One of my favorite paintings

I was looking through paintings that I have created over the years and this is one of my favorite pieces. I decided on a big blue sky overhead, with white fluffy clouds floating across it, on a summers day on an old farmstead, in the quite of the heartland. Another farm and trees are far across the fields. The kind of place where one can live a quiet, peaceful life, away from the business of the world. I hope that you will enjoy viewing this piece.

Just finished a commissioned painting for a collector

I have been neglected posting to my blog here! I just finished up a commissioned painting for a collector and carefully packed it up for shipping. Packing a large painting can take a surprising amount of time, as I often need to work on a custom box size, and then reinforce it with rigid insulation. The type of rigid insulation used in houses, that is very sturdy and yet lightweight for shipping. It comes in big 4 x 8 sheets that I cut down to fit inside the box. It works very well.

Baby Donkey Near the Old Farm

This was a painting that I ended up thinking about off and on for a couple of years and then working on for over a year, until it was complete. Some painting ideas come quickly to me, while other ones I let peculate in my mind, until finally deciding on a scene for them. I work from photographs for the animals that I paint, while the rest of the scene is from my imagination and memories. Anyways, I find baby donkeys to be one of the sweetest looking farm animals. This one was born on a midwestern farm, living with its mother and several goats there. This painting is done in acrylic paint on a stretched canvas.

Bales of Straw Under a Summer Sky

After passing a newly baled field on a back road along the way home one day, I was inspired to paint this county landscape. There are not many old fence posts and fence lines left around here, so I like to include them from my memories, as was the rest of this country landscape scene.

Oxen Under a Summer Sky Painting

One of my latest paintings, this piece is of an unyoked oxen, that I came across on a historical farm in the American Heartland. I painted him into a quiet pastoral scene from my imagination. I most often work from memories of scenes, from places that I have been on the backroads of the Heartland country. This piece is painted in acrylic paint on stretched canvas.

Old Stone House

I painted this old stone house and farm scene from my imagination and memories of old houses that I have passed over the years on the quiet back roads in the Heartland.  

Little Study Painting of an Old Country Schoolhouse

I just finished up this little painting today. Painted on archival quality gesso board and measuring just 7 x 5” inches. I like working on different sizes of paintings, and experimenting with brush techniques for the scale and surface each piece.

My dad went to a rural one room schoolhouse as a child, as did many kids that grew up in the country. I painted this piece from my imagination and thoughts of a quiet, overcast day in summer.

New Poppy Farm Landscape Painting

Overcast Sky Over the Poppy Farm

This painting is currently featured in the Ugallery Newsletter. I really enjoy adding the tiny, distant farmsteads that dot the

countryside in my pastoral landscapes. I painted this Red poppy scene into one of those quiet, overcast evenings, surrounded by the peaceful

silence of the country, This scene is from my imagination.

Newly Published Book Cover, Farm Landscape Art by Sharon France

I was happy to be contacted by the author Brooks Lamb, to license one of my farm landscape paintings as the cover art on his new book “Love for the Land”. This book has just been published by Yale University Press and tells “the stories of small-scale farmers who, despite intense adversity, continue caring for their land.”

Farm House Painting at Sunset

Nearing Sunset on the Old Farm

This painting of a quiet country farmstead is from my imagination, and was inspired from a lovely evening sky that I came upon, while on the drive home earlier this year.

Rows of Early Summer

This painting reminds me of the early days of summer, with the young rows of corn quickly growing in the fields. I love the quiet

and peace found in the county and depicting it in my simple landscapes of the American Heartland.

Little Cabin in the Country

Besides working on my larger paintings, I like to paint simple little studies of ideas also. Here is a recent small 5 x 7” that I recently painted and sold.

A little cabin in a quiet, rural scene.

House Portrait of Rural Indiana Home

House Portrait of Rural Indiana Home

One of my newest paintings here. This was a commissioned house portrait for a client of their rural Indiana home. They wanted their home set back into a quiet country scene, instead of a more traditional closer up view of a home. They were great to work with and I had fun painting their lovely new home in an old fashioned style. They opted for a field of abstracted peony’s instead of the red poppy fields that I paint into some of my rural scenes. Painted in acrylic on stretched canvas.

Under the Big Dipper Painting XIX

This painting is part of by Big Dipper series that I have been working on. The previous paintings have already been sold into private collections. For each painting in this series I have depicted a unique farmhouse scene under the big open sky above.

Road Past the Old Farm

An old farmstead set along a quiet country back road, is the scene from my imagination that I decided on for this painting. The more remote an old farmstead is located along a little traveled road, are the ones that I have always found the most intriguing!

Red Poppy Farm Under a Star Filled Night Sky

This painting has been sold to a collector in Australia. I had a really busy past year and have not posted new paintings as I had planned too. Hope to do better this coming year. I worked a lot on larger commissioned pieces for some great clients in 2020. I currently have several new paintings in progress.

Painting in American Embassies Art Collection

One of my original country landscape paintings is now part of the Art in the Embassies collection for the next couple of years. This piece is now hung in the American Embassy in Sir Lanka. https://art.state.gov/personnel/sharon_france/