Rainy Day

I just finished Pause.  Pretty much a day long project and most of the time petrified that I'd mess up many of the wonderful elements that make the piece so special to me.  I really love this particular canvas and have used the energy from it to start four other works.  I honestly feel it's one of my very best works. The composition and brush strokes are just spot on in my mind.  It's just set the bar up that much higher for the rest of the paintings for the show and that's what it's about.


The tricky part with this painting was transitioning from full color into black and white (I say that loosely, because the juxtaposition of warm blacks/greys and cool blacks/greys are far from monochromatic).  I used this color strategy to control where the eye goes in the piece as well as amplifying what is indeed in color.  I'm using more color, but I like subtlety and a minimal pallet.

Finishing what I've started

First up is the completed A Small Escape and below that is Shopper 1. Today's rain somewhat derailed my goal of getting outside and painting the sides and hooking and eyeing all the pieces for the Small Print show that will be in Tempe this upcoming Friday.  Oh well, not the only thing on the to do list.  I need to finish some of the works I've started and put a portfolio printed piece together.  Besides when you have eight or so artworks in process the brain seems to get a little boggled.  When I get the new studio I'll try working that way again, but for the time being I don't have the space and I end up tucking work away out of sight and then it's out of mind to boot.  It's really hard to get back to working on a painting when it's been stuck in a closet out of sight. I find that I have to put it on the easel for a bit without touching it while working on other stuff.  


Life is about experiments or at least life as a painter is.


As mentioned above I've been putting a portfolio together, which really is just searching through my art folders to round up the best of the best.  It's always a challenge, but I'm going to resort to flipping coins if I have to.  I'm planning on sending out a mess of portfolios all over the country.  It's going to be my biggest push in a long time and perhaps a bit over due.  Who knows?  

While searching the folders I keep finding small works that really should be resurrected and put onto large canvases. A good example is Mersault which was part of a show at Modified back in 2008. It's just a fantastic painting and was only 12 x 24 inches.  It's the kind of composition that could easily live on a 36x72  or even a 48x96 canvas and it well should.  I'm also finding a bunch of works that have small passages that would look great on a 24x36 or larger canvas as well cropped.

Pensive (working title)

Above is Pensive (working title don't know if it will stick).  Keeping the same strategy of starting works and working on everything simultaneously in order to keep the body of work closely related.


With this one there is a debate about keeping a film noir color scheme.  It's just feels like color would be gratuitous if added if not disturb the dynamics of the composition.  I'll let time decide.

Another Day

A Small Escape is going along smoothly.  There has been an internal debate of whether or not I should have buildings in the background similar to Dreaming of April, but there's this deep gut feel that seems to stop me from disturbing the milky sky behind the figures.  Guess I should listen to that feeling.


I have so many paintings on the easel right now and I'm starting a new one today to add to the madness.  The strategy really is to have as many works going at the same time as possible in order to provide a more cohesive body of work.  When the new studio is built I actually plan to start designing entire shows at the same time and start all the canvases at once for the show with them leaning against the walls in open view.  I will simply bounce back and forth from canvas to canvas.  I think it will produce a very different body of work.  Ah, who knows it could change the way I work period or maybe I'll simply adopt a methodology of working that is a mixture of that strategy and what I do now?  Time will tell.

Pause

A relaxed day of painting.  For the most part I didn't push to hard to finish anything just bounced from canvas to canvas doing bits and pieces.  While things dried I spent time figuring out what the next canvases would be.  I'm planning to start three new works soon before I finish the ones I'm working on.  I want to make sure this body of work is very tightly linked together.  I want the pallet to stay a bit lighter.  I'm planning a series of night paintings as well that will dove tail into these current works as well.  


I don't have any painting shows pinned down at the moment just the knowledge that they're being scheduled sometime after April, so I'm just going to get the work ready to go for as early as May if needed.

Failed Snapshot

Above is a new painting entitled Failed Snapshot. Okay, started off as bit of a joke when I titled my photo.  It was one of those shots where I moved or accidently snapped a photo when I was in Seattle, so it was out of focus.  Somehow though the composition has grown on me.  I'm planning to leave most of the painting out of focus with some elements partially in focus.  The hope is to capture the movement and the reality of how people truly see the world.  When one walks down the street not everything is always in perfect focus due to concentration or movement. 


I'm debating whether or not I will be collaging elements into the canvas or not.  There are time where the collaged elements help tell the story and other times when they're gratuitous, which isn't a good thing.


I also painted more into Pause and A Small Escape, but that will have to wait till tomorrow's update.

A Small Escape

Above is the continuation of Pause (formerly Conversation), a detail of Pause and A Small Escape. Both canvases are going pretty well. I'm finding that I'm having to step back and take them in and not just paint away at the usual pace. There are many passages I might have carelessly painted over if I hadn't had to get a drink or a phone hadn't rung.

What I really like about these two canvases as that the central figures/characters are atypical choices for me. Pause is probably my favorite of the two solely for the reason that the canvas is very intimate and immediate. I used to compose like this a lot back in school. Ironically, back then I was more comfortable with a intimate almost claustrophobic viewing space and actually had to force myself out of that comfort zone to grow. It's nice to revisit that compositional framework. I like the power of it and how emotionally charged it can be.