Twin Suns

Twin Suns – acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

I’ve just completed Twin Suns, a new painting for my Cosmic Bodies Collection. I got the idea to paint two suns together as I was thinking about how I was born with an identical twin. Last week I visited my twin sister for a couple of days to celebrate our belated birthday. We started getting together like this a few years ago and it’s been fun. I’ve done many double paintings over the years, usually fish or dolphins. I thought that this time it might be fun to do an abstract painting with a double effect.

It’s interesting to think that she and I were once an embryo that divided and formed into two individuals. I imagined what it might be like after a sun divided into two. I played with the idea of outer and inner space. I used two figure eight waves as infinity loops and more waves to give the sense of ever expanding movement.

Spring is in full force here, hope all are enjoying the season.

Solar Eclipse

Solar Eclipse – acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

Solar Eclipse is a new painting for my Celestail Bodies series. The idea for this painting came to me for two reasons. First, after painting last week’s Sun Moon and Planets, I felt the strong composition of the large sun in the center worked well and wanted to try that again. The second reason was because of the recent spring equinox of equal day and night led me to think of doing another painting with the balance of light and dark similar to my crow with dove paintings. I then thought, why not do a new painting as a compliment to the first using a large sun darkened by the moon due to an eclipse?

The upcoming total solar eclipse is traveling across North America on April 8th 2024. In this painting I put in the planets as they will appear from earth’s view. They are bundled in one area in the sky, I added asteriods, stars and also the green devil comet which may be able to be seen during the eclipse. It was challenging to get the space dark but not too dark around the eclipsed sun, while also making sure the planets were light enough. I think it works pretty well.

There is lots of buzz here about it here in the US, which is probably another reason it came to mind to paint. It will be exciting for those who live or visit under the path of totality of this solar eclipse.

Whale in Space

Whale in Space – acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

I’m back to my daily painting and have just completed Whale in Space, which depicts a large blue whale spinning out in space. I follow a whale page on Instagram which shows videos of whales as they spin up out of the ocean and then crash down on the water, it’s breathtaking. These images inspired me to add a whale to my space series. My husband tells me whales spin as they rise from the deep to create a vortex of bubbles that traps fish for them to eat.

Whales are magestic, large and other worldly; I can see why the space whale has become popular in various science fiction shows. Here is what google said about the meaning of the Space Whale: It represents the grandest of dreams. It represents a world in balance, one in which humankind has learned to walk with all of the life on this planet.

Pinwheel Galaxy

Pinwheel Galaxy – acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

Pinwheel Galaxy is a new painting for my space collection. While writing the last blog post, I became intrigued when I read that black holes may help with the formations of galaxies. I clicked on a few space sites to learn more. Scientist think galaxies may be formed around massive black holes, the theory is that black holes leak dark matter, creating a “wind” of particles that stream away.

A galaxy is a system of billions of stars and dust held together by a gravitational attraction. They are formed by bands of gases that form the stars. I saw a beautiful photo of a galaxy with a black hole in the center and each band of light spiraling out in the Fibonacci sequence, as seen throughout nature, such as a fern fiddle head, seashell or beautiful flower.

With this painting, I decided to play with that idea of bands of color, each expanding in a spiral out into space. I named it pinwheel galaxy because it looks like a pinwheel. I know it’s a holiday weekend for many, enjoy these days!

Black Hole 2

Black Hole 2 ~ acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

Black Hole 2 is a new abstract painting in my space series. A black hole is an area in space with so much gravitational pull that no matter or radiation can escape. Black holes are formed from super nova star explosions and the extreme density of the matter causes the gravitational pull. Astronomers think that black holes may help to stabilize galaxies.

This is the third painting in my space collection that includes a black hole. In this one, I put a large black hole on the top edge and added planets and stars along with a sun. I painted radiating colors being drawn to the hole along with a comet. It was fun to paint. I love the looseness of layering color washes and then scratching back to see what’s created. I also enjoy doing the detail work of painting the spheres and star dots. Doing detail work helps to keep me in the present moment, at times I tend to overthink. I’m fairly pleased with the result.

Infinity

Infinity – acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

Infinity is my new abstract painting. I chose to paint the infinity loop as I had been reading of how the infinity sign is a loop going back and forth continuously while the center point is still, which I thought was interesting.

In the painting I kept with the theme of swirls of jewel toned colors and spheres of various colors and sizes. I painted the infinity sign looping in the center with the still point centered which I played with a spiral coming out.

I’m shifting gears this week to paint a bear and then will paint another abstract with a different color palate. I think it will be helpful to change things up a bit.

Inner Space

Inner Space ~ by Heni Sandoval

I’ve just competed a new abstract painting titled, Inner Space. I liked the complexity of the last abstract painting, Outer Space, with the many colored spheres of various sizes and wanted to continue with that idea.

I follow the Design in Nature Facebook group and love looking at the various images posted on their page. Every so often an incredible image of a magnified leaf or flower will show up on my feed. Nature provides us with beautiful organic designs. Some of these images look a bit like space with the tiny particles and wave like lines.

I decided to imagine that I was painting a microscopic organic structure so small that I could see particles and waves. I enjoyed making the waves look like tree branches dividing and as they moved through space getting smaller. Perhaps because on my winter walks it’s hard not to notice all the many tress here with the intricate branch patterns. I used a lot of paint and played with the various sized particles to give it a spacious feeling. It was fun to do.

We’re enjoying a mild winter here, after surviving the record breaking frigid winter holiday season. The daffodils are out and the cherry blossoms are just starting. Spring will be here soon.

Galaxy

Galaxy – acrylic painting by Heni Sanoval

Galaxy is a new abstract painting for my space theme. A few weeks ago, I saw a photo that showed brightly lit stars upon stars filling the space with a caption that said something like “how space actually is” That gave me the idea to paint an image of lots of stars on the page.

I laid down colorful spirals and and curving lines and then put in spheres in small to larger sizes as if they are expanding out into space. It was fun to paint getting to play with lots of color. My next painting is going to be more subdued. I’ll be making a cat painting for my chiropractor who helped with my neck injury. His healing energy helped me get through the experience and I’m thanking him with a painting of their family cat.

I put up holiday decorations early this year because we had a holiday artist open house here in early December. It was fun, I sold prints from my etsy days and and also picked up some lovely unique gifts. I like getting all that done early as now we can relax and do a bit of entertaining. On Monday our daughter will be flying home for the holidays; we can hardly wait to see her! I hope everyone is enjoying this festive season.

Uranus

Uranus – acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

Uranus is my most recent painting and the final one in my abstract planet series. In these paintings, I like to imagine that the planets are connected with the surrounding waves of colorful energy and smaller spheres all moving through space together. I’m so enjoying getting back to painting and this one was a fun to do.

Uranus is the seventh planet out from our sun and takes 84 years to travel around the sun. It is a blue ice gas giant and is the coldest planet in the solar system. A full day on Uranus is 17 hours and it spins west to east unlike most of the other planets. Another unique fact is the Uranus’s axis is 99 degrees which means that it rotates on its side, so it spins like a ball rolling down a hill. I tried to show this as I painted Uranus with the light from the sun on the right side and the ring almost perpendicular on the page.

Uranus was discovered in 1781 and is named after the Greek god Uranus who was the god of the sky. In astrology Uranus rules the sign of Aquarius and it symbolizes the rebel, the outsider and the genius of the heavens. Since it was discovered at the time of the French and American Revelations, this planet has been correlated with independence, and breaking old structures.

Black Hole

Black Hole – acrylic painting by Heni Sandoval

Black Hole is the newest painting for my abstract outer space series. It’s darker than a lot of my paintings. With the challenging world events going I was in the mood to bring in more darkness contrasting with the light. I experimented with various colors, playing with dark planets contrasting with the light and the lighter planets against the dark space. I like the way the black hole looks a like an eye.

It’s horrific and shocking viewing what is happening in the Ukraine, the brutality of Putin’s war all over social media for everyone to see. It seems that the whole world may be coming together to say no more, I hope anyway. I’m beginning a new painting to distract myself and continue to hope for a peaceful resolution.