Acrylic on Gessoed Watercolor Paper  51″ x 39″   Global warming’s tumultuous effects in the future concern me.  Every day I do  art work related to this worry in the hopes that the paintings will help raise awareness to find solutions.   If you want to read more about what I am doing, please check out this link to a recent article from Luxe online magazine: =&0=& Read more

Here is a photo of my new work in progress:  an acrylic painting being done on two sheets of paper. This  art work in my “=&0=&” series that I started in January, 2014, depicts coke burning in an old blasting furnace.    According to Wikipedia, historical sources dating as far back as to the 4th century that describes the production of coke in ancient China.  The most important raw material  fed into the blast furnace for making iron and steel is coke and the most commonly used form comes from =&1=&.  I am an artist–not an engineer or scientist–but I wish there were a process commonly used that would not have to employ=&2=& as a primary heating source.  From the  How Stuff Works  web site (http://science.howstuffworks.com) I found out that “the more advanced way (these days) to smelt iron is still in a blast furnace..which is charged with iron ore, charcoal or coke and limestone (CaCO3).  No matter how much we wished that the burning of coal could be eliminated entirely–thus removing the most major source of carbon dioxide in the air–many industries are still dependent on it. Read more

=&0=& =&1=& =&2=& Although this painting is not quite finished, I wanted to post it in order to continue showing works I am currently doing that focus on coal.  I am also finding that during my painting breaks  I have been using the time to read about the history of coal; study about the problems currently associated with the burning and transporting of coal; and learn about the  ways people are starting to slowly shift the world’s dependence on coal and other fossil fuels as energy sources by developing a variety of alternatives.   Here is a tidbit of coal history from www.ecology.com.  I am sure you all know this, but I found it interesting.   “Although the fossil fuel coal had been used as a fuel since 1,000 B.C., it wasn’t until the arrival of the Industrial Revolution from the mid-1700s through the 1800s that coal began to replace biomass (essentially wood) as the primary source of energy.  The Industrial Revolution also marks the beginning of an era when the world human population started to explode. Indelibly tied together, both energy consumption and population growth have experienced exponential growth with few exceptions since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. As the population increased, energy demands increased with greater intensity”. =&2=& Read more

Can you see the touches of blue among the pieces of burning coal in this painting?  Most of the reference photos I am studying for my coal series are replete with the colors of gray, black and orange.  However, I found one picture that had blue traces and found out in Wikipedia ... 

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“Women’s Rights” by Mary Lou Dauray, Watercolor, 22″ x 15″   =&0=&  

Menlo College in Atherton, California, put out a call for artists to enter an exhibition honoring the college and coinciding with its founding 85 years ago.   Artists had to be juried in and once chosen the artist was given a randomly assigned year between 1927, the year of Menlo’s founding,  and ... 

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Greetings and Happy New Year from the forest of Hobbit Land in New Zealand!  I definitely felt the magic and enchantment there in early December, 2013, while sitting in the chair from Beorn’s house!

More magic ensued when, immediately following the New Zealand trip, I traveled to West Palm Beach, Florida and taught a Master Class on environmental art to ninth graders at the A.W. Dreyfoos School of the Arts.  While in the class, I experienced the “magic” of the student’s focused interest, their originality, creativity and enthusiasm.  Please visit the link to read some of their own comments about the class.  http://dreyfoosartreview.blogspot.com/p/mary-lou-dauray.html  

Lastly, we, as artists, integrate magic into our art.  Below ... 

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Here I am working on a new triptych painting about icebergs while, at the same time, thinking about news reports (John Vidal–The Guardian–March 25, 2013) linking the massive snowstorms and bitter spring to the dramatic loss of sea ice.

 

My “Iceberg Wasteland” oil painting (see ... 

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