Waiting

 Waiting

6" x 12"

 oil on stretched canvas

Remember the little boat I was having problems with a few weeks ago?   Giving my arm a rest from the large painting I'm working on, I pulled this one out and figured I'd tackle it with a palette knife.

I really do love the feel of paint using a palette knife, its very different than brush feel of paint and results are strong and direct and can be put down quickly without quite as much of the thought process as there is in a more detailed painting.


This is painted in oils 6" x 12" on a stretched canvas.  Its a new brand of canvas, made in Canada and the quality seems very good.  I'm testing out a few new supports over time and while they can be similar in many ways, some surface just seem to accept paint more easily and smoothly than others.

Lone Survivor

 Lone Survivor

4 x 6",   oil on canvas panel

The clean up of an oil palette in preparation for a new painting evolved into this painting with a palette knife.

Its similar to Abandoned in the Garden, with a few new colours introduced into it.  The hot yellow and green give a different feel to it.  The last survivor in the garden, screaming for attention from a bee to ensure its legacy.  The colours are very saturated in this piece and that is part of the appeal.  Pure and strong without being muted. 

You can purchase this little survivor on Daily Paintworks.

Tragedy of Commons

 The Tragedy of Commons

5 x 7", oil, canvas panel

2012 is the 20th anniversary of the cod moratorium in Newfoundland and Labrador.  The impact on culture and life has been dramatic in the province with the withdrawal of what was once a livelihood for many people who worked on the ocean.  The moratorium in 1992 marked the largest industrial closure in Canadian history. Overnight 35,000 people became unemployed.

The tragedy of commons  is a dilemma arising from the situation in which multiple individuals, acting independently and rationally consulting their own self-interest, will ultimately deplete a shared limited resource, even when it is clear that it is not in anyone's long-term interest for this to happen.  This was very much the case with the fishery in the province.  What is in the individual's best interest is not always in the best interest of a society at whole.

Wikipedia sums it up:

In the case of Newfoundland and the Northern Cod fishery this meant that from the perspective of the individual participating in the fishing industry, maximizing their catch was in their best interest; however when the government failed to intervene – due largely to the highly sensitive nature of the political discourse created by the expansive group of stakeholders – the ecosystem was brought past its threshold and collapsed, leaving everyone worse-off.  When the government was finally galvanized to action, it was too late. The 1992 moratorium was initially meant to last two years, with the hopes that the Northern Cod population would recover, and along with it, the fishery. Unfortunately, the damage done to Newfoundland’s coastal ecosystem was indelible, and even after sixteen years, the Northern Cod population has failed to rebound and the Cod Fishery remains closed.

During the summer of 2011, a study was announced to show that recovery of East Coast cod stocks around Nova Scotia showed promises of recovery, despite earlier thoughts of complete collapse. It was found that initial stages of recovery began around 2005, though more time and studies were needed to study the long-term stability of the stock increase. In addition in 2010 a study by the Northwest Atlantic Fisheries Organization found that stocks near Newfoundland & Labrador had recovered by 69% though that number only compared to 10% of the original size.

I started playing around with some paint left on my palette and this little cod swam out of the red water, a worried expression on his face. And well he should be worried, his existence is in danger.

Revising the artist statement

I'm reworking my artist statement to reflect what has evolved in my work over the last couple of years.  Artist statements, while a necessary evil, are usually the last thing an artist wants to create.  They have a reputation for being useless pieces of fiction, written only for galleries and collectors who don't understand them, but want the writing on the wall, quite literally, to become part of the aura of the artist.

My artist statement tries to be factual, brief and written in terminology that helps the viewer have a better understanding of why I paint what I paint.  Its never easy to put into words something emotional and often something that even I, as the artist, don't  have a firm grasp on the 'why' of.  

As I drove home today, I glanced at a bank high above me on the highway.  It was early spring dulled brown with just the lip of dried grass poking over the cliff edge and a fallen tree lying across the summit.  In my mind,  a sepia drawing flooded in along with detail of the rough grass, strewn rock and dead tree.  To most people passing by, it was boring, and not worth a second glance.  The artist statement challenge is getting across to the viewer, my vision of how something such as that dull piece of land can turn into art and why it inspires me.

Back to my artist statement.  Its swerved from being tightly focused then broader, then more focused and now back to broadening once more.  I think this is quite normal, as for each exhibition and focus a new statement needs to accompany the art to help the viewer see the artist's vision.   Now my focus, while broader than gyotaku and even water has a common denominator of reflections.   I analysed why I was drawn to the fish and the water and marbles, glass, etc.  Its the play of light back from a surface.  Its reflections.  Coming to that realization was  through an brain storming exercise where I wrote down everything that I liked about subjects, other paintings that drew me in, colour, landscape...almost like a storyboard of images, colour and ideas that helped me focus and drill down to what I was really thinking about in my art.   Now to put it into words.

A little pre-used canvas, a little left over paint on the palette and ideas of reflections in my head  created this 5 x 7 in oil of a marble.   Simple and without overthinking, this took about 30 minutes.

Secret Formulas

Between bouts with a large painting, my break becomes smaller pieces. And with an exhibition looming in May I wanted to create a few newer paintings.  This piece also serves as good practice for an upcoming workshop that I'll be delivering next weekend on painting water.

As I paint, I go through steps in my head to be able to explain how it is created.  Its never as simple to explain in words  how paintings come out at the end of a brush than it is to actually paint them.  And doing so while painting sets up a battle between right and left brain functions.  One side always loses or at least gets lost for awhile and its usually the left side.

Artists who teach are often expected to have secret formulas that provide others with all the ingredients of a successful painting.  And individuals believe that by purchasing the same paint, brushes, canvas, etc., etc. that becomes part of the formula for success. I wish it were that simple.  All I can provide is technical information in getting paint onto a surface and tips on learning how to observe.  The rest is down to the desire of the individual to practice, to learn to observe what is really there and to ensure they develop their own style, not a copy of mine.

For those still interested in knowing what my watery combinations are in oils, I can share that with you, but you'll have to do your homework and paint many gallons of water.   I use a mix of paint from different manufacturers from Daniel Smith, Richeson, Old Holland, LeFranc and Winsor & Newton.  I have a couple of favourite colours that turn up on each water-related palette as standards.   Richeson The Shiva Series Ice Blue; Old Holland, Caribbean Blue;  Daniel Smith Indigo, Cobalt Teal Blue, and Manganese Blue,  Maimeri Classico, Cerulean Blue.  Titianium white is a standard and I usually have Winsor & Newton large tubes on hand as they're available locally.  A new paint I've introduced is from Kama Pigments, Cold Grey Deep, perfect for the north Atlantic.

I use varying colour mixes from these and other colours that I introduce, depending on the water and the setting, reflections, etc. The turquoise so commonly seen I create from Cobalt Teal blue or use a combination of Cerulean Blue, Cadmium Yellow light and a touch of white.  Either work well for light shining through water in certain wave conditions.

For acrylics, its a similar palette that I'll share in another post.

Dull as ditchwater

I have a fondness for ditches.  There, I've said it.  Its out in the open.

I can't resist peeping into ditches as I walk down the road and, of course, living in the country, they're not a rarity.  Usually filled with water, plant life, water beetles, frogs and sometimes the odd little fish, they're endlessly interesting.

Then there's the light as it filters through the trees and bushes that hang over the ditches, forming patterns and casting shadows.

This is the inspiration for this rather abstract painting.  The water runs off the land, through the ditch on its way to the sea and depending on the time of year and depth of water, the earth gives an amber/golden colour to it as the sun shines through the trees into the water.

This is a 6 x 12 study for what will be a large painting  that I'll be setting up tomorrow.  And of course, a glimpse at the delicious isoindolinone yellow.  Isn't it just so vibrant in all its varying stages from pure to tint?

From the archives

So I'm digging through the archives to find a little treat as I haven't much new and wonderful to show you right now.  I came across photo of one of the Embden geese having a bath in a puddle in early spring.  With still snow on the ground you'd think the water would be too icy for bathing, but they never seemed to care, treating any bit of water like their own personal pond.  Even though the geese and I weren't the best of friends, I loved the look of them and their grace of movement.

I've been run over by a steamroller this week.  The cold from hell has captured me at gunpoint and won't let me go.  Ok, enough dramatics, suffice to say, I feel blah, but today is the first day I've had a glimmer of hope and not felt like curling up on the office floor at work with the heat on full blast. 

Why I am at working if I'm sick, you ask?  Well, welcome to the world of non-profits where nothing is average and everything is different. I truely can't remember the last time I had a sick day.  They're more a luxury than a norm and usually involve hospital or doctor visits.

So not much has been done with art this week.  I've pushed a little paint around halfheartedly then stopped again. But I have been reading and looking at other art sites and considering ideas for new pieces, one of which I'm starting tonight. 

My treat of tubes of new handmade paints arrived this week and only tonight have I squeezed some out and found a new colour to fall in love with.  Isoindolinone Yellow - I can't even pronounce it! But it is beautiful.  A true golden yellow, strong, but transparent.  Its like orange juice married a lemon and they had butter children. Ok, ok, blame it on the cold meds.  But this colour is heavenly.  You HAVE to try it.

Aquatic trio

I finally painted the third in this aquatic trio, a mussel shell.  I'd had a mussel shell that was perfect, put it somewhere for safe keeping and, of course, couldn't find it again.  So a local restaurant, unknown to them, provided the prop.  I may put a few more touches to the mussel, that mother of pearl inside shell is difficult to reproduce well and more difficult to reproduce in a photograph of a painting.

These are tiny (for me) 3" x 5" oil paintings on panels.  I will have them framed together if possible as they seem to be heading that way.  Its tempting to do a few more small pieces in a similar vein, but the best laid plans and all that...

This cold is wiping me and some OTC drugs are keeping me going during the day that at least take the edge off the worst of it so I can work and paint. Wouldn't we all be a miserable bunch if we couldn't rely on some temporary relief from discomfort?  I musn't complain (yes I know I already did) as others have a much worse lot in life. 

Revealed - complete

 Revealed

10" x 10"

oil on canvas panel 

Inbetween napping and toasting myself by the fire today, I put in a little time in the studio to see if I could get this clementine finished.  And I think I did.  I'll let it sit and dry and see if any additions are needed, then its good to go.

I've been doing some research on support to paint on with oils.  The types on offer vary considerably from manufacturer to manufacturer.  I've used a number of brands, from Winsor & Newton to Fredrix mostly, as they are available here, but I'm in the market for some new ones and think I'll give RayMar panels a try.  They have a range of cotton and linen canvasses and offer sample packages for sale which will make choosing much easier.  I wish all manufacturers offered samples, I'm quite willing to pay for them and not looking for handouts.  As long as the panels are professional quality, I'll be happy.

I tend to like panels more than stretched canvas, although I do use gallery canvas to get around the framing issues at times.  The panels provide a sturdy surface that's not as prone to damage.

What supports do you use for oil paint?  Panels or stretched canvas?  Do you have a favourite brand?

Revealing - update

I've done a little more work on this clementine.  Its a fine line to keep the light in the fruit and make it believable.  Citrus has such a high water content, light shining through it is almost the same as water, making it translucent and reflect colours.

This image was taken earlier this afternoon and I've added more detail to the piece since.  However, I find it really difficult, even with good lighting to get true colours of this painting.  Some colours just don't seem to photograph well under certain light conditions.

This afternoon the symptoms of a cold suddenly arrived out of the blue.  I hope it moves past quickly, as colds can sometimes knock the desire to paint right out of me.

Revealing - in progress

As usual, and likely the same as many painters, I have several paintings happening at once.  While one dries, I do some more work on another.  Its the necessary evil of oil paints, but also helps increase productivity. There are times that I want to rush things and am itching to put some glazing blues over the Calmer Waters piece, but I have to wait and let nature and oxidization take its course.

So I've started another clementine painting.  I took some photos of clementines I had around Christmas.  The season of them is fleeting usually and I wanted to make sure I had some extras at hand.  I was experimenting with the shapes of the peel and how much could be unwrapped without the peel dropping off.  That and strong directional light helps make a composition have more strength.

Here is about an hour's worth of paint in oil on a 10 x 10 inch canvas.

Calmer Waters

I'm letting the little boat sit in a corner and consider its transgressions for a few days before tackling it again.  Its often good to put something to one side if its not working for me then come back with fresh eyes at a later date.

Meanwhile I pulled out this piece that I had started previously of a fairly calm water surface.  The nuances in a body of water are one of the things that draw me to it. Perhaps the challenge in getting the shapes and values just right satisfies the detail freak in me.  It becomes a meditation of sorts and I can easily lose track of time while I create swirls and gentle curves on the water surface. This painting is in oils, 11" x 14".

My entry into the gallery world once more is off to a good start, with two paintings being sold today that had only just been put on the wall.  That will go towards my late birthday present to me of a load of Kama oil paints. I'm justifying the purchase as necessary art tools.   Besides traditional tubes of paint, I ordered a few oil sticks as well.  I haven't used oil sticks before.  I'm presuming they're similar but perhaps softer than oil pastels, but should be interesting for making marks.  I'll have to experiment a bit.  Tips are welcome if others have experience with them.

Boat woes

I've fought with this little boat for three days and still its not doing as I want.  The colours are ok, the shape isn't and I'm about to wipe it for the umpteenth time. 

Its likely because I'm tired and stressed from work and general busyness.  Daylight savings time play havoc with my body clock and it takes me a week or more to get over it, rather like jet lag.  I wish they'd just leave it all alone, it serves no purpose to me - and many others by the sounds of it.

So when all the factors combine, the construction of art seems to suffer.  I don't know if I'll continue to beat this piece to death or admit defeat while I'm ahead.  Its looking more like the latter right now, but you never know what a new day will bring. 

Tonight, in a moment of weakness, I ordered a dozen tubes of handmade oil paints and some oil sticks from Kama Pigments in Montreal.  Like all artists in moments of despair, I believe that the tools will be the saviour or the destruction of me.  Either way, quality pigments made traditionally cannot be a bad thing, can they?

Flight Path completed

The funny puffin coming in for a landing is complete and on his way to the gallery tomorrow. 

I quite enjoyed painting this bird and perhaps will try another seabird in the near future.  A gull maybe if I can get the right composition and light, not that there's any shortage of gulls around here!  They're brazen and would snatch food right out of your hand given half a chance.  It always amazes me at how large the gulls are, mostly herring gulls that I see here, but there are other varieties around.  I'm just not up on them.

But for now, this little clown will head out into the world.  Its 24" x 30" in oil on gallery canvas. Gary Jones has kindly provided the reference image for this piece.

Blues

I use the walls in my studio to hang paintings on nails to dry.  As I put up last night's blue donut on the wall with other pieces I noticed a trend emerging.  Everything is blue to varying degrees.  Some more prominently than others.  Yes there are other colour elements in the pieces but there seems to be an underlying blue connecting most pieces. 

I know I paint water which often does have blue tones, but haven't really noticed this before.  Tonight as I started a new piece and stepped back to look at the form, it too is blue.  Of course it is a blue boat to start with so there's no escaping that.

Blue is likely one of the most universally favoured colours and I'm no different.  Also as a child, I always was dressed in blue and still love to wear blue .  Maybe its engrained, maybe all my paintings will always be blue!

Do you notice a colourway seeping into your work every time you paint?

Something blue

I've never eaten (or even seen) a doughnut with blue icing on it before.  But this was one of the subjects on a challenge and instead of fiddling with a cat study as I have for the last couple of nights, I thought it was time to move on, so here's a little 5 x 7 in oil of one of life's sinful pleasures.

I've been working on water using acrylics and the switchback tends to be a bit frustrating after using oils for the last few months.  Each medium has its own quirks and it takes awhile to get back into the swing of it again.  But I had to admit that I enjoy oils more than acrylics.  Its the paint feel I believe.  Yes, it too has challenges, but I am more familiar with how to get around those now and enjoy the process.

The Spurrell Gallery in St. John's will be representing my work and currently have have several of my original works.  I'll be bringing in a few more pieces in next week, a couple of them being gyotaku prints to see how they fare in the open market.  Today the Gallery have my information and pieces on their website and I look forward to working with them into the future.

Backwash

 I've spent more time defining this wave to add some realism to it.  All those little fiddly details are what I love to work on, but there's a fine line between detail and overkill.  With water, its easy to go on forever adding light and darker values to the water surface, foam and spray. 

Close analysis of water reveals its complexities.  Its not simple  shapes or solid colours as so often depicted, especially by beginning artists. Creating a transparent, moving mass takes time and so often I see pieces discarded in frustration when another couple of hours of work would push them into a new direction.

I rarely work from a printed photo, as it never provides enough detail of the water surface and values.  I keep the image on the computer screen so I can enlarge and reduce it as required to really observe well.

This piece is a sample for a workshop and measures 8 x 16 on canvas panel in acrylics.

Making waves

Quite literally.   I'm trying out a demo piece for a workshop on painting water in acrylics that I'll be teaching later this month.  I've rather immersed myself in oil these last few months and need to get back into the feel for acrylic paint and how it performs again.

Its much easier for me to show than explain technique just as its easier for people to learn by seeing then doing.  I thought I'd test a video clip and see how it turned out.  I still need to get lighting better and have a tighter crop on the image.  However, this being an 8 x 16 canvas, its difficult to get closer without losing some of the image.  I used a Flip video cam to shoot this and have no control over focus only to zoom in and out a bit.  For the next video I'll try the Canon camera that has the video function on it and see what the difference is.  It should be much better as the resolution is so much higher.

For now, this is about 25 minutes of painting condensed into 3 minutes and is at about the halfway point of the painting.

The Medium War

There is an endless debate in art circles over which medium is the favoured one for producing art.  The purists say oil but I never hear a sound enough argument for the preference.  There is the argument that the 'masters' used it.  Well they did mostly because they had no alternative beside watercolour, both having to be created by hand in many instances, not a quick fix at a local art supply store.  In some areas of life, we cling to the past as if it shows us the way forward, instead of forging out own paths.

The collectors have their preferences also, again societal followings lead towards oil too, but without strong argument for the choice.  Are we programmed to presume oil is a higher quality medium to paint with?  And, if so, what drives that thought?

Skill in handling is often cited as a factor.  But that can be said of any tool used to produce art.  If you cannot handle the medium well and know how it performs, you set yourself up to fail.  Oil painting, like painting in any other medium takes practice, many hours of practice to become competent in it.

I was told today by a gallery owner that buyers currently look for oil paintings and that works under glass are out of favour.  Whims? Trends?  Who or what is the catalyst that pushes the end user to decide which medium should be the chosen one?  Is it the same trend that dictates what colour we should wear each year or paint the walls of our sitting rooms?

What about the image itself?  Where does composition, competence in technique and eye appeal fall down in terms of mediums?  A beautifully drawn piece can be as stunning as a beautifully painted piece in any medium.  I believe that if the view has a connection with the image, the medium in which it is executed has little role to play in whether it has appeal or not.

There's an eternal circle that exists of one medium chasing or being chased by another, one claiming superiority over the previous til it runs full circle back to its origins again.  And then there is the snob appeal of materials within some artist circles.  Its another version of  "Whoever dies with the most expensive toys wins." concept.   Some individuals slavish purchase outrageously priced materials in the hopes that the the higher the price and/or quality, it will magically turn their mediocre paintings into gold.....'oh, yes, that Sheep's Hoof Brown, its only $120 an ounce and made from the elusive Tattamangoula male sheep in Outer Mongolia, but its just divine to paint with darling and XWY uses it in alllllllllll his paintings and you know how much *they* go for...'  I know, over the top, but you've all heard something similar somewhere before, right? ;)

My conclusion?  Paint what you like, in whatever medium you like.  If you are competent in technique and composition, your work will find its own level.

Mine has leveled  today with a local gallery representing my work.  Stay tuned for more details soon.

Familiarity

 Watercolour, 200lb paper

Does this image look familiar?  Yes, its the Merry Christmas Hares piece that I painted and which sold at the Comfort & Joy exhibition just before Christmas. 

However, this isn't the original painting, its a replica that I'm currently producing.  The gallery rang me to ask if I could recreate the painting as the collector had an 'unfortunate accident' with the original.  I have painted the same object twice or more, but not the same painting, so took on the challenge.

This is were record keeping comes into play.   I usually scan or take photos of pieces at varying stages of production and the original hares drawing was scanned into the computer, as well the final painting was there too.  This helped speed up the process immensely as I could transfer the original drawing then just paint it.  Of course, it won't be the exact same piece, but close enough I think.  In fact, I'm liking this version more than the original.   Its nearing completion once I finish the hares and add some snow, then off to the framer again!

So record your paintings and progresses carefully, you never know when you'll need them again.