Magnolias at Fire's Creek in North Carolina

My wife is a quilter and loves her class at the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, North Carolina. She's made a good number of friends among the other students. I only have one person from a previous class that knows me -- one of the blacksmiths from the class I took two years ago. However, I could not find a class for myself that week (the blacksmithing class offered was too hard for me), but not to worry -- a painter is never lost. During the day I either painted on the campus of JCC or traveled to nearby Fire's Creek to do some plein air painting. Just about five miles from the Georgia border along a winding road through the woods, Fire's Creek is great for kids to do some tubing in the creek or fly fishermen to catch fish -- and me -- to do some painting. This painting is an 8" X 10" oil which just worked out well from the get go. I had a couple people walk by and look while I painted. I set up inches from the creek across from this scene. With a little preliminary wash and a few well drawn lines I was in this world for the next 90 minutes. I'm not sure what I will do with this one yet. For now I have three works at The Next Picture Show Gallery in Dixon, Illinois at the annual "Farms & Barns" show. UPDATE: I've now "finished" the painting from the last posting. I am giving it the stare -- to see whether or not I am pleased with it. If I am I will post the finished version.

Two months and counting

These are two images from the same painting. I've been working on this one for quite a while. The canvas is 36" X 48" which is a lot larger than I'm used to working. I was passing this scene last fall on a dark and drizzly day in southern Wisconsin along a road I often travel -- route 12 south out of Cambridge, Wisconsin -- great bakery there!! This is a bog marsh -- how I learned that I don't remember, but as I passed it at 55 mph I thought immediately that it looked really great and might make a nice painting. Even though I was in a hurry to get home, I hit the brakes, turned around and took in the scene from several angles. The top image is the bottom right of my canvas and the second one is the top left. Why would I work this large????? Well, number one -- the canvas was free. After that come other reasons, like, I wanted to explore doing something I don't enjoy -- noodling out grasses. I'm not making it photographic -- I'm going after a painterly style in doing them. The major size focal point tree is in the center left, which I haven't anywhere near finished. Another reason -- looking at some of Clyde Aspevig's work, which I really liked. So from here I am just going to work on coherence -- making the look of the foreground and background agree. Since it's a studio painting I'll be working on making it look like it was done outdoors -- not easy.

Farm near Rochester, WI

Somehow or another fall and winter have become my favorite time of year. I don't enjoy painting in the heat of summer, so the cool of fall and the gray colors appeal to me. I travel around in the late fall looking for this very type of thing even though I find it challenging to paint. Believe me, all those fine limbs and grasses are enough to try anyone's patience to the limit. This is a detail of a pastel which I knocked off while teaching a class. While the student paints and I offer assistance, I have time to work on one of these. I wonder if the state of Wisconsin is aware that I am their unofficial artist/historian of farm life in their state? My grandfather started a farm in Oregon in 1912, but was not able to make a go of it (a short but sad story). I never had the good fortune to grow up and live on a farm or ranch, but I did grow up watching all the Western movies and TV shows back in the 1950s and 1960s. Earlier this year I was juried in as a member of the Oil Painters of America and recently I sent in an application to become a member and enter the show of the American Plains Artists. Here's two instances where my western and farm paintings have led me into membership in groups that otherwise I might not have been involved in. I have to be careful or I will belong to more groups than I can afford.

Finished work - "Sunset In The Bighorns"

I finished this painting recently after a lot of looking and thinking. This is a scene you will see headed east out of the Bighorn mountains just outside Buffalo, Wyoming with the sun setting on your left. I have come through the Bighorns this way twice in recent years and they've been the source of a couple of works. This painting was done in oil, 24" X 36". I should have said it's like a scene you will see.... because I have moved trees, added things to the foreground and edited the road. There's nothing worse than painting something as it is and then upon seeing it, the real thing looks fake. I worked on several other paintings while I was working on this one due to the tedious nature of working on such a large canvas. Also, I seem to want to jump around a bit after working on one thing for so long. You know the famous question...."How long did that take you to do?"...that people want to know. Since I don't punch a clock, I can't answer that one, but I worked on it over a period of about three months. I hope to get this into a show and I just sent off an image of it today.

Now here's another thought: when I first entered shows I had to come up with slides of my work (remember those?). I entered a few show a couple years ago and found out I'd have to wait a week or ten days to get my slides processed. I used to get them in a day or so. They made me feel like a geezer. Since then I've learned to used the digital camera and the computer to produce a CD with my work on it. This latest show was electronic submission only. My wife had to help me with it. I guess I'm a geezer.

Cincinnati #2

These are shots of the train station in Cincinnati -- an Art Deco masterpiece. Inside are the huge tile murals. Not being familiar with the place, I didn't realize it was a mosaic until I came closer. Being a painter, it's a bit of a mystery to me how you would go about doing something on this massive a scale, but it is awesome. The whole setting is something to admire -- the approach to the building, the great style of the building and the inside. It's a real tribute to an era gone by, but still functions as the train station and another museum.

Cincinnati in the winter

I traveled with my wife to Cincinnati in early February. We stayed a few days thanks to Gwen, a friend from classes at the John C. Campbell folk school in North Carolina. Gwen drove us around the downtown area, to the historic art deco train station, took us for Cincinncati chili and fed us well. The women are quilters so I brought along my paint and took a drive early one morning to a park several miles outside the city. I painted this in about an hour. You are looking east toward Cincinnati in the distance, that plume of white smoke at the horizon. It was in the low 20s that morning and the wind was howling, so there was no way I was going to stand out in that kind of cold to paint (I'm hardy, but not foolhardy). So, inside the car on the passenger side I painted. In the meantime, the ladies were at work on a cooperative quilt for a charitable cause. After finishing up and cleaning the palette, I set the GPS to help me get to the Cincinnati Art Museum. This place is a real treasure. They have Frank Duveneck paintings, some really famous John Singer Sargents and several of the famous painters of New Mexico and the West; Couse, Farny and Sharp. I had to go there twice on that trip. Not forgetting a beautiful portrait by Sir Henry Raeburn, the Scots portrait painter -- or the Indian motorcycle from 1947.
The painting pictured is a 6 X 8 inch (I assume that you knew it wasn't 6 by 8 feet painted outside at 20 degrees in below zero wind chill) on canvas board. It was kind of nice doing a "plein air" painting inside the car without the bugs and the sun beating down or contending with the wind.

Restoration for the Jack of all trades

When you are an artist you get asked to do all kind of "art" related things. I've been asked to do logos for someone's business (I don't do that). I've drawn children for the cover of a school phone directory. I hate doing illustration, although I've done them (after giving the art director exactly what they asked for, they tell you it isn't exactly what they asked for) -- animation too -- as a result I can hardly watch an animated film anymore.
One assignment I don't mind doing is restoration.
I was recently asked to clean a painting. It was a snow scene done in the 1950's and covered with yellowed varnish. I went out and bought a picture cleaner which I thought would do the job. I won't mention any brand names, but I know you've heard of them if you paint. Well, the cleaner did little more than clean grime off the surface --- although it did leave a lovely pine scent in the air. I tried it several times to no further avail. I brought out my denatured alcohol and it took the old varnish off. Why I didn't start with it, I don't know. The painting was clear of the yellowed layer of varnish. I let it dry and then applied a light coat of damar varnish. The client, a friend, paid me more than I asked, thank you very much.
I've restored a genre painting from a century ago; taking off flaked paint and repainting in the style of the brushwork that was there to begin with. After taking closeup pictures, I was able to overcome nervousness about tackling the job. That's what the Jack of all trades does -- overcome apprehension and barge ahead, sometimes foolishly.
A brief apology to those of you following this blog. I became a bit tired of doing it. I have been painting quite a bit, won an award of excellence in a group exhibit, sold one at a Holiday show. Since I don't crank out a painting a day, sometimes even one a week I don't always have things to post. I am working on a 36" X 48" canvas and you just don't do those every day, unless you paint abstracts. Anyhow....my bad, and I'll try to post more often.