Hearts 2
posted by Deborah at
7:56 PM
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Monday, July 30, 2007
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Hearts Series
I have been working on a brand new series of paintings this week which I am calling Hearts. Wow, brilliant, since they are all of hearts. A customer of mine has requested a heart painting, so in my usual style of more is better...I'm currently working on 6 different ones.
They are all Pop Art style in bright colors so far and this image is only the first one. I'll be emailing images to the customer so he can pick out his favorite(s). The others will be placed in my eBay store for purchase.
Le Tour de France ended today as I watched. Things finally settled down over there in France for the last few days of the race. It was extremely exciting yesterday, though, when the top 3 riders only had 31 seconds separating them in the final standings. This was a fabulous finish!
The final day of the race when the riders are in Paris cycling around, the standings don't change as no one seems to want to chance falling or causing an accident. It's basically a Get Home Safely day. I am always hoping that someone will chance it and go for a shake-up in the overall standings, but I can certainly understand why they don't risk it all.
posted by Deborah at
12:38 PM
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Thursday, July 26, 2007
OMFG !!!!
I had a humongous shock early this morning when I turned on Le Tour de France coverage on the VS Channel. Michael Rasmussen has been removed from the race by his team! This was the guy wearing the yellow jersey for well over a week now...kicking serious bootay and it looked as if he had the race sewn up.
He was not kicked out of the race by the race directors or anyone else. His own team! There was a large controversy circulating about Rasmussen's refusal to report for drug testing in other venues within the cycling world, and he had been banned from participating in other important races. He never once tested positive during le Tour, but the controversy was splashing across the headlines in Europe.
The speculation at this point is that Rasmussen was removed by his team due to them discovering something that is, as yet, unknown to the rest of the world. Rasmussen was apparently in Mexico just prior to Le Tour where people think he got some special treatments to enhance his sporting performace. He denied being there, but was seen by someone. And it took a while for the information to be confirmed, apparently.
Not only was Vinokourov removed from the race, but his entire team was as well. I heard today that if one single rider tests positive on a team, the rest of the team is removed from the race. This also happened on another team in the past couple days.
My hat is off to the teams, riders and other people involved in trying to clean up this sport and remove the unethical behavior from it's ranks. Hopefully, some day other sports will follow suit. Drugs are rampant in other sports, but we don't hear about it because it is accepted practice. It may appear that cycling is 'dirty' etc, etc, when in fact the participants in that sport are taking steps to expose the problem so that a solution can be found.
I have not lost my enthusiasm or respect for these fine athletes in this sport. Unless you have seen these races first hand, or tried riding a bicycle up a mountainside, it might look silly but it is indeed a gruelling, demanding sport. I'm going to make a Coors Classic video one day soon to post on YouTube. Photos that I took during my years of following that race in Colorado.
He was not kicked out of the race by the race directors or anyone else. His own team! There was a large controversy circulating about Rasmussen's refusal to report for drug testing in other venues within the cycling world, and he had been banned from participating in other important races. He never once tested positive during le Tour, but the controversy was splashing across the headlines in Europe.
The speculation at this point is that Rasmussen was removed by his team due to them discovering something that is, as yet, unknown to the rest of the world. Rasmussen was apparently in Mexico just prior to Le Tour where people think he got some special treatments to enhance his sporting performace. He denied being there, but was seen by someone. And it took a while for the information to be confirmed, apparently.
Not only was Vinokourov removed from the race, but his entire team was as well. I heard today that if one single rider tests positive on a team, the rest of the team is removed from the race. This also happened on another team in the past couple days.
My hat is off to the teams, riders and other people involved in trying to clean up this sport and remove the unethical behavior from it's ranks. Hopefully, some day other sports will follow suit. Drugs are rampant in other sports, but we don't hear about it because it is accepted practice. It may appear that cycling is 'dirty' etc, etc, when in fact the participants in that sport are taking steps to expose the problem so that a solution can be found.
I have not lost my enthusiasm or respect for these fine athletes in this sport. Unless you have seen these races first hand, or tried riding a bicycle up a mountainside, it might look silly but it is indeed a gruelling, demanding sport. I'm going to make a Coors Classic video one day soon to post on YouTube. Photos that I took during my years of following that race in Colorado.
posted by Deborah at
8:55 AM
>0 comments
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Magic Painting Shirt video
Busy week! The above link will take you directly to the video that I made on Sunday featuring my Magic Painting Shirt. I've been experimenting with various paints and mediums on them and taking a new approach. Sort of a Rock Star approach.......
Mick's portrait contest ended this past weekend and the winner was Bellsakabin from Australia. She made a wonderful video about her mate, Paul, and since it featured tractors in it...Mick picked that video out of the dozen or so entries that we had. We had some fantastic entries! I was impressed with the skill of the entrants. Here is the initial video announcing the Portrait Contest and below it you will find video icons that you can click on to see the entries.
This is the link to the video announcing the winner of the contest AND showing the step by step Gouache portrait that Mick made for the winner. It was a lot of fun to do this portrait contest, but I know that several people were terribly disappointed that they didn't win. That's the hard part.
posted by Deborah at
6:02 PM
>0 comments
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Magic Painting Shirt
I've been conducting experiments this week on developing my Magic Painting Shirt. I have been selling these for the past year or so in my eBay store and with each one the technique changes. This latest one isn't completed yet, but nearly so. I'll be taking more close-up shots tomorrow prior to shipping it off to my customer and I will post them in here.
posted by Deborah at
8:18 PM
>1 comments
Sunday, July 15, 2007
1985 Coors Classic
The bottom photo here is of Andy Hampsten, who was also a Boulder resident back in the 80's when he was racing in the Coors Classic. He may have even taken 3rd place in 1985, I'm not sure. Memories have gotten a bit foggy.
The other two photos are of Greg LeMond and Bernard Hinault who were both racing on the Red Zinger team that year. Mo Siegel, owner of Celestial Seasonings, had started this bike race years earlier when it was only 3 days long. This was before Coors took over sponsorship of the race.
Greg and Bernard have an interesting history, as most of the bicycling world knows. They were both on the same team in Le Tour de France back in the 80's and Bernard was going for his 5th win of the race at one point. LeMond COULD have won the race that year, but was not allowed to do so by the team manager and Hinault because they wanted Hinault to have that 5th win. I wasn't there, so I can't say if all this is true or not, but that is what has been reported in the stories and news media about that historical time period in bicycling.
It's obvious from the photos that I captured during the Coors Classic that there was no love lost between the two of them. LeMond has continued to be quite outspoken about many things in the bicycling world and has generally taken a critical and negative view of things. Whether he is accurate or not, who knows. I used to admire him a great deal, but as the years have passed and he has continued to whine and complain..............
posted by Deborah at
9:34 AM
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Friday, July 13, 2007
1984 Coors Classic
The above photos are a sampling of the adventures we had 23 years ago while following the Coors Classic bicycle race around the state of Colorado. The top photo was taken on the I-25 between Cheyenne, Wyoming and Denver, Colorado. The helicopter on the left was flying up and down trying to capture the racers as they got very spread out over several miles on the road race that day. You can't see the racers in the photo except off in the distance.
I should know the names of the folks that won that year, but all I can remember is that the fellow's last name was Shapiro. The woman was the French gal that won the race many years in a row and for the life of me I can't remember her name.
Anyone familiar with bicycle racing for any period of time will recognize the familiar figure of the great Eddie Mercxx on the podium in the next photo. Again I have probably misspelled that name, but at least I can pronounce it!
And the final shot is of Connie Carpenter and Davis Phinney. This couple was living in Boulder back in the 1980's and were amongst the elite in the cycling world.
It certainly brings back many fine memories for me to be revisiting this now extinct bicycle race. Bicycling was a relatively new sport in the US back then and I was fortunate enough to be there for some of the absolute best moments of its history. It was not uncommon for me to shoot 400-500 photos each year during our two weeks on the road. They don't look so hot today, but back then I thought they were wonderful photos. LOL
posted by Deborah at
7:48 PM
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Thursday, July 12, 2007
The 1983 Coors Classic
The blonde racer in the top shot was Steve Bauer, a Canadian. He was best known for his ass...at least by my sister and I. He was also a very fine racer, but she and I were transfixed by his buns in his racing shorts.The second shot is after the race and the fellow in the center with whipped cream all over him was the Race Director, Michael Aisner. I never had any personal dealing with Michael, but he always seemed like a character.
Anyone that was following the Coors Classic back in 1983 will probably recognize the names Alexi Grehwahl and Davis Phinney. I probably mangled the spelling of their names, but they should be recognizable.
Davis was married to Connie Carpenter, who was the top female bicycle racer for some time until some French gal came on the scene. Davis was always famous for his sprinting abilities and we used to scream until we were hoarse when we would see those racers blasting across the finish lines for the final sprint.
In the mountains, Davis wasn't in his element. He was like Robbie McEwen is in the Tour de France...a champion sprinter.
posted by Deborah at
8:21 PM
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Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Thor Hushovd
I think I got that name spelled correctly anyhow. Thor has been one of my favorite racers for a number of years now and he won the 4th stage of the Tour de France today. He's a very strong all around racer who deserves a good win now and again!
Another racer that I used to be very fond of about 20 years ago was my ex-husband. You can see him crossing the finish line in the top photo above. That was taken in August, 1983 when he placed 4th in the Mt. Evans Hill Climb in the Senior division. I was so proud of him that day...I was bursting. I wish I had a video of the road up Mt. Evans to show to people so they could get the full grasp of what riding a bicycle up there involves. The road at the top is at 13,000 feet above sea level.
As you can see...there are NO trees up there. It's above the tree line in the Rockies. The other shot was one that I took of him when he was on one of his training rides up Mt. Evans in preparation for one of his races there. That looks like rain in the sky, right? Well it was snow and hail and it was in June or July. That little lonely figure out there on the road was my dearly beloved and I always thought he was insane to do these races and torture himself this way.
There's not enough money in the world to get ME to do that!
posted by Deborah at
4:42 PM
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Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Le Tour Day France
That's how Bob Roll pronounces Tour de France. I laugh and laugh about this, because he gets chided about it year after year and the French must go completely nuts. LOL
Bob adds a whole dimension to the race with his commentating as he inserts his own brand of American humor. They even have a spot for him on the VS website featuring the race which is entitled Ask Bobske.
I never had the pleasure of meeting Bob in person, but I did see him racing in the Coors Classic back in the 80's when my husband and I used to follow the race around Colorado for two weeks each summer. Ah, those were the days! Those trips were THE coolest!
The above photos were taken in 1982 during the Coors Classic in Boulder. We used to live near North Boulder Park, so we would set up our ladders and a board to give us a view of the finish line. Back then they didn't provide bleachers for the spectators so we improvised.
It was a family affair which involved my brother, sister and son. We had some wonderful moments together.
posted by Deborah at
5:40 PM
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Sunday, July 08, 2007
More Florida artwork
Another Florida evening moonscape painting. Highly texturized this time. It's a 16 x 24" painting on masonite board. The auction will begin on eBay tomorrow night, Monday July 9th.
posted by Deborah at
9:43 PM
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Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Hate to see this one go...
This Florida painting sold today (imagine that...July 4th) just as I was preparing to remove it from my eBay store. Today was to be its final day there and I had decided to keep it in my personal collection. It has been one of my favorite Florida abstracts in that whole series of 57 paintings.
I had never understood why it hadn't sold before. The price wasn't all that high, for goodness sakes. The online image doesn't do justice to the beauty of this painting at all. The greens have an iridescent sheen to them and those orangey areas around the outside are an iridescent copper. To me, this is a beautiful painting...but then I love abstracts with a hint of realism added.
The beauty of doing online business is it can come on any day or night of the year...24 hours a day. It's always a blast to have that notification of a sale show up in your email box. Things have been slow this summer, pretty much across the boards for most of the artists I know, but summers usually are slow.
I have marked many of my store items on sale recently, but this was one of those that I refused to markdown. I feel good that this lovely little piece will find a good home out there in California. I hope to have a very satisfied and happy customer out of it. I'll miss having the painting here to look at, but I do have many others to view.
And I will be making many more in the future!
posted by Deborah at
1:03 PM
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Monday, July 02, 2007
Winner of Pet Video Contest #2
Jordan VS The Peacock, a video by Gregmonte, has won our contest on YouTube. This video made the judges laugh and laugh and even some of the other pet owners were rooting for him! What a cute face that little pugmeister has!
This was a very tough decision for the Panel of Judges to make, believe me. We had some wonderful and HILARIOUS video entries. Pet owners and animal lovers are getting very creative about their videos these days. With 23 entries this time, we had at least 4 of them that were very close in the running for the top position.
I would guess that this will get more and more difficult with each Pet Video Contest that we have and the word spreads on how much fun it is. We have already begun the Art Contest in the eBay art groups and those entries should begin showing up in the next 5-7 days, I'm guessing. Greg will then have the unfortunate position of having to choose which artwork he wants as his prize.
posted by Deborah at
5:28 PM
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Sunday, July 01, 2007
Florida 4
Come and get it! I just marked this painting down by 40% in my store. The colors in the online image do not accurately reflect the copper and bronzes of the real life image, but this is nothing new.
It's a 2' x 2' painting done on Masonite Board using acrylics and inks. The colors are in iridescent paints and they change colors depending upon the light in the room. Flat black acrylics were used on the other areas for drama and contrast.
Just think of how beautiful this painting would look hanging on the walls of your home! Click on the name in the title above and it will take you directly to the listing for purchase. Instant art in the mail!
posted by Deborah at
5:32 PM
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