Off to New Hampshire

Pine Grove Farm, 2006, Oil on Panel, 30x30










I am slowly getting back into the groove of painting. It feels good yet is slightly painful as I maybe would have enjoyed another week or so off. But I am on a very relaxed schedule, with time to have lunch with friends, chat with the guys who are working on our porch, take my 3 mile walk each day, bake cookies and basically sit around a bit more than I usually do.

Today I have to finish up and deliver six small pieces to the Cooperstown Art Association for their annual Holiday Member Show & Sale. My local sales have tapered off a bit (I think most of the people in our small town who like my work have already bought one or more pieces) but I still like to support the local arts if I can. I am also going to do the underpaintings for the show I have coming up in January. If I get a good start now I actually think that I can take some serious time off in December. I will be doing 25 or so medium sized pieces, plus maybe a couple of larger ones, in the 24x36 range. While that might sound like a lot, after the last few months it seems like child's play to me!

I won't be posting tomorrow or Friday, as I am off to Concord, NH. The opening reception for the show that will include the eight barn paintings (including the one above) that I did in September, is on Thursday night and I thought I should attend. I wish Doug could come with me but he has to stay with the kids (now there's a switch, usually usually I am the one at home while he is gallivanting around the country), plus he and I are going there next week for another opening and staying overnight, so for this one I am going by myself. With the exception of the fact that I will probably spend much time standing around awkwardly at the reception, I am looking forward to having a few days by myself, even if I will be driving for much of each day (it's a 5 hour drive each way and I am so grateful to the person who invented satellite radio!).

The show will be at 2 Pillsbury Street in Concord, which is a newly renovated historic office building. The Anderson-Soule Gallery, which represents my work in Concord has opened a second space in the lobby of the building named appropriately, The Gallery. The show is called Old Barns/New Perspectives and the other artists whose work will be featured are Richard Gombar and Heather Stearns. The show will be on display until the end of January. The organizers of the reception chose this image to be on the front of the invitation for the event and so I am very flattered by that. I was also asked to participate in a radio interview on the Thursday afternoon and I pretty much declined that (my schedule IS pretty tight that day, as I am not sure when I will get to town). I know that interviews are very important and I don't mind doing them for print, but radio and TV are pretty far beyond my comfort zone. I think that I will be able to do them at some point, however I am not there yet.

This event is open to the public of course, and so if anybody out there is nearby please come and save me from looking like a pathetic loner at this social event. Oh yeah, and you can check out some art and probably eat some food too.

The Opening

Path in Front of the Barn, 2006, Oil on Panel, 6x6










Based on the unusually high number of hits to my blog the last few days, I suspect that some of my regular readers are waiting for an update concerning the opening reception on Saturday night. I didn't intend to be coy about it-the reason I didn't post about it was because our satellite was down all day Sunday, which was kind of nice having no contact with the outside world whatsoever. But by Monday morning that wore thin, and since Doug REALLY needs the internet for his work, he spent much of Monday climbing up and down the ladder to the roof in order to get the position right. I don't like for him to do this as I don't think we have enough life insurance on him, but it was a beautiful sunny day with no wind or snow and the repair crew wasn't going to be able to get out here for 5-7 days. So at the end of the day, our reception hit 64 and we have been back to staring at a screen ever since.

I also wanted to thank everyone who left comments and emailed me with words of reassurance and commiseration. It was so thoughtful of you all and helped me feel much better. Thanks!

The opening went pretty well. It was fun, there wasn't a big huge crowd, but clearly everyone knew each other and many people came to see Jane's work, I think. And she did very well, selling several pieces at the opening, including one with a price that made my eyes all buggy-$11,000! That was so awesome! She and I chatted quite a bit, exchanging info about painting techniques, studios and the galleries that we both show at. Unfortunately, the other artists weren't there so I missed out on meeting them.

Carrie was very complimentary about my work and I love that she really appreciates and understands what I do, the palette, the mood, the imagery. As I mentioned though, she didn't care for the large, 48x60 painting and so I was not surprised to see that it had not been hung (Doug and I took it home and it is safely tucked away in our office for the time being). One small piece had sold before we got there and one larger piece, 24x36, sold at the opening to a very nice woman who said it reminded her of a view that she remembered from her childhood. That is what I like to hear! She and her friend were really looking forward to having it in their home. And since Saturday, I believe one more piece has sold, although, as you all know I won't be checking in to find out, because of the jinx factor. Oh, and Carrie told me that several people stopped in on Thursday and Friday specifically to see my work. I think one of them might have been a blog reader who had emailed me to get the details about the show. So hearing about that kind of stuff is really good for the old ego.

But now it is time to put the show, the compliments and the attention aside and gear up for the next show. I have had a very easy week, a pretty good post-show meltdown and now I must start again. I will be preparing panels tomorrow for the first batch of paintings intended for a show in January at The Harrison Gallery.

Gotta keep plugging away.

I am Moderately Freaked Out

Pink Barn with X's, 2006, Oil on Panel, 6x6










All last week, I was feeling confident about the work that I took to the gallery for the show and in fact just kind of floated through the last few days not thinking about any of it very much at all. I worked on several small, 6 inch square paintings for a small works show, cleaned up the house, caught up on the yard work a bit, did some baking and made a nice lunch yesterday for the guys who are working on our porch. Basically I took it easy and didn't do too much in the studio, kind of forgetting about it all for awhile.

But then last night I looked on the gallery's website and they had posted some photos of the show, including a shot of my section. It looks as if they had decided NOT to hang the 48x60 barn painting (I had suspected they might not-when I dropped it off they weren't too keen on it) AND I can see that at least one piece from a previous show was hung along with the new work. This set off all my anxieties, and I woke up convinced that my newer work sucks and that it was a struggle for the gallery just to find anything good to hang. And Jane's work looks amazing-her paintings are huge and beautiful and I am totally envious, but in a good way really, because I am very happy and proud for her, that she is so successful. It's just that I want that too, and today I am feeling very impatient about about getting there.

I think it helps me a bit ultimately (it's kind of that jinx thing-too much confidence is a jinx in my book) to have all of these doubts and worries, but in the meantime, I am kind of freaking out. I AM disappointed that they didn't like the big piece (mostly because now I have to figure out what the heck to do with it), and while I know and understand that everyone has different opinions (obviously, because otherwise I would be way more successful, we all would be) about what they like, part of me always hopes that everyone will love every painting that I do.

I know that this is all part of the post-show meltdown. The opening will be fine, I will meet cool people and maybe sell a few pieces. It'll be fine. I just need to have a good half day of insecurity, embarrassment and yucky feelings of disappointment in order to enjoy the fun part.

I guess.

Making Suggestions To a Gallery

Pink Patch, 206, Oil on Panel. 16x20













James at jrmedia asked me an interesting question in response to yesterday's post. He said:

I'm wondering, when you send your work to a gallery, do you ever 'suggest' how the pieces will hang - or is that just not the done thing?

I started to write a response and as usual it became rather long-winded so I thought I'd make a post of it. That way I can really prattle on and on.

Most of the galleries that I have worked with do a beautiful job of hanging their shows. So I have felt very comfortable in leaving my work and returning to find a nicely displayed exhibition. Doug and I have hung several of my shows at a few different art associations, so we know what's involved and that it does take a good eye and a bit of flair. I have a tendency to include too much work (editing my own work is not one of my talents) so I prefer to let the gallery take care of that as well as to group the paintings according to how they interpret them. Which is usually different than how I would. Which is good.

So at this point, I have never made any suggestions as to how they should hang my work. I suppose I might at some point, although right now I can't imagine doing that. I did come close this time, however, to making a suggestion. I made two large pieces specifically for the two spots in the gallery that will accommodate them, the director and I had discussed that ahead of time and she gave me the wall measurements. So when I dropped the paintings off, I mentioned that the two large pieces were meant for those spots, however if they felt that the work would be better suited somewhere else I was fine with that. Whatever they decide there will be no hissy fits on my part.

I certainly have had my share of bad experiences though. Mostly with art organizations whose livelihood doesn't necessarily depend on sales from their shows. I was in a show at an arts org a while ago and they did a terrible job of hanging the work, everything was either too low or too high and the groupings had no balance. They only sold about three pieces from the entire show and I feel certain that that number would have been higher if it had been hung better. There's a local organization that I participate in each year and I always offer to hang my pieces because they seem to have some difficulty with it, things are crooked and the nail holes and scuffs aren't always cleaned up properly. Last time, one of the two lights directed at my paintings had a burned out bulb at the opening, which was annoying. I did complain about that as I think that it really affected how my work looked at the opening. Burned out bulbs, especially at the opening receptions, are one of my pet peeves in a gallery and when I see that, it really bothers me. I was in a group show once where there were maybe 5 bulbs out. I didn't complain but it has affected my decisions about participating in future shows there.

That was a very long answer to a short question, which you all should expect from me by now. heh. To answer the other part about whether it is "the done thing", I don't know. And I would love to know. Perhaps some artists make suggestions, those who are more assertive than I am, and I imagine that more prominent artists would have some control over that if they wanted it, that is.

So tell us if you make suggestions about hanging a show or if you have heard of others doing so.

Exhibit Information

Pink Hills, 2006, Oil on Panel, 36x48













The show at Carrie Haddad Gallery is in the process of being hung this week. I look forward to seeing how Carrie and Melissa, the director, choose to organize my paintings. I always love to see how others interpret a grouping of my work and how it differs from what I would do.

While this is not a solo show, it's not your typical group show either. The work by the artists will be hung in separate areas so there will be some definition between each body of work. The other artists included here are painters Jane Bloodgood-Abrams, Barbara Mink, and sculptor Gregory Smith. Along with me and the female owned gallery this qualifies as a very high ratio of art and organization by women. (Edna: take note!)

Jane and I are represented by several of the same galleries in the area and we have had occasional contact by email. We have not crossed paths in real life however, so I am looking forward to meeting her and I hope we have a few minutes to chat. I suspect we may not though, her work is very popular in the Hudson area and I think many people will come to see her and her beautiful, luminous, paintings. I am honored to be included in the same show as Jane and also hope I will get a bit of her overflow!

Barbara Mink is a painter from Ithaca. Arthur at the The Thinking Eye wrote about her work here. While I don't know her and have not seen her work in person, Barbara's work looks to be fairly abstract, full of energy, color and texture. I also look forward to meeting her and seeing her work in person which is always so much more interesting as we all know.

Gregory Smith is a sculptor who lives in Vermont. I am not familiar with him, but after reading about his work here I am very intrigued. This will be a good chance for me to learn more about an area of art that I often look past, not to be dismissive certainly, but in order to focus on painting or drawing, which is what I tend to relate to a bit more.

I think Carrie and Melissa, as usual, have put together a very interesting combination of art and artists.

The opening is on Saturday, November 4 from 6-8pm. Please come by if you are in the area. And just to remind you all of how trivial I am, I will be spending the next few days trying to decide which variation on black I will be wearing.

Halloween

Cast Shadow, 2006, Oil on Panel, 18x24













I have never been a huge fan of Halloween. I liked dressing up when I was a kid but as I got older I felt a bit embarrassed to wear a costume. So mostly it's been a holiday that I basically didn't pay much attention to.

Until we lived in a real house in a real neighborhood in Milford, Connecticut. It was the first Halloween that Doug and I lived together and we realized that we would be getting trick or treaters. So I bought several bags of candy about a week before and we proceeded to eat all of the candy before Halloween. Clearly we had maturity issues. Instead of buying more candy for us to eat, we dug out some holographic glasses from our stash in the basement (Doug's company in Utah made them, so for some reason we had hundreds of them on hand) and we handed them out. We were told by the neighbors that the next day on the school bus all of the kids were wearing glasses with images of eyeballs, kittens, alien eyes and peace signs on the lenses. Doug and I felt very proud of this achievement!

The next year things changed. K., our nephew (he was 4) came to live with us and so we had to do a costume plus take him trick or treating. I put together a bad batman costume (I made that poor boy wear a leotard and tights) and Doug took him around the neighborhood. K. is developmentally handicapped and he has a few behavioral quirks one of which was walking right into people's homes and making himself at home. Every time they stopped at a house, Doug would chat with the neighbor for a minute and K. would slip away and disappear into the house, usually making a beeline for toys to play with. It took them hours to get around the block because Doug would have to retrieve K. from inside of each house.

We moved to Utah and started having babies. Soon there were many costume parties involving screaming toddlers in pumpkin costumes, cupcakes with licorice spiders on top and green punch with floating sour worms on dry ice, in addition to the trick or treating. When my second baby was born I decided to learn to sew in order to make cool costumes for the kids. Over the years I made many costumes including a lion, a witch, a princess, a bat, a ghost, a cowgirl, a angel, a cat and I probably made a dozen capes in various sizes and styles. Now that the kids are older, however, they desperately want store bought costumes. I have relented because I don't have as much time to sew anymore. But today I am feeling a bit nostalgic for the years when I would begin planning their costumes in early September. Tonight we will have a trojan warrior (though we haven't decided if K. who is now 17 should be trick or treating or not), a psycho clown/flame thrower in a skeleton suit (I take no responsibility for THAT one), a devil and batgirl. It was a good decision to move to a house in the country so we don't need to buy candy. Alas, Doug and I are still a bit immature: despite our efforts at keeping away from sugar, tomorrow we will be alone with the kid's candy all day and we will have to make sure it's safe for them to eat. heh.

This is a photo of the kids on Halloween 2001. I made the girl's costumes, as well as the magician's cape.

Small Paintings and Big Dust Bunnies

Pink Fog, 2006, Oil on Panel, 18x24













Literally, the day after I finished the 48"x60" and 36"x48" panels, I began work on eight 6"x6" paintings. The whole time I was doing the underpaintings for them I was shaking my head trying to clear the visions of huge imagery. It felt a bit surreal, but the underpaintings look fine and hopefully I will have a bit more clarity when I work on them again.

I took my work down to the gallery in Hudson on Sunday. Everything went smoothly, although I realized on the drive home that my night vision is really not what it used to be. Guess I need to visit the eye doctor again. Anyway, my studio looks almost barren now. It's a strange feeling to walk though it without bumping into anything, except for the pet hair/dust bunnies which have become large and very saucy, landing right in the middle of the room instead of hiding in the corners like they usually do.

Links

Strong Sky, 2006, Oil on Panel, 12x12











A few new (to me anyway, some have been around for awhile) blogs have captured my attention lately. Supposedly I have been so busy for the last few months that everything besides painting and a few kid related activities fell by the wayside, but the truth is that I did manage to keep up with blog reading and I continued to find blogs that interested me.

A few were blogs that I had seen previously and hadn't taken to for whatever reason. Art and Perception is one that I had bookmarked months ago but I didn't really visit it very often. All of a sudden though, the topics and conversations there intrigued me and I have been enjoying reading it daily. Karl has kindly invited me to write an entry and now that my schedule is easing up a bit I may do that. Well, if I can think of a good topic-they cover a lot of territory over there!

Neil Hollingsworth is another artist whose blog I had occasionally looked at, and now I am checking it daily to see his new work. I really wanted to buy this painting, but the price went up and beyond my current art buying budget, good for him! Normally, I don't collect work that is so realistic, but Neil's work has really grabbed me and I do hope to be able to buy one of his pieces at some point. I did, however, recently buy a painting by another daily painter, Peter Yesis. I saw this on his blog one day and knew it was for me. I love the color, the graphic quality and just the whole feel of the scene. I tracked it on ebay, won the auction and Peter shipped it to me along with a very nice thank you note. I am very happy to have it in my collection of art. Peter does a great job of showing his painting process on his blog also, which I find fascinating.

June Parrish Cookson recently began a blog and has become active in reading and commenting here and on other blogs so many of you may be familiar with her already. I think her work is very interesting and evocative and there is also a distinctive regionalist feel about them which is something that I really connect with. I like her paintings of houses and this one especially gets me. She also writes very eloquently about her art and her life.

This is another daily painter whose blog I just found and I love her work and her attitude. Karin Jurick does these wonderful paintings of everything; people, street scenes, still life, landscapes. She is very skilled and her paintings have a wonderful intimacy about them. Something I aspire to. I love her sense of color as well and Karin also seems to be incredibly productive, showing hundreds of images on her blog and website. This painting is my favorite, and I can totally relate to her story about it being too fussy and wiping off a sign and other details.

Feel free to post links to art-related blogs that have been inspiring you lately!

Finished!

Long View with Red Trees, 2006, Oil on Panel, 12x24



And so all of a sudden I am finished. I felt frantic and busy all day on Wednesday as I rushed around trying to finish up the two large paintings as well as several 18x24's. At the end of the day I looked at my list and realized that I have plenty of paintings for the show, in fact I am probably going to deliver too many for the space where my work will be displayed. But I much prefer to take too many rather than not enough. Carrie will do some editing if necessary.

I do still have to put the final clear coat on the pieces that I finished up yesterday, as well as do the paperwork, paint the cradles and put on the hangers and labels. However, I have three whole days for that, minus a few hours for a soccer game and a trip to Home Depot and the stupid Walmart to finish shopping for my son's costume. Everything has been photographed, although the large panels will need to be done again at the gallery, I think. I will post those next week, after I get a better shot of them.

Doug and I are driving down on Sunday to deliver the pieces. I need his help with the 48x60, not to mention his big, gas guzzling SUV, which I don't like to drive (I have a tendency to run over curbs and that sort of thing when I drive it, it's so big). Sometimes it does come in handy though, like for transporting ridiculously big paintings. I was hoping to take next week off, in fact I have been clinging to that hope, however I do have to keep painting, at least a little bit. I have to do several pieces for a small works show at Gallery 100 in Saratoga Springs as well as some things for a local holiday show. But I will be able to work at a leisurely pace and will be able to get back to real life chores that have been neglected for the last several months.

I can't believe it's over. Post-show meltdown, here I come! I may have to order myself a big box of Godiva chocolates to get through it properly though. heh.

A True Money Pit

The Geometry of Two Barns, 2006, Oil on Panel, 12x16






Not much to report today. I didn't work on the large panels Tuesday as they weren't quite dry from the previous day's layer. I spent most of the afternoon putting the color down on a few more pieces, some of which may go in this show as they turned out nicely.

Naturally, because I am getting close to the frantic stage of trying to get everything done by this weekend, this also happened to be the week that our friend and contractor, Steve, sent his crew to fix our ailing front porch. We knew the roof was bad because parts of it were usually on the ground after a good rainstorm, but also the ceiling was sagging downwards, the front corner was listing to the left and just for fun I thought it would be really nice to have a few lights out there, not to mention an electrical outlet. They were also going to replace the support posts underneath the floor while keeping the existing floor structure and posts intact. However, when they removed the siding and looked at the structure underneath, they discovered that what I had thought was simply piles of bricks, wood scraps and cinderblocks left by the somewhat eccentric old farmer who used to own the house, was in fact what was supporting the entire porch. Great. Then we realized that the existing turned wood posts (you can see one of them on the lawn in the photo below) look really stupid on our classic two hundred year old farmhouse. So everything except the frame of the roof has been removed and we will get a shiny (and plumb) new porch with lighting! and a bill next week that is nearly twice as much as we had expected.

Can't wait until we get that exterior painted next spring. Who knows what they'll find when they scrape the paint off and how much that will cost us....

Close

Things went pretty smoothly yesterday, I'd say. I spent awhile deciding on colors and then it took me some time to get used to using different materials like the larger brushes, and to having things set up differently. I am not quite sure when I became such a creature of habit, but it was nice to mix things up a bit, even if it was a bit unsettling. And I still can't get over how much paint, medium and cotton cloths I went through! I am usually so thrifty with my supplies and am accustomed to using very minimal amounts of paint so it was kind of shocking to use a half tube here, a half tube there and a large portion of my last bottle of medium just to cover the panel! Doug will be visiting Pearl Paints when he is in the city this week for an emergency container of Liquin.

The lighting issue turned out to be a non-issue. I put a clamp light at the top of the easel and Doug set a light stand up high so I ended up with about the same kind and amount of light that I normally have.

I struggled with the color of the foreground on the first piece that I worked on, the barn on the 48x60 panel (left, in above photo). I must have painted that foreground five different colors before I finally settled on a bluish green color, which was quite similar to the color I had applied in the first place. hmmm. Well, sometimes you have to go in circles, I guess. I am not completely satisfied with the color so I will be trying another glaze on it. Also, I feel like the image is a bit stiff at this point and so I need to try and loosen it up a bit. But it is close to working, I think.

The second piece just painted itself (pictured below) and honestly I felt like crying afterwards, I was so relieved. There are still a few minor things to be done, like lightening the foreground a bit, but it is essentially finished. In this one I didn't add color to the trees, instead leaving them the color of the underpainting. I feel as if the painting would really be dragged down if I were to add color to the trees, by not doing that the piece is lighter and more energetic.

I will have to work on them on Wednesday however, because I applied some of the paint rather thickly and I also worked into the evening on Monday so the paint isn't completely dry today. I will spend today working on several more paintings that may included in this show if they turn out. Um, before Saturday.

In talking with Doug at the end of the day on Monday, I realized that the move to working at a larger scale went fairly smoothly despite my initial trepidation. No new problems appeared really, the things I struggled with here are the same things I usually have difficulty with in my work which are color harmony, spatial issues and edges.

We also figured out that if I were to sell twenty 48x60 paintings, I'd have about enough money to build a new studio. No problem, right?! ha

Ready For the Color

Light on Orange Barn, 2006, Oil on Panel, 16x20






Well, today is the big day. The big panels have gotten their red glaze and today I will be applying the next layer of color. Thanks again to Steven LaRose who suggested I try a Purdy house painting brush. I did and it was great for the glaze, it did leave some brush strokes but with a bit of finesse I was able to get rid of those and get the smooth look that I prefer. I have several of those brushes now in different sizes, plus my very expensive sable brush so I am feeling pretty good about the brush situation. I am a bit concerned about having enough light to work under though. So far I have been doing layers that I don't necessarily need good lighting for. But when I do the full color the light is pretty important. I do not have very good natural light in my studio and setting up my work lights over such large panels will be tricky. If I am freaking out tomorrow, you'll know that the lighting is what did me in.

So wish me luck, no wait, don't do that it, it could jinx me. Positive thoughts would be ok but we all know that has the power to create a jinx too if you're not careful. Maybe just come back tomorrow to see what happened. That would be good.

Good Timing

Yellow Strip, 2006, Oil on Panel, 12x16













I am just plugging away, trying to get enough work finished by the end of next week which is when I have to deliver the paintings. The underpaintings are taking their time drying although there has been some progress. As long as they are dry by Monday, I won't be panicking. Well, no more than I already am anyway.

I am going through that thing right now where I am totally second guessing the quality of the paintings that I am putting together for this show. I go through this almost every time that I prepare for a show and I understand it, but still it is a bit unnerving. I was right in the worst of it when I sent out about five jpegs to the gallery. I would not have been surprised to get a call canceling me out of the show that's how badly I felt about my work that day. But Carrie emailed me and said she loved the new paintings and was really looking forward to the show. That was a much needed confidence boost and it came at a really good time, right when I need to find another burst of energy to finish up this next batch of paintings.

Sometimes timing is everything.

Drying Time

Shadow on Road, 2006, Oil on Panel, 12x16













I enjoyed doing the underpaintings on the large panels. Physically it was more of a challenge- there was much rearranging, raising and lowering the easel, moving lights, etc. For the 48x60 panel, I had to stand on a stool to do the top section and on both of them I had to stand back from the piece often to see what I had done. I probably circled my studio a hundred times yesterday. Technically, just applying and then removing paint on such a large surface made my arm hurt. I tried to use my left hand for the busy work of applying paint, but still my right hand (I am right handed) had to do most of the work and my shoulder is sore today. Of course some of that is left over from preparing the panels and well as from moving the panel from room to room and from when I got trapped between a desk and a table and had to stand in an awkward position while trying not to drop the big panel until Doug could save me. Anyway, I was pleased to find that the end results looked good and that they both have a nice feel. Keeping the images very simple helped with this. As I get more comfortable working at this scale, I will do images with a bit more detail, like signs and that sort of thing. I did have to suppress my urge to "noodle" here, it seemed as if it were a good time to get good clean lines, when in fact I prefer kind of messy, soft lines. So I had to be a bit careful there. All in all, a very good experience and I feel confident about the underpaintings, at least. Generally, when I mess up a painting it's during the glazes.

Because of the size, I figured I needed to use paint with a longer "workability" time. Last spring I began having problems with the paint in the underpaintings not drying, which I discussed here. I switched to a different brand of paint which I have been using all summer and has worked out nicely. The underpaintings dry in a day or two and while that has been fabulous, the paint sets up more quickly and I have to work fast to finish the image. So for these panels I used the original paint and it will be at least three days before they dry. While they are drying, I will stay very busy finishing up the other paintings for the show, and I plan to start one more batch of paintings tomorrow, "just in case." Better to have too many than not enough and if the large panels don't work out (always a possibility that I must consider) I will be needing extra work to fill up those large walls.

The Underpaintings

I tried to post on Tuesday but our satellite was down for most of the day because of weather, rain, not snow yet, thankfully. So I spent the day working on the underpaintings on the big panels. I had gessoed the panels on Monday, sanded them and so they were all ready to go.

I thought I'd describe how I do the underpaintings in a bit more detail. The first thing I do is to rub paint all over the panel. I used a whole tube of paint on each of these panels! Too bad most of it gets rubbed off. Cotton cloths work well here, no paint brushes for me at this stage, I could if I wanted to but I prefer the effect I get from using a cloth.

Then I start to form the image by pulling out the light areas and leaving the darks. My focus here is to get the drawing right, the forms and the lights and darks established. I also try not to think and plan too much as I tend to overwork if I do that. This is where listening to music or talk radio comes in really handy. However, I do have to think a bit about whether I will use a light or a dark color in a specific area. If I leave an area dark in the underpainting, then I am limited as to which colors I can use in order to keep the washy, layered look that I prefer later on. But that is about the most thought I put into the painting at this point. The rest is mostly instinctive-and pretty much the only question I ask myself is whether or not it "looks right".

There is another aspect that I have to balance here though. I would prefer to leave the underpaintings very dark and moody and expressive, but if I do that it is technically really difficult to layer the colors over it later. It becomes too dark or has a "pastey" look to it that I don't like. So I have learned to keep the underpaintings lighter and simpler. I can always add things in later (often I leave windows or doors out in the underpainting) if I want, though I don't do that too often. And if I am not sure about the colors that I will use (normally I have no idea what colors I will use at this point, I decide that later, uh, pretty much at the very moment that I begin to paint) I will make the area really light so I will have more flexibility later on when I choose colors.

This is the large panel about halfway finished. You can see the other large panel on the left:


















And a closeup (sorry about the glare on these) :














I am not sure what color the foreground will be so I decide to pull all of the paint off in case I decide that it must be yellow. I also make some adjustments to the barn and shadows. At first the barn was short and squat, which I liked but I didn't really like how it worked with the rest of the composition, so I changed it to a more traditional proportion. Sometimes giving up a part, no matter how much you like it, helps the whole. Remembering that has helped me out of quite a few jams.

And here it is finished.


















I consider the underpaintings to be sketches, but really they are an integral part of what you see in the painting. They do much of the work of the image, they are the bones. And I love doing the underpaintings. I love to get my hands in the paint, though now I use gloves instead of bare hands, and I love to create the volume and mood. At first I just wanted to make these, and while they seemed finished to me no one else thought they were, and I began to use color. And then they really started to sing. But while I love the color too, the process of making the underpainting is what really gets me. Often, as I discussed here, I use a different color and leave them as is.

So go ahead and try working like this sometime. It's a good change of pace and can give you a new way to look at things. I prefer the earthier colors now, but I have used many other colors in the past. Blues and greens are effective if you are painting the figure, the flesh colors look amazing over blue, and for a few years after college I did a number of paintings in black, using turpentine to really get the light areas. I have worked with and without brushes and with and without turpentine. It takes some experimenting to get comfortable as it is quite different than working all prima. I have been working with the underpaintings and glazes so long now I am a bit flummoxed when it comes to alla prima anymore!

And this is going to sound really corny, but this whole process really fulfills the various needs that I have as a painter. I get to be really spontaneous, but then I have to show some restraint and patience by working just a little bit each day in order to complete the piece. There is a constant push and pull between those two elements, hurry up and wait. I really dig that. Or that digs me. Either way.

Preparing the Large Panels

Paintings in Progress.










Ok, I decided to go ahead and track my progress on these large panels on the blog, since doing that was quite helpful with the barn project last month. So here we go again.

Every time I start a new project, there ends up being some kind of chain reaction in the studio. On Saturday, I did nine more under paintings, here are a few:













and since I hadn't done the final coat on the finished paintings, I had to move a few things around in order to fit the new pieces onto the picture rails. So I had to move the large panel into the adjoining room, which is where Doug works and where my office area is, in order to stack underpaintings on the easel so they could dry. I decided to prepare the large panels in the office area, so I brought in a big table plus a card table to work on so I could two panels prepared. I was worried about the cats jumping up on them, as they seem to feel as if they own every surface in the house but they never did jump up on these. Perhaps they sensed that they would be throttled if they were to land on my wet paint this time.

I am planning to paint one of the 48"x60" panels, as well as the 36"x48" panel and so on Sunday I began to prepare those two panels. I applied two coats of wood primer to the back, and then turned them over and put two coats on the front surface, sanding between each coat. Today I will apply a coat of gesso, the brushy gesso layer that I like to paint on. A light sand, and then I will be ready to do the underpaintings. I know that many artists apply several layers of gesso in order to build up a really thick and smooth surface, but that's not the kind of surface that I am going after, so since the wood is primed well I am going with just one layer of gesso.













Also, on Sunday I coated a few of the finished pieces and today I will be able to move a few things around again and maybe get the large panel back onto the easel so that I can do the underpainting on it on Tuesday. I don't normally do studies for my paintings, preferring instead to work out the image, composition, light and shadows in the underpainting stage, but for the large paintings, I thought that maybe I should do an 8x10 just to have something to go on when I start those. Of course I don't have to be married to the study, I can make changes if I want to, but I like the studies that I did and will probably refer to them as I begin. Guess you could say we're engaged.

Somebody Should Have Stopped Me

Why didn't anyone stop me from buying, not just one, but 2 FOUR FOOT BY FIVE FOOT PANELS???????? I know Doug has this whole supportive art spouse crap going on but really, when I am about to do something so insanely crazy, he should be stopping me.

In the section where my work will be displayed in the Carrie Haddad Gallery, there is one wall that is at the end of the long narrow space which is 80' wide-perfect for one large piece. So in a moment of complete and utter self-confidence, I ordered two 48"x60" wood panels, and then a 48"x48" and a 36"x48" panel just for good measure. Doug picked them up at Soho Artists Materials yesterday and they are just beautiful. It's a shame to muck them up with a bunch of paint. I unloaded them this morning and managed to get one of the 4'x5' panels into my studio and onto an easel but I have no idea where I will keep the others (they are leaning against the wall in the dining room where the cats are very carefully inspecting them right now). I don't know where I am going to prime them-I guess if we have a warm day this weekend, I can set up a spot in our uninsulated and terribly messy garage, full of bugs and critters who will either run through or get stuck in the gesso. Otherwise I may have to take over the dining room, which poses it's own risks, such as paw prints or damage inflicted by children.

Even if I do manage to get it prepared, I have no idea how in the heck I am going to paint that large. I have only one large brush, (yes, the one that cost $205.99), and I don't know how I am going to get a decent light source on a panel that size. The natural light in my studio sucks so that's no help. Good grief.

But I have to admit that despite the pressures of priming the panel, storage, time and material issues, I am totally looking forward to the challenge of doing a painting this size. Kind of a good stretch for me, you know? Well that, or we will end up with several lovely new tabletops.

A Day Not Lost

Barn in Progress








So the field trip turned out to be quite interesting. No bus ride, instead we had a nice walk to (and from) the cemetery, which basically took care of my whole stupid exercise thing for the day. Once there we split up into groups and based on a list of questions from the teacher, who was extremely organized, the students recorded information from various headstones. We looked at families, a captain who fought in the revolution, a mother and her infant who died in childbirth, servants who were buried at the back of the cemetery and spent some time in the section where the town's founding family was buried, including the author James Fenimore Cooper (Last of the Mohicans) and his extended family. The students had been studying graveyards and knew quite a bit about placement of the head and foot stones and how the graves where organized, so I learned quite a bit from them!

I had thought that the field trip would make me lose another day in the studio, as I have had all kinds of interruptions to my work schedule over the last week or so. I haven't minded too much, despite a growing sense of panic at how little time I have to finish up work for the show, because I have been feeling somewhat blocked and have been glad for any excuse to take a break. I managed to do about nine under paintings last Friday, but have felt less than excited about them and then along with the erratic schedule I just haven't been feeling it, you know? So I thought yesterday would be another lost day but I ended up being able to work all afternoon (I didn't have to pick up the kid's until about 5pm) and with a roast in the slow cooker and Doug out of town I had no distractions for five lovely hours. And so I managed to get my groove back and do some work that I am excited about.

Just in the nick of time too, because I only have two weeks until I have to deliver the work for the show in Hudson. Yikes....

Field Trip

Ten Squares, 2006, Oil on Panel, 24x36






No real post today. Within two days after I left a comment on Steve's blog that I avoid going on my kid's field trips "like the plague", my son came to me and asked if I would come along on a field trip with his favorite class, Language Arts. I tried to say no but he got me with the puppy dog eyes and since I am usually more of an embarrassment to him these days, I figured I better take advantage of these requests while I still get them.

So I am off to spend the morning at a cemetery (they are studying local history) with a gaggle of sixth graders.

Happy 50th! And Thanks God It's Not Me (Yet)

I wanted to say a very public Happy Birthday to my dear, but now very old husband, Doug. The last few weeks have been filled with many jokes concerning hair, blindness and memory loss and the kids have been marveling at the fact that they have a father that is a half century old. Doug takes all of this teasing well, mostly because he is in pretty good shape. He actually has all of his hair, it's not gray yet and he is not on any prescription medications.

I am off to wrap a few gifts, make a home made carrot cake with cream cheese frosting and to plan our little family party.