Gloria J Zucaro's "Wishful Thinking"

8"H x 8"W  Original Oil on Panel

Unframed $75.00/ $7.00 S&H

It has turned completely frigid and prospects of 4 to 8 inches of snow loom ahead.  Although I love to have cool sleeping conditions and love the four seasons, it is usually around this time of year that I really appreciate the thought of 70 degree temperatures with a slight warm breeze and sunny skies.  I saw these flowers near a weathered chair and vintage rusted car in Door County Wisconsin last July.  Take me there oh my imagination!  This is my Paint Party Friday entry for this week.  Happy PPF!

Gloria J Zucaro's "Colorized Peacock"

                                                     5"H x 7"L Original Mixed Media Design

This is my final version of my thank you card to my daughter Faye and her family for the Christmas presents they gave to me.  A necklace and earrings, a journal and note cards all with a peacock motif were my lovely gifts this year.  I used ink pen and some metallic gel markers on watercolor card stock to make my artwork.  I think she will really like it, I do! :-)  Below is the card before I added color.  I would be interested to know which version you prefer.  Market research for future projects ya know!

Gloria J Zucaro's "Pokey's Pals"

8"H x 8"W Original oil on Panel

$75.00 Unframed/ $90.00 Framed

Unframed/Framed

Option 1-Unframed $75.00 USD Option 2-Framed $90.00 USD

I had a lot of fun with this Daily Paintworks challenge because as you may have noticed, I love the color orange!  Apparently the designers have designated "Tangerine Tango" as the color of the year.  Our challenge was to paint a picture with the color of the year predominant.    My friend Ann Feldman beat me to the orange vegetables, so I raided my grandsons' toy box in my basement.  I kept calling "Pokey" " Gumby", until someone reminded me that "Gumby" is a little green rubber man, and this is his horse" Pokey"!  The fire truck is broken with its' ladder missing, but "what the hey"!  I like the weird little cross-eyed ball, too.


Below is a photo of "the beginning", my value study and start of putting in color.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Lucy's Box of Socks"

                                           5"H x7"W Original Ink Design on Watercolor Cardstock

I spent an enjoyable evening preparing this "Thank You" card for my daughter Lucy and Grandson Alex to thank them for the Christmas gifts they gave me.  One of their gifts to me was a big box of all kinds of socks.  Some were black and some were white.  But there were also Christmas socks, socks with polka dots, socks with hearts, socks with penguins,socks with diamonds,socks with kites,socks with rainbows,socks with cupcakes,socks with polar bears,socks with cherries.  A whole lot of really fun socks!  I had told her I needed socks when she asked what I would like for Christmas...what a great surprise, a great big box of socks! 

Designs inspired by Zentangles.

This is my entry for Paint Party Friday.  Happy PPF.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Green Plate & Ham"

6"H x 8"W Original Oil on Stretched Canvas

$75.00  Staple-free sides painted black.  May be hung with or without frame.

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The Daily Paintworks Challenge for the week of January 8- 14 is to paint a picture of your breakfast.  Well, this was not my breakfast because I couldn't cook in the studio!  I actually had 2 slices of bacon, two fried eggs, and a healthy juiced fruit and vegetable combo that was made from 1 beet, 1 carrot, 1 apple, 1 orange and a one inch square of fresh ginger.  Oh, not to forget the large cup of Colombian coffee  "straight"! I haven't posted for a week because my children celebrated Christmas with me on the 7th. of January.  I was busy last week with some extra shopping and wrapping, and preparing or picking up food for the weekend.  So the ham in this picture is part of a Honeybaked ham we had.  I still have too much leftover, even though they each took some home.  Ham anybody?! I painted this over a previously used canvas.  I have photos of the canvas and my value study on my blog         www.gloriajzucaro.blogspot.com 

Gloria J Zucaro's "Butterfly Apples"

91/8"H x 113/4"W Original Pastel on Sanded Paper

$125.00 Unframed

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I love stacking things and making off-kilter arrangements.  I had decided on flowers and fruit, but it needed something, so I added the butterfly.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Purple Apple,Blue Orange,Green Lemon"

6"H x 6"W Original Oil on Canvas Panel

$65.00 Unframed $5.00 S&H

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This weeks challenge from the Daily Paintworks site is called "Change the Color!"  My original and actual colors were red apple, yellow lemon and an orange orange.  The soup bowl is actually shades of teal,blue/ green, & purple.  This was hard but fun!  I did the value study over my first panel with the four 10 minute pumpkin paintings on it that I had done for that challenge in October.   The colors underneath were orange, yellow and blue/green.  It made it a little confusing when I started my value study and painting, but once I got in most of the basic colors it felt better.

Gloria J Zucaro's Zentangle Inspired "For The Holidays"

3.5"H x 3.5"W  Pencil and Ink on Official Zentangle Tile.

Unframed.  May be framed with mat as you would for watercolor.

$5.00 $1.00 S&H

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I thought up some of my own tangles for this one to have a holiday theme.  It includes one official Zentangle pattern as far as I know.  The upper left corner that looks like snow flakes is called "AHH".  I then made the branches of an evergreen tree, a pattern of candles, and another of stars.  In the little loops, I put squares to represent boxes and "barbells" on top to represent ribbon bows on top of the boxes. This is my entry for Paint Party Friday.  Next week it is back to my oil and pastel paintings!  I have been away for quite awhile.

Gloria J Zucaro's Christmas Card "Already!?"

20"H x 16"W on Utrecht Linen Panel

$100.00 Unframed $10.00 S&H

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 I painted Santa from life in a portrait class.  His real name(don't tell the kids!) is Rich.  He is tall and thin and has a wonderful smile.  Santa was wearing his Santa hat but had a green or blue flannel shirt on in November, when this was painted.  As some of you might know, when you paint a human from life, the sitting is about 3 hours long with 5 minute breaks every 20 minutes.  Well, when you are sitting and staring at something across the room on the wall for three hours, you are not going to be holding a smile!  I also exaggerated the creases and lines.  I love the way it seems that Santa is already tired when he thinks about all that needs to be done before Christmas Eve. We all know that feeling.  I had this painting made into postcards for Christmas and had "Already!?" printed down along the bottom.  I wish all my friends at Paint Party Friday, and at The Daily Paintworks and Contemporary Fine Art International a Merry Christmas.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Cactus Christmas"

6.5"H x 7.5"W Original Oil on Linen Sheet Canvas.
Unframed  $65.00, bidding starts at $32.00 on the Daily Paintworks auction site.

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I don't think these cacti would be still blooming, but they certainly show off a Christmas color palette!
This is my entry for Paint Party Friday this week.  
Have a good week, remember to take time to smell the Christmas cookies baking!

Gloria J Zucaro's "Season's Greetings"

This is one of my two holiday cards for 2011.  I painted this one in watercolor and had Seasons Greetings printed on the front when I had it made into postcards at Office Max.  I sent these to all my Jewish friends and if two people in the same family group on my list were getting cards from me, I sent this one to one family and another card that I made with a portrait of Santa Claus to the other family.  I will post Santa next week.

Gloria J Zucaro's " Learning Something New"

3 1/2" Square, Ink on Zentangle  paper.

On Friday I was invited to a Christmas luncheon by an artist friend.  She had not only planned for great food and wonderful companionship with other artists, but had a project for us to do.  We sat at her kitchen table with the supplies she had set out for us to introduce us to an art form called Zentangles. We each had one official Zentangle paper square, a pencil, and two pens with different line thicknesses.


First we were to put dots a little inside of each corner, then connect the dots.  I went wrong right away, by making my connection "bumpy" on two of the sides instead of making it look like a "pillow shape".  But she said it is okay, just have fun!  Then we were to put dots on the edges of the pillow in pencil, then connect the dots across the pillow with our fine point pen so as to divide the pillow into sections.  The first section was filled with lines running parallel to our section line.  See my upper left and lower right bumps.  Then in the same section to go across those lines to make diamond shapes.  Then fill in every other line of diamonds with our thicker point pen.  Next we picked another area and made dots in parallel lines as if you were going to play that connect- the-dots game to complete squares.  See my area in the upper middle.  After that we connected our dots with an "S" line, then connected the opposite sides with the same "S", which resulted in a curvy shape.  Some of us then put squares in the middle of our curvy squares.  And we darkened the little circles that had been the substructure for the design.  Next we were to make scallops across one section.  I got that all mixed up!  I was to make the same scallop shape one on top of the other and then darken with the thick point, every other row.  I went around my perimeter by mistake with the scallops, which did not keep their "scallopy" shape.  So when it came time to darken alternating rows, I ran into areas where two white scallops or dark scallops met.  That meant I started randomly darkening areas and so it looks like Indian Corn instead of a reoccurring pattern which I think is one of the main ideas of Zentangle. See two "bumps" top and bottom.
Next section we were to draw a set of parallel lines in a slight curve across that section.  Then continue with sets of lines but never going over that top set.  We continued to fill that section with parallel lines.  Then we filled in the open areas with"bubbles" or small circles.  See lower middle section.  After that everyone else was done but I had areas that were still open, so I just followed the lines of the open areas to make a maze effect. The other artists were adding some pencil to have more values.  So I started to fill in, with pencil, some of my maze lines.  Again I ran into the problem of having a darkened area meet another already darkened area that would lessen the effect of contrast!


This was a lot of fun and took us about an hour to do.  After I got home, I researched Zentangles on Google.  The originators of the craze are Richard Roberts and Maria Thomas.  The website if you want to find out all about it is http://www.zentangle.com   
Since I would like to do more of these and do them properly, I will need to take a lesson from a Certified ZT teacher.  There are two in the area where I live.  Also, there are many patterns which have specific names and their creators name are listed with them.  There are also challenges just like on the Daily Paintworks site.

"Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Our square red logo, "Anything is possible one stroke at a time", "Certified Zentangle Teacher", "CZT", and "Zentomology" are trademarks of Zentangle, Inc.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Making Lemonade"

8"H x 8"W  Original Oil on Stretched Canvas

$65. Unframed/ $90. Framed in Black Floater Frame.

Unframed/Framed

Option 1-Unframed $65.00 USD Option 2-Framed $90.00 USD

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Here are some more of my 5 lbs. of lemons from Costco!  I am almost done with them, gradually using them for other things besides a cup of tea.  They have been good sports about lining up for me to paint them.  

Gloria J Zucaro's "All Boxed Up"

6"H x 6"W Oil on Panel

$65. Unframed/$90. Framed in Black Floater Frame

Unframed/Framed

Option 1-Unframed $65.00 USD Option 2-Framed $90.00 USD

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This is the December challenge for Ria Hills, Shoot and Paint.  It was fun packaging up my painting! Visit Ria's blog. 

Gloria J Zucaro's "The Seeds Of Life"

12"H x 6"W Original Oil on Stretched canvas

Unframed and ready to Hang, sides painted, no staples.

$97.00

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This my early entry for Paint Party Friday, since I will be busy for the next few days and wanted to wish you a happy Thanksgiving with this painting.  I painted this Indian woman with a pumpkin and a sunflower from  a still life set-up of two objects that I put out for my Thanksgiving decorations.  I also have the male Indian and both a male and female Pilgrim.  I decided on the title after thinking about the fact that our native Americans did not always have turkey at their disposal so enjoyed seeds sometimes instead for their protein, fat and carbs.  

Gloria J Zucaro's "Are They Talking About Me?!"

6"H x 6"W  Original Oil on Canvas Panel

$65.00 Unframed

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This lemons gossiping painting is for my PPF(Paint Party Friday) entry.  I just realised I posted to PPF before I posted here!!  That won't work.  I had the idea for this painting when I rolled out a bunch of lemons on my kitchen counter and took pictures from various sides.  This looked to me like most of the lemons were talking about the one who was left out in the upper left hand corner.  The Instigator of the gossip is the other lemon with a highlight and a well defined nose!

Gloria's"The Worm & The Mushroom II"

8"H x 8"W Oil on Panel$75.00 Unframed/$90.00 in Plain black Floater Frame(see Below)

Unframed/Framed

Option 1-Unframed $75.00 USD Option 2-Framed in Black Floater Frame $90.00 USD

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This is the second in my two part series of the paintings from the Ria Mills "Paint & Shoot" October Challenge, only I didn't get it done in October so here it is now.  The first one had the worm under the mushroom and was done in Pastel.  This one is in oil.

Here it is in the floater frame, the colors in the top photograph are closer to reality in my monitor.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Abstract Favorites"

20"H x 10"W  Original Oil on Stretched Canvas

$175.00 Framed in black floater frame ready to hang. See frame at bottom of this listing.

 I am proud to say that I had four paintings accepted into the Randy Higbee 6 Inch Squared National Juried show in Costa Mesa, Ca.

I tried something a little different here.  As I sat watching television, I drew on my canvas different things I like or enjoy.  A heart, fish(in a pond!), a cup of coffee, the telephone,my green tile kitchen counter,trees with the leaves drawn in house shapes, a rose, the wind, a rainbow and the star with various triangle and circles.  As I drew each one, I turned the canvas 1/4 of the way around to the right.  I hope you enjoy some of these things, too.  This can be hung either vertically or horizontally.  See below.  This is in the black frame,against my natural oak floor.  The colors in this bottom pix don't seem as accurate, I think I took this picture in a different place and at a different time of day.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Elephant Story"

12"H x 9"W  Original Oil on Board

$125.00 Unframed/ $150.00 Framed

Unframed/Framed

Option 1-Unframed $125.00 USD Option 2-Framed $150.00 USD                 SOLD

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Today's painting was done from life, but not an alive elephant at Cabela's in Hoffman Estates, IL.  I arrived at 7:40AM, twenty minutes ahead of schedule with all my paraphernalia.  Even though what I considered a rush hour time of day, it only took me twenty minutes from my home in Lake Zurich.  So I tilted my seat back and listened to the radio.  It was a cold 30% morning and the sun had a mist around it.  I was trying to decide how I would paint the sky if I were doing Plein air.  But I digress. 


None of the other artists had arrived as far as I could see.  I had noticed employees arriving in those twenty minutes.  At eight I went to the front door.  There was a maintenance man there and he told me to go to the staff entrance because the store didn't open until 9AM and the front door was locked.  So I went, it was locked, so I knocked on the window with my sun glasses because no one had come when I knocked with my knuckles!  At last!  A young woman opened it and I told her I was one of the painters who were to go to the second floor.  She called someone on her walkie-talkie(is that what they are called now???) and said" The painters are here for the second floor".  I said "OH! We are not wall painters we are artists here to paint the animals."  So then she called another person who said I should go to the conference room.  After asking where it was I took the elevator up to the second floor. 


HOW COOL!  A rocky mountain with waterfalls and with life-size bears, deer, coyote, turkey, moose, elk, fox, mountain goats,eagle,etc.,etc.   I put down all my painting stuff and started taking pictures.  At the far end I discovered the safari animals.  Wow!  So neat...Lions, Gazelle,Rhino Elephant,Water Buffalo, and so on.  More picture taking.  All the animals had labels and a couple of facts about them.  By this time a staff member walked by and told me that even though Cabela's is a sportsmen's store, they are also considered a museum and do tours for groups large and small.  He told me there was a tunnel through the mountain with fish tanks holding local types of freshwater fish.  After he left I called one of my artists friends and found out that since the store didn't actually open until 9AM and they hadn't been able to get in, they had gone for coffee and would see me soon.  I decided to go downstairs and see the fish.  As I walked by all the staff members who were getting their morning update, a woman stopped me to inquire who I was.  It turns out they shouldn't have let me in.  But all was explained and I was setting up and ready to paint by the time the other six artists arrived.  I took my time drawing my elephant, painted til lunch, then finished up early afternoon. 

I am so glad to find out about Cabela's as I had missed going there with another group of artists earlier this year.

Gloria J Zucaro's "Changing Season's"

8"H x 8"W  Original Oil on Raymar Panel

$75.00 Unframed/$90.00 Plain Black Wood Frame

Unframed/Framed

Option 1-Unframed $75.00 USD Option 2-Framed $90.00 USD

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I painted this from life.  It is a bronzy orange metal pumpkin that is open in the back for a candle, and has a beaded stem and some embedded rhinestones or beads in the pumpkin body, along side a large lush sunflower.  The sunflower closes out our summer season and welcomes in the Fall.   10% of the sale price of this painting will go to breast cancer research.