market flowers

I've been working on this, slowly, over the past week or so.  It's the flower market at Pike Place Market in Seattle, a place I visited last year.  I'm not sure if I've hit the sweet spot between enough detail and too much detail.

Painting the Nude

Today we had the same model as last week, same pose.  I brought a larger canvas, it helped.  We've got her again next week, stay tuned.  I didn't want to paint her foot today, and set up the composition so that it wasn't on the canvas, which clearly is a lousy way to deal with a painting problem. I did like the foot that tucks under her leg, though.

Flowers, after the figure - updated

I painted a nude figure in the studio yesterday and I was not getting in the groove, not at all.  I have nothing to show for that effort.  I made the mistake of using a pretty small canvas and it went downhill from there.  We'll have that model next week and I hope to make a better showing of it next week.

For now, here's more flowers, painted using a photo from Maine last summer as a reference.  Good way to cheer up in the gray of winter.

The painting started out just fine, but I went back into it today to lighten the grassy lawn and create stronger contrast between the lawn and the trees at the background.  I ended up giving the flower stems a stronger role in the painting and I like the energy they add.

this is how it started last week

this is how it looks in final form

Another sketch of the unexpected - Metro Goat - Updated!

this is the start of the work 

Continuing my exploration of "what if" skteches, the view of blinding light that awaits at the top of the escalator has been replaced by a goat in Tuscany.  Maybe that would put a smile on the face of haggard commuters coming up from the metro.

I'm not sure when or if I'll turn these sketches into larger paintings, but the ideas are flowing.

I worked on this some more today, I figure I might as well take the sketch to a greater resolution, so here it is:

Unexpected on the Metro

 I am working on a sketch to get ready to make a large metro painting.  The canvas I'm using for the sketch is 6" high by 12" wide.  In order to make it transportable, my plan is to make a triptych that's three panels that are something like 30" x 20" so that the final will be 30" high by 60" wide.  I need to play around with the math ... I may adjust this.

Anyway, I was looking at recent work by Ed Miller, a friend whose reality-based work is fantastic -- and his new work takes those works and moves beyond into a mix of reality and history, fantasy and dizzying perspectives.  It's not my direction, but I thought about how the unexpected in a painting can elevate work.  So... what if there was a girl in a bikini on the metro escalator?

To heighten the focus (as if she wasn't attention-grabbing already) I cooled down all the other color in the sketch so she is the main warm spot drawing you in.

View of St. John Ruins

Working on a Party Invite

Just for fun.  I've got so much paint on the canvas that I need to let this sit before I can add in some blues and greens.

Return to the Canadian Rockies

I started this painting of the Canadian Rockies a while back.  I wanted to get back to it and today I had time.  I have a photo to look at for a reference, but a lot of what there is to capture about July in the mountains is the clarity of the air, the majesty of the mountains, the force of nature.  Those intangibles are the challenge.

Flowers and more flowers

I got one last small painting out of the bouquet I brought into the studio last week.

The roses were painted based on an arrangement on the table at Rose's Luxury, a very wonderful restaurant in DC.  I took a photo of them and between that reference and my warm feelings/memories of a big family/friend dinner, painted them as lush and loose.

Flowers, finished

Well, I didn't think I'd end up here, but there was something about the rhythm of the petals of the chrysanthemums that kept calling out to me.