The Drawing Board

Had to teach a private lesson this morning, by the time I got to Beloit it was 1 pm. I started painting at around 1:30, left around 6pm. The light was flat, and it started raining at two points, finally I wrapped it up and left. Not catching any breaks for this event. I can only hope that none of the other artists did either.

This is the 5th painting I've done so far, including the one I wiped out, in fact this one is on the same panel. I'm heading out early tomorrow to see if I can get a quick one in before turning in my work. The frames are done and came out nicely. The deadline is noon tomorrow. I sure hope this pays off, I could really use the cash. I figured that each trip down there is costing me $25 on gas alone. Not looking forward to the Rockford event later this year (about 20 minutes farther than Beloit).

What was supposed to be a long day of painting went badly. After having to turn around to grab something I forgot, I had a late start. I got to the area around 10 am, by which time the light was relatively flat, and changing quickly. The sky was very cloudy, with thunderheads rolling in. The weather did this rain-no rain dance all day long. I managed to get the first painting in a little over 2 hours. I packed up and got some lunch when it started drizzling.

An hour after lunch the sky cleared enough to begin again. The second painting was a rushed piece I did once the weather cleared, in between thunderstorms. The skies were immense and ominous, but moving quickly. As I was laying in the foreground, the rain came down hard, and I got soaked trying to pack up before the worst of it. It was another 15 minutes before the worst of it had passed. By then I was cold and wet and thoroughly distracted. Not very successful, but worth the effort.

Shortly after calling this one I decided to try to get a third painting in. By the time I found a spot and set up, it was already after 6:30 pm, with less than 2 hours of sunlight left. In trying to find ideas to paint in an impressionistic manner, I decided on some rather transient light effects in reflections off the water, and unfortunately, the light moved too quickly for the size of the piece I started. This one ended up wiped down to be used another day. My next opportunity to get down there will be Tuesday, then possibly Thursday. I'll have a few hours on Friday as well before turning in my work, but that may be very tight. I still have to gild my frames this week.

The Edge of the Rock plein air painting contest is the first local contest this year. There is only one event, in which participants have about a week to submit up to two paintings, framed and ready to hang. The first place award is $1500. When I got there they said they had 34 participants registered. Those are pretty good odds. I think the last time I competed in Oconomowoc there were nearly 80 competitors.

I got there today a little after 2pm, checked in, got my panels stamped, then used an hour and a half walking the designated area. Participants are allowed to paint anywhere between three bridges along the river in downtown Beloit, from either side of the river. A third of this is not conducive to interesting views, as it is largely industrial buildings without great vantage points. There are several parks, a dam, a fishing bridge, vantages from under bridges, pavilions with uninteresting views, and a few choice spots. The criteria prioritize most highly those paintings which capturing the effect of the light in an impressionist manner. I think timing will be everything.

Today, I set up along a creek that fed into the main river. I was struck by the reflections of the sky and the trees in the water. This was the first time in a long time painting so large, this piece is 12" x 16" oil on panel. It's a bit overworked, but I think that's now out of my system. The next few paintings should be much better. I'm shooting for 6 by next Thursday, I should get down there Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday of next week. It's supposed to rain most of tomorrow, thunderstorms and such, I may spend the day working on my new frames.

I decided to make my own frame stock this time, and I plan to gild them with gold and copper. I am going to use my traditional gesso recipe, hoping it will sand easier than acrylic gesso. I'm also planning to use gouache instead of bole for an underpaint. We'll see how that goes, time is very short.

Early this spring I started a painting at the drive to the Cousins Center in Bayview. This is a Catholic center for priests and retreats. It has spacious grounds, and a tree-lined drive that is easily 100 yards long. While painting this, a priest came up to me with his lady friend and said that it was a beautiful view. Then he decided that he would impress me by saying that he lived there. I stifled a yawn. On leaving he said, graciously that he wouldn't charge me for the view. how fortunate was that? (I wasn't painting the view asshole, I was painting the light.)

After my hands froze, I decided to work on this in the studio, working from some photos I shot while on site. This ended up with a lot of picking...this is about 1/3 Plein Air, 2/3 Studio work. (8"x10" Oil on panel)

Sunday was my next outing, another record high day. My truck's dashboard read that the temperature was in the mid 90's. I went through two bottles of vitamin water and even donned sunscreen and long sleeves. It was a long hot day.

Starting at Scout Lake, I completed my first painting in less than an hour (5x7" oil on panel). Packing up quickly, I immediately headed out to a shaded location that I knew of in Wilson Park. I did another small one there (5x7 oil on panel). The smaller paintings seem to work well as warm ups. When I have 50 of these I plan to display them somewhere, side by side.

After lunch and more water in a mercifully air conditioned restaurant, I headed out to Sheridan park again to take advantage of the cooler temperatures and the breeze. This time I was set upon by Indian children, some family festivities going on at a diffferent part of the park. Sundays are for families, apparently. A little girl told me I should use more brown in my water. I had to agree. I used a much more chromatic and thick approach for this painting, (8x10" oil on panel) I think by this time my concentration was wandering as well. I experimented with a way of capturing the ripples on the lake, but I did not scale the marks well. It is exceptionally difficult to paint something that moves constantly.

After this I drove to get more water and cool off, then returned to the lake front, scoping out several locations in other parks. I finally came upon a very late afternoon view of the docks from Cuppertino Park. I decided to try this even though the light was already dying. The race left me breathless and triumphant at the end of an hour and a half. (8x10" oil on gessobord) I will definitely have to go back and attempt this again with more time, but I think I had a breakthru with regards to painting faster and more gesturally.

The first competition begins late next week. Thursday and Friday I will be in Beloit, Sunday as well. I've got a week to get three frames together for this. I may get another outing in before then.

With the first painting competitions right around the corner, I decided to make the most of the Memorial Day weekend and really push myself to the limits of my endurance and concentration.

I've been struggling for months with trying to get more than 2 paintings done in a given outing. Most of the time I'll have 6 hours or less to paint, and at most have managed two in a day. I decided to clear my schedule for two days and have a ready 10 hours to work.

Friday I started later than I had wanted, but managed to get the first painting done in just over an hour (5x7 oil on panel). Starting at a pond in Whitnall Park, I went directly to Scout Lake to paint some light effects on water (5x7 oil on claybord). The day was extremely warm, mid 80's inland. I decided I wouldn't last in the heat, so I headed out to the lake front after lunch.

Settling in to a secluded area with a view of a hill that dropped off to Lake Michigan, I ended up handing out another card to someone who had seen me painting there last weekend. I hope these people contact me. This piece (8x10" oil on panel) took about two hours. I decided I had time for one more, but needed a new location.

I headed back towards home and settled for a late afternoon view of the pond at Jackson Park. The park is often besieged by noisy hispanic kids and the occasional jogger. I had several crowds of kids come up while I was painitng the last one for today, (5x7" oil on gessobord) as I raced against the setting sun.

Hoping to solicit more serious interest, I returned to Sheridan Park today. Took the pond and reeds from a different angle. The residents living adjacent to this park are typically well off, active and like to walk or jog or bicycle past, seem to take pride in the park.

After a relatively peaceful session, I wrapped up and headed for my favorite spot near the Park View Condominiums. It was late in the day and the sun was unrelenting, so I decided to get a late afternoon landscape by facing into the sun. The atmospheric perspective was fantastic, and the nearest trees were strongly backlit. The clouds were large and active, so I opted for a square set up. (8x8" oil on panel)

I began today with a small study at a local lake, dodging fishermen and passers-by. The other day I was at this park when a near by school brought a gaggle of students across the pedestrian bridge for a field trip through the circular walking path that enveloped the lake.

The amount of wildlife at Scout Lake is pretty amazing, I've seen the requisite ducks and geese, ducklings and goslings in tow, finches and warblers, a red tailed hawk (surprisingly no gulls), muskrats, tadpoles, fish and frogs, even a small painted turtle swimming for its meal.

The problem, for an introverted anti-socialite, is dealing with passers-by. I was asked for my card by a drunk vet by the name of "Gonzo." Gonzo came up to me with two (2!) extra large plastic cups that must have held some kind of mixed drink. This was at 11 am on a weekday...

Enter the cacophony of a gradeschool field trip, parents, teachers and chapparones herding the impatient group from site to site to glimpse "nature" soon they came upon the solitary painter in his natural habitat. Over and over I suffered those words "Oh look, he's painting" as each band of the group rounded the corner. My concentration was blown.

There are times when I get a break and the lake is peaceful. The fishermen stick to the pier (why there's a pier when boating is prohibitted I'll never know). Today was one of those days. I set up across from the pier and did a quick study of the foliage and the light hitting the water. (5x7 oil on panel)

Later I drove east to Sheridan Park to paint the pond and meet up with a friend. (8x10 oil on panel) Two women inquired about my paintings, I handed out some cards. Definitely need to get some postcards printed up.

I sometimes wonder why I do this to myself. Fortunately it's never before I start painting, which could be prohibitive. I wanted to find a new location in Whitnall Park today, and after no small amount of driving around, I did find a spot with an interesting view. This field of dandelions had this remarkable perspective to it. The sky was tumultuous, very cloudy, sometimes dark, and always moving. The light was greatly inconsistent, sometimes overcast, sometimes extremely bright. I had hoped, also that this location would remove me from passersby, but alas, I nearly punched some old dude walking his dogs right up behind me. Lovely.

This piece is 9.75" x 14" oil on panel. I would have liked to spend more time on this, but as it was, I managed to pack up just before it started raining.

When I finished building my new panel carriers, I decided that I would begin working small, specifically at 5" x 7" (since I knew I could get 3-packs of hardbord or gessobord for relatively cheap). My goal was to begin working faster, smaller, and less expensively. I knew I had certain issues to work through, composition, economy of method, expressiveness, color, etc., and I knew that I could work on those issues without wasting a larger panel. I did finally break the 2 hour mark, and I know this economy of method has made my larger work faster.

These are the first 6 paintings, each of these are oils on hardbord, gessobord or claybord. The claybord is my least favorite, gessobord the most reliable. Claybord tends to suck the chroma out of your paints until you get several layers down. I may try working with gouache in the future as well. I had 12 panels prepared, which, coincidentally, is exactly how many my small carrier will hold. It is so nice not having to put wet paintings on my dashboard for the ride home any longer. These panel carriers allow me to finish a piece and forget about it, knowing that nothing will come in contact with it.

After checking my regular spot near the Park View condominiums on Lake Michigan, I decided to head North, and finally ended up downtown. After more driving around, I finally found an interesting spot on the newest section of the River Walk in Milwaukee. This area is home to several new buildings which house retail spaces and condos. These buildings have a boardwalk that is open to the public, and new floating docks for small craft. I found a causeway down to a very private dock that had a great view of MIAD and some of the other buildings on the Milwaukee River. It was a sunny, warm day and several boaters waved as they passed by. I will definitely be going back here later this year. This piece is 8" x 10" oil on panel.

It took about an hour of driving around the city to finally find a spot worth painting today. After checking out a few of my regular haunts, I decided to go back to the Wauwatosa area. After scounting a couple of new locations there, I fell upon this spot and got to work. This piece is 8" x 10" oil on panel. This was also the first time I used my new palettes and panel carriers. Photos of those coming soon.

I found what I thought would be a quiet spot over looking the pond at Jackson Park. There were two different wars going on between several groups of gulls and several groups of geese. The gulls would scream endlessly. Using up one of my last home made panels for this one, the piece is 5.75" x 10" oil on panel. I love working on this surface. It's home made gesso, a distemper really, made with rabbit skin glue and sanded smooth. It takes about four coats to get the surface I like, but it's worth it.

This was the last session for the semester. I decided to try some different media, the graphite and colored pencil was starting to get old. I had a small 140 lb pad of watercolor paper in my kit, I decided to work with my Rotring fine point quill pen and my Micron 1.0 pen, then work back into it with marker and sometimes colored pencil. I did the last one in carbon pencil just to see how the grain worked with that type of paper. I think I'll do more ink and marker sketches next semester. Working pen and ink at an easel while standing is not easy.

Felt a bit heavy handed tonight, ended up overdoing some outlines. The next session is the final meeting for this semester, classes start up again in fall. I found out that UWM has a figure drawing studio that is open to the public on Friday evenings. It costs more, but I may end up attending that from time to time in the fall. The models couldn't be worse than the ones we have at MIAD.

We had the fruitcake again. This is the model who likes to replicate poses from other artists' work. She held some pretty severe poses, I just wish we weren't doing something that had already been done before. This was a long night, by the time we got to the reclining pose (last for the night), my concentration was blown (which explains the awful likeness).

Finally, a decent model! This guy had a decent physique, and knew how to hold a pose. We were finally able to work on some musculature.

A rather uninspiring day, but still putting out the work. Working in colored pencil, charcoal pencil, carbon pencil and graphite. The model opted to keep her glasses on this time, which offered some interesting portrait potential. I wish her poses were more animated...I mean at least try would ya? Oh well, maybe better luck next week.

No images today, just a quick update. I know it has been a long while since last I posted here, but more images to come soon. I have six yet to be photographed paintings and several sessions of figure drawings to post yet, as well as some more character sketches. New students at the school, lots of woodworking, preparing panels, and actually getting out to paint.

I'm waiting for the next rainy day to photograph my latest work, I have a couple of paintings started that will take a few sessions, waiting for the right weather to go back to those. Still waiting on the panels I ordered through ASW, back orders suck. About to begin framing in preparation for the upcoming competitions. More later...

No new images today, just a few thoughts.

After a couple of frustrating days, I've decided to institute some new rules for myself. As it stands, I've been painting for 9 days in a row, and aside from running out of panels, I should be good for at least another week, weather holding...

Rules for Painting:

1. When you put a mark down, leave it. This emphasizes the need to get it right the first time, placement, value, temperature, direction.
2. If it's wrong, scrape it and do it again. Don't settle for "close enough" - get it right or do it over.
3. Paint only what you see. If you can't see it, or weren't paying attention - DON'T paint it. I have found myself far too often brushing in areas out of habit, or painting what is supposed to be there, instead of what I SEE is there.
4. Keep it simple. The past few paintings I've caught myself completely overworking the image. Simplify. Try to use the minimum amount of marks to describe a thing.
5. Priority #1 - Get the placement right. I've really been disciplining myself to use the sight-size method to get my drawing/layout right.
6. Priority #2 - Get the values right. When I look back at all of the mistakes I've made, all of the problem paintings, many of the problems revolve around either incorrect proportions/layout or incorrect values. Values are what sell the painting. Everything else can be off, but if the values are tight, the painting will be convincing.
7. Priority #3 - Get the temperature right. It's been said that painting is simply a matter of getting one dash of color right, compared to another dash of color.
8. Priority #4 - Get the direction/expression right. This is the element that gives the painting an effortless look.

I started a painting with these rules in mind today. I want to touch up certain areas before I photograph it, but I think it will resonate. The weather turned cold today, I was out by the St. Francis Seminary, right on Lake Michigan. I should be able to post that in a few days.

As I said earlier, I've been painting every day, the only day I didn't get outdoors was Saturday, when it snowed. I've got three paintings that need work, that I'm saving for bad weather days. I am finding Saturdays to be incredibly difficult to find time to get out to paint. By the time I'm done working I'm exhausted and it's pretty late in the day. I found out tonight, however, that UWM offers an open figure drawing studio on Fridays. I'll have to check into that.