46th Starving Artist Art Show on May 1 - 2

Reflections from the Bridge
Cityscape of Sligo, Ireland
--Cindy Morawski

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46th Annual Starving Artist Art Show

SAHA Park - 818 S. Flores St.

San Antonio, Texas

Saturday-Sunday, May 1-2, 2010

10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

"The SAAS was voted one of the 200 best art events in the U.S. by Sunshine Artist Magazine."

--John W. Miller

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You are officially invited to join me at the Annual Starving Artist Art Show in downtown San Antonio. It's this weekend from 10 to 6 at a new location -- more room and more shade! There will also be $3.00 entrance fee that's a fund raiser for the less fortunate which is sponsored by LaVillita's Little Church. Free Parking all day and bus and trolley service are available too!.

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I'm looking forward to participating in one of San Antonio's biggest art shows this year. I'll be showing and selling my original art, reproductions, and art cards. Look for me in my booth. I'll give you a 20% discount on any one item if you mention this! This will be a great chance to buy some affordable art for you and your family or to give as a gift, and it will support emerging artists and the fundraiser of the Little Church. Hope to see you there!

~~Cindy

Celebrating Earth Day with a New Landscape Painting

Group Photo with my Canadian Cousins at Lake Louise (I'm on the right, a younger version of me.)

Pinetop at Lake Louise

Landscape Painting of Western Canada by Cindy Morawski

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Happy Earth Day! Looking out my studio and office's second story open window this afternoon, I can see and feel the cool mist of April's falling rain and almost imagine being in Western Canada again. Paul and I traveled there about 10 years ago to hike, sightsee, and most importantly to visit with my Canadian cousins, the Bakers, in Alberta. We stayed in an old lodge near Lake Louise and Banff National Park and hiked twice with my Cousin Dawn and her three children. The first thing I noticed while hiking was that the steep elevation was doing a number on me. I'm not a mountain goat, but I thought I was in pretty good hiking shape when I was there; yet, I found myself huffing and puffing like the big, bad wolf in The Three Little Pigs as I climbed higher and higher on the trail. Gasping for air when I reached the thin, cool air of the summit, I looked out between the pine trees. I gasped again. This time it wasn't because of oxygen deprivation; I was shaken by the startling beauty of the scene before me. Lake Louise winked up at me with her lit reflections of tantalizing turquoise. The rugged mountain range in the background still sparkled with the past winter's freshness of snowcaps on those immovable giants. I peered out again, this time startling a crow from a thick branch overhead. Hotel Lake Louise seemed like a tiny replica from a toy train display of an alpine village. Even though I have had the good fortune to travel in the past to the German Alps, this New World scene gave me a heady certainty that I was a witness to something close to pristine and magical. Many goosebumps later, I finally recovered enough to fumble around for my camera in my forest green backpack and snap several photos. Gently laughing, my Cousin Dawn teased me that I'd been living in a big city for way too long! I guess, my visceral reaction to this majestic vista was rather apparent to my hardy cousins who had hiked and skied this area all year round. I stood rooted like the tall pine trees beside me. I needed to drink it all in. Like a thirsty runner after a marathon, I could not get enough. Suddenly, I could just picture me in a Master Card commercial. Buying all the necessary hiking and camping equipment, lounging by the massive fireplace in our lodge, and then conquering the mountain trail's summit. Priceless! Camera pans with a 180 degrees swivel to show that outdoor wonderland. And, of course, me standing there grinning from ear to ear like an idiot. Cut! It's a wrap . . .

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Last month I was clicking through my computer's picture files for composition ideas and inspiration, but I kept going back to the Banff and Lake Louise files. I had been wanting to paint something from that trip for awhile. Then, it happened. I sat riveted on my office max chair. The Lake Louise photo from above the pinetops on the vista trail held me like a junkyard magnet. Squirming, I broke loose. Memories came at me like a spinning roladex. The hike to the top looking out at Lake Louise was the one I was going to paint.

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This landscape painting entitled Pinetop at Lake Louise measures 18 by 23 double matted and framed. I used quality Colourfix rich beige Art Spectrum paper and mostly Terry Ludwig soft pastels. It will be available for sale through an upcoming exhibit of the Texas Pastel Society's All Member Show at San Antonio's downtown Carver Theatre, May 4 through the 30th. You're invited to our reception too. The art reception will take place on Thursday, May 6th, from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Carver. If you have any questions, please email me at cski02@sbcglobal.net. I'll also be showing two other landscape paintings as well, Stopping by Reichert's Woods and Homestead and Heritage.

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Hope you have a green Earth Day! Don't forget to recycle, compost, and carpool when you can. It's the only planet we have for now!

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Love you, Mother Earth!!!

~~Cindy

Looking Back a Hundred Years, Homestead and Heritage, a Landscape Painting

Homestead and Heritage, a Landscape Painting

by Cindy Morawski

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I heard earlier this month that the drought in Texas is "officially" over. After driving on Loop 1604 this past weekend, I can believe it. I used the bluebonnet test for my measuring stick this spring. I found a sea of blue everywhere! Recently, I decided to check through my bluebonnet photos of the past. I clicked through my computer's picture files, and this is what I found. Last year's two photos showcased a group of only three random flowers in our community's greenbelt area. Of course, there were a few others in our greenbelt, but they had been nurtured. After lots of water, the protected ones finally bloomed. It was like looking at an endangered species in the zoo. That dang drought had done its damage! "What is that flower? Do you remember seeing it before?" I overheard someone say that as I was walking my dog down the greenbelt trail while shaking my head in disbelief. It wasn't until I went back three years ago into my picture files of 2007 that I found big-time bluebonnet evidence. My dog Phineas was surrounded in a thick blue carpet of neighborhood bluebonnets. I didn't have a small child handy to take a photo so I settled for my dog. Yikes! That drought did last a long time! Now I know why I appreciate this spring so much. I can't get over the many shades of green, the zillions of colorful wildflowers, and the gigantic weeds in my yard. It's truly amazing what a rainy season can do to San Antonio. After popping my allergy meds this past week, I've also said thanks every morning when I have awakened to all this beauty. Just Color My World!

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Therefore, with all this appreciation of nature going on, I decided to paint a tribute to Texas and to the Season of Spring through a landscape painting. Of course, I had to feature wildflowers, especially bluebonnets. I added trees, grasses, and a rural cabin along my horizon and entitled it -- Homestead and Heritage. Nostalgia, like Charles Dickens, can bring out the best of times and the worst of times. During the drought, I felt nostalgic for rainfall, all things green, and blooming flowers. And it just so happens that when I think of Texas history, I also get a little bit sentimental about log cabins and a simpler time. That's why I felt compelled to place the cabin in my painting.

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One of my favorite San Antonio landscape artists who happened to be a genius in painting bluebonnets was Julian Onderdonk. I saw his beautiful paintings in an exhibit featured at San Antonio's Witte Museum on Broadway awhile ago. In my opinion, one of his best was painted in 1912, "Bluebonnet Field." It features the Texas Hill Country in all its bluebonnet splendor. In 1912, San Antonio must have had a spring that rivaled ours. Onderdonk's spring paintings can also be a measuring stick that there was no drought going on in 1912. When you look at his art work, you can see a sea of blue in his bluebonnet landscapes. Almost a hundred years later, I can almost imagine how Julian must have felt gazing out at all those bluebonnets. Spring in Texas. Can it get any better than this?