Christmas Gift Art

Mikaela decided that she wanted to do art for her Uncles and Aunt for Christmas so she started working on the pieces a few months back.  Now that they have been gifted with the art we can share it with everyone! :)

For Uncle Paul and Aunt Rebecca Mikaela did her second ever landscape!  She did a watercolor of Pikes Peak and Garden of the Gods using this picture as inspiration:

And this was her completed piece for them:

And here is Mikaela with them after they opened it.  :)

For her Uncle Brad, Mikaela decided to draw with colored pencil on black paper all of his favorite sport team logos.  She thought if this all on her own!  Here it is in process:

And here it is completed:

Here are Uncle Brad and Mikaela after he opened this surprise gift!



The Uncles and Aunt were THRILLED with their art and all the rest of the family was SO impressed with it!  I realized something about Paul and Rebecca's art.  They own both of the landscapes Mikaela has done!  They have sole ownership of those pieces but I think she needs to do more landscapes! 

School Project

Mikaela's first Art Class School Project for the year was this painting.  Even with sub-standard paints and paper she was able to produce a great painting!  Unfortunately the Art Teacher doesn't know good art when he sees it and didn't give her a grade deserving of this.  I can guarantee you this was the BEST painting out of all the ones he graded.  Whatev!  :) 

Early Childhood Art

In May 2002 Mikaela whipped out this snail on her little doodle board.  Not bad!! 

She was 4 years old.

Mikaela: Young Artist!

October 2002 Mikaela dressed up as an Artist for her Preschool Halloween party!

Flamingo

Flamingo

And here's yet another piece she did in 2007 that we neglected to share! This flamingo is done in watercolor on 300 lb paper.  She gave it to her Great-Mama who passed away December 2007.  Isn't it beautiful?!?  I think she did a lot more that if we locate them and can photograph them we will share. 

Monarch Butterfly



Monarch Butterfly

 We keep finding pictures of paintings Mikaela has done for people that we haven't shown off yet!  She did this Monarch Butterfly (oil on canvas) for a dear friend.  If memory serves correct she did this 2007-2008.  It's a couple of years old. 

Frogs!

Mikaela LOVES Frogs! And since she has yet to do any art for herself, she decided to do a frog for herself in Watercolor. She spent a lot of time on it and we think the time she took was worth every minute, every second! It's stunning, for those of you who can't see it in person trust us! Currently she is doing another frog and this time her medium of choice is oil. When she finishes that one we'll post pics of course!
On a slightly different note, Mikaela got a great opportunity this summer to go to Chicago's Art Institute and take a week long art camp. Thanks to some of our "framily" (that would be friends who are really more like family!) she hung out in Chicago for a week, got to experience this art camp and see some of the sights! Now we are wondering if there are any opportunities for her in other cities like New York City where we have family! While visiting NYC in July we of course spent some time at The Met. It's a must destination every time we hit the Big Apple! We love perusing the amazing artwork from centuries past up to today and all the different styles, genres, and mediums! This trip we spent a lot of our time exploring the Egyptian wing as you can see from a photo of Mikaela in front of some mummies. It was a great day at The Met, as usual!

Beagle Painting

Mikaela worked on a beagle painting for her fifth grade teacher who has a beagle of her own. It is oil on canvas, one of her favorite mediums to use. Unfortunately we didn't get a picture of Mikaela, Mrs. Jenkins, and the painting. Again...look at those eyes!! She has a way of making the eyes speak to people. Currently she is working on something for herself - the first time she has ever done a painting for herself! She is working on a frog in watercolor. After she is finished with the frog she has a lot more ideas to start on!

More gifts!

Remember the bear Mikaela did a few years back? (Crazy that is has been so long!) In 2007 Mikaela gifted her Uncle Bradley with the bear to help decorate his NYC apartment. Her work is going up all over NYC!! :)


Mikaela spent the last part of 2008 working on this drum set for a close family friend. He requested it as he is a drummer. Turns out this was very challenging for her because it was a lot of clean lines and she is used to fluidity and texture! But even though she was challenged it turned out amazing! We believe there was a tear in his eye when we gave it to him. She did this in colored pencil on white paper.

Lots and lots of texture!

Scottish Kitten


White Tiger

Mikaela started working on the Scottish Kitten early on in 2007, not realizing all the texture which to an artist equals lots and lots of smaller brush strokes. It's very tedious work. So she wouldn't burn out from doing all that texture Miss Laurie had her alternate the kitten and other works throughout 2007. She finally finished it earlier in 2008!

One of the other works she completed was the white tiger for Lanny's office at work. We have framed it and it is quite stunning! Check out those eyes...its those eyes that she has such a gift for! What is kind of funny about the white tiger is it had just as much texture to it as the kitten but Mikaela didn't tire of doing the texture in colored pencil like she did with oil. The tiger, as you may be able to tell, is done in colored pencil on black paper.

Lucky Dog (or as we say it Dawg)

Lucky Dog is Mikaela's "cousin", the beloved dog of her Uncle Paul & Aunt Rebecca. We are all rather taken with Lucky, and none more so than his "parents". So for Christmas 2007 Mikaela painted a portrait of Lucky for Paul and Rebecca. She painted him using oil on canvas medium. The resemblence was uncanny!

Lucky wasn't all that impressed but we sure were!

For the love of her sister

Mikaela and her sister are great friends and love each other so much, more often than not! Well her sister is obsessed - and we really mean that literally - with kittens, cats, felines. Mikaela drew this picture for her as a birthday present. Isn't it sweet? We will frame it because it is done on the black construction paper with colored pencils. We are really amazed by it and know that Eliana will love it so much!

To Sell or Not to Sell?

Mikaela worked on this bear throughout the Fall of 2006 and completed it just last week. She did it on canvas with oils.
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Something happened that we didn't see coming when we sent out the pictures for the first time. We had requests for purchasing! We had questions of commissioning Mikaela to do pieces! WOW. We are blown away by this, to us it never seemed a possibility. So now the question is - to sell or not? Can we part with Mikaela's works of art? A friend suggested she do reproductions of the originals. That's an idea. And what about allowing her to be commissioned? She's 8 1/2, the waiting time could be awhile!! All this to say that if you have asked about purchasing or commissioning hold on! We are going to talk to her art teacher and get her advice on how to go about this. We don't want to be greedy and hang on to all of her art, no home is big enough to hold what she will most likely do throughout her lifetime. We do want to share her gift, for it IS a gift. So we are researching & we'll be in touch! But until then we hope you enjoy what Mikaela has done and continues to do.

The Gift of an Artist

Happy Mother's Day! For Mother's Day 2006 Mikaela painted both my mom and I's favorite flowers for our gifts. My very favorite flower is a Gerber Daisy and my mom's is a Daffodil. These are priceless gifts that are treasured. They join the ongoing art gallery!

Amazing, simply amazing.

As Mikaela progressed past cartoon characters, flowers, and landscapes she began to work on animals. The dimensions are different, the shadings more complex. She did this monkey first. This was also done in her first year of art lessons (2005)!

This Panda was next. It's hard to see if you aren't right in front of it but if you look closely you can see the texture of the hair. If you ever get a chance to see this one in person you will be amazed at the eyes. Mikaela did a great job of capturing this animal's gentleness.

Mikaela did this cardinal on simple black construction paper with colored pencils. We were astounded when we saw it for the first time! Again, her art teacher had to assure us that this was all done at Mikaela's hand. She had details in this bird that made it look like you could reach out and touch it and actually feel the feathers. In person you would see the texture of the feathers perfectly as well as the gleam in the eye of the bird. It is so life-like in person that we had to frame it.

She immediately followed it up with...

This fox. Again, it is so life-like that you can almost feel his coat beneath your hand. Both this fox and the cardinal were done in the spring/summer 2006. The fox we had framed as well, it was also done on black construction paper with colored pencils. In person the texture that she put on him is incredible as well as the coloring she put into his coat.

Amazing, simply amazing.

Wouldn't you agree?

Mikaela's First Sale!

Mikaela's Uncle Paul and Aunt Rebecca came to visit in April (2006) and while they were here they made an offer on her first ever landscape. She accepted the offer of $10.00 and we documented the sale of her first art piece with this picture. Now she has art hanging in a New York City apartment and even the possibility of a commissioned piece from them down the road! Of course she didn't know what "commissioned" meant and they had to explain it to her! She is having such fun! (The landscape was painted in the early part of 2005)

Huh? Is there an explanation?!?

Okay, we admit it. We are a little confused by this painting. It's oil and it's on canvas and we want to know why? Perhaps Miss Laurie wanted Mikaela to do something whimsical or child-like, we just aren't sure. But put this up against any of the other paintings and you have to wonder why.

Order doesn't matter when it's this good!

These aren't in chronological order because Mikaela was painting so quickly and so well that all we could do was get the year in which she completed something!

(Both the yellow calla lily and the red tulip were done in 2005)

One day as Lanny was picking up Mikaela from her art class he asked her teacher, Miss Laurie, how she was doing. Needless to say, Laurie was very pleased and said what amazed her was how quickly Mikaela picked up the techniques and how well she retained them!

Miss Laurie had Mikaela try out all of the mediums - pencils, oils, watercolors. Mikaela has art on paper, watercolor paper, canvas, and mason board. The art gallery we have is amazing for a little 8 1/2 year old girl who has only been in art classes for 2 years!

(Pears and apples both done Summer 2006)



Lanny and I had a hard time at first believing that Mikaela had done all of these techniques by herself. She was shading and bringing texture to animals and a depth to the eyes that we just couldn't believe she had done! But she and her teacher assured us that it was all her as Miss Laurie taught her the technique and then she applied it. Amazing. Although I must admit that we still ask at times because it seems so incredible. She doesn't draw like this at home, only at her art classes. At home she does stuff that you would expect an average 8 year old to do, not a gifted one.

And let the parade of art begin...

Mikaela started off with cartoon characters. First, in her art pad she did several little pencil drawings of various characters and then her teacher moved her onto canvas and she did these two back to back.

The beginning...but not of the end

Mikaela started drawing when she was barely old enough to hold a crayon. Her first drawing that was recognizable was an elephant, we have that picture saved in a protective sleeve. She was 6 1/2 years old and we handed her a large package at Christmas wrapped in shiny gold paper. It was a large pad of drawing paper, "professional" pencils, a T-ruler, and a note. Art lessons! Yes, the Christmas gift of 2004 that keeps on giving.

She started her art lessons in January 2005 and proceeded quickly through the beginner stages of shading techniques. The picture you see in this post is the first one in color that really shows off her knowledge of shading. Her Grandma Ashley, a quilter, loved it so much we allowed it to be framed and it hangs in her living room. Little did we know that this picture was just the first of many...

We hope you enjoy!