Opening Tomorrow Night!

Opening Reception is tomorrow night -
Fri, June 5, 2009
5-7 pm

Lotus and Orchid Gallery
21 West Street, Keene, NH

Hope to see you there!

Still breathing!

Haven't posted in a while. Life has been busy!

THE BIG NEWS
This week, I'm wrapping up a bunch of paintings and bringing them to Keene, NH for a show at Lotus and Orchid, an eclectic little gallery with a broad range of art. I'm being paired up with a sculptor, so it will be interesting to see the combo.

Being a commercial gallery, not a public space exhibit, I'm finally allowed to show Introspect. It's generally been considered too R-rated for civic building shows. I'm so excited it's finally being seen that I've put it on the show card.

The show is running June 5-30, with the opening reception on June 5 from 5-7 pm. For anyone who wants to come, Lotus and Orchid is located at 21 West Street, Keene, New Hampshire. It's about a half block off the big rotary around the green on Main Street. Everyone is welcome!


ON THE PAINTING FRONT
I've started working on the New Allegiances painting, but can't stand it's progress so far. My schedule has only allowed an hour or two here and there, and I really think I need to wait until I have a couple of whole days to work on it in one stretch.

The pair of paintings for Distant Sharing are coming along. "Transmitter" is all primed and ready to be painted and "Receiver" is all molded, but needs to dry more solidly before priming.

I've started the frame for Bereft, but still have to put in the cross-bracing before stretching the canvas. It's a whopper, one of the biggest I've done in a while.

Finished?

I did more painting this afternoon and I think this one is done.
This is part of a series (I've yet to tell Dad I need a bunch more casts - uh oh). It's one of the more subdued ones, a quiet transfer of energy, including an entire rainbow of undertones, but just hinted in the underlayers. The next one I want to do is similar in composition, but will have more of a rush of energy - more bright colors and less regard for the forms on the canvas. This one has colors contained within the bounds of sculpted elements on the canvas.

If there's any more to do on it, it will only be some small integration of brighter over-strokes of color here and there.

I took a long look from a good distance (about 45 feet?) From far away, it looks like it's too subtle, but from a normal viewing distance (about 10 feet) it looks understated, but discernible and most of all, balanced. It's signed and ready to dry for the upcoming show. It's just very hard to know when you're done a lot of the time.


As I mentioned before, I'm painting outdoors. The lighting and air quality can't be beat. Here's a view from a bench at the edge of the yard. I'm hanging the paintings off the front steps and have a chair and work table set up about 10 feet away.

Next up?
I'm eager to get going on the "Forming and Shedding Allegiances" piece, but also want to repaint a couple of previously exhibited paintings that I'm just not happy with - "Opening" and "Re-Entry". Those are very large and I have a show in a smaller space coming up in June, so I'll focus on the medium to small pieces for now.

Middle phase

Worked on Intercedence again. Mid-tones and some of the final blue. It's not quite done at this point. I'm still working out the arms and third level of circles from the top character. I was surprised that much of the paint from last week had dried substantially, but it loosened when I started working on it.


The dark blue I use for "background" is a special mix of colors I work up in large quantities. It's kind of the background field of energy through which we all move. I work in the background colors with a kind of cross-hatch brush stroke. There will be more over-painting after that to refine and integrate the colors. It's really the best way to pull out bright spots and work over some of the rough areas. It's a slow build-up of layers. It's evolving.


I was hoping that the lower area around the lower face would have a glowing lower edge above the billowy areas at the bottom. This took some work. I kept going for way too much light and finally darkened it enough to make the edge glow.

Let Spring Painting Begin!

Well, yesterday it was finally warm enough on a day I had off from other work to bring a canvas outdoors to paint. It's better than working with the not quite balanced light downstairs in my studio space. These are just the first few layers of color. I always work in light-to-dark stages. In the interim, it looks absolutely hideous, but the bright colors eventually just peep out from the dark blue base color.

This one finally has a title I can live with, "Intercedence of the Guiding Soul". It shows a subject being worked on by another, with hands cupping the subject's head. The idea is a depiction of an elder or spirit guide (guardian angel, whatever term you want to use) pouring as much energy into the person as possible, bringing a more centered energy into their field. This influx of higher energy floods the person being worked on, causing the cloudy, more chaotic energy to surge up momentarily as it flushes out.

I started with the light blue of the etheric body, then started to add the more clear colors of the concentric spheres of the guiding soul's aura, gold, violet, pink (with green) and red to reflect the chakras being guided into a more balanced state.

The areas along the top will show the same range of colors as well as tinges of the bright blue as the upflow of old energies from the being below is recognized by the guiding soul, then released upward at the same time the other colors spill down.


This is what Wendy often refers to as "the ugly baby stage" when it's not quite formed, but you can tell where it's going. You can get an idea of how the finished painting will look at the bottom center of this last image.

The casts on this canvas are my Dad for the head and hands of the guiding soul and my head for the subject below. It's the first in a string of images showing someone's transformation on the path of becoming a shaman.

Remember, I welcome all comments and questions, so as always, feel free!

Shows!

Boy, talk about bogged down in details. Forgot to mention upcoming shows. ... I have a few tentative shows lined up. (I usually don't count on it until it gets closer to the actual time - things change fast these days).

- Zeitgeist Gallery in Pittsfield, MA - July 29 - August 16; Opening reception Aug. 1 6:30-8:30
- Lotus and Orchid in Keene, NH - September (and maybe ongoing pieces in collection)
- Cummington Community House - possibly fall show, if not, then next spring.

I'm still working on more paintings and trying to get myself to complete several on a theme before submitting to lots of other galleries. A more cohesive body of work will help in that endeavor. On the other hand, I could stand to sell a couple to raise enough money for materials to make the new series I'd like to work on, so some shows are necessary.

UPDATE!
- Not sure if the Zeitgeist show is happening. Will keep everyone posted.
- Lotus and Orchid visit went well! Show moved up to June instead of September. I'll be paired up with a sculptor for that exhibit. I'm excited!!

Materials crunch

I'm almost done sculpting the twin canvases for Distant Sharing, but need to come up with more modeling goo. I have a batch brewing, but my current method takes a while before the paper is sufficiently pulped.

Normally I submerge shredded paper directly into latex paint and let it sit until it starts to break down into pulp, but that takes weeks and these paintings are all set for sculpting and I have casts ready for at least another two. The usual method of soaking paper in water then using a blender to pulp it is difficult because of the extra moisture, but it is far more quick.

I had a block of "Cellu-Clay", basically bone dry paper pulp. Yesterday, I broke it open into some paint and mixed it with sawdust - about 40/60 paper/sawdust in just enough latex paint to make it into a wonderfully soft yet full-bodied modeling material. But Cellu-Clay is *really* expensive, so now I'm determined to find a good way of quickly coming up with dry pulp at home.

I have a tub of shredded paper soaking in the greenhouse. I saw a papermaking site that mentioned pressing the pulp in an old t-shirt to drain it, then sun-dry it on screens. We'll see if that works.

I have a whole series of meditation paintings lining up in my head now, too, so the need for more is only getting worse. Sheeeeesh.