Painting In Heritage Village in Dallas

The Renner School House
8 x 10
oil on canvas
$175

 This morning I went to Heritage Village in Dallas to paint with my friends T.K., Kent, Olivette, and  Jeff. We got there early and had the park to ourselves as well as super temperatures, and plenty of shade.

The Renner School House

 I chose to paint the old Renner school building. This is a two story building, The younger children were taught on the lower floor and the older students were taught on the second floor. I liked the combination of the old building with the Dallas skyline in the background.

Kent painting

 Kent and Jeff both painted the same building. T.K. painted a vegetable garden . Olivette painted two very nice paintings. One was of a house with a buckboard wagon. The other was an old church.

The Millermore Plantation

 There are many really interesting buildings in the park. One of the neatest ones is the Millermore plantation home. It was built in 1855 by the Miller family and their slaves. (The chairs are set up in front of it for a wedding later in the evening.)

The Parlor at Millermore

  This house was fully furnished. It also had its barn, outhouse and other out buildings as well as a herb garden.

Log Cabin

 There were also several log cabins on the property. This one had two rooms downstairs and a loft upstairs. It had only one window.

Interior of the log cabin.

 Inside the cabin it was fairly dark with very little in the way of furniture.

One of the docents with the two donkeys Nip and Tuck

 One of the docents washed the parks two donkeys Nip and Tuck so they could pull the carriage for the wedding party in the evening. The donkeys were half  brothers, around 14 years old, and very gentle.


Dog Trot Cabin

Another neat building was the dog trot cabin. It had a lot of out buildings, a vegetable garden, and also a blacksmith's shop.

Sheep behind the dog trot cabin.
 

There were sheep behind the dog trot as well as chickens. Several of the houses had hen houses behind them with chickens. In fact the morning was filled with the crowing of roosters and the braying of the donkeys.

The old train station.

 Besides the houses and their outbuildings there is an old town with brick streets.

The old bank.

 The bank is one of the  nicest looking buildings in the park. There are several other old buildings on the main street of town including a general store. There was also a  livery stable, church , and the Worth Hotel.

The Worth Hotel

After we painted we went to  eat lunch  at the Angry Dog in Deep Ellum and then went to the Dallas Farmers' Market. I bought two cacti for  my garden there

Prairie Fest Morning

Prairie Fest Morning
8 x 10
oil on canvas
SOLD

This is the last of my Prairie fest psaintings. Yesterday we had a great outing at my friend Maryann's property in Granbury. We had artists from all over the area including Fort Worth, Weatherford, Aledo, Grand Prairie, and five who drove all the way over from Dallas. The weather was great and a lot of really nice paintings were produced.

Kifaru, black rhino



Kifaru
15 x 5 x 7.5
bronze on granite
edition of 30

 I went to Dallas today to pick this sculpture up from the Beretta Gallery, for my show with Sheri Jones at the Southwestern Adventist University, only to find that it had just sold. That was a very great surprise. I will have another cast but not in time for the show at the University.
The title of this sculpture, Kifaru, is Swahili for black rhino. It was considered one of the Big 5, along with the elephant, cape buffalo, lion, and leopard. Compared to the white rhinoceros they are more aggressive. They are no longer hunted but still fall victim to poachers. I took a lot of photos and sketches of rhinos at different zoos for this sculpture. Our zoo here in Fort Worth has a great collection of rhinos having, black, white, and Indian rhinoceroses. Sadly all rhinos are endangered but at our zoo and at Fossil Rim Wildlife Park, near Glen Rose, they have been successful in breeding and raising rhinos. I think they are really a great animal to depict. What I like about them is that they look so prehistoric.