Red Pear in Low Light

Set this still life up in low light using a 15W light bulb.  Hard part was lighting the panel and palette without influencing the set up.  I had to make alot of adjustments to the color on the wood slab and the cast shadows.  What is normally a dark mixture is not dark enough for a low light condition. 

This is a 5x7 Oil on Linen Panel. 

Hey, Made my first sale. The Village House

So, I brought the painting by the house that I painted.  They made an offer I could not refuse.  Nothing crazy, but fair for a journeyman artist.  Kind of embarrassed by the praise.  Told them I was happy when the framer recognized the flowers even thought they were painterly.

Gooligan and Friends

Went to the Farmers Market yesterday.  Decided to grab some little pumpkins and gourds for painting.  Always an opportunity to practice my drawing skills.  One of my goals was to paint a white object convincingly.  As always, shadows were frustrating.  In keeping with a cool light warm shadows, I made use of Trans Red Oxide for the orange pumpkin and a warm grey for the white. 

8x10 Oil on Linen

Market Sunfowers

The Market in Syracuse is full of Sunflowers this time of year. My inner Van Gogh could not resist trying my had at a botanical arrangement. The use of live flowers certainly makes for motivation to complete in short timne. I tried to keep a little loose while capturing enough detail to work on my sketching.   I tried to reduce my palette this time, by using only one blue and no greens. Deciding on shadow color was tough. I tried three different schemes before settling on a transparent red orange to keep it warm.  Still having a hard time discerning shadow color.  I am told this comes with time.  Sure it does!?  Just like I'll start seeing the world in Henche color study blocks too!.

Village House

Drove by this place a few times, I thought if the sun poked out this morning, I would head there and paint. It did; and then it rained; and then the sun came out again. I hid under the SUV hatchback and kept the umbrella over the easel. The owners came out and took my picture.  Said they wanted to see it when it was done.  I'll go back. 


10x8 oil on primed panel.

Couple of New Paintings

"View from the Crew House"...8x10 oil on Panel

Set up by the Syracuse Univ crew house. Looking down river to Onandoga Lake. Thought about painting the crew boats, but fear got the best part of me. The green already had me vapor locked. 


"Morgan Road Farm" 8x10 oil on Panel

Road past this washed out barn on my bike, came back and painted it from across the field.

Red Jungle Fowl Rooster

This was certainly a fun experiment in using paints; lots of palette knife work.  The reference was of a red jungle fowl from a farm in Kauai.  These birds sort of lend themselves to be painted impasto.   I took some liberties with the extra color throughout the canvas for balance

Griz-ailey Painting

I was thinking about a drink made up by my friends Dave and Bobby Connolly while up at Krausman's carving studio and was inpired to paint the ingredients.  The Name is pronounced something like Griz-Ailey which is a total mispronunciation of Grisaille, the french word for underpainting.  We were in a decoy painting cand carving class. 

The Boat House

20x30 Oil on Linen

Planned Still Life

I recently finished the Ted Goerschener Workshop Book.  This painting is not a exercise from the book, but a replection of what I tried to do.  First of all, I drew this out in much more detail than I have ever used.  I took measurements of the pieces and then sketched the local, highlight and shadow lines.  I started with a complete transparent red oxide underpainting.  That was cool as I have never attempeted it.  So far this is a series of transparent colors built up.  The glass vase has been the most difficult.  It must appear round and transparent at the same time.  The sun flower will need 2 more coats at least to start to take shape.  Even though I am using cadmiums, there is not enough covering power for the underpaint and pencil marks.  Anyway, this is my weekend. 

Here is my set up in the hotel room.  Keeps the boredom in check..

Pear Studies

Bought some new fruit at the Wegmans.  A bartlett and a red pear.  Decided to work on drawing the foreshortened plate in these.  Man do I need a lot of work on that.  Also felt like doing some pallet knife work on the textured canvas.  Man do I hate textured canvas.  Well, at least the rough junk.  I need to load them with gesso to fill in the texture.  And as usual, cheap camera does not get the colors right, but I am trying to do a little editing

Barlett.  5x7 gesso panel
This pear had a nice peachy splotch.

Red Pear 5x7 canvas

This pear had so many colors running through it. I enjoyed trying to render. 



More Color Studies with Fruit

Having some fun with fruit and on to more color studies.   Yes I really love Mangos, but when I visited the store, I bought these two mangos so I could Paint them.  Trying to apply some of the lessons from the block studies.  By the Way.  A cheap camera cannot pick up the colors correctly so in person these look a bit different. 

Mango

Light was from the side using an old, and now yellow OTT light.  I am finally starting to see a bit more color in the shadows.  Its still tough, but I am also seeing reflected light and color where I did not see it before.  The shadow was not too dark because I had to have some additional light to see my pallette

Mango and Blueberrys 

   Having fun with both fruit and Edgar Payne balance composition.  I went for the blue cloth to compliment the orange in the Mango while creating a tough platform for blueberries.  Light was directly from the top. 

Color Studies

I have decided that shadows are a nemisis.  Specifically what a color does as it is in shadow or shade.  My friend Dave Connolly recommended some color block studies.  He mentioned he knocked out about 12 during a painting class.  I made some blocks and set up a couple of different settings to see what the effect were. 
The shading was added by adding cobalt blue, to the direct light color (Top color) to the medium side and then more cobalt for the shade side.  Where necessary, I added prussion blue to intensify the dark.  I should have color balanced because the table cloth is white.  The shadows were created by adding the complimentary color to the block in shade. 

1st painting Backlit.  Strong Colors with backer wall.  The red block is floating a bit.  I tried to correct on 2nd picture by darkening the lowest area of the shaded side. 



2nd Photo.  Backlit, lighter colors.  Two big changes here was the addition of reflected color and varying the side colors to allow the block to appear more natural. 

Blue Vase

Never set up for a Still Life.  Til now.  I pulled a bed sheet out and set up some lighting.  I could still use some drawing practice, but I am happy with the colors.  I cant make the photo look like the painting, so it does not appear exact. 

Backlit Pine

This was how I spent my lazy day today.  Bushwork underneath with some heavy pallet knife work to complete. 

Very much fun. 

Rising Moon Glow

My approach was Plein Air, but it was all done in studio. I snapped a photo of the moon rising early in the evening, It was still rather bright, but it was casting such a glow. In keeping with the approach, it was about 75 min.

5x7 Oils on Hardboard.