Summer Shore, 12 x 18

I just wrapped up this painting last night and wanted to post a few progress photos. When painting in plein air or working on studio landscapes, I usually incorporate some buildings or man-made objects. It helps me focus my attention on something strong and hard-edged and affords me the freedom of leaving the grass and foliage very loose. Not having that support in this painting was a big difference for me and makes me respect those landscape artists that do it so well.

New Painting with progress photos

I just wrapped up this painting for entry into the Salmagundi Clubs Annual Non-Member show. The source is from a Putney Painter session a couple months back, and my studies from that day were extremely helpful in keeping as much "from life" flare to this painting as possible. 

Above is my initial sketch done in pencil. Just a 15 minute placement of all the important features, making sure I had everything fitting in the canvas.

 I then went right into splashing some paint around for a loose background, and then started blocking in the head. I painted the head first in the two main values, the dark and then light side of the head, then slowly went into the details, trying to only paint what I thought was necessary.

 This is the end of the first evening of painting, probably 2:30 hours at this point

From here, I just worked my way out from the head. The photo source was very different from what I witnessed from life (you never notice this when just doing things from photos . . . when you paint something from life, and then paint the same thing from a photo, that's when you start realizing what photography robs you of). Some examples of the differences was the washed out highlights on the guitar and sofa, the varying texture of the scarf, and the color of the shirt (which in the photo was very grey, but in my studies, very purple/blue)

Here I moved into the details of the guitar and the hand (the hand is painted with only three colors/values -- the light side, the dark side, and then the middle value that can be seen in the angle shift of the fingers)

And here is the final painting

Song for Putney, 12 x 18 oil on linen mounted to board

Oil on Wood Study

I have always been interested in the old masters and their various painting techniques. One thing I have been wanting to try was painting on wood. I have previously painted on gessoed panels I prepared myself, but they were to absorbent and I couldn't get the smooth, wet strokes that I like with a fine weave linen canvas.

After researching creative paintings that still embody traditional techniques, I immediately thought back to the wood panel and how it could be used in a more contemporary way. Being a sucker for the beauty of wood, I knew I wanted to make it part of the painting—not just what the painting is on. This use of grain isn't a new idea, but has predominently been used by illustrators, not necessarily fine art.

I just finished this little study to figure out the technical issues and to find out if painting on wood could work for me. I don't know if I'll continue on and develop a large "studio" painting, but I think there are a lot of creative ideas that can evolve from this.

Let me know what you think.

Rebecca, 9x14

Just finished this little painting of my sister-in-law Rebecca. I've been working on a huge painting of her for a long time now and I need to keep taking breaks from it so I don't go crazy. I think this little painting will act as a good study for me, there were some problems that I solved that should help with the big one . . . it's always hard for me to play around, or try out different things on a big painting. I get scared of building up to much paint, or wasting a big canvas, but with these little paintings, I could care less if it doesn't work out and I can always just throw them away if I'm not happy. I wish I could get my head to think like that for the big ones too, I bet the outcomes would be even better (and quicker).
 
I was planning on taking more photos throughout the painting, but it moved pretty fast so I only got three.

Wet Paint: Repose #1

Just finished this little painting. Been wanting to do it for a while now, but kept feeling like the larger paintings should come first. This is the kinda stuff I really love to do and I think I'm going to bust out a couple more before I embark on some more bigger canvases.

Autumn

Just finished this new painting. It's 20x30 oil on linen and is actually a section of our backyard (I left out the ugly chain-link fence and swing set!). There are a bunch of trees in our lawn, and a wooded portion just past that, which results in way to many leaves. To be completely honest, I didn't finish the raking before the snow started to fly -- I'm definitely fearing spring for that singular reason.

Because of the slightly weird composition (head so high on the canvas) this painting has an oval top to draw your eye up. Some of the bigger named artists are doing this a lot lately (Jeremy Lipking in particular) and I was pretty excited to have a chance to do this and to eventually get a cool frame.

For those who care, I also made some minor edits to the final painting of my demonstration below. Scroll down to the Part 3 to see the final version.

Lemons

Lemons were on sale at the grocery store this week, so I bought a bag for making some homemade lemonade. I saved these three from the juicer and was able to paint lemons while I was drinking lemonade.

Yale Crew

The Yale Crew boat house is a few minutes away from us, and a couple weeks ago, I was able to ride along with the coaches during a practice. This is a painting of one of the members who came to get some extra rowing in before practice. He was just coming back to the dock when I got there and this was the first shot that I took (I told him I was just setting up my camera, but I really liked this picture – I hope he won't mind).

Double Profile

This is a painting of my wife, Bryana. Luckily she is so understanding, letting me paint till late at night, spending time with a photo of her, instead of the real thing. This painting is 14 x 20 and mainly done for a competition. Hopefully I win, but if not, at least I got a good painting out of it.

Putney VT

I had the opportunity to go up to Putney this Saturday. I met Captain John (from Richard Schmids Video, The Captains Portrait), and got to take a look at "The Barn", the home of the Putney painters. In between the rain, I was able to paint two landscapes, the first took about 2 hrs, the other was limited to an hour and a half because of the wind and rain.

South Kent

I keep up with the blog of California artist, Jeremy Lipking. He is one of the best painters alive and he was just up in CT doing some painting. He and a few friends were painting in South Kent at Bull's Bridge (Richard Schmid did a fairly famous painting of this very area) After seeing some pictures of the area, I decided to take a drive up and paint for the day. To make a long story short, I started to paint at the edge of the river and I accidentally bumped my easel which caused it to start falling into the rapids. I saved my easel, but lost a tube of white paint and the canvas in the river. I also dropped my glass palette in the process and it shattered into pieces. So after a miserable 30 minutes I got in my car and found a little grocery store and picked up a junky disposable camera and snapped a few shots of the river and bridges. The below is the first painting from those pictures - hopefully you'll see more soon.

Katie

Below are some recent small paintings (6x10) of a friend who so graciously let me paint her. It's always a bit awkward for me to ask someone if I could paint them, she had no idea that I painted, and if I was any good, but she still waisted an afternoon for me, and I am so thankful. These were meant to be studies for a very large painting commission, but we are heading in a different direction, which is ok, because I got two great little paintings by going down this path.

Winter in Spring

A while back, I was looking at the work of Dennis Sheehan, he has a wonderful mood and style in all of his work (I regularly get lost in his paintings, it's such an inspirational experience). The majority of his work is from memory, sources, and studying the old masters. I decided to try my hand at it, and did this little study from resources and memory. It is in no way an attempt to recreate his paintings, but just a chance to see if his method works well for me. I hope you enjoy it.

Heirlooms and Pansies

This is an older piece from a few years back. The pansies had just come into season and this old tea cup from my grandmother had all the colors of the pansies on it's hand painted sides. The book to the left is a favorite from my childhood. I think it was originally my fathers and all the pages have turned yellowish brown. The book was a compilation of short stories about amazing animals that did good deeds and rescued it's owners - I believe the title was "Call of Courage" or something like that.

Pears and Onions?

For some reason, my two favorite items in the produce section are pears and onions. They seem like complete opposites, but when they're put side-by-side, the colors harmonize so well. Now this might be only me, and perhaps you think I'm crazy, but each have special qualities that are just dying to be painted.

Maybe Tuscany

No, I've never been to Italy, but dream about it every other day. This painting is pulled from a few sources and some thin air. I'm trying to train myself to say as much as possible with as little paint strokes as I can - not because I want to knockout a painting in an afternoon, but because I really want my work to be as pure and deliberate as possible. This painting is heading in the right direction by that means, so I was fairly happy with the turn out. Grapes anyone!

After the French Toast

It seems like about every Saturday morning I'm making french toast for my son and wife (who am I kidding - it's for me). I was able to save a few eggs from the mixing bowl one day and paint after breakfast. It seemed like it was getting a little boring/"country" so one of the eggs decided to mix it up and think about jumping. Hopefully it adds a little movement to a still life.

Allentown Art Festival

Every summer in Buffalo a few streets get closed off for the weekend for the Allentown Art Festival. It's an amazing site to see 1,000's of tents and exhibits lining the streets, with many more thousands of spectators checking out all of the amazing work. There is music, food, and people painting - it would be hard to find a better way to spend an afternoon. Each year they have a poster contest and the winner gets some cash and the pride of seeing their work all over the city. This is one of my two entries from a while back. It didn't win (the judges didn't know what they were talking about . . .), but I think it blends design and painting together, and was a real step out of the box compared to the "folk art" that is usually seen. Check out the festival site here

Pumpkin!

This is one of my favorites. My wife and I went to a pumpkin patch and searched through the fields for the perfect one. I stole some random brush and twigs from around the property and set the painting up that night.

Plein Air Barn

This is a great set of barns and fields near my parents house. The owners had an amazing vintage house with wide plank floors and a few horses roaming in the fields - you just stepped right back in time.