Cedar Lee May 11th, 2010

I just returned home from a week in sunny Arizona to visit some close friends I hadn’t seen in a long time.

It was a week of adventure and decadence.  I enjoyed lots of sunshine, hiking, and good food!  I lounged poolside.  We ate at a fantastic Ethiopian restaurant, a fantastic Greek restaurant, a fantastic vegan restaurant, and at my friend’s house we enjoyed ripe avocados, fresh-squeezed citrus juice, and dark chocolate!

I of course brought my 7-month-old with me, and carried him on my back for much of the time.

My friends and I had a wonderful visit to Sedona and hiked one of the Boynton Canyon trails to a “vortex,” or a spot where spiritual energy is believed to converge in a spiral, where this beautiful rock formation sits.

I climbed partway up the actual rock formation too!  In the picture below, the tiny figure waving at the bottom is me and the one at the top is my much more badass rock-climbing friend.

Enjoying the view:

Near this spot were dozens of little cairns (stacks of balanced rocks) left by people all over the place.  It is customary to build your own cairn, say any prayer you like, and leave it there.  I thought it was cool, and beautiful to see the physical representations of the prayers of many people who had passed through.

The mountains in Sedona are incredible!

I also really enjoyed browsing the Southwest-themed artwork in the Sedona galleries.

I’m glad to be back to work in the studio.  I’m currently working on a new Lotus triptych.  The Lotus series is popular as ever and I’m struggling to keep up–the good news is I’m still not tired of painting them!  Here you can see I’m just laying down the base colors in the first layer of oil paint.  Much more detail will be added as I add more layers.

A collector sent me this photo of one of my Lotus triptychs hanging in their home.  It looks beautiful with the colors of their bedroom!

I just received word that 3 of my Sunflower Heart paintings have sold from my NC gallery, and I have more of those in progress.  A fresh 40″ x 30″ canvas is sitting on my easel as well, with the design already sketched in for another tree painting.  So there’s a lot of action right now in my studio!  More news to come…

• Adventures , Collectors , Works in Progress
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Cedar Lee April 21st, 2009

Here is a sneak peek at the sunflower paintings I’ve been working on. I’ll take clear photos of each one when all 9 of the new series are finished.

I think these are going to be the best sunflowers so far in my series–I love how they are turning out!  This time I am purposely making the background colors similar in all the paintings so that they will display very nicely together.

Some are all done except for small finishing touches.

This one is a work in progress–only the background has been painted so far.

The cherry tree in our back yard is blooming! I love watching it every spring.

When all the flowers are fully bloomed, like big puffy pom-poms, the petals will start snowing down on the ground and make a thick pink carpet all over the yard.

For those of you who are interested, I’ve finally finished sorting through our photos from our recent vacation.   Click here to see them.  (Warning: lots of scrolling!)

• Adventures , Garden , Works in Progress
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Cedar Lee March 19th, 2009

I´m typing from an Internet cafe in beautiful Puerto Limon, Costa Rica!  I´m short on time but just wanted to give a quick update.

We´re on day 7 of our cruise and we´re having a blast! The food is excellent on the ship and we´ve been taking advantage of the round-the-clock buffets. Every night there´s an excellent show–my favorites so far have been the broadway-style singers and dancers.

We are getting sun but are being sure to use sunscreen so have not been burned at all ! Today we went on zip lines through a jungle canopy, flying between platforms way up in the tops of the trees. Costa Rica is by far my favorite place so far on this trip! I have always wanted to come here and now I must plan to come back and spend some time here.

Labadee, Haiti was beautiful, but we only got to visit a little strip of beach that is owned by the cruise line and it was therefore SUPER touristy, which is not really my thing. Cartagena, Colombia felt unsafe and was stressful as we were constantly assaulted by pushy street vendors following us and shoving their cheap wares in our faces.

We saw the Panama Canal yesterday. Our ship arrived before dawn and we got up at 5 am to go out on deck. We entered the first lock of the canal as the sun was rising–it was so beautiful. We got a lot of pictures of that!

Next is Grand Cayman, where we will snorkel and kayak. Then we´ll go back to Miami, where we´ll spend one more day with my aunt and uncle there before heading home.

I found out when I checked my email 2 days ago that 9 of my paintings have sold from one of my galleries in my absence! (My entire series of sunflower paintings are now gone, so first order of business when I get back is to make more of those to send to the gallery.)

My husband bought me a beautiful necklace and earrings set to wear on the formal nights. I´m really enjoying spending so much time with him. It is a special treat for us because we are both normally so busy with work.

We are attempting to document everything with photos, but sometimes we forget because my camera is huge and often gets left in our room. At any rate, I´ll show you the good ones when we get home.

I miss my dogs terribly, and especially at mealtimes when I dream of slipping them tastes of grilled fish and french fries.

Well, I wish you all were here! See you next week!!

• Adventures
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Cedar Lee March 10th, 2009

Well, the day has finally arrived.  I’m about to embark on my big adventure and I plan to return sun-tanned and relaxed!

Depending on my Internet status, I may attempt to log on and update while we’re at sea.  But if not, I’ll see you all when I get back on 3/25.

Stay tuned for new artwork to be revealed in early April.  Any inquiries in the meantime–please email me and know that I will get back to you ASAP!

I leave you with this picture of me and my brothers, which illustrates my current state of mind. 

Enjoy the beginnings of springtime!  I’ll catch you on the flip side!

• Adventures
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Cedar Lee February 25th, 2009

I have gotten a bad case of the travel bug–this happens to me, on average, every 3 years.  So for the past several weeks I’ve been researching travel destinations and searching for good deals.  My need to get away from this cold climate and into some hot sunshine and blue water has become nearly overwhelming this past month.

So, two weeks from now, my husband and I will get on a plane to Miami, Florida.  We’ll spend a day with family there before we embark on Royal Caribbean’s ship “Jewel of the Seas” for a 10-day cruise to the Panama Canal and back!

These are the places we’ll visit:

Miami, Florida (where I lived as a child, by the way):

Labadee, Haiti:

Cartagena, Colombia:

The Panama Canal:

Puerto Limon, Costa Rica:

George Town, Grand Cayman:

I can hardly believe this is really going to happen!

This was an impulsive decision and I feel like we’ve gone a little bit crazy.  But the truth is, we are so frugal in our day-to-day lives (no house phone, no cable TV, we drive old cars and do all our home repairs ourselves, we rarely eat at restaurants, we rarely buy new things) that it makes it feel more justified, from a financial standpoint.  Plus, I found great deals!

I had an airline travel voucher to use towards plane tickets, which I got a few months ago on my way home from a friend’s wedding, in exchange for giving up my seat on a plane and taking a later flight.  That, combined with an insanely cheap price I found for tickets to Miami, makes our airfare nearly free.  And the price we are paying for the cruise is pretty good!  Seriously, if you ever plan to go on a cruise, go for one of those “last-minute” deals–they cut the prices significantly to fill up the ship as the sailing date nears.

All I have to do is keep selling paintings when we get back, and it’ll be paid off in no time.

I have 2 weeks to get some work done, make arrangements with a house-sitter, dog-sitter, etc., get packed and mentally prepared.  I’m so excited!

I have not been as productive as I’d like lately, and I think this vacation will do me good.  I predict that I’ll return re-energized and full of inspiration!  I plan to take lots of pictures.

• Adventures
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Cedar Lee August 8th, 2007

I’ve been reading a little about lotus flowers lately, and was inspired to paint them. The lotus is such an amazing plant. Lotus flowers symbolize many things, including divine beauty, purity, love (romantic & non), faithfulness, and expansion of the soul. You see them a lot in Buddhist and Hindu art. The lotus is a metaphor for the light of the human soul transcending the darkness that surrounds it. It grows out of a mucky, scummy, vile swamp but is pure, clean and vibrant, perfectly symmetrical, delicate and fragrant. Every part of the lotus plant is edible. The seeds can lie dormant for hundreds of years and then be successfully germinated! Read more about lotuses…

Here are three new paintings for you. They are meant to be displayed together, but look great by themselves too. I love how they turned out and I plan to do more like them. They are all 20″ x 20″, Oil on Gallery-Wrapped Canvas.

Lotus I

Lotus II

Lotus III

Great news! I am now officially represented by three galleries. On Monday, I signed with the Canton Gallery in Baltimore. They have nine of my paintings on hand and I’ve promised them three more by September.

I met the owner, Carolyn, and the resident framing expert, Mercedes. I really clicked with them…both of these ladies are friendly, knowledgeable, passionate about art, and generally fun to be around. I’m really happy to have started such a great new business relationship, and the best part is they’re local, so delivering new artwork to them is not a big deal.

If you live in the Baltimore area, check them out! It’s a small, cozy gallery near the inner harbor.

Canton Gallery
2935 ODonnell Street
Baltimore, MD 21224
(410) 342-6176

In other news, I went whitewater rafting for the first time this weekend. We went 80 miles down the New River Gorge in West Virginia. The area is known as one of the top five spots in the world for whitewater rafting. These were quite possibly the most beautiful mountains I’ve ever seen in my life–the river cut through rock faces climbing up 50 feet in the air, and above that, mountains upon mountains straight up. The air was full of blue mist. I can’t even come close to describing it.

The trip took 9 hours, including a lunch break. Most of the rapids were class 3 but one of them was class 5 because the rocks were so close together. Certain parts were so scary I could hear my own heart pounding in my ears. At one point I climbed to the top of and jumped off a 21-foot cliff into the water. At certain points they let us jump off the raft and swim with the rapids. Then there were more peaceful parts where the water was calmly drifting and we just floated along.

The water was warm and the weather was perfect. All in all, it was incredible and I really want to go again. I might go again in the fall or the spring, when the water is higher and the rapids are all class 5.

There was one part where they had a photographer waiting on a rock to snap our picture. Here’s the picture. (I’m second from the front on the left side.)

• Adventures , Art Gallery Representation , New Works: Flowers
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Cedar Lee July 5th, 2007

This is just a quick little entry today. I feel like I’ve barely had time to think this week…I have to look at my calendar to tell you what day it is and what I’m supposed to be doing. Last Saturday we went out of town for a family event and got home very late Saturday night.

Then I hung my show on Sunday morning and had my opening on Sunday night. It was fun! (I didn’t get any good pictures because by the time I remembered to take pictures, the place was closing and we were getting kicked out. I’m sorry!) The show looks good though, I met some new people, and everything went pretty smoothly. The paintings will be up all month, so if you’ll be in the DC area anytime in July you can still go see them.

Monday, my mother-in-law came to visit, and my husband, dog and I all went camping with her in Pennsylvania. I hadn’t been camping in a long time, and I really enjoyed it. Sleeping on the ground was remarkably comfortable, and poking at a campfire, listening to birds, and breathing clean air was all so peaceful. Now I want to go camping again, but for longer next time.

So we got home from camping last night and watched fireworks. We just watched some little local ones from our front yard, and didn’t have a very good view of them, but still. Today, my friend from out of town was visiting and I spent most of the day catching up with her.

All of this time I have had this blank canvas sitting on my easel staring at me, and simply haven’t had time to paint anything on it.

I’ve got a meeting with a new gallery lined up a few weeks from now, to show them some artwork in person. The problem is I don’t have any artwork. My house is usually crammed full of artwork, paintings filling all available wall space and even stacked on the floor in my back room. At the moment though, pretty much all of my inventory is either displayed in a show, or up for sale in art galleries–which is a good thing. But now I have to do a lot of painting in a short amount of time, and it needs to get done whether I have out-of-town visitors or not, no matter what else is going on in my life, whether I feel inspired to paint or not.

Sooo….that’s where I am right now. I have this long to-do list of tasks that are small but still annoying, like “get eyeglasses repaired” and “take dog to vet for vaccine” and “buy whatever thing we’re out of.” I need to take care of all these annoying but necessary errands and chores that have been accumulating on top of everything else, and I’m feeling generally tired and frazzled, so maybe I should meditate or something.

But after I meditate, I’m gonna paint.

• Adventures , Art Gallery Representation , Life
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Cedar Lee May 20th, 2007

This painting is called “Ischian Vineyard.” It is based on a photo I took of a beautiful vineyard on the island of Ischia off the coast of Italy (pronounced “iss-key-ah” for those of you who don’t know Italian phonetics.) My husband and I went to Italy 2 years ago for our second honeymoon and to visit my aunt and uncle, who live in Verbania, a village near the Italy/Switzerland border, about an hour from Milan.

We got to spend a few days on this incredible island towards the end of our trip–the island comes straight up out of the sea, and it’s very dramatic, like mountains piled on top of mountains. They have these narrow roads that wind up and up and up like corkscrews. (There was one scary moment I remember when the bus we were on seemed like it was about to topple off the face of a cliff as it passed another bus going the other way with about a millimeter between them.) It’s a very precipitous place. We got a workout just walking from our hotel up the street for a couple minutes.

Anyway, this painting has nothing to do with all that (it’s just a pretty vineyard we passed by) but to give you some background info on the location, we were walking up one of those steep hills when we passed by it.

Ischian Vineyard
18″ x 24″

• Adventures , New Works: Nature & Misc.
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Cedar Lee April 2nd, 2007

This painting is based on a photo I took on my honeymoon in 2003. (We got married in 1999, but couldn’t afford a honeymoon until 4 years later. Working hard and saving the money for this trip made us appreciate it all that more.) We went on a Caribbean cruise…left from Baltimore and made stops in Charleston, St. Martin, St. Thomas, San Juan and Nassau.

This gorgeous view was what we saw from the deck of our ship as we cast off from St. Thomas with a warm breeze in our hair. The water was sparkling, the seagulls were soaring, and both words and this painting fail to convey how incredible it was. A great memory.

Sundown on the Shore of Saint Thomas

Acrylic on Canvas 24″ x 36″

• Adventures , New Works: Nature & Misc.
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