Woodmansey Artist-In-Residence June 2025

This morning I saw another fantastic sunrise from my casita's patio.  This is the last day of my residence. I am checking out of the casita. Before I begin my long drive back to Dallas, I have a few floral sketches that I want to complete. This is a 5 x 7" watercolor on paper greeting card. And this is a 9 x 11" watercolor on paper. I left one painting as an official donation to the park and three others as personal gifts to rangers who were especially kind and helpful to me. I packed up the greeting cards and 3 selected paintings to take home. I left the rest of the paintings for the rangers (or anyone else who might want them). This has now been my third year as a National Park Service Artist in Residence gig -- and this experience was by far the best. During my time here, I completed 30 artworks! I think that some turned out great and others are disappointments – – but that is the artistic process! Overall, I think I picked up a few ideas and techniques that I will be ...

Today I learned that one of the Carlsbad ranger's cousins is an endodontist in Missouri. Surprisingly, I don't know him.  I completed another painting of the cavern. This one closely resembles one I did last week. This is acrylic on canvas, approximately 10 x 14". Next, I completed the cactus flower painting that I had started yesterday. I think it turned out OK. It is simplistic and stylistic. This is acrylic on canvas, approximately 14" square. Last Saturday evening, I was sitting on my patio and waiting for the bats to fly, when a double rainbow appeared to the south. I was hoping the bats would fly across in front of the rainbow – – because that would look really cool! But unfortunately, the sun went down and the rainbows disappeared before the bats flew. I'm not a photographer, I'm a painter -- so I was able to create the scene as I envisioned it. This is watercolor on paper, approximately 8 x 12". Today at 3 PM I was asked to give a 30 minute "...

Last night, as I was driving back into the park after a quick trip into the city of Carlsbad, I saw a huge herd of barbary sheep. It is hard to see them in this photo, but there was more than 100 animals packed together in this brushy area. The barbary sheep are not native to this area. They were introduced in the 1950s, I think from the Barbary coast of Africa. They have thrived here; but unfortunately, they have pushed out the native bighorn sheep. When I woke up this morning, there was only around 50 feet of visibility. The fog was packed in thickly. This was the view from my patio. It rained all day. Sometimes it was just a drizzle and sometimes it was a downpour. They called this a monsoon here.  I am so grateful that Carlsbad NP has such a great studio area for me to work in. At other national parks the past two summers, I was always painting outdoors on a trail somewhere – – so this set up is awesome! As I am nearing the end of my residence here, I counted up the works I hav...

Today was quieter at the park. Caverns entrance tickets had sold out over the weekend, but today seemed quieter. Even so I had some really great conversations with interesting guests today. I was super productive art-wise today. Yesterady, an employee of the visitor center's Western National Parks Bookstore suggested and image idea to me. After some thought, I decided that I could best produce that idea as a digitally created image (instead of with wet paints). In preparation, I got a posed photo of a ranger along with an image of the caverns entrance and a stock image of an eagle. There are lots of turkey vultures soaring around here, but I haven't seen an eagle. Even so, my idea-suggestor was very specific about wanting an eagle. Using Adobe Photoshop Elements, here I what I digitally created.  I started 5 other pieces today -- but they are not done yet. They need to dry overnight and then I will easily complete them tomorrow. So just a teaser -- tune in tomorrow to check the...