How long does a painting take?

Well, this piece is going on 8 years. In 2012, I made another trip to the Smithsonian's National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. I've painted paintings of paintings before and thought it would be fun to do another.
One particular masterpiece caught my eye. Of course, it is particularly complicated! Since 2012, the idea of using this painting as a backdrop has been circling around in my head. Every now and then I would think of it. About 4 or 5 months ago, a compositional idea came to mind.
As I reviewed my reference a couple of weeks ago, one particular shot of two people looking at the painting seemed to fit in to my concept.

Challenge #1 - The Drawing
Days were spent deciding on the composition (I looked at thousands of my lion reference photos) and drawing the masterpiece's subjects on the gessoed board was difficult. My painting is not very large so drawing the detail to aid me with the painting took a lot of time. I changed out one of the heads of the couple looking at the painting. The next day I realized the idea I had to start with was better so I redrew the head closer to what I originally had.

Challenge #2 - The Wall
I have never painted a wood wall before. In my previous paintings of paintings which were hanging in a museum, the gallery walls were painted. After wondering why I was doing this, I mixed numerous color batches staying with warm wood tones. Yellow ochre, burnt umber, raw sienna, and burnt sienna were used as base colors and I started with the upper left of the painting.
The light cast above the painting on the wall was cooler and there I used some burnt sienna mixed with ultramarine blue, lightened with titanium white.

Once the upper part of the wall was finished, I painted the wall's trim and worked my way down to the floor.

Roseate Terns

From May to late August, some beaches on Martha's Vineyard are home to nesting terns. Common terns, least terns, roseate terns, and a few arctic terns return year after year to lay eggs and raise their chicks near the abundant ocean. Each year I enjoy my trips to see terns and other species nesting on the island.

While roseate terns are often mistaken for common terns, their more streamline body and long forked tail lend them a particularly graceful look while in flight. The summer grounds of roseate terns range from Long Island to Canada's northeast provinces with wintering grounds in northern South America. The European roseate tern spends its winters as far south as southern Africa. This tern species, like most, gets around.

As stay-at-home, safer-at-home, and limited openings remain in places throughout the world, a hopeful future seeped into my painting composition. I wanted to create joy in free-wheeling flight.

You Are Now Free To Move About The Planet

14" X 24"

Original Oil

Nostalgia, Hopeful Future

In working on the compositions for a July show for the Louisa Gould Gallery on Martha's Vineyard, the roles of nostalgia and hopeful future have been in my mind.

nostalgia

noun

a sentimental longing or wishful affection for the past,

typically for a period or place with happy personal associations.

Based on that definition, nostalgia sounds pretty good. However, living in the past has its drawbacks. In this time of change, it may be a long time before we "go back to normal." Things we remember as children have changed and will never go back (like the now-developed woods near my childhood home.) The life we led mere months ago has changed for so many.

Where does that leave us? Many are living intensely in the present, dealing with illnesses, lost jobs, and less clear futures.

While keeping a foothold in the present is necessary for our day to day lives, casting our eyes to a hopeful future can be a source of comfort.

The paintings I have composed for the upcoming show reflect my very fond childhood memories of Julys on Martha's Vineyard with brushes of a hopeful future thrown in. 

My paintings will be in the gallery by July 3 and remain throughout the rest of the summer.

Louisa Gould Gallery

54 Main Street

Vineyard Haven, MA 02568

(508) 693-7373

louisagould.com

In progress

Stripes and Solids

13.25" X 24"

Original Oil

As part of the hopeful future, the beach umbrellas no longer have to maintain social distancing. Stripes and Solids can mingle freely.

Perseverance

per·se·ver·ance

/ˌpərsəˈvirəns/

noun: perseverance 

persistence in doing something despite difficulty or delay in achieving success.

I like this definition and it leads to a personal story.

When I first starting painting and had maybe 20 paintings under my belt, I went to a place with some artists to do a bit of plein aire painting. A spot by a river was chosen.

I was nicely set up with all my tools and dug in to capture the flow of the river.

Part way through my effort, an artist whose work I respected walked up, took a quick look at my painting and said, "Well, THAT doesn't look like water." With that, he walked away.

I was shocked by his callousness. I could have packed up my brushes and gone home deflated. I could have continued to struggle through the piece. Maybe my stubbornness kicked in but the first thought that came to me was, "Oh yeah, I'll show you I can paint water!" My next step has served me well. I put down my brushes and really looked at the water. I started to see how the water changed color at the break over submerged rocks, how the white spray was not really white, how the rocks appeared underneath the flowing water, and how the trees along the bank were reflected in the water differently depending on how fast the water was moving.

My next painting of water was not brilliant. Probably a subset of mediocre. But, I had a goal and didn't shy from the chance to include water in my paintings. I kept working with different depictions of water (quiet ponds, roiling streams, ocean-breaking waves) in different light (sunrise, sunset, midday, cool and warm) and with different reflections.

Water is now one of my favorite things to paint. 

Working on the birds

Razor's Edge

13" X 20"

Original Oil

Almost done. When the painting is fully dry, I plan to glaze some metallic gold oil paint over some of the yellow in the birds' wakes.

While I cannot say I appreciate the approach from that artist many years ago, I do hear myself commenting during the middle of some of my paintings, "Well, that doesn't look like _______." It is then time to take a step back and work through how I can achieve the desired finished piece.

Perseverance. Often difficult, often necessary.

 

A rarity

My first glimpse of razorbills was in the West Fjords of Iceland where 60 - 70% of the world's population breed. This auk is the closest living relative of the great auk which became extinct in the mid-1800's.

That fate almost snared the razorbill but it was aided in 1918 when it became protected in the United States through the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. With fewer than 1 million worldwide breeding pairs (which may seem like a lot) its habitat in the North Atlantic can be deeply effected by commercial overfishing, oil spills, and human encroachment.

When is something rare? For animals it could be a threatened breeding population or an animal seldom seen in the wild because of its remote location. More broadly for us, it could be something you see, hear, or feel not very often.

To accentuate the water in the foreground I used Michael Harding Phthalocyanine Blue Lake

May you find beautiful rarity in your day today.

The Unexpected

June 2019
It had been raining on and off for several days. I had weeks ago booked a trip to the Bird Islands off the northeast coast of Nova Scotia, obviously with only hope that the skies would be clear and the wind not too strong to prevent the trip that day.

Luck was with us. The weather was ideal and the three of us joined another eight off to see the nesting ground of Atlantic puffins.

Our boat on the left

On the trip out to the rocky islands, we watched bald eagles diving for fish. However, the whole trip (and my main focus) was to see the puffins. I could envision lots of paintings which would come from this outing. The water, lighting, and overall atmosphere were perfect.

As we arrived at the Bird Islands, I strained for a glimpse of the puffins catching fish, carrying fish, and returning to their nests.

Nova Scotia's Bird Islands

And there they were. I was one of the first to see them and, in my enthusiasm, almost missed an unexpected sighting. While I knew razorbills also nested here, I was not prepared to see them moving through the water. Their reflections were patterned in to the shallow waves' ripples and the buff-colored island's reflections made unique patterns around them.

I had come to see the puffins but was transfixed by this scene. While I subsequently saw many puffins on this trip to the Birds Islands, I want to paint this unexpected scene first. 

I was caught off-guard and my appreciation was elevated.

The start of my razorbill painting

May you find joy in the unexpected today.

A Park Bench

Few on this planet are uneffected by the coronavirus pandemic.
We know someone in quarantine. We are quarantined or under stay-at-home orders. We know someone who is sick, dying, or has died. We are sick.
The local, national, and world news is saturated with this very real disease.

There is plenty of information out there, some good, some bad.

I'd like to make the case for the park bench. A place to sit and take a deep breath. Rather than racing through the park, let's sit down.

Maybe this blog can be a figurative park bench for you. A moment to not forget about the world, but to greater appreciate it.
Close your eyes, take five deep breaths. Imagine feeling the bench wood on your fingertips.

Open your eyes and go about your day, hopefully momentarily refreshed. And maybe, you'll find those benches throughout your day.