“Japanese Woman with a Parasol” Artist’s inspiration: This was my very first painting back in 2003. My husband wanted to transform his side yard into a Zen garden. I thought to myself, this is Cake; I’ll do this painting for him and dazzle him with my brilliance! The painting is on plywood and is really,really BIG. It was a gargantuan task that took me a whole year to complete, but in the end, I still won him over.