Summer has arrived...

The paintings of the commission are coming together quickly now.  Same amount of hours being spent, but they're moving faster nonetheless.


I have a feeling that the Steel Bridge work will be the first one completed even though it was the last one started.  I've been working hard to balance the collaged motif with the painterly sky.  Around Midday  I pretty much obliterated the painterly dark sky I'd painted with a pallet knife loaded with white, titan white and light grey.  The textures created are wonderful and don't have the look I generally see as the result of knife painting.  I guess that's why I so rarely utilize the technique.  Every once in a while I have a moment of inspiration and do something I hadn't done before.  I was just really hungry for the physicality of paint on the surface as much as I like my smooth blended skies I just wanted something more brutal.  I am softening it up just a bit, but the mass and textures will remain.


These two bridges are dramatically different.  The Steel Bridge feels like two rusty towers that jet up into the sky like monuments of a bygone era, while the Fremont spans the water with all the grace of a spider tracing it's web.  The constant is the sky and how these works are tied together.


With it hitting triple digits in the studio; summer has arrived. I purchased a portable evaporative cooler. I'm having buyer's remorse.  It just turned the studio into a sauna. I will give it a try again not waiting until it's hot in there to give it a go.  I may just have to work early in the mornings and at night, no big deal really.  Until the commission is finished I will be braving the blunt of the heat.  My goal is to have the commission finished within the next two weeks considering how fast the Steel is going.