River Walk

Watercolor

Oh my God, he uses black!

Yes, yes I do, even in watercolor.  Works good.  It's a perfectly good color if you know how to use it.  I could get along without it, but it's so nice for lowering chroma, and for this black dress it's kind of a good place to start.  As far as I know, no black on the market is a complete neutral.  Ivory black tends to be a bit on the blue side, carbon black is a little on the warm side, but with either I find color shifts to be less of a problem than with using compliments to dull a color.  If you really don't like black and find Paynes's Gray to be much more useful, you might want to check what it made with.  Most manufacturers make it with ivory black.

Doesn't really matter.  Color is an interesting thing and a pretty personal choice.  You can usually get to a given HVC with a variety of different mixtures.  One mix isn't really any better than any other as long as you come up with the color your looking for.  So have a big palette or a limited palette.  As long as it works for you and you know how to get the most out of it, you're good to go.  Personally I've got a big drawer full of paint -- three drawers actually, one for yellows, one for reds and one for blues, greens and blacks.  Most of that paint stays right there in the drawer.  I find myself regularly using about a dozen go to pigments.  Gets me where I want to go usually.

I didn't put a size on this.  I don't have it handy to measure, but it's not very big, about 12 inches high if I remember right.  It was a piece of leftover not pressed paper.

A Little Drop of Rain

Watercolor on Hot Pressed Paper

22 x 30

They've changed a few things here on me.  I guess that's to be expected if you don't post in, what, two, three years?  Well, maybe that will change.

This seemed like a good image to start with considering all the rain we've had the past week or two.  Really squishy walking out there right now.

Normally you do the painting first then get it framed.  In this case I've had a frame for quite a while, and I've been looking for something that will look good in it.  This should do quite nicely due to the dress color.  Besides it kind of a nice image, at least I think so.  I think it's a nice blend of tight rendering on the figure along with a more splashy approach on the background foliage.  A lot of lifting off was done there.  That's one reason I chose to use a hot pressed paper.  That along with an addition of some extra gum arabic makes lifting out quite easy.  Much easier that painting around lighter areas.

One last unrelated thing for anyone that has commented lately.  Sorry I didn't get back to you, but I had to change me email and the link never got updated here.  So I didn't know there were any comment to get back to.  Hopefully that has been fixed.  All for now.

Wading

watercolor
22 x 15

Today's offering is a watercolor. Watercolors can be tricky little things. To be really good you need to do a lot of them. That's pretty much true of everything. Can't be good without putting in the time to get there. It seems to be particularly true of watercolors though. There's so many little things you need to keep in mind. For certain effects the paper has to be at a certain degree of wetness. A little too wet it won't work, a little too dry it won't work, and the only way to know when it's at that correct point is experience. Unfortunately you have to keep at it or you lose a lot of what you've gained. Lots of little tricks too. Again though if you take some time away from the medium you forget the little tricks.

That being said, I need to do more watercolors or forget about it completely. Can't see me giving it up completely though. I like watercolor too much. I think I actually prefer it to oil.

The Glades

Watercolor
22 x 30

This is an older piece that I never got around to putting up for some reason. I rather like it though. It's pretty much made up, no reference pictures, no actual place, but I think it is fairly representative of a glades landscape. That's glades in the sense of an open area in an otherwise wooded area. Around here glades have a quite thin layer of topsoil over rock. Usually not a real flashy landscape unless the wildflowers are in bloom. Hopefully that will be happening soon.

Green Cathedral

Watercolor
22 x 15

As a painter I often ask myself what exactly am I trying to do. I guess I could go into artspeak mode and talk about the need for intrinsic elements to come together in a chaotic society to form a whatever. Yada, yada, yada. I could play that game but honestly it bores me. My work has been called no nonsense and unpretentious. I suppose in some circles that could be taken as an insult. I'm not in those circles and actually consider it a compliment. At the very least I think it's the truth. What you see is what you get so I better give you something worth seeing.

At one time Camie Davis had a blog on narrative painting. She's since combined all her blogs into one. See the link if you're interested. One of her last posts on the narrative blog started with a quote from Anthony de Mello:

"You have to understand, my dears, that the shortest distance between truth and a human being is a story."

And that is basically what I'm trying to do with my art. I'm a story teller. I'm much better with images than with words so I paint and draw. Figurative painting lends itself best to story telling, but landscapes also can tell a story of a specific place at a specific time of year and a specific time of day under specific weather conditions. If a landscape is done correctly (by my standards) it will take you to that certain spot at that time.

So what's the story with this painting? Well, there is no literary text portrayed, but the story is still there. I'll leave you to come up with it this time. After all, what you take from a story often depends on what you bring to it.

One final word here. Do your preliminary drawings!!!!! I had a lot of trouble painting the bottom of the drapery. Strangely enough, when I did the study for the figure I didn't do the bottom of the robe, too anxious to get started with the painting.



Coincidence? I don't think so.

Split Rail

Watercolor
6 1/2 x 5 3/4

I wasn't totally happy with the painting I was planning on posting today. I like the actual painting fine, but the picture doesn't do it justice. Just as I was about to bite the bullet and post it anyway I found this little watercolor that has slipped through the cracks for quite a while now. New plan.

This is an older piece, but it still holds up pretty well. I'm older after all, and I still haven't reached my expiration date just yet. Besides it fits into the whole seasonal thing. We haven't really had much fall color this year, the weather didn't completely cooperate. Just have to make do, and get ready for winter.

Morning

Enough drawing for a while. Never thought I'd say that since I actually prefer drawing, but it just seems like time for some color. Watercolor in this case. Since there were no watercolor portraits last week that strikes me as a good choice.


Watercolor
14 x 18

What I wanted to do in this was show that early morning light and the calmness that goes with sun up. I love that time of day when the world is just waking up. Too bad it comes so early. There's usually a beautiful calm golden light, not as harsh as later in the day. Add a little bit of ground fog, and I'm ready to go.

Roses in the Snow

Valentines's day is closing in and there's snow on the ground so this seemed like a timely thing to post. If you're thinking that this isn't quite up to current standards that's because it's a good 20 years old. I was digging through the accumulated junk the other day, and found this illustration, just about the last remaining piece from my first go round in the art world. So the imagery may be timely but the posting is a bit tardy. In my defense though, when this was done there was no internet to post to. I was just waiting for technology to catch up.

So happy Valentine's Day to all the ladies out there, and for the guys, the ball's in your court, I'm covered. For once I didn't forget.

Lady of the Lake

Watercolor
30 x 22

The Lady of the Lake, a classic subject that I have stayed away from until now. So let me wade into the waters with this one. (See how I worked the water theme in there. Darn he's clever. Please pardon me, all this cold weather seems to be effecting my brain. Back to the scheduled programming.) She's usually depicted in a boat or sometimes just as an arm sticking up out of the water with a sword. Well, I think she deserves to be seen as more that just an arm besides I had this really good photo of a full body to work with. And a boat, c'mon seriously. This is magic, she don't need no stinking boat.

You may be wondering about the sword, or in this case, the lack thereof. I wasn't worthy of seeing it. Yeah, I'm going with that. It's a much better answer than it honestly never occurred to me to include it. Never let the truth get in the way of a good story. Anyway, now that it's been pointed out to me that the sword is missing I'm considering adding it. I don't think it is really needed though.

And let me once again thank the lovely Elandria. You may remember her from this You would have had to have been paying really good attention or have a really good memory though. Keep her in mind, she may be showing up again to reprise this role and others.

Untitled

watercolor
18 x 12.5

Well its been three months since my last post. I don't know if I'm more surprised that it's been that long or that it hasn't been longer. Untitled pretty much wraps up the last three months though.

I finished this a few days ago, at least I think it's finished, and I don't have the slightest idea what to title it. That's usually a result of not having a clear idea of what I was trying to do in the first place. Seems to be a lot of that going around these days. "Just do it." Nice bumper sticker but maybe we should give things a little thought before we jump in with both feet. But I don't really want to go down that road today. I'm not really sure what road I want to go down today. See, still untitled.

Anyway, even though this isn't exactly a Christmas image (poor thing would freeze something off wearing that around here today), I hope everyone has a good holiday season. And I'd like to thank everyone that has dropped by, especially those that have taken the time to comment. It really means a lot to me. And a special thanks to all my models (did you recognize Linda from the last silverpoint post?) Where would I be without you?

Twig

Didn't mean to be gone that long guys, sorry. It's been a long and rather interesting summer. Overall not that great but there were flashes that kept me wanting to see what would happen next. It looks like that the way it will be for a while to come too. At least now I'm used to it. On to the pictures, that's what you're here for.

I've done virtually no painting or drawing at all in the last few months so this had the potential for complete disaster. I'd wanted to do this piece for quite a while, but something always seemed to come up and push this to the back burner. Instead of going right to the finished picture I thought you might like to see a couple of the studies that I do beforehand. There's a lot of stuff done that nobody will ever see, but are nevertheless important to the process. This is where all the drawing issues get worked out. Before I start the final piece I have a pretty good idea of exactly where I'm going.


pencil heightened with white
22 x 15

So here's the final drawing of the figure. If it wasn't right there would be no reason to go any further so it was pretty obvious that I needed to spend as much time here as necessary. Besides I like to draw, this was the fun part.


Watercolor
15 x 11

So now that I've got a figure I need to put her in a landscape or some kind of environment. An excuse to go for a walk in the woods, most excellent. Not the best watercolor I've ever done, but it serves the purpose. She should fit in there nicely. It's really best compositionally to do this all at once working with basically abstract shapes and then adapting the shapes to figure and surroundings. Sometimes you get lucky though and this way will work out all right. Let's put it together and see what I've got.


Watercolor
30 x 22

This is what I thought would be the final piece. I'm not so sure though so this could turn out to be another study. There's some good points but I think there are parts that I could and should do better. And this is why it is best compositionally to work on the whole piece at once instead of putting together pieces. On this particular painting there is no deadline and no one is dying to see it (as far as I know) so why not keep going and do it right.


Watercolor
22 x 15ish

This is a detail of the previous piece and makes a pretty good image on its own. Right now I'm leaning toward cropping it down and salvaging this part and later going back and repainting the whole piece, maybe an oil next time.

Edit: I've switched out the last two images with ones that are closer to actual in color at least. Images seem to come out about a step lighter here than anywhere else. Anybody else have that problem?

Summer's End

Watercolor
22 x 15

I know this isn't exactly what you would call timely considering it's closer to the end of winter, but maybe it's just what we need to shake off the cold. Perhaps I'm ahead of my time or lost in the past or just totally screwed up.

This is the first watercolor I've done in a while so there was potential for disaster. A lot of watercolor depends on "feel" that comes from doing. Is the paper wet enough, dry enough? It's real easy to lose that feel so I was pleasantly surprised at this outcome. It's also a composite of a landscape reference with a model reference. Around here when you see a log like that, you can be pretty sure there will be turtles laying on it catching some sun. Personally, I think this is much better.

Here's a detail of the figure for anyone interested in details. It's about actual size, maybe a touch smaller.

The Coming Year

Watercolor
11 x 7

As the year comes to an end you can expect all the year in review shows complete with predictions for the coming year. No predictions here from me. You don't want to know what I think is coming, trust me on that. As for what's past, if you've been keeping up you've already seen most of it, so just flip back on your own. I had thought about going back several years to let you decide if I'd shown any improvement, but due to a technical problem I can't get to any old files stored on my zip disks. So you dodged that bullet too.

One of the few files I can get to right now is this little watercolor. It struck me as a relatively good image to end up the year on. Is she watching something / someone go, or waiting for something / someone to come? Maybe she's had a really bad year and is getting ready to jump. What you take from a piece depends a lot on what you bring to it, doesn't it?

To my reader(s) I hope you're not getting ready to jump. I wish you all a good new year and remember the trick is to keep your head when those around you are losing theirs.

Dogwood Blossoms

watercolor
15 x 22

Before the winter sets in I thought I'd post a spring icon, a branch of dogwood blossoms.

Snow Storm

Watercolor
22 x 30

Geologically speaking Missouri is two different areas separated by the Missouri River. As I understand it the glaciers only got as far south as what is now the Missouri River valley so the north of the state is considerably flatter than the south which is dominated by the Ozark mountains. The Ozarks are a very old mountain range and by mountainous standards they're really not much more than hills in this age. They are quite beautiful though, and they are home. They are also dotted with a variety of springs, most of which have, or at least had a mill associated with them. That brings us to the subject of this post, Alley Springs. I've found out recently that this is the most photographed mill in the state. Far be it from me to not paint a cliche. In my defense it's usually photographed from the other side where the millpond usually provides a mirror-like reflection. All right, I admit it, I've done it from that side too, and probably will again. In an attempt to be a little different here is a view of the front side of the mill during an early winter snowstorm. Not as picturesque perhaps, but it does have a quality to it that I rather like.

Shawl and Rose

Watercolor
16 x 9

In keeping with the portrait theme here's a one in watercolor. Most of my portraits are in either oil or some drawing medium, but I can do them in watercolor too.

Pink Hat

Watercolor
21 x 14

Finished this one about a month ago, maybe a bit more, and never got around to adding it here. So here it is. A nice airy, summery painting.

Winter Church

Watercolor
22 x 30

I was looking through photos trying to find something that might be of interest, and I ran across this one. It's a bit on the old side, but it's not too bad. On to the interesting part.

This was in a show once upon a time. When I have shows I like to kind of blend in and see what people really think. If they know you are the artist you rarely get true feedback. You get the "Oh this is wonderful" stuff whether it is or not. While that may be good for the ego, it really doesn't help all that much. Anyway, I was wandering around and there was this one guy talking to a rather attractive woman in front of this painting. A little eavesdropping seemed to be in order so I started listening to him tell her all about my painting. It seems that this piece is all about life and death and spirituality. The green tree represents life with the dead (actually leafless) tree and cemetery representing death. The church of course is the spiritual part. I don't know if she was buying all this, but I was quite impressed, especially since I had no idea that I had done that. I thought I was just balancing out lights and darks not commenting on life and death.

I guess I'm just a deep kind of guy, deeper than even I knew. Something was sure getting deep that night.

Wading

Watercolor
22 x 13

Sorry, I wandered off for a bit. Things got a little hectic, but I think its better now. No matter, back to the art. This is a watercolor that, I think, came out fairly well. Hope you like it.

Pickle Creek

Watercolor
15 x 22
For purchase information follow The Art Gallery of Hog Hollow link

It's cold today with a forecast of colder for the rest of the week. So I'm pulling out a nice warm, sunny summer scene to look at today. This is Pickle Creek from a state park / natural area a bit south of here. It's one of my favorite hiking spots and the creek running through it is beautiful.