Donut Trio 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

Donuts , as opposed to doughnuts, are rather artificial things, produced by big-time manufacturers. Doughnuts are created in a kitchen, probably by a lady with a great deal of pride in her work. Lord love a home-made doughnut.

Flow Blue Tureen 6 x 8 1/2 Oil on wood panel

Since I began Daily Painting this has been my personal favorite When I first saw it in a flea market display I knew what I was going to do with it. I wanted to paint the soft edges of the Flow Blue design but retain the hard edges of the form of the piece. It didn't really pop for me until I put in a red background. Contact me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Sunflower app 6 l/4 x 5 1/4 Oil on wood panel

Sunflowers are not generally my cup of tea, but some friends had planted several in their garden and wanted a painting. I have painted acres and acres of sunflowers (and roses) when I was doing faux and trompe l'oeil murals on the walls of residences. I don't do that anymore. Contact me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Christmas Candy 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

When I look at this Christmas candy I get a little flashback of what we called "that Christmas feeling", which I think is unavailable to adults except in a small, quicky dose. There is too much joyful innocence required for realistic grown people to get hold of for any length of time. A satisfying substitute is providing it for your children to have. Adults should never underestimate the power of a quicky anyway.

Plum Pyramid 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

Apparently plums are no longer purple, not the ones available at my market. They are "black" or "red". What is even more confusing for me is that the "black" plums are sort of a deep maroon hue, and the "Red" ones are rather orange. But although it may seem trivial it does make an artist wonder. I am the guy that gets upset when I see a Blue Tick hound. They ain't Blue. You can contact me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Gone To Seed (2) 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

Originally the title of this piece was going to be "The Over-The -Hill Gang" because my tendency is to be clever. The viewer is going to put their own personal message into it, so why would you want to tell them what that message is supposed to be? Contact me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Cobalt Blue and Lemon Yellow 6 x 6 Oil on mounted canvas

The blue in this painting has not photographed too well, it comes out rather black because it is vivid cobalt. I tried photographing it several times but it always comes out navy blue.
You never get too old to learn, but after a while you discover that you have gotten so old you have to relearn. You are not allowed to leap before you look. You do not begin a painting until you have worked out the composition. This can cause you to make a statement that doesn't say anything. I painted the saucer on an easel thinking it would be enough but it was not. It was dull. Lemon yellow and Cobalt blue are always exciting and that is what pulled this painting out of the dull trap. This will probably end up with someone who collects Blue Calico. I don't know anyone collects lemons, but there probably are some. You can E-mail me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Leaning Pear 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

This pear is like that tower in Italy. It is leaning and that's all there there is to it. I tried to upright it, it would not. I finally compromised and let it have its way. I understand that in Pisa they have the same problem with their tower. All their engineers, all the king's men, and all the theories of smart guys and learned professors cannot put it straight. Pears must be just like people. They will have their way until they fall.

Dandelion Centerpiece 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

A rare experience, a dandelion centerpiece for the breakfast table, freshly picked from the yard by busy grandchildren and placed in a lovely crystal pop bottle . They have come to believe that Grandpa's favorite flower is the dandelion because they have seen him paint several. The problem with a dandelion centerpiece is that it does not last till noon.E-mail me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Sugar Creamer 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

This is really a white-on-white painting. I found it in a flea market just like this, in a white-on-white display. It made me think of my grandmother who I'm sure did not own such a thing but she would have, she was my favorite person in the whole world, and I was hers. I am proud of the loose brush strokes and you can click the image to get a really close-up view them. Contact me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Lake Tenkiller - Oklahoma 5 x 7 Oil on wood panel

I don't know the origin of the name Tenkiller, but I think it may be an Indian name. It is on the eastern border of the state, butting up against Arkansas, and I guess is as actually a part of the Ozarks. It is quite beautiful and I have spent a lot of time there and this painting is a small one I made from a sketch. You can click the image for an interesting look at my brushstrokes, and you can E-mail me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Wet Fall Leaves 5x5 Oil on wood panel

I saw this during my early morning walk There was a peculiar weather condition - one of those hurricanes was playing out here in middle Tennessee - very cloudy, rainy, and windy. Some trees were already giving up a few leaves. These were water soaked and flattened out against the walkway. My doctor thinks I take this daily walk because he told me it was good for my health. I really walk every morning to find something to paint. I think this is a lot more exciting that painting from a sketch I made in the past. Click the image to see my brush strokes and E-mail me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Two Nectarines 5 x 5 oil on wood panel

Nectarines are my current favorite subject for painting. They are red and round - always a good thing - and very available in the produce market right now. There is a glitch of some sort on the background that is not on the painting - it looks like lint but it is not lint. Contact me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Book Stack 5 x 7 1/2 oil on wood panel

I painted two book stacks but when they were finished, they were not really finished - they were sort of dull, boring paintings. I put a pair of reading glasses on top of one stack, and the painting came to life. That was successful, so I added an open book on the other stack, and I like it even better - I especially like the horizontal-ness of it. Suffice to say, I am a bookworm, always have been, always will be.

Ozark Lake View Oil and wood panel

Most of my life has been spent living near a lake, and the past two decades it was in the Missouri Ozarks . It was as beautiful as a Swiss Mountain Village but it was not a Swiss Village up close. I added the steeple just to give the town some class, which it did not have. A church without a steeple is just a building, at least to me. E-mail me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Clover 5 x 5 Oil on wood panel

I am supposed to walk briskly every day for an hour. I usually walk with my head down so that I see a lot of stuff that I don't usually see. Like clover and dandylions and fallen leaves. These make small statements and nice 5 x 5 paintings. I didn't have too much hope for the clover blossoms looking good but I am rather pleased with them. There is a four-leaf clover in there.

Book Stack with a Pair of Glasses 5 1/2 x 8 Oil on wood panel

Here's how it is. If I were marooned on an island - alone - I would want these three books with me. They are my bedside table books . They don't put me to sleep, they relax me and take me out of this world - and whatever I am facing the next day - and I go to sleep. Not that it is very important, but they are "Gnomes", "Robinson Crusoe" and a Vermeer book with color reproductions of all his paintings.

Wrapped Peppermint Candy 5 x 5 oil on wood panel

Peppermint candy hasn't been around all that long. Dickens wrote of it, and that seems as far back as the history goes. That would have been in the l800's. At that time they were called lozenges and several persons have been named as the inventor of hard candy on a stick which are called lollypops. The main manufacturer used his favorite horses name, Lolly Pop, and I guess that is it. Crane Chocolates bought the rights to it because his chocolate candy was melting and he was losing money was and wanted a candy that wouldn't melt. He sold the rights to another man (for $2900) who went on to make millions. The first Lifesavers were peppermint.

Finial 9 x 5 oil and acrylic on wood panel

A finial is merely a decorative terminal on the end of a rod or spire , as in a lightening rod or a curtain rod. They have become an art form unto themselves. People collect them -I do- because you can find them almost anywhere such as flea markets and antique shops.

Radish Bowl app 5 x 7 oil on wood panel

Radishes are probably popular because of their color, however they are incredibly good for you, practically no calories and lots of cancer fighting properties. I first came to respect them in reading a book about the 100 healthiest foods. I didn't really read the book except for the list of the vegetables and why they were important. Radishes were really high on the list. But I have painted them a number of times because I love their color.

Ozark Backwoods Landscape app 6x6 oil on wood panel

When I look at this work I can't help but feel it is my Pointilist endeavor. My only Pointilist endeavor. It was early fall, had been raining, and the sun dappled through the wet leaves. This was back in the boondocks, the driveway led up to ramshackle farmhouse, long deserted, and even the road in front was a dirt road. On the spot I did a preliminary sketch with pastels and came home. When I had the picture completed in with oils (with an acrylic underpainting), I saw that it turned out to be in a Pointilist style. I like it fine, but have no plans to do another.

Banana Bunch 5 1/2 x 7 oil on wood panel

As a Lactose-intolerant individual, I was glad to hear recently that bananas are a more perfect adult food than milk. When I lived in Tulsa, I bought a banana tree ( five bucks per lineal foot). I got a six footer. In Oklahoma you can raise one outside but you have to take it inside before frost. That tree grew and leafed out at a good rate of speed - it rained a lot that year - and by September was magnificent and it made my patio wonderful. When I got back from a weekend trip somebody had slashed it with a machete. A friend of mine had six trees. He put them in his greenhouse and actually got some bananas.

Apple 6x6 oil on canvas panel

This apple was painted on a canvas panel, not on my usual wood panel and I felt that the brush took to the texture of the canvas as well as wood. As a matter fact I think it looks every bit as smooth as the wood panels. I'll do more. E-mail me at artistjohnwlong@live.com

Eggs 5x5 Oil on wood panel

After a couple of months doing these small paintings I had the feeling that my work was changing in ways I had not thought of changing. When you have to produce one a day you really have to get with it. I have two or three hours to get it, basically, finished. The result is softer edges but with an agonizing wait for it to cure out, since I have also gone back to oils. Anyway this was done during my earlier painting-a-day days (January). My only reason for going in to all this is because when I got it out to post I noticed the change in my painting.E-mail me at artistjohnwlong@live.com