Here are a few of mine. I really like landscapes, animals (I'm weirdly drawn to birds, but have no desire to have one live with me!), and portraits of women. All are either gifts or thrift finds because my budget doesn't accommodate my loftier tastes ;)

This is my "expensive" one, HA! I'm transported to a different time, every time I look at it. Decorated for Christmas.

The start of my salon wall

Loved this! It reminds me of where my grandparents live. $14 at a local church thrift store.

A couple of canvas prints of Robert Wood seascapes. I'm a sunset person! Also, an amateur painting at the top that makes me smile. Really inexpensive thrift store finds at different times.

This is a photo I took of my niece at a river we always try to spend some time at when we visit my parents. She's going on my dining room wall, where I have a salon thing going on.

Love this almost as much as slice of life. This original is my favorite piece because it makes me smile. We found this at an arts festival held every year in Huntsville, and eventually discovered this piece won a 2nd place ribbon.

These are a few of mine.

We bought this small reclining nude at a local antique mall. We tend to like nudes, and we liked the frame as well. Right now it is in our hall.

Love all the new art posted!

KC, I love the art that you posted. May I ask who the artist is?

oooh, gsciencechick, that is right up my alley... beautiful!

The following did not speak to me, but I have grown quite fond of them. They were inherited from my husbands Aunt and Uncle. A niece of the Aunt told my husband that they [Aunt and Uncle] specified that the paintings go to my husband.

This first painting is oil on canvas in a 15 x 20 frame. The frame looks to not be original. The painting is signed H. Howard 1901. We have no idea who that is. Not a family name.

2 more coming up!

This is quite unusual, I think. It is 15 x 31 and painting on a hard board. It is signed Gilbert. The frame appears old.

Another on a hard board with a really old frame. It's 26 x 32 and has a hidden smudge of a signature consisting of 3 letters (at least I think it is a signature.) Appears to start with a M.

None of the colors in these paintings look as clear, crisp or as colorful in person as they do in these photos. They are more muted. How does that happen?

This post was edited by newhomebuilder on Tue, Oct 8, 13 at 16:16

Wow NHB, what lovely art you have! They are beautiful. Thanks for posting them.

I love these latest posts, as well as so many of the earlier ones.

Alex, what a beautiful photo of your niece. I would love to see that one in black and white, because of all the interesting light plays.

Fall has arrived and some of my hydragena flowers were speaking to me and asking to come inside my house. Mother natures is a fabulous artist.

This post was edited by badgergal on Tue, Oct 8, 13 at 17:34

holly-kay - The artist is Cao Yong.

Ty so much! They are just lovely.

KC, I have fallen in love Cao Yong's art. He has an amazing story. I feel that I just have to own Moonlight in Vernazza. It is such a lovely piece. His art seems so filled with joy and hope that my heart yearns to hang a piece of his art in my home.

Thank you Holly-kay. We are fortunate to have inherited the paintings. Just wish we knew what they were.

badgergal - Love the hydrangeas. I didn't know that they bloom this late. Mine have never bloomed. :( Great foliage, though.

Pesky1, I love your cat art. I am a crazy cat lady. I wonder if you could share the name of the artist.

Found this artist years ago (her name is Irena Jablonski)

Purchased the top for my husband for our anniversary - and purchased the bottom for me for no reason at all. :)

(I wish my walls wouldn't always come out screaming such a bright blue in my photos... they are much deeper than this)

enjoyed looking through this thread - lots of good stuff in here.

This is Stacy London's house with a painting by one of my all time favorite Bay Area artists - I like this eclectic art wall and am hoping to achieve this in our next house:

One of her paintings I am eyeing:

Thinking about this playful Japanese-inspired painting to decorate around in my kids' room :

Newhomebuilder, the hydrangeas I posted above are from a PeeGee Hydrangea plant/tree. It starts blooming in spring with small green flowers, by late summer the flowers are huge and white, in the fall the flowers start turning a pinkish color and then change to brown. The dried brown flowers stay on the plant all winter. I bring some into the house for arrangements but leave the rest on the plant for winter interest. Here is how the plant looks outside right now.
{{!gwi}}
Here's how it looked in early summer.

Here is some other art I have that is made from nature. This guy was hand carved from a wood plank by a local artist.

{{!gwi}}.

I have adored this for over 10 years. I think this thread might finally push me to purchase. Now just need to decide on what size?

This post was edited by zoey75 on Sat, Oct 19, 13 at 11:27

Here is one of things I would grab if the house was on fire. I don't really know much about it. It's an old copy of a famous Van Dyck painting. It has a lovely gold leaf mat and I adore the baby's sweet face.

{{!gwi}}

This post was edited by deee on Sat, Oct 19, 13 at 13:42

zoey75 would you mind sharing the artist of that beautiful picture...I love it!! thank you

Very sweet, Deee. Looks really old. Should you have it appraised? I need to have someone look at mine.

badgergal - The PeeGee Hydrangea is gorgeous! How fun to see it change colors.

A friend let me cut some flowers from her yard for a baby shower that I hosted last Sunday. Mostly roses, but I saved this hydrangea for my dining room. It is in the drying stages, now and should last as décor all winter. It's my favorite hydrangea color.

melgrek - Tony Sweet is the photographer. I never get tired of looking at it, I really must make it a priority and finally purchase it. Enjoy :)

This post was edited by zoey75 on Sun, Oct 20, 13 at 9:58

thank you zoey75!! That picture so caught my eye/attention....I love it...thank you for sharing

This ink sketch speaks to me.. Her eyes show such pain, like she's just been told someone she loves dearly is gravely ill and may not have long to live. She can't quite understand why someone so good, someone who has always thought of others before herself can be so deathly sick. How can her cousin have so little time left when she's still so young. She's on the brink of crying, but doesn't want anyone to know she's in so much pain because there's nothing she can do to help, but pray. And she is praying. Allot.

Hugs to you Just. Praying for your cousin too.

Aw thank you Holly Kay. She needs a whole lot of prayers. Her surgeon thinks he can get her into a study on an experimental treatment that at least will offer her a little hope. She's only 58.

When I came across this thread I thought what a neat idea. I went to my computer where I store art I found interesting and saw this drawing. I called it an ink, but I don't think it is ink. After I started to describe it I realized why I it jumped out at me from all the others I've saved. I don't think I saw it that way when I originally saved it.

Here's something from the artist I was looking for last night. I love trees, always have, so she's the first artist I thought of sharing. Jany Dahmen.

We love Jane Dahmen! We have two of her pieces. One is at our beach house so I don't have a pic, but I'll post a pic later of the one we have hanging over our bed at home.

Here's the Jane Dahmen painting that's over our bed.

I haven't seen that Jane Dahmen Sue. It's even simpler than the work I've seen by her. I think everything I've seen was similar to the one I posted as in all trees often with water back grounds.

Just, I love the tree art work. We are surrounded by trees and I love them too. In my adult life I have always lived in wooded areas. Not always the most convenient to shopping etc but the beauty has always made the inconvenience worthwhile.

Holly-Kay, my hubby and I both love trees. I find them the most beautiful of nature that you can find almost anywhere you live. Even bare they fascinate me.
We live in a country neighborhood that was once a tree farm. Sadly we've lost more than two dozen trees in the back acre, but are working to replant new trees every year. Living here is very fitting for us. Our first daughter's ashes (still born at 24 weeks) are buried with a beautiful Auburn Maple just outside the choir loft of the church we were married in. One of my favorite things to draw anymore are trees.

Oh Just, hugs to you! How comforting to have your little one buried beneath a tree at your church.

The po planted a lot of pine trees in rows as they were considering a tree farm. When DH and I bought the property we would buy seedlings every year. We don't plant anymore as we have so many now. We especially love how beautiful they look bending under a burden of snow. I like to look out at the pines when I sit in the living room the cardinals make the pines look so Christmasy.

This is my favorite piece. The photo below is from the gallery website. Mine is matted in black and framed in a simple, wide worn gold leaf frame. The artist is Richard Merkin. He taught at RISD.

When I bought it, just before DH and I married, his first comment was "can you take it back?" He has since come around.

Ha ha ha! You're hubby sounds just like mine. Not afraid to say what he thinks. You must really love him to have gone ahead with the wedding. ;^)

Oakleyok can you tell me any info about your lithograph of the two rabbits.

Holly-Kay, sorry I thought I replied to you earlier. I think I'm forgetting to do the second click after the preview. I know better.
You are so sweet, I think of our baby daughter as a gift to our family. Though I still have my moments, for the most part I've accepted her as our very own guardian angel.
The trees on our lot were mostly pines too. And you are right, they are absolutely gorgeous heave with snow. A virus swept through the Midwest and took most of the Scotch Pines which is what many of the trees on this land was.

DH and I saw this series, by an artist named Patrick Bastardoz, at a gallery in Paris and fell in love. We bought one painting of the series. I grew up in an industrial city in the Midwest, he grew up in Glasgow, and this reminded us both of the rusting waterfront areas of our respective cities in the late 70s through mid-80s, before each city underwent a revival.

The second piece was a wedding gift from a friend. The artist, Peter Howson, did a disturbing series of ink drawings from his time in Bosnia during the war. I saw this one in a Glasgow gallery and couldn't stop thinking about it.

And on a much lighter note, we saw this installation at a gallery in New Orleans in February, and I'm still trying to convince DH that we need a few balloons, badly, in our living area (they're larger than they appear in this photo, each about 8-12" long):

This post was edited by zeebee on Tue, Oct 22, 13 at 14:18

I checked out Tony Sweet Photography and WOW! I love his stuff, thanks Zoey! I love that you can have matted prints made of any of them. Hoping to buy a new (to me) house in the near future and would love to add one of them to the walls ... hmm ... maybe a housewarming present from me, to me!

Chadoe3 - So glad you are also enjoying his beautiful work :) Years ago I found one of his photographs in a Coldwater Creek catalog and it was love at first sight for me.

I went to another shop today looking for art that spoke to me. Nothing. Again. Yet I am in love with about half of the items posted to this thread! lol Keep them coming please. This thread is one of the few things that is keeping my spirits up about finding art for my walls within the next decade.

:)

My 11 year old daughter painted this in school when she was 10.
It hangs in my kitchen.

I also LOVE this one. But sadly, I cannot find it. I don't know who painted it. It is called "Forgive and Embrace".

Joanie, that's an awesome work of art by your darling daughter.
The painting below it is quite moving. Have you tried loading it to that site that tracks photos? It's called something Eye. I wish I could remember the whole name. Maybe someone else will.

I decided to search and I found it. Linked below.

Here is a link that might be useful: TinEye

This post was edited by justgotabme on Wed, Oct 23, 13 at 13:25

Thank you! I will pass it along to my daughter. I glanced at the link you provided. I hadn't heard of it before. It was a little too much for me to deal with today, too bad you have to register and everything, but maybe I can check it out another day. I would buy this print if I could find it, in a hearbeat!

Registering must be new. I never had to do that before. It's been quite awhile since I used it.

Joanie, I love your DD's painting. That is definitely a keeper.