Recent Paintings

Here are two recently completed paintings. Both are landscapes, one was commissioned by a collector and the other painting while not a commission, was done for a specific purpose. One is an acrylic and one an oil.

Lets look at the first painting, the acrylic.

This painting was done to be used as a model for a painting class held in a nearby wine shop, The Twisted Vine. ( You can read about the class here, and the shop here.) Since our students use acrylics, so did I. After painting mostly in oils the last five years or so, but having painted watercolor portraits for over ten years before, the acrylics were interesting to work with. The first layers started out very transparent, like watercolors, on a white canvas. Later opaque passages were worked in. New colors to learn such as the difference between lightening a color by diluting it and letting the white show through and lightening a color by adding white. A good example of this is burnt sienna. You can try this with oils or acrylics.

And then you have to decide when to go opaque and when to leave transparent passages alone. And this was supposed to be easy, to provide a guide for students....

The second painting is an oil, a painting of a golf course. However, it is not your ordinary golf course.

The painting is 12 x 24 on oil primed linen. A transparent ground of Charvin French red was applied (Why do French paint companies come up with such names. Why not use the pigment names so we know what we get. Cadmium Red, Cad. Red Light, Cad. Red Deep. Make it a little easier for us easily confused artists) The French Red has a very orange cast to it when applied in a thin layer. Then comes the nice soft buttery oil paint with enough pigment load to actually be opaque. Except, the oil primed linen has a very slick surface compared to an acrylic ground. So a first layer was blocked in rather transparently. Once paint was on the surface, your brush would remove paint rather than blend it. So plan your work. Get the color right and get the shapes right.

After it had a chance to set up and dry somewhat, the surface was more receptive and would grab the paint. Overpainting and blending became possible. Like the acrylic, I had to decide what to leave as is and what to paint over. (The answer is that most of the painting was overpainted, however a lot was left from the original session. Most of the area above the grass. The shadows of the hills were let mostly alone. The dark shadows in the sand traps also. The sky was painted over three times, using the grain of the canvas to let some previous colors come through.

A fun to paint painting. It's always great when a painting works out and you get to enjoy creating it.

Painting at Blowing Rock

We have just returned from two weeks at the Blowing Rock Horse Show in where else but Blowing Rock NC. Actually, it has taken a week or so to recover from the show and get caught up here and back to work in the studio and out in the field.

The Blowing Rock Show actually started months ago with creating a painting for the show's poster and t-shirts. This painting was fun to do, including setting up the props and trying to get the level of wine in the glasses just right...too much, have to sip it down some-oops...drank to much, have to pour more....you get the picture. (Actually I had a three hour drive home after the session and the wine very quickly got warm.)

The posters and t-shirts proved very popular. All sorts of show participants wanted one....

Of course, after setting up our exhibit it was off the Wall (also know as the Wine Wall) to paint the view of the John's River Gorge. It was evening when I started painting and after an hour or so the sun was setting so fast that you couldn't keep up with the changing light and colors.

A number of dogs had portraits painted of them this year at the show

And a miniature portrait of a trainer on the rail watching was a gift commissioned by one of her clients

A final note, "The Wall" is how I refer to that location. "The Wine Wall" is a name used by others. My "recovering from the show" had nothing to do with wine, just a continuous period of painting and working outdoors. It seemed that by the time you were done for the day, it was time to get started all over again. A wonderful time at a wonderful show with some wonderful people. Until next year...

Children on the Beach

Here is the completed painting, On the Beach, 24 x 30 oil on canvas

You can see the earlier stages of this painting on the 1hundredpaintings blog

I worked from a photograph the children's mother took a number of years ago. Capturing the late afternoon/early evening light was my goal here. Of course being able to recognize the children is the foremost requirement. Nearly twenty years ago I was lucky enough to be able to study color theory (actually color practice, color theory usually falls apart when you start putting paint on the canvas) with an artist who studied with a student of Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida, on of the greatest painters at capturing color and light. His work is well worth study.

Below are details from the painting.

Sunday Afternoon in the Park, Impressionism Revisited

Sunday in the Park. An afternoon concert in the open air. I have my easel and canvas set up amongst the crowd and am painting the people watching the show. This must be how the impressionists felt, outside painting people enjoying themselves.

There is a great leap from painting trees and flowers on location to tackling people. At this point look for a few clues to help you. People who seem settled in. If they have chairs, food and drink they probably will stay for a bit. Couples can give you nice interaction and if one leaves for a bit, the other will stay. At this time, I avoided painting people with children and pets. They can be gone in a flash, never to return.

I was able to paint this couple for most of first set until someone sat on a wall between them and me, blocking the view.

Below a painting looking out at the spectators. The trick is looking out at all those people and colors and think, how am I going to paint all that in the time available. A back lit subject kept my canvas in the shade. Hat brim pulled down, but still a lot of bright light. Sunglasses on as soon as I finished.

Sunday-Concert in the Park

4 x 6 Oil on Canvas

$100. shipping included

Painting Greens

It looks like the title to this post ends up inadvertently being a pun. Today I began the actually work, that is getting out on location and the putting paint to canvas, on a new project. Sort of an artist in residence at the North Ridge Country Club in Raleigh NC. The project is a series of paintings of views of the courses, some done on location and possibly some painted in the studio.

Here is the first study, the product of this afternoons work at Hole No. 8 on The Oaks Course.

Getting back to the pun, while mixing colors to paint the Pine Trees, the Oak Trees and the young newly planted trees. The grass of the fairway and the grass of the green, the grass in the foreground and the grass in the distance, I remembered one of our students at this past Saturday's workshop (Painting in the Rose Garden) asking me, just how do you get the greens in the landscape correct. Now there is an answer for him, go paint at a golf course. After a couple of months, you will have all the shades and tones of green, all the mixtures and colors figured out or you will have given up or gone mad.

You can see our classes here: ArtStudentAcademy.com

The Lorenz Grand and Stardust Ballroom

The Lorenz Grand (and Stardust Ballroom) is a home theatre in SC. Here is a step by step look at the creation of a Gold leaf and Mahogany sign for the lobby

First rough designs were drawn (no. 2 pencil and paper)

Getting closer to a design

After the drawing is done, a full scale pattern is made.

The sign blank, stained and varnished

The finished pattern is perforated.

A pattern is made for the scrolls

The perforated pattern is pounced onto the sign. (Powdered French Chalk in a bag is rubbed over the pattern to transfer the design)

The transfered pattern

Gold size is painted on.

The gold leaf will adhere to the gold size

All of the gold leaf areas are painted

The gold size has to reach the right degree of dryness before the gold leaf is applied

23kt Gold leaf is applied to the gold size

The sign with gold leaf

Gold leaf is engine turned

A clear varnish covers the gold to protect from scratching

The sign ready for outlining and shading

Black outlines and maroon shading and lettering finish the sign

Painting Aiken - Art Workshop April 16 and 17

Join me April 16 and 17 from 10-4 and step OUTSIDE with your oil paints and easel while I share with you mytechniques and tips for creating beautiful "plein air" paintings. For complete information and to sign up, visit http://www.aikencenterforthearts.org/. 803/641-9094