All About the HeART

Current exhibit up at Peterson-Cody Gallery in Santa Fe, NM. It is all on a Valentine's Day theme and the color red, My favorite!

The show is up Feb 1-29, 2012.

Here are a couple of mine in the show.

Fast Lane

Oil 32" x 47"

The Bribe

Oil 11" x 14"

Here is sampling of a few others.

How to Keep Paintings From Sliding in the Frame

Here's a simple solution to prevent your paintings from sliding around in a frame that doesn't have a tight fit.  It's always annoying when a painting shifts around during shipping and scratches the surface of the paint.

Back Side of The Certainty of Youth and The Complexity of Wisdom

I cut a few pieces of black foam core and use them as spacers between the edge of the painted panel and the edge of the frame.

In this instance the thickness of the foam core was the correct thickness to keep the painting snug. If it needs to be smaller the foam core can squish together, its kind of springy and that works too. If you have a bigger space you can use the foam core flat rather than on the side.

I find the best solution is to do a floating frame but depending on the design of the piece that is not always viable.

The gessoed panel or canvas is secured in the frame with a Fletcher's Framer's Point Driver. It's the best thing since sliced bread.

Another indispensable tool is the Fletcher PullMate, for removing the points.

Front Side of The Certainty of Youth and The Complexity of Wisdom

This painting is at Peterson-Cody Gallery in Santa Fe, NM., and here are a couple posts I did about the making of the work:

Black and White Or Shades of Gray?

 

The Inspiration Quotient or Mr. Coffee

 

I'm working on my November newsletter introducing plein air and alla prima oil sketches I've done over the past year.

 

To get the 7 tips for Plein Air painting that I learned the hard way, sign up to receive my monthly newsletter here.

Extraterrestrials in Santa Fe?

I was only there for a couple days for my show opening at Peterson-Cody Gallery, which will be up through the end of November, 2011. I explored the downtown area and poked my head in a few galleries as well as the New Mexico Museum of Art.

It all seemed exotic and alien to my southern eyes, you'll see what I mean.

Crop circles, crops in a circle, twentieth century art?

Being a southern gardener, when I see a plant I immediately name it,  couldn't do it there, they were like alien plants.

Coolest art EVER by Rik Allen at the Blue Rain Gallery, blown glass and steel. Inside the glass capsule is a tiny red chair. Love, love, love the retro sci-fi stuff, his show was titled Adrift.

Then there were the actual aliens, street art aliens that is.

More street art. I love discovering this stuff. If anyone can identify the artists let me know. This one might be documenting the alien crash sight.

Artist, Martin Spei defying gravity with his Meteorite Man at gf Contemporary.

Karen Lamonte, cast glass, at the New Mexico Museum of Art. (possibly an abduction, only the kimono remains). Seriously, I've seen Karen's work many times and it never fails to amaze and mesmerize me.

Awesome Judy Chicago from 2000, also at the museum. Cast glass and paint with a light behind it. Kyrptonite?

Jacob Pfeiffer's work is entirely other worldly, so delicate, the colors glow! This one is Bulbous, 8x10, oil on panel, at Meyer East Gallery.

Think about actually going cross country in that thing. This was at my hotel, The Old Santa Fe Inn, a nice place to stay, right downtown and very reasonable. Starbucks 'round the clock in the lobby, and a free hot burrito breakfast bar, free wi-fi that works, yes!

Adobe construction is so bizarre and beautiful. It's everywhere, no brick or siding in sight. I was very curious about the construction.

Then I met a couple guys in the process of repairing a building. The were nice enough to answer my crazy tourist questions.

They showed me this section where the adobe bricks are visible. Also it turns out the color is a tinted lime wash and not really paint.

Evidence of extraterrestrials in New Mexico-you decide? I'm just here to ask the tough questions.

Where No Man Has Gone Before

Veni, Vidi, Veci

More later about other art and the fabulous food!

More info for those inquiring minds:

My and Forrest Solis' show installed at Peterson-Cody.

Below is a video, with commentary about the work in the show.

Karen LaMonte's work

The New Mexico Museum of Art

The Meyer East Gallery 

The gf Contemporary

Blue Rain Gallery
Terry Strickland Art YouTube Channel

Opening Night in Santa Fe

with Martine-Bertin Peterson, gallery owner/director

LA artist Shanna Galloway and her husband Jim came into town for the show and a weekend of exploring Santa Fe.

Forrest Solis' paintings, Ben Hammonds sculptures

It was a beautiful opening, the gallery looked great. It was wonderful to see the other artists work that Peterson-Cody Gallery represents. Here are just a few.

Jane Jones

Darlis Lamb sculpture, Annie Dover paintings,

Dennis Wojtkiewicz

Josh Moulton, Gordon Inyard

I'll do a post later about the rest of the weekend which included a freak snow storm that left the entire downtown without power for half a day. Santa Fe is an adventure.

The Inspiration Equation or Ideas Percolate Like Mr. Coffee

Today I wanted to write about The Inspiration Equation or How Ideas Percolate.

X+Y = the Final Product - W Magazine uses this kind of equation to explain their fashion photo shoots and it makes sense to me. Sometimes there is a linear progression of thought for a piece. 

Mr. Coffee - In truth it's really much more complicated than that because there's no way to factor in years of life experience and emotions for example. Sometimes an artist doesn't know why they make the connections they do, it's more like percolating water flowing over ground up coffee beans and picking up a little something along its way into the pot.

"The Certainty of Youth and the Complexity of Wisdom", Diptych frame size 43x49,
each panel 29x18, oil on panel

So this is how all the following ideas added up to my painting.


Common Saying - "seeing things in black and white or in shades of gray". I think that is true and the older I get, the more I understand about certain situations, the less clear cut the issue is.

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 Billy Joel - A few years ago I heard his song Shades of Grey, for the umpteenth time and it dawned on me that there was truth to what he'd written. I frequently find wisdom in the lyrics of singer-song writers, they are indeed the poets of our day. (lyrics to the song are at the bottom of this post) 

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Make it so #1 - I sent my mind out looking for ways to visually present this very intangible idea. It literally took a couple of years for something to bubble to the top.

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Rocks? - I'm not sure when the rocks occurred to me so that will have to be a blank in the equation. 

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Awesome Models - A young model and a mature model to capture the idea that wisdom comes with age (hopefully). Both models are fellow Birmingham, AL artists. I decided that they should be depicted separately to allow for the possibility that it could be the same man at a different ages, for that reason they couldn't exist in the same pictorial space, hence the diptych. 

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Costumes - I wanted the younger model to be wearing a crisp white shirt and my mature model to be wearing a more relaxed shirt. Turns out my younger model didn't own a dress shirt, so he bought one on the way to my studio. When we took it out of the package it still had the fold creases, PERFECT, I thought for the black and white character. My older model is a sculptor so he lives in denim shirts anyway. This is an example of how models contribute to the painting in important ways besides how they look.

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Renaissance Altarpieces and Portraits - These things say "This is of import" and I couldn't resist having an elaborate frame, like the one below, built to house my diptych.

Piero dell Francesca, Diptych Portrait: Battista Sforza & Federico da Montefeltro, 1472-3

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my painting

Maybe that gives some insight into the creative process, it was a fun exercise for me anyway...

Here's another post about The Certainty of Youth and the Complexity of Wisdom that has many close-ups and other paintings that feature these models.

Lyrics to Shades Of Grey: by Billy Joel
Some things were perfectly clear, seen with the vision of youth
No doubts and nothing to fear, I claimed the corner on truth
These days it's harder to say I know what I'm fighting for
My faith is falling away
I'm not that sure anymore

Shades of grey wherever I go
The more I find out the less that I know
Black and white is how it should be
But shades of grey are the colors I see

Once there were trenches and walls and one point of every view
Fight 'til the other man falls
Kill him before he kills you
These days the edges are blurred, I'm old and tired of war
I hear the other man's words
I'm not that sure anymore

Shades of grey are all that I find
When I come to the enemy line
Black and white was so easy for me
But shades of grey are the colors I see

Now with the wisdom of years I try to reason things out
And the only people I fear are those who never have doubts
Save us all from arrogant men, and all the causes they're for
I won't be righteous again
I'm not that sure anymore

Shades of grey wherever I go
The more I find out the less that I know
Ain't no rainbows shining on me
Shades of grey are the colors I see

Serial Artist

Count Down to "Story Within"- 2 days to go!

How do you know when a series is exhausted? If the subject still has appeal for me I'm willing to continue exploring it. 

Our Dancing Days, 30x40, oil on panel, is a large piece created for this show "Story Within".

Here's a post I did about Our Dancing Days. I realize I've done three other paintings at this point that were initially inspired by the clearing in the woods near my house. The models are my son, my daughter and my daughter-in-law. I think each painting has a different feel, at sometimes being playful, sensual or mysterious.

"If Music Be the Food of Love, Play On", oil on canvas over panel, 32x39

"The Clearing", 24x18, oil on panel

"Ripe Was the Drowsy Hour", 18x24, oil on panel

How do you work in a series? Some artists work on one series at a time, designing them all as a cohesive group. I seem to have several series going at the same time and work on them for years.

I did The Clearing and If Music Be the Food of Love, Play On in 2009, and just finished Our Dancing Days and Ripe Was the Drowsy Hour this summer 2011, with many paintings in between. 

Why even work in a series? For me it is hard to say everything I want to say about a particular subject in one painting. It takes the pressure off knowing that it doesn't have to all be said within the borders one piece, especially if it's a complex subject. 

The Changing Series. Interestingly enough sometimes the series fizzles out and I know I'm done with it, but other times a series get a crazy spin off series, kind of like Torchwood from Dr. Who? or Pinky and the Brain from Animaniacs... Anyway you get the idea!

For example the Incognito Series of paintings that I've been working on since 2005, spawned The Incognito Project in 2010. It's a very specific Event and Show. 

I'm still working on that project, having completed 15 paintings with 14 more in the works. The collection will be shown here in Birmingham, AL, at a date TBA. The work is also being documented for a book.

But in the mean time come see me in Santa Fe at the Peterson-Cody Gallery for my opening on Nov, 4, 2011 with Forrest Solis, I'll be in town.

I am interested in the hows and whys you do serial work, so let me hear from you. Until tomorrow!

Triangle Power

Count Down to "Story Within"- 3 days to go!

One of the large piece created for this show, "Story Within", at Peterson-Cody Gallery in Santa Fe, NM, opening Nov, 4, 2011 is Power Struggle, 30x40, oil on panel.

This is a composition of triangles considered the most stable of design devices. The triangle also has symbolic roots in ancient culture.

In Egypt the triangle was a symbolic representation of a triad related to man, woman and offspring, think pyramids. In Greece a triangle was the door of life; for Pythagoreans a symbol of the goddess of wisdom Athena; in Buddhism a triangle symbolized pure flame and three treasures of Buddha.  In Christianity equilateral triangle signifies the consummation, closure, accomplishment, completion, Trinity.

Just a few trivia tid-bits there. I'm not sure all that had anything to do with the initial design since it's impossible to arm wrestle and not get a few triangles, however when analyzing why a composition works or doesn't, it's an interesting thing to think about.

Here's a previous post I did about Power Struggle where I used pre-varnish images. This piece was very difficult to get a good picture of and I'm still not sure the color is right.

Here are a couple posts about the tricky business of photographing oil paintings, Part 1 and Part 2.

See you tomorrow!