Tuesday, June 30, 2009

Shrimp Boats, Darien GA 104 SOLD


This piece was done from part of a photo taken earlier this year. I have wanted to paint boats for quite some time but had yet to muster up the courage to do so, at least on this scale. I still have quite a bit to learn about painting boats and what not. The negative spaces are difficult as are the guide wires and supports. I am pleased with this first attempt and I look forward to doing more of these, especially in a larger format...

Monday, June 29, 2009

Old Boot, 103


This was a great way to loosen up last night. I had done one really bad landscape and needed something to work out, or come close at least. I have this great old pair of Dr. Marten boots I have had for years. The are worn to perfection... I got one out, grabbed my palette knife, mixed up gobs paint and had at it. It is very abstract, but that was kinda the point. Quick, loose, abstract and thick with paint... I am looking forward to doing this boot again... for the record, I used ultramarine, burnt umber, and some mixed up orange...

Seed Barn, 102


I did this 8"x10" study pretty quickly, and it isn't the way I want it to be either. I am no sure what I expected, but this isn't it... the composition is wrong, the colors are too muted, blah, blah. I was a bit distracted by my new umbrella contraption... my hat kept hitting it, the wind kept blowing my set up over and it was HOT... all part of the experience of plein air painting! This is a reminder that I still have a lot to learn, maybe next time I will go smaller... much smaller.

Friday, June 26, 2009

Red Boat, Darien 101 SOLD


I painted this image from a photo I took on our last excursion to Jekyll. This was taken on a dock in Darien, GA where the shrimp boats come in. It was one of those photos that sneak up on you. I was so focused on taking pictures of the shrimpers I almost didn't turn around to see this little gem. It sparkled in the sun with all of it's reds, yellows, greens and the reeds swaying in the wind. It looked like a boat they may row out in when they are painting boats, it was splattered with cerulean blue and white. It reminded me of one of my ladders from the house painting days. It was a great capture and I had to paint it. It was too bad we were on our way home and had been sucked dry by all of the mosquitoes, or I would have stayed to paint it on the spot.

They Can't All Be Good: Caddy Study


Thought I would share my latest unsuccessful piece. Sometimes when you are all excited about a subject, you do a study and it doesn't work out. This is one of those pieces.

I have all these pictures of this great, finned, '57 Caddy that I have painted before. I was very excited about this particular view because of the grill and the hooded headlight and the bullets on the grill... they reminded me of something Madonna would have worn once. I have already drawn it out on a 30"x40" canvas and all I had to do was this little color study and then I was off! Simple, right???..... no. Last night I went into the studio to whip out this little beaut and it crumbled before my eyes. You continue to rework and try to correct, but you really should just scrape it down and start over. This piece is not working for a lot of different reasons, and I am not sure if it will ever become large or not.... either way, it stands as a reminder that they can't all be good! Humbling...

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Compliments, Savannah 100


It just now dawned on me as I typed the title of this post that this is my 100th daily painting, seems like a miles stone, or at least it should be. As I look back from this painting to the very first daily painting, there has been significant growth... thank goodness.

The last time I was in Savannah, I was there for a conference on creativity. Needless to say, even though I was enthralled by the workshops, every chance I got, I escaped to the streets of Savannah (one of my favorite cities on the face on the planet) to take pictures of some of my favorite haunts. I wandered the streets of in uncannily 70 degree February weather rattling off photos in the great sunlight. This particular painting was inspired by a pictures of a house on Jones Street that was being restored, I loved the orange and the blue of the doors and even more, the cast shadows of the architectural details.

This is a color study for a 30"x40" painting I plan on doing of these doors.

click here to purchase

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Cool as a Cucumber, 099


In our garden, we have more cucumbers that we can shake a stick at, which is good, because I could live off them. BLT with C, tomato, cucumber and onion sandwiches, pickles, fried dill pickles, put the on a salad, eat them with humus, I love to juice them with and orange and an apple. What could be better. We have squash and zucchini, but who eats that stuff??

I tried this one with a yellow wash underneath, tomorrow, I may try it with blue, just to see. I always think of cucumbers as being cool in nature and color, but not always true, there was a great deal of orange in there, especially the seeds.

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Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Jekyll Inlet, 098


Another addition to the painting class arsenal of paintings. We did marshes again today and I worked from a photo that I took in Jekyll earlier this summer. The brushwork has become second nature and I don't notice it giving me as much trouble as it did. I hope to get comfortable enough in a bit to inject the palette knife into the mix. The palette is easier to manage as well, however it would be a lot easier to use if I wasn't so cheap. My blue is cheap and my red is expensive and I chased the red all morning... thus the reason there is so much red violet. Happy enough with the end result here. I did get some larger canvas today, so I am a bit anxious and apprehensive about going landscape large. It has been about 9 months of small studies since my last attempt at a larger landscape canvas, but it is about time to bite the bullet!

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Monday, June 22, 2009

Jennings Baptist Church, 097


I found a picture of this church after I extracted most of my photos from my corrupted photo library. I used to pass this church when we used to go visit my grandmother in Washington, GA. This little church is between Crawfordville and Sharon... old Georgia. I love these old churches, but they are slipping away from us, like much of the rural south. The tend to cover them in vinyl or add astro turf to the front steps, attach a fellowship hall that doesn't match or attach a new sign. This place is as beautiful as it was when I was a boy, still stuck in a time warp. This area of Georgia is like another home to me, it even smells different out there towards Augusta. Great backroads, great towns and villages and great peoiple. They don't grow them like that anymore and when they are gone, they are gone. Enjoy them while we can. They will either crumble and turn to dust or they will tear them down and put up a strip mall... we have no sense of preservation in the country, newer, with more plastic, please!

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Sunday, June 21, 2009

Three Lemons on Lilac 096 SOLD


Lemons were about the only thing left in the kitchen that we had enough of that I could cut up. Lemons were much more difficult than I had anticipated, I can't quite put my finger on it, but I will try! They were a lot greener than I thought and had a whole lot less yellow than I had anticipated. I am not exactly sure what I expected at the end, but I guess this is close enough. It has been a while since I have painted a vegetable or fruit, so it was not as easy as I had hope. I am pleased with the end result of the experiment.

SOLD

Saturday, June 20, 2009

Stand of Pines in Blue and Red Halftones 095


This is the second painting I did as a feel good piece, I still have more paint left on the palette in the freezer, so there may be more of these to come, I will try to space the out a bit. It is hard for me to get going once I start with these, they just keep coming until they are done and I am sick of them.

Friday, June 19, 2009

Stand of Pines in Yellow and Green Halftones 094


I was getting worried that my new viewer at DailyPainters may be getting the wrong impression about my work. The last 2 pieces and the first they have seen have been learning pieces for me, a new palette and subject matter I have yet to master. I have also been a bit lost in my painting efforts as of late, whihc I attribute to the introduction of the new palette and new techniques. I thought I would get back to business and do a few of my "Zen" pieces, pieces that make me feel comfortable.

I painted roses not that long ago and loved the colors I used, they were all halftone, so I took it upon myself to do the Stand of Pines series in that family of tones. This piece is the first installment. I am very happy with this piece, it has great color, a springy, sunshine feel, very warm. The textures are bold and I love the dabbles of other subtle tones within the piece.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Morning Greens, Marsh Study 093


I dusted my old stand-by palette off this morning and tried another marsh with some materials I am more accustomed to: cad yellow pale, . It didn't turn out as well as I had hoped, my indecision turned the piece a bit abstract, but that happens. Overall, I think this is a very interesting piece and one of my favorite marshes thus far. Tomorrow, I hope to do some fruit or perhaps something a bit larger for a weekend project.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Marsh, Jekyll Island 092


Thought I would give the new palette another whirl today. Practice, practice, practice! I am still not real happy with the trees, but the overall mood and the harmonies of the piece are nice... I am going to try my old palette tomorrow with the same reference and see if I can get what I am looking for. This palette is very hard to get dark, I was warned of the before hand, but there is a great deal I have to learn about painting marshes. These are by far the best I have done.

As of today, I have been accepted to dailypainters.com, an online community of daily painters from around the country plus a few. I found their site after Millie Gosch suggest I give it a whirl. After painting almost daily for 6 months now, I have been accepted to their community. I am honred. Some of the best in the business are there. I applied almost a mothe after I started daily painting, whihc was very premature, they suggested keeping a blog for almost a year. I was afraid they had passed me over, so much to my surprise, they sant an email e,ail confirmation tonight. So, welcome to those of you who founf me through dailypainters!

Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Driftwood Inlet, Jekyll Island 091 SOLD


This is the piece I did in the Millie Gosch painting class this morning. I am becoming more comfortable with the colors and the mixing but I have still yet to inject the use of the palette knife. I have enjoyed working with the brush again but I also hope to be able to thicken the paint up as get used to these new hues, which would enable me to manipulate the edges with the knife. We shall see! This was done from a photo I took while we were on Jekyll.

Monday, June 15, 2009

Field Study 090


Tomorrow is painting class so I wanted to make sure that I had a t least practiced with our new colors a bit. I have discussed in previous posting the palette I used and the one we are experimenting with now... This piece is done from one of Millie's photos we used last March when we did our first workshop.

At the moment I am grappling with the colors and the brush and I am shying away from my usual techniques. This field study is small, I feel good about the colors and values, the brushwork is still lame and my trees still look like cookie cutter trees with holes poked in them. I really need to work on creating form and volume... I smell some serious tree studies in my future. My edges don't quite seem to work well either, there are a couple of places where they are passable, but that's about it!

Going to the Gallery


These pieces were inspired by my smaller daily pieces. Some of my favorite work is of small objects painted larger than life. So I decided to do the same. After beginning theses larger works I noticed I had a penchant for dissected fruits and veggies. I love the form of fruits and the like, but the radial and lateral symmetry are much more interesting to me, so I am moving in that direction.

These pieces will be taken to downtown Newnan, GA where they will hang in the Flint Gallery in Panoply. All pieces are 24"x24" painted inoil on museum wrap, which has a much deeper profile than gallery wrap.

Angry Starwberries 089


I don't quite know why I had such a hard time with these strawberries, but I did. They mad eme very mad, or maybe I was already mad. I find that half the time, anger and frustration are the emotions I feel while I paint and that after, it is usually happiness. After being out in nature painting it was difficult for me to come back in and paint from still life. I am not sure why, but it was like i had no idea what i was doing and even after i was finished, it looked like i had no idea what I was doing. After I took a picture to post I could see every flaw. It was almost like I was halfway done. Either way, I worked on it a bit before and after it was dry. It's a study after all and I should lose too much sleep over it anyway!

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Mobile Location Shots, Jekyll Island








These are some location photos from the painting trip to Jekyll Island. I posted these on my Facebook profile page as we went, but thought I would share them here as well. I love taking photos of the paintings where they were painted. There are also some pictures of the campsite and Driftwood Beach I mentioned in other posts. Enjoy!

Tuesday, Day 3 Jekyll Island: Surrender 088 SOLD


We decided to stay for and extra day despite noisy neighbors and barking dogs. I am so glad we did, they all packed up and left and pretty much left the tent section to us and the raccoons. Needless to say, we goofed off in the morning, I reworked my pack situation and really got it down to a more managable, packable size. This was key since we ware haling lunch, chairs, blankets, hammocks and tarps around not to mention my gear.

We went back to Driftwood, where I dared to paint a dead tree. After my tree experience the day before, I was a bit gun shy. The best thing about Driftwood is that you dont need a tent. We took our tarp whihc was our ground cover, some rope, our chairs and my backpacking hammock whihc is amde of parachute material and seats 2. The high was going to be 97 that day, so I bought a rediculous straw hat just in case I had to be in full sun... we set up just right, tied the tarp over somew dead limbs, hung the hammock, set up the chairs and hung out all day.

The tree I painted reminded my of surrender, like it gave all it had, faughht the ocean but never gave up, so far as it never fell down, it just bowed it's head. It was a beautiful majestic tree at some point. I was so pleased with this piece. My brushwork was passable and my color harmonies were just right. I squeezed out 3 tiny squirst of my mud and put my primaries on top of them, thus creating harmony in the secondaries and tertairy colors as well. Painting the ocean water was also a first. very pleased with that piece.

Afterwards, I slept the afternoon away in the hammock in the peace and quiet.

Monday, Jekyll Island Day 2: Marsh and River Study 086 & 087





Today started with a scouting run and a campfire breakfast with musquitos. Nothing better, really. We went to clam beach where I did a study of the marsh there. I struggled iwth this one for a bit but it turned out pretty well. I actually found a different view that I will do later as a larger painting. The colors were ok, and everything seemed to work well. I kept with the traditional brush and tried not to stray to the palette knife, so my brushwork is iffy at best. I also kept my palette very simple: cad yellow light, cad red medium, ultramarine blue, my mud and titanium white. I am trying to travel light but I am still not light enough. I have way too much gear.

The second painting was a quick one, before lunch. The haze was starting to burn off and I love the atmospherec perspective and the bright green off the marsh grasses. I did this one in about 5 minutes, so, not a whole lot going on there!

We ventured back for lunch and the out to Driftwood Beach to paint this beautiful wind swept oak was. The sun was at its peak and I had no umbrella, but I went for it anyway. I am not crazy about the study, but I know a larger painting will be great. Still fighting with the brush over the knife... my edges are screwy.

Driftwood Beach is anything but driftwood. It is on the north western side of the island where the beach has eroded and the maritine forest has been encroached upon by the salt water. It is a beautiful bone yard. I felt like I was playing umongst dinosaur bones. It was beautiful and sad. I love water and live oaks like no other tree. Most of theme are older than our country, now dried up and dead, washed over. Their root balls are amazingly large. The pines however, have such a long tap root, they mostly still stand erect but dead.

Jekyll Isalnd Day 1: Marsh Inlet Study 085 SOLD


What a blur the last week of school was... exams, grades and comments for every student. Not to mention I was the commencement speaker for the senior class. Needless to say, I was in a daze all last week. The speech went well and I have been told it was the best ever... which means a lot, my father gave the best one I ever heard followed by the legend Lewis Grizzard and friend and fellow teacher Jeff Stuart. I was blown away by how many people stood in line to shake my hand (can you believe it) and emailed, called and sent Facebook messages. Today is the first day I have not heard from someone about it... a week later, the honeymoon is over. I will post a copy of my address as well as a link to the video as soon as I get it. Aparently it was amusing.

Jules, in all of her infinite wisdom, knew I needed to get away soon, so she scheduled for us to go camping on Jekyll Island. This will be my first visit since my ill fated first marriage in 2000. The Georgia coast is my favorite place on earth and I am glad she did this for me, she is the best. I don't know many people who would do that. I love to camp, but warm weather camping is not something I enjoy, as I am a polar bear by nature. It was hot, humid and buggy... but who cares when it is summer, you don't have to work and you have more painting supplies than you know what to do with.

Day one, we scouted and took pictures. Later that night I did this study from a picture I had taken that day outside of the Jekyll Island Club. I drew from the camera, which shut of every 2 seconds. It helped to knock the rust of and get the juices flowing.

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Kiwi 084


It felt great to get back to small stuff today. I love these smaller pieces. I can get something out of them that I can get out of a larger piece. The larger pieces seem so over worked in comparison to the smaller ones, it feels like using a butter knife to fix a loose screw on a pair of glasses, but that is what is so great. When you work larger, all your tools are small, when you work small, all your tools are large. I also get the perfect amount of form breakdown and it is easier to build up the large cuts of paint with the knife. The small paintings are awesome. Fresh, distorted and full of life. A little piece of painting goodness...

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Workshop, Day 1: Chattahoochee Study 083


Today was the first day of my second workshop with Millie Gosch. I took from her a year ago, and she changed my life. I had never used oils before and the workshop really tuned me in. I also give her credit for getting me to try daily painting. Today she threw me a curve ball by using different colors and brands that I have become accustomed to. I use cad red medium, cad yellow light, ultramarine, sap green and white and my "mud". We used permanent red light, cad yellow lemon, and cobalt blue light all by Rembrandt. It took me a while just to get used to mixing the new colors, so I did not do my regular knife manipulation. It was also strange working in a setting with a lot of different folks around... it was a great morning and I am very excited about our next class.

This painting is based on a photo she brought in. I am pleased with the end result, but it lacks the usual Boyd quality. I did enjoy the challenge of the water and the new color palette. I plan on doing this painting a couple of time. Look for it and the other posts from the workshop.