Art Gallery Opening

My good friend Elizabeth invited me to an exhibit opening in Brea last night.  Of course I jumped at the chance for a night out, and for hanging out with her.  She's a busy mom of three who has lots of responsibilities.  

Here we are chatting on the way to the exhibit.

She picked me up and off we went to the gallery her friend works at to see the opening of a juried Watercolor exhibit.  

 We had some good conversation and catching up on the way there.  I got to be the navigator.

It was so nice walking in to this lovely gallery.  There were artists aplenty, a lot of the exhibiting artists were in attendance.  We even spoke with a few about their work.  Elizabeth introduced me to everyone as her 'artist friend'.  That was nice.

Here we are checking out the display in the entrance.  They offer workshops, there is a giftshop and of course have regular exhibits.  

We walked around  and  looked at wonderful watercolor paintings.  I am always impressed by the technique and skill required to paint with watercolors.  Here is a great quote by Georgia O'Keefe above some photo realistic paintings of a couple of water scenes.  The quote reads " I found I could say things with color and shapes that I couldn't say any other way- things I had no words for".  One of my favorite art quotes.

This is a closeup of the boats watercolor so you can appreciate the quality of it.  It was amazing.  

This painting reminded me of one of my girls.

 Every now and then we'd stop and discuss the art and chat with the artist.  Choosing our favorites and discussing what we liked and didn't like about certain techniques.  It's interesting the different things one's eye picks up- how it varies from person to person.  In one piece of some beautiful Chinese dancers we saw my eye was immediately drawn to the dancer in white with red flowers.  However hers were drawn to a dancer in beige with blue swirls.  She hadn't even noticed the dancer that drew my eye.

This was one of Elizabeth's favorites

After the exhibit she treated me to a tasty dinner at a local restaurant which shall remain nameless. 

We ate, we drank, chatted and caught up.  It has been a while since I've seen her.   Once again I was reminded how much I love art.  How I love paint and paper.  And I wanted to run home and paint something.