Paintings With Soul

"A Whole New World", 10" x 12" acrylics on museum quality panel, depicting some of my favorite young dancers. This painting has a good story behind it - and posters will be sold - read more below! The painting itself belongs to The Princess (that's her on the left), but as always, inquiries may come directly to me . Oh, and in process photos are here Production Numbers In the world of competitive dance, a production number is a dance that tells a story, and typically features every dancer from the team. Production numbers are nearly double the length of other dances, and are tremendous fun, as they usually include props, fabulous costumes, and incredible music mixes. This year, The Princess's production number tells the story of Aladdin. It's complete with neon orange beaded harem pants, a flying carpet, a marketplace and a magic genie lamp. It also includes lyrical movement, musical theater, acrobatics, pointe and tap, and ...

The cover of "A Dog Named Blue," now available from Blurb publishers. When I first painted Amelia I never imagined that she would be re-christened "Blue" and inspire a book. In her defense, Amelia had a number of other partners in crime - animals who's portraits seemed to fall into a specific color category and prompt color-centric names. In typical ADD fashion, my brain started spinning 100mph. What if I turned those muses' paintings into a picture book for animal loving kids? I shared my idea with three friends in the industry, and they eagerly offered their expertise. I am truly indebted to them. Illustrator and author Matt Faulkner and children's book author and literacy expert Kristen Remenar edited an early version of the draft. They suggested key plot/conceptual changes that made it oodles better. Designer Elizabeth St. Hilaire Nelson worked her magic, pairing the images with perfectly color...

"Annie, Sketch," 6" x 8", acrylics on museum quality panel, the most recent in five different sketches (the other four are underneath). You can see the first one here . If you've taken one of my workshops, you know how many sketches and studies we do together in a handful of days. It's a pressure-free zone, sketching. It's easier to take risks because it's just a study. If it turns out, fantastic - and if not, we just paint overtop and try it again! After a workshop, I come back to my studio, jump right into creating more finished paintings, and forget about the beauty and importance of sketching regularly. I'm making a conscious effort to change things. Thanks as always for following along with my artwork, Kim ksantini@turtledovedesigns.com About Kimberly Santini  Facebook

"Evan Patrick, 11 mos," 6" x 8", acrylics on museum quality panel, depicting a young toddling Santini. Not for sale. Given the right references and full creative license, I am accepting a limited number of children's portraits - email me  your non-flash photos and we can talk. Today is The Caped Crusader's birthday. It's a milestone one - he's 16. Not sure how that happened, but I spent some time with a shoebox of photos and a box of kleenex. And decided that I had to pick up my brushes, just for him. Thanks as always for following along with my artwork, Kim ksantini@turtledovedesigns.com

    "Masquerade," 6" x 8", portrait of three young dancers on stage, inspired by the young ladies at  Broadway Dance Co  (where The Princess studies). This is acrylics on museum quality panel and is available to the first asking nicely for $329 - inquiries can come  to moi !    Last nite I found myself with a couple hours to do whatever I wanted. That was a tough one!! I headed straight to the easel and created Masquerade - it's time on the easel was relatively short lived, but this composition had been in my head for over a month, and the idea itself has been percolating for several years.   But inquiring minds always want to know how long did this take to paint?   The painting process cannot be measured or valued by a number of minutes. Making art is a lifelong process of seeing and questioning and filtering and experimenting, building up cumulative knowledge and filling those visual memory banks. ...