Kathleen Elsey| Fauve Paintings | Favorite Paintings

This page reveals 25 years of my life. A couple of my all time favorite fauve paintings are “The Table” and “Matanzas Creek Winery, Lavender, Sonoma.” Kathleen Elsey, California Fauve

My fauve paintings from the past 25 years are on this page, many of them California plein air paintings. I am an impressionist, with fauvist tendencies. I love color and paint bright and happy scenes. A plein air painter friend once said to me as we were painting on a super foggy California beach, "Kathleen, you see sunshine everywhere."  She was seeing and painting the foggy beach and I was painting sunshine everywhere on that same foggy beach.

Old "Wood Truck" was made one hot summer morning and afternoon at Island View Nursery, just south of my home in Santa Barbara. Nestled in the foothills of the Carpinteria Valley, the nursery is a feast for the eyes. This old truck with a pile of wood was hidden amongst the avocado trees on the side of the nursery.

I am inspired by the famous French Fauve painters of the early 20th century, Maurice Vlaminck, Henri Matisse and nine fellow New Fauves  from around the world. I also find the Society of Six, from San Francisco during the early 20th century, especially Seldon Gile, a constant source of learning and inspiration. There is a beautifully written and well-printed book called “The Society of Six, California Colorists” by Nancy Boas full of the history of these six painters from the San Francisco area and it is chock full of their colorist paintings. I find it a constant source of inspiration and often discover solutions to my painting problems by looking to see what Seldon Gile would have done in my situation. And looking further back in history, Vincent Van Gogh has helped me with many of my paintngs.

Above is “The Porch, Sunday Morning” the first of my series of porch paintings. It was begun as plein air on location inside the screened in porch and later finished in my studio. “The Writers’ Garden,” above, is a plein air painting from Sonoma, California, on my favorite Sonoma mountain. I lived there and made many of the paintings below on this mountain for four years before moving to Santa Barbara.

The 240+ paintings on this page have become a visual journal of the past twenty five years of my life. Kathleen Elsey, Santa Barbara artist, California Fauve, American Painter

Kathleen Elsey Painting Wins Award “Best Oil or Acrylic Painting 2005”

"Nursery in the Valley" signed by Kathleen Elsey, painted at the International Carmel Plein Air Festival

If you like this painting, you might also like my painting of the Santa Barbara Botanical Garden Nursery. They were painted within two weeks of each other and both paintings won awards on the same weekend. Santa Barbara Nursery won a ribbon in the Scape Spring exhibition on Friday evening while I was in Carmel. I was saying to myself "I think I came to the wrong painting exhibition." Then the next day, awards were announced at Carmel, and they had created an award for me. Since I painted in acrylic, and usually there is a "Best of Oil Award," they created the award "Best of Oil or Acrylic Painting." It was a great weekend for a Fauve plein air painter!

Kathleen Elsey Painting Wins Award Carmel Plein Air 2004

“Truck for Trade" by Kathleen Elsey, signed lower right,
International Carmel Plein Air Festival 18" x 24"

This Kathleen Elsey painting was made on the first day of the Carmel Plein Air Festival. I love painting old messed up scenes. Thank you Dennis and Earl McDougall for inviting me into your beautiful ranch to paint quietly that hot day in 2004. I love painting funky old barns and farms full of stuff. Your ranch full of memories stole my heart and inspired me to paint this award winner for the Carmel 2004 Plein Air International Competition. I was thrilled to receive an Honorable Mention ribbon. Kathleen Elsey

Paintings on this page are sold. Select any thumbnail for details about each painting.