Three Crosses: A story told in Art

Luke 23:32-43 gives us the account of the crucifiction of Christ between two thieves. I was inspired to create three crosses illustrating this.  One of the robbers was drawn toward Christ, the other rejected him.  The cross on the left illustrates the bitter robber, visually leaning away, almost repelled by Jesus.  The center cross represents Christ, and the cross to the right is for the forgiven sinner.  I added bright golden yellow bits of light on his cross forshadowing his entrance into paradise after his life here was finished.

Set of 3 Crosses
$50.00

³² Two other men, both criminals, were also led out with him to be executed. ³³When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him there, along with the criminals—one on his right, the other on his left. ³⁴ Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” And they divided up his clothes by casting lots.

 ³⁵ The people stood watching, and the rulers even sneered at him. They said, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is God’s Messiah, the Chosen One.”

 ³⁶ The soldiers also came up and mocked him. They offered him wine vinegar ³⁷ and said, “If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself.”

 ³⁸ There was a written notice above him, which read: THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS.

The Bitter Robber
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic Collage on Canvas
8" x 8"

³⁹ One of the criminals who hung there hurled insults at him: “Aren’t you the Messiah? Save yourself and us!”

Messiah

by Cheryl Harris White

Acrylic Collage on Canvas

8" x 8"

⁴⁰ But the other criminal rebuked him. “Don’t you fear God,” he said, “since you are under the same sentence? ⁴¹ We are punished justly, for we are getting what our deeds deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong.”

 ⁴² Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.”

 ⁴³ Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.”

The Forgiven Sinner

by Cheryl Harris White

Acrylic Collage on Canvas

8" x 8"

My Mondrian Experiment

I called this post my "Mondrian experiment" because he was an artist so well known for his linear minimalist squares and lines paintings... but actually before he painted those famous red, blue and yellow squares and rectangles, he did paint many, many other kinds of paintings.  I was lucky enough to see his work on exhibit in Fort Worth and I found the progression of his pieces over time extremely interesting.

I enjoy trying different styles of art as well, but I'm not so sure what I accomplished this time could really be considered a progression... anyway, this is my experiment with creating abstracts with just shapes and color and texture.  I did these two together and I'm keeping them as a set.  They were so much fun.  I think the most difficult part about doing these type of paintings would be trying it on a larger scale.  I just might take up the challenge someday. 

Buildings
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic Collage
10" x 10"
Set of 2 paintings $50.00

City
by Cheryl Harris Whte
Acrylic Collage
10" x 10"
Set of 2 paintings $50.00

1000 Gifts 81-100

An Artist's List of 1000 gifts continued...

Friday, May 13th, 2011

81. Lunch with son, one on one

82. Extra rest

83. Late night chats with daughter
84. Pink roses blooming like crazy by the front door 

85. Mother's day family lunch

86. Fresh flowers in a vase 

87. Blueberries 

88. Just in time finances provided unexpected 

89. Caleb's commercial

90. Courtney's voice 

91. Duke's faithful steadfastness

92. Dad's new found purpose 

93. WWII veterans legacy  

94. Singing in the car 

95. Hearts of loyal friends 

96. Understanding and forgiveness

97. Shade 

98. Wind on my face
99. Sunshine filtering through trees splashing on the lawn

100. Smell of the air after the rain

Bloom Like a Rose

Long-Suffering

by Cheryl Harris White

Acrylic Collage 

on Canvas

8" x 10"

Bloom Like a Rose

by Cheryl Harris White

Acrylic Collage 

on Canvas

5" x 7"
SOLD

Here are two more crosses I just completed.  I call the left one, Long -Suffering because it was one I started and then didn't finish until much later after a lot of time and struggling and "do overs".  Some pieces are just like that. When I look at it, I'm just glad it is finished.


The one on the right is called Bloom Like A Rose. I did the whole thing in about 30 minutes and it just seemed to almost come together by itself.  It almost felt alive and I just had to watch it grow. When I look at this one, I feel happy.  


If I had to choose one painting to be like, I'd choose to bloom like a rose.

Art from my Mother

I've always enjoyed exercising my creativity for as long as I can remember, and I believe a lot of my desire to create art stems from my own mother's encouragement.  She sewed clothes, curtains and doll clothes for us, lead us in crafts and also painted with watercolors.  These date back to sometime in the late 1940's through the early 1960's, but I'm not exactly sure.  I lost my mom when I was just 24 years old, so Mother's Day is always a little bitter sweet for me. ...I am remembering her on this day and thought I would share some of her watercolor paintings with you.  

Mountain Camp Site
by Harriet Thompson Harris
Watercolor15" x 20"

Ocean Village
by Harriet Thompson Harris
Watercolor
14" x 11"

Spring Bouquet
by Harriet Thompson Harris
Watercolor
10" x 15"

Shore Day
by Harriet Thompson Harris
Watercolor
15" x 20"

1000 Gifts 61-80

An Artists List of 1000 Gifts Continued....

Friday, May 6th, 2011

61. My ART on display at PREMIERE GALLERY!!!
62.  The colors Red and Blue framing love made crosses
63.  Hearts on their art
64.  Jill Briscoe's coming to us
65.  Giving and Receiving
66.  The practice of being present with people and God
67.  One on one conversations
68.  Till We Meet Again Hugs
69.  Laughter
70.  Tears
71.  Prayers shared
72.  More Laughter
73.  Discovering a spiritual discipline
74.  My daughter making a cross in my class
75.  Watching a person grow
76.  The house to myself after the hardest day at work
77.  Tuesday night family night dinner
78.  Wednesday morning's answered prayer
79.  Knee therapy
80.  A quiet corner , coffee and and a cookie

Being friends with ME

This one is a companion painting with last Monday's painting (April 25th). Same subject, same color palate, just a little bit different.  I guess everyone needs a good friend they have a lot in common with...even paintings.  I think they look great together.

I've thought a lot about my friendships lately. I cherish the friends I have made throughout my life, but I don't really think I make friends very quickly.  When I meet a new person I usually like them or dislike them right away, but it takes me a LONG time to figure out if we will be really good friends or not....some quicker than others, but it has always taken me time.  I actually like the time it takes me to grow a friendship with a person.  Developing relationships slowly feels like a worthwhile long term investment creating value over time.  I think that is why I like painting trees so much.  They are slow growing, but strong and dependable and the roots go deep. That is the kind of friend I like to be to people.       

For both of these, I used a palate knife and lots of thick paint.

Rain Path Birch
by Cheryl White
Acrylic on Canvas
11" x 16"

Collaborative Art Project from CBC Women's Weekend Workshop

I coordinated this project as a workshop this weekend and it will be on display at the CBC art show this summer.   One of the women in the workshop brought up how interesting it was that they all had the same materials to create their part of the project with, but no two turned out exactly the same.   This is a perfect  illustration of Corinthians 12:12-14. .. unity and diversity in the Body of Christ.   For the art show we will display them with the ones from the July classes as one unified piece of art.

 ¹² Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. ¹³ For we were all baptized by Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. ¹⁴ Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many.

Collaborative Art Project
CBC Women's Weekend Workshop
Acrylic Collage on Canvas
Coordinated by Cheryl Harris White
Contributors...

Dawn Paradise

Vickie Peters

Melissa Williams

Cheryl White

Courtney White

Kathy Hjelm

Teresa Graham

Amy Culak

Kim Cross

Melanie Bromfield

1000 Gifts 41-60

An Artists List of 1000 Gifts continued...

41. An entire day with nothing on my calendar
42. Easter morning Sunrise Service at CBC
43. Rain
44. Art enthusiasts putting wind in my sails
45. Frames for my crosses feel like giving them a home
46. A daughter's friend
47. A son's heart
48. Husband 's steadfast faith
49. and a frap date
50. and his home roasted coffee beans!
51. April
52. the color green
53. frequent phone chats with Dad far away
54. Visits with friends close
55. Conversations I leave feeling glad I've had
56. Caleb's hair cut day
57. An art workshop helper
58.  A job offer extended that I didn't accept
59. Art show invitation that I did accept
60. And a pretty good day at work

Orignal Works Art Show May 6th and 7th

Time	Friday, May 6 at 10:30am - May 7 at 5:00pm
Location	Premier Gallery 1681 Justin Road ste 200 Flower Mound, Texas
Created By	Cheryl Harris White
More Info	Premier Gallery Art Shows May 6-7 Local Artists - Originals Only Come see the beautiful Artworks of the Local Venue Richard Cimino Cheryl White Linda Bourgault Whitney Hack Joyce Tremethick Mary Ellen Wehrli and many more! www.premiergalleries.com

Rainy Monday

8 Birch
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on Canvas
11"x 14"

It's been raining today.  I love the rain.  It makes everything green look fresh when it's over and washed clean. This painting was inspired by the freshness in the woods after the rain.  

1000 Gifts 21-40

Continuing An Artist's List of 1000 Gifts...

Friday 4/22/11

21. Paw Paw and Caleb playing catch

22. Five cousins round a table

23. Family meals at Grandparent's house

24. Viper baseball

25. Reunions 

26. Swinging 

27. Morning Coffee

28. Time to paint

29. The perfect nap

30. Encouraging words
31. Heart to Heart with teen daughter
32. Love of son
33. Chat with Friend
34. Courtney's song
35. Two restful days
36. A friend's burden's shared
37. Trusting hearts
38. Tears tender
39. Car ride conversation 
40. Resolve 

Ohio Fall

  I grew up in Elyria, Ohio until about the 4th grade.  Every season there was absolutely beautiful to me.  But if I were ever to plan a visit back there, I would probably choose to go in the fall. The colors were amazing. There was a huge maple tree by our house that would just catch a fire with color every fall.  I've never seen anything like it since moving to Texas.  I found this photo of fall colored trees and was inspired to do my own painting of illustrating my memory of fall in Ohio.  I did it on two canvases which hang side by side.  Here's a photo...

and Here are my paintings...

Ohio Fall I
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on Canvas
11" x 14"

Ohio Fall II
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on Canvas
11" x 14"

An Artist's List of One Thousand Gifts

One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp is a wonderful book, I highly recommend. It's about loss and thankfulness and it is absolutely beautiful.  It has challenged me to create my own list of 1000 gifts


I'm just getting started with my list, but I plan on dedicating at least one blog entry per week to my gift list.  The whole list will be on the 1000 Gifts page.  

Friday 4/15/11

1. Paint On My Walls
2. My Creator
3. His Creation
4. Colors dancing on my canvas
5. The PIT that taught me
6. The love that bought me
7. The hand that lead me into light
8. Sunlight piercing stained glass window
9. Eyes that listen
10. Colors that speak 
11. "Made In His Image" flowing through me
12. Dripping love off the brush
13. Parable Paint
14. Finished Pictures
15. Stories in Paint
16. Following Friends
17. Freckled Faces
18. Smiling Braces
19. Small Hands
20. Big Hearts

Listening to the COLORS

"I Am Enough"
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on Canvas
48" x 36"

I was preparing this canvas for a large forest painting.  You can see where I was going to put the sky and the darkest colors below which would be the forest floor.  I got this far and left it to dry before adding the trees.... I kept putting off adding the trees to this one and kept just looking at it for a few days.  Somehow, I just couldn't bring myself to paint more on it.  It felt like the colors were crying out saying, "I am enough... I am enough."  I wrestled with adding more to the painting for a another day and  then I decided to listen.  I left it this way and  hung it up in my living room.   I'm so glad I listened to the colors.... I think they were right... They really are enough.

Trees on Blue and Red

Trees on Red and Blue
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on Canvas
4 x 6

On this one I decided to try Red and Blue for the the background on this tree painting. 


I LOVE IT!!!! 


It really looks cute in a frame and is one of my favorite little paintings. 


Whenever I paint anything from nature... trees, flowers, water... I get so much satisfaction out of just creating a picture of something God made.... and then I think, how much satisfaction did God have when he created a real tree, or a real flower?  He created each thing and then spoke, "It is good" .  How perfect His creation is.  I am so thankful for each and every piece of it.  

Creating and Naming

     In this one, I set up where I would have darks at the bottom right corner to anchor the painting and lights above.


    In the 2nd photo I know I am creating a forest with lots of color, but I don't have a name in mind yet.  I just concentrated on adding in more color... especially the streaming lines of buttery yellows going diagonally from right to left and top to bottom to represent sunlight filtering down through the tree tops.  You can also see how I filled in the bottom white spaces with darker warm tones and the upper half with cools.



    This 3rd photo shows how I anchored the trees into the ground of the painting...using a palate knife and lots of white paint.  I left it like this on my easel for about a week.  I kept walking by it thinking it needed more...something...but more of what?  
    
    Another day or so an then I did this (below). Five more trees and lots of branches pointing up, and more leaves on the ground. It felt done and I was satisfied. I called this painting "Color Trees".  This process of creating and naming is what makes painting fulfilling to me.  

Color Trees
by Cheryl Harris White
24" x 18"
Acrylic on Canvas

Six Birch Trees

Birch Trees

by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on Canvas

18" x 18"

This is a different painting from yesterday, same style. The smaller picture above  is phase one.  I put the leaves where I thought trees might look good basically. You can kind of see where the leaves of the foremost tree were going on the left side there. ...Then on the large photo, you see the finished painting.  I used a palate knife loaded with thick white paint to add the trees.  I let some color show on the white bark of the birch trees just for fun. I also liked grounding the trees this time, showing where they sprout from the ground.  I loved the result. I'm definitely going to do more like this!

Round Lake Woods in Progress

    

Phase 1 of Round Lake Woods

Round Lake, Minnesota is a place I've been visiting all my life.  My mother camped there as a child, and took us back often when we were growing up.  When my mom's cancer became terminal, that is where she wanted to spend the rest of her days, and that is exactly what my parents did.   My folks bought property on the lake and we went there often as adults to visit and I started bringing my own kids there.  My mom is now buried at the Round Lake Cemetery and the home they had there has been sold, but Round Lake is still there.

Round Lake Woods
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on canvas
18" x 16"

The lake is spring fed and almost perfectly round and has a sandy bottom.  The water is so cold and pure and all around the lake are small cottages and lake houses surrounded by tall pines and birch trees.   I'm going to be posting some art this week celebrating  the memories I have of that place.

This is really one painting.  I did phase one first and just painted the leaves and sky above and woodsy floor below.  The 2nd photo is  the finished painting and it shows the trees I added with a palate knife.  This is my first attempt so I've hung this one in my guest bathroom to be revisited later.  More to come.

Poppies for Millie

Poppies for Millie
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic on Canvas
24" x 18"

Here's some more lovely poppies to start of April.  I loved putting some of the blue and red from the sky and poppies into the grass.  I used a lot of thick paint for the sky and grass and the same color scheme as the Rowen Trees from earlier.

This painting is for Millie.  She's an amazing woman who has dedicated her life to serving God and inspiring others to do the same.  I met her the summer between my Junior and Senior year of college when I was on a summer mission project with Campus Crusade for Christ.   It is amazing to me to even try to fathom the seeds she has planted in the lives of young college students over the years.  She had a huge impact on me and others as well and  I  am so thankful to have had her in my life.   

Nine Crosses

Ta Daaaa!!!  Here is a nice arrangement of the crosses from the last two weeks.  I LOVE IT!  Isn't color amazing?   It is such  a gift to have and be able to play with.    I didn't even really plan this, but as I was working on this I was moving them around a bit and when I was done, I realized I had created this pattern without even trying.  I noticed the cool colors are on the corners and the warms are forming a cross shape with my favorite one in the middle!  Which is your favorite?


I'll be back Monday with more paintings and thoughts... Have a great weekend!  Cheryl

It is Finished

 This shows a progression of one  piece from the beginning to the end.


A question  often put to artists is , "How do you know when a painting is done?"  For me, I know it is finished when I am satisfied with it.  


When I got the idea to post several pictures of a cross in progress, I thought of the words Jesus spoke on the cross.  "It is finished."  and it hit me.  When Jesus spoke that it was like saying that God is satisfied with the work Jesus had done here on earth.  He had come to do what He was meant to do, and that was to overcome sin and death.  The sacrifice for our sins was complete and the work of redemption was done.     

It Is Finished
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic Collage
4" x 3"

Upcoming Workshop

Mini Green on Orange
by Cheryl Harris White
Acrylic Collage
4" x 5"

These are  mini size crosses I am experimenting with. This is a possible project for an art workshop I will be coordinating coming up in April.  These are small, just 4" x 5" but made with the same technique as last week's larger crosses and look really cute just tucked in on a book shelf. 


The workshop I am planning is part of the women's weekend coming up at CBC called "Spiritual Arts" CBC Girlfriends Getaway and it is scheduled for April 29th and 30th, 2011.  Registration info is on the Women's Ministry tab on the CBC website.  I hope to see some of you there.