Slogging through the Muck, and a new painting is born

This is a field sketch (6"x8" oil on canvas board) of the larger piece I am working on now. I love the rusted tin, the cracks in the walls, and the patina on the limestone. Good stuff. I used the sketch as a model for the larger piece, as far as proportions go, which I am not sure is always such a good idea... There were some discrepancies, which I found when I took the larger piece to work on location (hurray for the french easel!). Had to change the roof line and some others a bit. I prefer to work wet on wet, but things dry faster here than in Washington... I wasn't sure of what to think of today's work, but by the time I got back to the studio, I was feeling better about my progress. I'll post more pics later.



My mind has been a terrible mess for the past few weeks(take a look in the back of my car, and you will see what my noggin innerts looked like). But here is what I have gathered from looking back on similar experiences:

Chaos ensues just before I have a breakthrough of some sort.

Whether the breakthrough is personal or related to my work- it always has the same effect. (...but then, "personal" and "my work" kind of go hand-in-hand, don't they?) This happens often, it is cyclical. I happily paint for a while and then all of a sudden it feels like my creativity has dried up. I stew on it for a bit, until the ideas and methods begin to boil and the next thing I know I am sailing through another fresh season of painting bliss!

An example of the method in my madness: My paintings generally looks shoddy right up until the last few touches are placed. Especially the cloud paintings- they are this huge jumble of oddly shaped color masses, not quite connecting, certainly not related, and as the final brushstroke go down -BOOM! we have clouds.

I feel like I have been in a funk for a little while and I realized today that part of my problem was just not letting each painting be what it was going to be. I have had the most success with a painting when I sit back and watch it develop. No expectations. No forcing it to unfold before it is ready. That can be frustrating. Its like getting to know people. I find it difficult sometimes to step back and let things happen at their own pace. Sometimes both people and paintings have to be allowed to unfold at their own pace. The outcome can be uncertain, but more often than not well worth the wait (some of my friendships have taken over a decade to ripen, but oh how sweet they are! Love-em.). Egad! Imagine working on the same painting for a decade plus! Ccchhhkk! The thought is bitter in my throat.

Summing up! It is all about letting go of the outcome. All I can do is know what I want and let it happen. (Now if I can just remember that when I get into the studio tomorrow morning... I need fifty sticky notes and a sharpie- STAT!!!)

Oh! My ad is out in Fine Art Connoisseur for November and December- check it out! I love it. Lee, you might recognize the painting...

The picture from Anderson Road - WIP

Doodling on a painting's packaging is really turning out to be a great thing. I did this one last night and started the painting today.


This is the first sketch. I didn't like it. Way too centered. So I wiped it and sketched again.


I like this one much better.

This is a real building. It is a bunch of rusted scrap metal pieced together to make an incredible little castle on the hill. - I see a washing machine door, car door, three iron head/foot boards, what looks like some sort of giant drill head, and all kinds of other things I couldn't name even if I wanted to. I saw the tip top of one of the little towers from the road and fell in love with the place.

Its really cool.

Plein Air and Chocolate - Its a Good thing.

Lazy Daizies
8" x 10"
Oil on Canvas Board

I had a good painting session today!

I picked up a box of chocolates on the way out of town, which was something of a big deal for me because I hadn't had chocolate (or anything else with even the slightest bit of caffeine in it) in almost three years. Count 'em- three.

I enjoyed my chocolate. And I enjoyed painting. I am attributing some of my success today to the chocolate. It may become a part of a weekly plein air routine... But then I will have to start hiking to my painting destinations to burn off the extra calories.

Three out of four of the sketches in this picture are now paintings. The lower left one is today's sketch. You might recognize the top two...

I really liked the curl of yellow flowers on the hillside and wanted to make that the center of interest. I had to nix a tree and move the purplish shrub over to the left a bit. Good ol' artistic license!

I was painting out of the back of my 4Runner so I and my canvas were in shade, but everything else in front of me was washed in glaring sunlight. I had trouble seeing the colors on the canvas. I didn't like the painting until I got home and had a chance to see it in even lighting.

All I can say is "Yippee!"

Scribbles

Another shipping box sketch. Scribbling on cardboard is fun. There is a sort of freedom in sketching on something that you know will be beaten up by USPS and then thrown away.

I am halfway there with the Metisse boat painting. I'll post a picture tomorrow. I have to wait for real light, otherwise the colors come out all jacked.

I decided to give membership with the Oil Painters of America (OPA) a shot. Membership is juried, but I'm not terribly sure how exclusive they are. I need more exposure for my work, I believe I can get some with OPA. I won't know for sure if my membership application will be accepted or not until around the 23rd of May, but I was told to go ahead and enter the 2009 Western Regional Juried Exhibition. I guess if my membership is denied, they can just chuck my entry into the show. Easy enough.

They get around 2400 applicants for that show and only accept 200. I saw last year's paintings, and they were very good. I'm a little nervous, but not really. This will be the first time I entered any juried show, so it is more of a learning experience than anything. Whatever happens, it will be fun!

The show will be in Kirkland, Washington August 6-30, so I hope to go see it whether my work is accepted or not.

OPA is also having a paint-out (painting outside, not like a shoot out or anything) in November that I hope to attend. It will be on Willow City Loop just outside of Fredericksburg, my hometown.
Oooo! How exciting! Just the thought of painting with a bunch of other oil painters gives me wonderful little chill bumps. Oh the excitement of it!

The Metisse - WIP

I was getting a painting ready to ship and got a little carried away. I couldn't help myself- the box was so perfectly clean and blank... It was just begging for a sketch. The boat is called the Metisse. I fell in love with it at the dock. It was smooth, slender and red red red!

This was another reference photo I had been avoiding for a while, but I had so much fun sketching it that I started a small painting of it.

I am enjoying working small. This one is an 8"x10". Soon I will have a mass of 6"x8" canvas boards to work on as well.

Let me tell you how much I love Gamvar (Gamblin's super awesome archival varnish). It dries to the touch relatively fast and doesn't make your head spin from the fumes... in fact, I hardly noticed a smell. Hurray for Gamvar!

More Clouds- A Different Start

OK.

So this time I made a few sketches (in my beloved Moleskine) to try to work out some of the design kinks before plopping the paint down. It all goes back to that P.A. (Plan Ahead) thing. I really shoot myself in the foot when I don't take the time to plan a painting.

In the first thumbnail I went all out with the drawing... well, as "all out" as you can get in such a small rectangle. In the second sketch, I broke the picture down into solid chunks of lights, mediums and darks so I wouldn't feel so overwhelmed by all the variation in the clouds. I felt a lot better about the design after doing that. I was looking for some enthusiasm to start this painting off, and this really helped.

I used this second sketch as a reference when drawing the design onto the canvas- I am trying not to rely so heavily on the photo. I am hoping this will help me loosen up a bit. I hatched in the darkest "blocks" to keep some of the confusion down. I got a bit frustrated with that last painting when I realized I had filled in a light spot with dark paint, in three different areas. Prevention is the best... um... preventing thing.

A little color theory fun-- the red font on both pages of the sketchbook is the same color. Ooo!

About that last painting... I wiped it with the intention of starting over. Can't find the photo, now - last time I saw it, it was in the clutches of an 18-month-old. It'll have to wait until my next batch of reference photos comes from Kodak.

Have I ever mentioned how much I like the internet?

Just upload some pictures into my Kodak account and tell them how I want the pictures and a few days later my prints magically appear in my mailbox! Its just brilliant I tell you!

I don't have to drop off film and wait for a week before the prints are ready. Remember the days when you couldn't just print the good pictures?

I love modern technology.

Dry Spell

Dry Spell
16" x 20"
Oil on Canvas

Woo-Hoo! Finished. I am proud of this one. I like looking at it. There are all kinds of subtle variations in the colors on the boat. They sort of come up in the photo. If you click on the photo, you can see the picture better.

I went back to the photos shadow placement... mostly. I dropped the bottommost shadow down a bit on the right hand side. It was almost parallel to the bottom of the canvas. Yech.

I was madly in love with this painting while working on it last night. I was thinking about keeping it for myself forever and ever. Then I finished it. I still love it. Funny thing though, when something is complete I sort of lose the desire to keep it around. My knitting is usually the same way.

I had a friend a long time ago that made fantastic sculptures out of clay. She kept them all in her living room and priced them so high no one in their right mind would buy them. She told me that she was afraid to let them go because she thought they were the best things she had ever done and ever will do.

Sadly, she seemed to be right. She hadn't made anything that good for a while before I met her, and she didn't produce a thing in the years I knew her.

I think an artist who hoards their own work puts a stop to their own progress. If a person sits and stares at the glories and mistakes made in the past, how can they possibly hope to move foreward?

I don't know if my desire to get rid of completed work is from a desire to move on or a fear of becoming like so many of my fellow artists, hoarding what will inevitably be our "greatest" and only works.

This sucker is going on Etsy.

Check it out! I found the sketch I made on location. A little different view point... Looks rather cartoony, eh?

I really enjoyed that trip. I got to sketch a lot and got a load of reference photos. I am ashamed to remember the meltdown I had two minutes into a rainforesty hike.... The mosqitos were horrid and it was hot and humid.

I hope to behave better next time.

WIP- Boat

I am mostly packed.
The house is still a mess because I couldn't say away from that lovely lovely red!

I fell in love with this boat the minute I saw it. I wish I knew why it was being worked on. Its like seeing a beached whale, but with a happier ending because this particular leviathan will return to the water in better shape than it was before. I sat for an hour or so and drew it in my sketchbook the day I took the reference photo. It was the perfect time of day when the shadows were nice and long, and everything had a very distinct highlight. "The Golden Hour" they call it. I'll have to find the sketch and post it.

Funny thing- I am really enjoying that street lamp on the right side of the painting. I thought about leaving it out because I thought it was ugly, but that would not have worked at all. It helps balance the painting.