

Every day in nature is a gift. Big time.

Like having a piece of gold in your pocket.

Only better.

9" x 12"  oil on panel   $370    Art in the Morning special

Organic Diva

October 30, 2019

This ebullient tomato is so full of herself she is fit to burst. Drama and high color, costume and frillery, she shivers with presence. I couldn't help but think of opera divas.

I'm sure she is about to hit a high C.

Better hold on to your glass. 

5" x 7" oil on linen panel   $230   Art in the Morning special

Suspension of Disbelief

October 23, 2019

I love that pigment on a brush allows for creating a bit of magic. It's an adventure.

We get to take the everyday and see it fresh.

Presto chango.

6" x 8"  oil on linen panel    $265    Art in the Morning special

Garden Fountain - Alhambra

October 16, 2019

I have been hot on the trail of the Spanish painter, Sorolla. One of the places he found beauty and solitude was painting at Alhambra in Granada, Spain. It is an amazing place. Sorolla modeled his home and gardens upon it.

Like him, I find a fountain is just the invitation one needs to stop and linger, to contemplate and breathe, to hear the quiet, and then the hummingbird.

9" x 12"  oil on linen panel   $415    Art in the Morning special

Clippy Gizmo

October 9, 2019

When I paint an object it is rarely about the thing. It's about what it lets me do.

Here, I am painting glass, but this time I am after its watery light. I like that I can make the glass foggy or clear, like the sky. The almost horizontal horizon against the vertical jar, flattens space. Accentuating the "watery" of the glass.

This jar speaks of another time. Another process. One of planting a tree, growing the fruit. Preserving colorful pieces of flavor to share with family and friends. An everyday act kindness.

5" x 7" oil on panel     sold     

Delta Waters

October 2, 2019

Quiet. Light. Water. Sky.

Space your mind can expand in.

Silence that will fill you.

Take a radiant light color massage.

Flow like water, baby,

36" x 48" x 1.5" oil on canvas   $5390     Art in the Morning special

Lawn & Garden

September 25, 2019

Hold the mower.

5" x 7" oil on panel     $230      Art in the Morning special

A Hectare of Nectarines

September 18, 2019

Juicy, juicy fruit.

Juicy, juicy color.

Eat it. Drink it.

6" x 6" oil on panel     $230 sold      Art in the Morning special

Speaking Spanish

Water makes music.

It babbles, and sings.

This water whispers in Spanish as it calms and cools all who pause for a visit. 

9" x 12"  oil on linen panel   $390    Art in the Morning special

Good Morning Bouquet

September 4, 2019

Gardens in the heart

Summer on the mind

Blue sky at the window

Coffee almost ready.

8" x 8"     oil on linen panel    $330 sold   

Gem Stones

August 28, 2019

I love the interplay of dark and light, flat abstraction and rounded deep.

 Plus, I'll take a bowl full of cherries any day.

6" x 6" oil on panel    $230 sold      

Primary Color

August 21, 2019

Primary colors are the building blocks of painting. The hot sizzle and dark drama of red, yellow, and blue enable glowing colors that create their own light. Their value contrast provides dark shadowy drama to develop the story and enhance the glow in its resolution.

So too, when it comes to the garden's bounty. Primary colors give us beauty units on our plate and a full spectrum of vitality - all the better to wrestle our next creation into good form.

6" x 6" oil on panel     $230  sold     

Newton's Law

August 14, 2019

What goes up, must come down.

It's how we land that defines our character.

6" x 6" oil on panel     $230 sold      Art in the Morning special

Good Morning Summer

August 7, 2019

Isn't it great when you walk into the kitchen with your morning brain trailing behind you and sunlight is already pre-warming your cup?

While the room fills with the rich aroma of brewing coffee, your eyes can wander the splash-of-color flowers from the garden.

If you're extra lucky, some spritely little bird belts out his version of The Hills are Alive...,

Or maybe he's a bit edgier, with his cool on, and a little bird goatee, and sings us birdland's take on Blue in Green.

8" x 8"     oil on linen panel     sold   

Morning Comes Over the Mountain

July 31, 2019

I love sparkling wetlands. And all of their sparkling birdsong.

30" x 36" x 1.5" oil on canvas

The Big Wide Open

July 24, 2019

Compass.

Check.

Walking stick.

Check.

Paint box & coffee pot.

Check.

Big wide open heart.

Check. Double checked.

24" x 24" x 1.5"     oil on canvas   $1840   Art in the Morning special

The Angle of Compose

July 17, 2019

I was drawn to the slight angle of the head. The downward gaze. He looks peaceful, lost in thought.

Then you walk by and feel the heat radiating off him, his metabolism in high gear, as he conjures the next action-packed mystery with Owen McKenna, that guy with a moral compass and a very big polka dot dog.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

River Glass

July 10, 2019

To skate or to swim, or to sit beside you. Or to cast a line and watch it  dance before it lands upon you.

Or to glide above like a water bird, getting lift off your surface, peering into your watery pools of cool. And view the clouds in your refective plane. 

9" x 12"  oil on linen panel    sold 

Golden Hills

July 3, 2019

A splash of sunlight to beckon.

A winding road to follow.

Golden hills to climb.

And we're off!

9" x 12"  oil on linen panel   $390  Art in the Morning special

Daybreak in the Quarter I

June 26, 2019

I was visualizing the French Quarter with its thick wet atmosphere, its watery light, its dripping foliage, and the way the morning sun might bounce reflections across a surface, losing the edges of things, dissolving their volume into bits of color. I think Bonnard was seated to my left.

I added the winding green as melody and to evoke the iron curly-cues on the Quarter's many balconies.

9" x 9" oil on wood panel   sold   

Chinese Lantern

June 19, 2019

I love the way a painting can evoke something we never even considered.

This conjured an exotic nocturnal place, abstract reflections on a wet street, all lit a Chinese lantern near by.

9" x 9" oil on wood panel    $315     Art in the Morning special 

Dame Agatha Came to Tea

June 12, 2019

Drama, stage left...

A fallen candle in the night or an off-balance flashlight?

In the heavily-draped parlor of the old Victorian? In the humid, unlit garden gazebo on the knoll under the flowering Dogwood?

Dame Agatha calls on you to find the clues and reveal the mystery at hand.

6" x 6" oil on panel    sold     

Gee's Bend

June 5, 2019

This painting brought free associations in the morning...

Tangerine by the green bowl,

Egg on a spoon,

Gee's Bend in a glass.

5" x 7" oil on panel   sold    Art in the Morning special

Forest Reflections

May 29, 2019

With end-of-day sunlight on the far shore, calm waters mirror the woods and reeds and sky.

The perfect conclusion to a quiet and spectacular day. And a log to sit upon as you reflect on nature's magic.

24" x 36" x 1.5"     oil on canvas   $2490   Art in the Morning special

April Showers

May 22, 2019

April showers bring April flowers. Good thing too, because yesterday we had two inches of fresh snow on the deck and the sky looked like a winter shake-up toy.

The mama Steller's Jay, hunkered down in the planter on her nest of eggs, was wearing a shawl of white snow.

Maybe I should cut off the thumb of my glove and bring her a little hat and some warm seeds.   

6" x 8"  oil on linen panel   sold   

Harmony Pears

May 15, 2019

I like to work in series because nothing is just one thing. There is storm and sun, introspection and expansiveness, solemnity and song.

I couldn't call this anything but Harmony. The colors invite us in with their warmth. The "grayed green" complement in the background lets the golds and reds expand their chests in preparation for the song.

It's okay to hum along.

8" x 8"     oil on linen panel   $330 sold  

Bach `n the Garden

May 8, 2019

Looks to me like Bach wandered into the community garden to celebrate Spring!

16" x 16" x 1.5" oil on canvas    $860    Art in the Morning special

Starlight

May 1, 2019

Starlight, moonlight, there's magic in the night.

20" x 22" x 1.5" oil on canvas   sold  

Creekside

April 24, 2019

Water is my favorite language. It transports without words.

Cool in the dark shadows, glowing in the glints of light. I love to let my mind swim in its watery depths.

I always emerge rinsed free and refreshed.

36" x 48" x 1.5" oil on canvas   $5330     Art in the Morning special

Firewater

April 17, 2019

Hot color made the land sizzle. Wild wind kept everything in motion. With no chance for control or for the timid, it was a hilarious and memorable day.

Wahoo!

30" x 36" x 1.5" oil on canvas   $3360     Art in the Morning special

Pears of Winter

April 10, 2019

I love how light, color, and quality of brushstroke create a mood. All of it weaves together to tell a story.

Winter, you may ask? While much of the country is celebrating daffodils, we still have five feet of snow on our deck, and it's much deeper in the yard.

That's okay, snow moisture in the bank.

8" x 8"     oil on linen panel   $330  sold  

Clear: Twilight

April 3, 2019

We elevate the every-day by rendering it in paint. Every stroke is a personal decision. We choose what to see and what to leave out. We choose how far we want to take the illusion of deep space. Or, how we might want to refute that and push abstraction.

To look is to see. To paint is a chance to experiment. A group of glasses become a chandelier. 

8" x 10"     oil on linen panel     sold  

NYC Lamplight

March 27, 2019

I love the atmosphere to be found in sketching rooms. Hotels, airbnbs, a chair by the wood stove - the pool and spill of light, the shadows hugged up against the corners. The unseen clutter of life is evocative.

I get to create my own bit of theater before the play.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

Poirot Came to Tea

March 20, 2019

I love that light can suggest a story, tell a story, be the story.

This piece conjured mystery in the night, a train, and the guy with a really big moustache!

6" x 6" oil on panel   sold  

Golden Blue

March 13, 2019

Oh for silence.

Time to sequester ourselves in the padded cell of nature. The stars in the night of blue. The tracks of critters in fresh snow. The pink of the sky at dawn.

In the quiet we can hear the crack of the branch in the cold, the thawing of ice into water, the nuthatch trumpeting a new day.

I like to think that morning alpenglow will guide us back into the world calmer and kinder, recognizing similarities and embracing difference.

11" x 14"  oil on linen panel   $520   sold       

Harbor

March 6, 2019

Safe Harbor.

A specific place.

A way of being.

A state of mind.

30" x 36" x 1.5" oil on canvas   $3860  sold  

Have Sketchbook...

February 27, 2019

Finding that curve of the spine and the angle of her shoulders animates the drawing and gives dance to the pen.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

Moonlight

February 20, 2019

Lunar shades of silvery light ride the rims and pour into wet pools of luminous color.

Painting and scraping, pushing and pulling, enjoying the call and response between "realistic" deep space and flat abstraction.

Here's hoping you catch a shooting star. 

20" x 22" x 1.5" oil on canvas   $1260   Art in the Morning special

Sunshine Morning

February 13, 2019

A cup of sunshine for you and your Valentine.

8" x 8"     oil on panel    sold  

Gaze

February 6, 2019

We hear that 90% of success is just showing up. The flip side is that not showing up guarantees zero result.

Doing the work gives us the chance to have meaningful purpose and the opportunity to find that remaining 10% that lights our hearts and minds on beautiful fire.

9" x 12"  oil on linen panel

Gold Shoulder

January 30, 2019

Chasing light, brush flash

Autumn gold climbs peak to sky

Trees cloak hidden stream

6" x 8"  oil on linen panel    $260    Art in the Morning special

Travel Sketch

January 23, 2019

Travel sketching sharpens the mind, the eye-hand coordination, and our experience. What better way to speed the hours of waiting in airports than to try to capture textures of posture and place, custom and costume, in a constantly moving peoplescape.

Sketching requires such focus that we really see! It doesn't have to be a finished piece. It's for you, a book of memories.

Sketchbook or facebook... no contest.

5.5 x 5.5 sketchbook    nfs

Cuban Moon

January 16, 2019

I've never been to Cuba, but I found it in this glass.

Wet and full of moon, I can hear the Buena Vista guys on their guitars. With cigars sending blue ribbons upward, the men croon in mahogany tones, bringing us the song of life through a glint of light.

5" x 7" oil on panel  $195    Art in the Morning special

Mountain Muse

Across the river from the base of this mountain, I was caught up in its sculpted shape rising above me. Its "aboutness" was an uncluttered message: mass and serenity.

The feeling intensified. I began to think how I could paint this mountain every day for a year and always see more and "different."

Maybe that was how it started for Cezanne and his beloved Monte Sainte-Victoire.

8" x 8"     oil on panel   $315    Art in the Morning special

Opposites Attract

January 2, 2019

You say either, I say either. You say neither, ...

Different origins, different body types, definitely a different sense of style. In the end though, both are doing their best in pursuit of pretty similar goals.

Wishing you a year of peaceful inclusiveness. Vive la différence!

8" x 10"     oil on linen panel   sold   

Previous - Art in the Morning 2018

The Book!

"Art in the Morning" is my way to greet the day. What began as an attempt to make the world a kinder place through art, has turned into nine years, and running, of weekly paintings accompanied by my musings on nature, painting, life, and jazz. 

Once a week I send out an email with a painting, hot off my easel, for you to enjoy with your morning cup of coffee/ tea/ chocolate before you dive in to your work day. It's just a moment to relax. 

It's my attempt to make art a part of our every day lives. All of the arts should get out of the cloisters and into the moment. Any moment.

Share it with a friend. If they want to receive it regularly, they can just send me an email with "Please Add" in the subject line. I never share your address.

Email me: Kit@KitNight.com  (this is not a link)

Night has no "K".

Thanks and enjoy!

- Kit

Thanks for all of the great sales of my book of the same name. After many printings it is now sold out.