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Ardella Swanberg Paintings

Explore My Portfolio

I painted almost exclusively with watercolor after college. Every now and then I branch out into something different. I have done collages, book altering, bookmaking, dollmaking, and embroidery. I like a new challenge. I always go back to watercolor.

California Landscapes

California Landscapes

311 Regatta

This painting started with randomly painting watercolor on wet paper and then gradually refining the shapes with texture and pattern and finally adding black ink and white gouache.
This painting is 30 x 22".

311 Regatta

This painting started with randomly painting watercolor on wet paper and then gradually refining the shapes with texture and pattern and finally adding black ink and white gouache.
This painting is 30 x 22".

935 River's Dance V

One day the Wednesday Irregulars who are a painting group who met in Cambria, California, visited a ranch that raised Clydesdale horses. You entered the ranch near the gate by the old cemetery. Everyone else went off to paint else where but I stuck around the buildings and when a groom brought a year old horse out of the barn for exercise I was there with my camera. He made good use of the small corral and I took a lot of photos. I took photos of other horses too but he gave the best show. His name was River. It took me three years to figure out how best to paint him. I finally decided to get rid of the back ground and the corral rails and just paint him. Some people went to paint the hills but I was glad I met River.
This watercolor is 22 x 30".

935 River's Dance V

One day the Wednesday Irregulars who are a painting group who met in Cambria, California, visited a ranch that raised Clydesdale horses. You entered the ranch near the gate by the old cemetery. Everyone else went off to paint else where but I stuck around the buildings and when a groom brought a year old horse out of the barn for exercise I was there with my camera. He made good use of the small corral and I took a lot of photos. I took photos of other horses too but he gave the best show. His name was River. It took me three years to figure out how best to paint him. I finally decided to get rid of the back ground and the corral rails and just paint him. Some people went to paint the hills but I was glad I met River.
This watercolor is 22 x 30".

Italy

Italy

586 Granada
I put graffiti on the rock wall. it is a poem by Samuel Butler
The Mores believe Granada Lys,
Directly under Paradise. And that they differ both no more,
Than th' upper rooms do from the floure."
This watercolor is 30 x 22"

586 Granada
I put graffiti on the rock wall. it is a poem by Samuel Butler
The Mores believe Granada Lys,
Directly under Paradise. And that they differ both no more,
Than th' upper rooms do from the floure."
This watercolor is 30 x 22"

503 Tour of Shaw Alam Mosque

Judy Poon specialized in tours for all the foreign women who were in Kuala Lumpur. This was a tour of a mosque outside of KL. We are wearing the smocks the mosque gave us so we wouldn't be immodest. The man in white was a guide for the mosque.
This watercolor is 30 x 22".

503 Tour of Shaw Alam Mosque

Judy Poon specialized in tours for all the foreign women who were in Kuala Lumpur. This was a tour of a mosque outside of KL. We are wearing the smocks the mosque gave us so we wouldn't be immodest. The man in white was a guide for the mosque.
This watercolor is 30 x 22".

255 Sunlit Birches

The light on these birches captured my interest. I entered them in the American Watercolor Society in 1989. I thought I felt two slides in the self addressed envelope they returned to me. But when I found out that there was only one slide and they had accepted it, I hyper ventilated in shock. This watercolor is 22x30" and still lives in Michigan.

255 Sunlit Birches

The light on these birches captured my interest. I entered them in the American Watercolor Society in 1989. I thought I felt two slides in the self addressed envelope they returned to me. But when I found out that there was only one slide and they had accepted it, I hyper ventilated in shock. This watercolor is 22x30" and still lives in Michigan.

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