Susan Smolensky
Painting in Oil
"Paintings have a life of their own that derives from the painter's soul." Vincent Van Gogh
Wednesday, October 15, 2025
Sunday, December 22, 2024
Monday, December 2, 2024
Sunday, April 12, 2020
A Time of Renewal
I wish everyone good health and safety in this time of new beginnings and renewal. My husband and I are doing well as we social distance. I hope to have some new work to show soon and have had a wonderful time checking out your blog sites and viewing all the inspiring artwork there.
Take very good care of yourselves!
Thursday, January 16, 2020
Washington DC National Gallery of Art.
The Smithsonian National Gallery of Art - what a divine place! I will start with the post impressionists and impressionists as they are always my favorites.
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I adore Degas and seeing The Mounted Horseman was near to heart stopping for me. His drawing skills are so superb - each horse and rider exquisitely rendered. |
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Woman Viewed from Behind / Degas. I would have taken this little gem home with me if I could have! |
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Toulouse Lautrec (another favorite) / Marcelle Lender Dancing the Bolero /1896 |
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Toulouse Lautrec / Woman with Dog / 1891 |
I took dozens and dozens of photos and I wish I could show them all but I do encourage you to go and spend a day at this wonderful museum.
I will leave you with a photo of a painting I did many years ago of Toulouse Lautrec in his studio with his dog , his model and his completed Moulin Rouge painting!
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Artist and his Muse / 24 x 36 / oil on canvas |
Friday, January 10, 2020
2020 Begins, a Bobcat and Part 3 of Washington DC
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Fundamental Limit to Precision / oil on linen / 18 x 24 |
Hot off the easel - first painting of 2020. And a big surprise this morning as I was having coffee in my kitchen - a beautiful, bobcat walked right across the backyard! I was not fast enough to get to my camera for a photo but did remember this lynx (cousin of a bobcat and very similar in appearance) painting I did a while ago.
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Canadian Lynx / oil on masonite / 14 x 18 |
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Mount Vernon |
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Breathtaking view from the porch over the Potomac River |
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Bedroom where Lafayette stayed when visiting Washington. |
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George Washington's study with his chest from the Revolutionary War and his chair with an overhead fan powered by foot pedals. |
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The working section of the farm - the laundry, ice house and stables. |
Monday, December 30, 2019
The Nation's Capital - Part 2
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Neil Armstrong's actual spacesuit from the Apollo 11 moon landing! It gave me goose bumps to see it and realize the immense goals that human beings are capable of achieving. |
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The world's first successful airplane - the Wright Flyer - 1903. |
Sunday, December 29, 2019
Christmas Trip to the Nations Capital!
My husband and I just returned from a whirlwind Christmas trip to Washington DC. It must have been windy in Reno while we were gone as we returned to find a huge mound of tumbleweeds up against our front door. Our first order of business was to clean them up and restore the yard to order!
Eager to get back to the easel, I did two quick portrait studies for warm up.
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Rosy Cheeks / oil on linen / 12x16 |
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Practice /old corrugated cardboard / 12x8 |
Our trip to Washington was exciting, fun and jam packed!
This is a photo taken at dusk from our hotel room overlooking Constitution Avenue.
The building with the tall clock tower is the old US Post Office now refurbished into the Trump International Hotel.
On our first day, we spent the morning touring the Pentagon. It was a unique experience - very high security with no photography allowed. In the afternoon we toured the Capital building, the Rotunda and Hall of Statues.
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Inside the Rotunda showing some of the iconic historical murals painted by artist John Trumbull, a Veteran and personal aide to General Washington during the Revolutionary War. |
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180 feet up, the dome of the Rotunda features The Apotheses of Washington painted by Constantino Brumidi in 1865 showing Washington flanked by figures representing Liberty, Victory and Freedom . Amazingly the figures are up to 15 feet tall in order to be seen from the floor. |
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A closer view showing Washington with the lavender robe across his lap |
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An imposing figure of Andrew Jackson |
In my next post, I will show you the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum and inside the John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.
Tuesday, December 17, 2019
Merry Christmas a little early!
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A Quandary of Possibilities 18 x 24 oil on linen |
MERRY CHRISTMAS
and the warmest of wishes for a
NEW YEAR
filled with wonder, joy, peace and good health!
As this year comes to a close I find myself filled with a deep sense of gratitude for the life I am living and all the truly wonderful people that I have come to know and love. Thank you to everyone who has stopped by this blog and given me the gift of commenting on my work. You have deeply enriched my life with your insightful thoughts and generous words. You, and viewing your work, continue to inspire and amaze me and have helped me to stay the course on this not always easy artful journey. With a grateful heart I thank you.
I will be traveling for the next couple of weeks and this will be my last blog entry until I return after Christmas. I will show you a practice piece that I painted on heavy brown paper this week - perhaps in preparation for a future work I may attempt on canvas.
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A Man and His Cats / oil on paper / 18.5 x 29 inches |
Saturday, December 7, 2019
New Paintings and a Trip to Hoover Dam
Some newer work
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Distinct Levels of Energy / oil on linen panel / 12 x 24 |
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Irina / oil on linen / 18 x 14 |
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Snow Run / oil on canvas 18 x 14 |
A few weeks ago, my husband and I took a short trip to Las Vegas and had a chance to visit the Hoover Dam - what a wonder of engineering and what a unique experience . We took the tour and went down, down, down to the bottom interior level to view the actual turbine generators (17 of them) and walk through some of the
original tunnels blasted out of rock with dynamite. It is an almost
impossible accomplishment of engineering (built in 1930’s using slide rulers to
do the math) and finished 2 years ahead of schedule. The dam has been in continuous operation and supplies hydroelectric generated power to a
large part of the southwestern US, is pollution free and runs self-sufficiently
using no tax money. I have suddenly become a big fan of hydroelectric power!
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Looking toward Nevada and Lake Mead - the intake of the water is through these two large towers. |
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The outflow into the Colorado River. |
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The turbine generators. |
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