Here is a raccoon baby, hem, I need to look up what raccoon babies are called. Bet it is "busy"! This is a framed 8x10 tile that has gone to a new home. We had 2 raccoons trying to eat the dogfood on the back porch. The dominant one would not let the smaller one eat. The smaller one turned away from the food and then backed up close to the bowl and snuck a bite while the other was eating.

My friend Francis asked me to paint a tile to go into her friendship table top. All of her other porcelain artist friends will be painting tiles also. She will be getting this rooster from me. I hope her table is not all rose tiles and a rooster!

Sorry I have not posted anything lately.  Life has taken over.  I will get back to painting just as soon as I can.  

This is an 8 x 10 framed tile of a lion.  This goes to all the men I know, my husband, sons, father and grandsons who sleep hard. God Bless You, Every One! 

Probably you smelled buttercups and got pollen on your nose as a child.  It is such a fun memory.  Around Floresville Tx and San Antonio they were mostly yellow but where I live now, I see mostly pink - pink evening primroses.  I have painted them with a sparrow on one side of the vase and a landscape on the other side. The photo came out a little darker on the landscape side, both sides are actually the same ligher color blue.   

Notice how the sailboat looks like it is in rough water.  When we were first married, we had a little sail boat and EVERY TIME we ever took it out there was a storm or too strong winds or something broke or we argued about who was captain - you can see my feeling about sailboats in this painting! Any minute and it will "tump" over. I will be cold, wet and mad! I am going to go paint some fruit, can't get much calmer than that.

It's summertime.  I have finished my last magazine.  The renthouse is just about polished up and I am back in the art mode! Here is a little 5 x 7 tile of the ocean.  I have happy childhood memories of the beach and happy memories from going with my kids almost every summer of their lives and now the grandkids.  I think I need to darken the birds.  I hope they get out of the way of those big waves.

Been producing an art magazine and renovating a rent house - creative but not painting.  Will get back to painting now.

This is my granddaughter Audrey when she was 4.  I took her photo at the beach and painted from it.  When I look at it, I want to paint portraits every day.  Right now I am working on a 20 page art magazine.  It will be my last issue as Editor - maybe I can paint more then.  This portrait was painted on an 8x10 porcelain tile and is framed.

This is a framed painting of Graham at the beach with the sun in his eyes on an 8x10 porcelain tile.  There was seaweed at the beach and none of the grandkids really wanted to go into the water. (Well, I wasn't crazy about how it felt on my legs either.)  But we were all very brave.  No seaweed's gonna keep us from having fun!  

This is a framed portrait of our Lizzy at 2 yrs old on a round tile.  I hope her sweet personality shows.  It is so much fun to paint someone you love.  I could look at her all day long.

This portrait is from a photo I found.  I wanted the scallops on the blouse to work with the edge of the plate. Also I see a lot of portraits that are tan (wait until you see Graham) so  I was trying to make this pink, blue and yellow in the skin tones.

Happy Easter, and here is a duckling and dandilions for you.  I masked out the subjects and airbrushed the blue background.  Nice effect.  This painting is on a 7 inch square plate.

This is the other side of the cup. Now that I look at it, it would have been fun to paint each seahorse's bubbles the color of the seahorse! When painted, the paint just sits on the surface of the porcelain until it is fired or cooked in a kiln.  Depending on the kind of china and the color, the kiln is fired to a range of temperatures.  As the pieces are fired the colors sink into the glaze and become part of the china.  Just a little porcelain painting lesson for you.

Are you thirsty?  Well, I like sea horses and I've never painted sea horses so I thought I would do this cup and saucer. It was fun to paint.  They are speaking in bubble.  Can you translate from bubble to English?  Well, what they are saying is that they are sorry that the saucer broke in the kiln.  It sometimes happens.  Everything goes into the kiln just fine but when you open it, what a disappointment to have something cracked or broken.  So this will just not have a saucer.

Jackrabbits are really fast. As they run, their back legs come in front of their front legs.  And did you know that a baby Jack is called a leveret.  Having painted a number of Jacks in  preparation for the seminar, I got tired of brown so this Jack is running away to hide - embarassed to be seen in purple.  The purple Jack is painted on the lid of a bisque pink box.  This is a hand made box.  The porcelain was tinted pink before the box was formed and it has no glaze on it so it appears very soft instead of shiny like patent leather.  

Soon the Easter Jackrabbit will be leaving eggs in the wildflowers and cactus.  When teaching a seminar, I always try to paint a number of examples and this is one of them that I did for a recent seminar.  This piece is painted on a rectangular vase.  The photo makes it look slanted at the top but it is really not! I haven't painted anything on the back yet.  Maybe those eggs in the wildflowers.  

In painting on this rectangular tray, my goal was to use red, everywhere.  So there is red in the grass, red on the sheep, red in the water, sky, trees, and clouds.  Many of my landscapes are cool and it is important to me to push myself.  Because the tray is not flat, there is a little bit of haziness from the photo.  It is not easy photoing porcelain because there is often a glare.  

Fairy terns are not good mothers.  They lay their eggs anywhere.  Sometimes they lay their eggs on the sand and when the tide comes in the eggs wash away.  I have a photo of a fairy tern egg on top of a water faucet handle.  My mother fairy tern is taking good care of her chick!  This is painted on an 8x10 porcelain tile.

This blue-eyed kitty is painted on a 5x7 tile.  It is for sale at Pepper West Gals Gallery in Lorena Tx.  Go visit but don't get scratched!

This is not a good year from bluebonnets here but we do have a few.  So use your imagination, and visit this make-believe peaceful country scene.  Can you feel the breeze? Do you smell the bluebonnets.  Now if the wild turkeys or deer will amble through,  it will be perfect.

I was comissioned to paint a rooster and sunflowers on the front of a country sink.  To work out the design, I painted this rooster on a large tray surrounded  by sunflowers.  My daughter Michele wanted the tray so these two chicken pieces live in North Carolina.

When my son Grady and his wife Michele married they talked about having a large family.  Michele wanted chickens painted for her kitchen and I gave her a tray with a rooster on it and then this large plate with a hen and many chicks.  But....... now that they have two very active boys, we all wonder how parents of a large brood would survive????  I love them but get tired trying to keep up with them.  I really enjoyed painting this and hope you enjoy it too.  

This painting is from an old print I found in an antique store.  Many of the portraits that I have done have tan skin and I wanted to try very translucent pink skin (like a pearl) with some blues and greens in it.  When I paint, I set up some problem for myself in trying to stretch beyond what I have done before.  I wanted to capture a likeness and a mood in a portrait but also in this one, I wanted to try to show other colors in the skin.  

After this painting was complete, I embellished the outside with raised paste, gold and white enamel. Although you cannot see it in the photo, I also put tiny white enamel dots like tiny beads along the edge of the head covering.  Her name is Pearl.  

My daughter was a member of the ethnic dance club at her college.  I was visiting when they gave a performance at a tea shop.  This little girl had seen them before, and this time came dressed to perform!  She was looking up at my daughter with such longing and admiration.  I just had to paint her. (I did ask her mother's permission.)  So little beauty, I hope you are still enjoying life as much as you did that evening!  

This is a painting I did from an old sepia photo of my father.  He doesn't look like he likes being dressed up or sitting still.  Dad is in his 80's and that is still the case!  It is painted on a 10x14 porcelain tile including a painted mat with gold touches and framed.  I will see if I can take a better photo to include the whole thing.  I am glad to be home and itching to paint.

My imagination carries me away sometime.  This is my sister-in-law Mari.  She was born and raised in Mexico.  When painting this, I thought of those years in history when portraits were sent from Spain between families to arrange marriages.  I imagined that in Texas, if my brother had received this painted oval portrait, he would have realized the beauty and sweetness of Mari and would have waited impatiently for her arrival - knowing my brother, he would have probably gone to Spain to get her. I decorated the edge of the tile with black enamel and also used it for Mari's ear ring and necklace.

This is a portrait of my daughter Dori at 14 yrs. old.  She is now married and in her 20's. She was wearing a hat that was her great-grandmothers.  Growing up with an artist mom, kids just take it for granted.  Dori did not think it was anything special.  Her friends did think it was neat.  But when I did this portrait, I noticed that she showed it to all her friends and I thought she believed it was a very good likeness.  Unfortunately for my ego, I overheard her tell one of her friends, "Look, she painted my face with no zits!"  Important for a 14 year old! I embellished this piece with 24 k gold and black enamel on the coat collar and around the edge of the tile.

I have my computer back with more Ram thanks to my son Heath.  Here are both sides to a porcelain watering can painted with mice enchanted by the prospect of cherry tomatoes for dinner. Sort of stylized mice but good for a smile.  No, I did not work from live models.

Goldfish, well they look orange to me.  When my children were small, they would win goldfish at the school carnival.  They would have them for a while and then the goldfish would start to tilt.  When they start to tilt, they are gone-ers and there is nothing you can do about it but wait for the end.  So it's important that we all stay level - don't be tilting now.

Pink petunias - trying a Martha Stewart type flower arrangement with all the space filled.  It may just be habit but it seems to need some breathing space and wish I had added a bug!

I am going to be out of pocket for several days so I am going to post several paintings.  Thought I would do somethings not-brown so these will be purply-pink.  All three are on 5x7 porcelain tiles.  I sometimes try new things on small tiles before I paint as a big painting.  

This is my beautiful daughter Michele.  She is the wife of my son Grady.  She is as beautiful inside as out.  This portrait is really an oval with a black background but the oval was distracting in the rectangle space in the post so I removed the edge of the tile in photoshop. I am going to visit them (not the portrait, the kids) soon and I am excited.  This portrait lives in Louisiana with Michele's mother.   

This is a tall porcelain vase with magnolias painted on it. Only flat pieces have been posted so far, so I thought I'd post a dimensional piece. I wanted something striking because it would be a centerpiece at a convention banquet and then someone at the table would win it. 20 vases were being painted by different artists - all this shape vase. Since most porcelain artists do beautiful pastel colors, I went for chocolate brown.  I like to paint white subjects and use lots of subtle colors in creating the form.  I sometimes feel like my paintings are children that I am sending out into the world.  They are a part of me.  I hope you have a happy home Magnolia.  

Since artists have to do things different ways so we don't get stale, this painting was first drawn with pen and ink.  Then I did washes of color.  It creates an interesting texture.   Usually on painted porcelain, smooth is the plan so this was a fun change.   This little owl tile now lives in  the Netherlands. 

Here is a little flying squirrel painted on a 5x7 porcelain tile.  He is having a snack.  Speaking of that I haven't had breakfast.  One of the great things about painting is that I lose track of time and just get lost in the process.  One of the not so great things is when the UPS man comes at 2 in the afternoon and I am still in my pajamas and robe! I just go into the studio to see how the piece looks when I get up and before I know it the day is gone! (Actually those are great days!)

This is a Misty Morning at a Hill Country  TX Creek.  It is quiet and peaceful and I am just waiting for the deer to come for a drink, or at least that is what I was trying for! It is a framed original painting on an 8 x 10 porcelain tile.  

These squirrels were painted  on a 8 x 10 porcelain tile as a commissioned wedding gift. They look like a happy couple, don't they?

My First Post

Hi, I am Pam Dieckert, an artist who paints primarily on porcelain.  All the artwork I will display on this site is original and one of a kind.