Gouache portrait sketch

A quick portrait sketch of model, Bill, in my Moleskine watercolour sketchbook from last night's life drawing session with Fabio at the Cambridge Centre for the Arts.

Bill, profile, gouache in watercolour sketchbook 5" x 8"

Sketchbook and palette

Under sodium lights

Here's a small portrait sketch in oils from last night's life drawing session. The model is our session coordinator and sometime model, Miss Robin. I've been using far more paint of late--applying it thickly, with almost no added medium except what I need to make the paint workable, and drawing directly with the brush instead of relying on a preliminary underdrawing.  It's exhilarating.

A small portrait sketch in oil on panel (detail)

A portrait sketch of Miss Robin, oil on panel (detail)

The light in the room where we draw is lit with low pressure sodium lights, which are great for energy efficiency, but terrible for colour rendering accuracy.  Under those lights, I lose all perception of the red spectrum, which isn't a problem when I'm drawing, but is a definite challenge when painting. I always emerge from the room with a far more highly saturated painting than what I'd perceived.  Last night I paid closer attention to my colour mixes and tried to get the tones right, so the painting isn't quite as far off as usual.  Still, it's a little like painting while colour blind.  I love the Cambridge life sessions, so maybe I'll look into getting some kind of clip-on light with high colour rendering index to take with me on painting nights.

A portrait sketch of  Miss Robin, oil on panel, 11" x 14"

Incidental landscape

This landscape painting is not mine, which is to say I painted it, but it’s a copy. 

 

Incidental landscape (detail), oil on canvas

I’m painting a corporate portrait in which the CEO, an avid outdoorsman and art collector, is posing in front of a landcape painting which hangs in his office.  The original is a highly finished instantly recognizable Ontario landscape conjuring Muskoka or Algonquin in a familiar language we know if not from actual experience, then from Group of Seven paintings.  I had to stylize it significantly for the background of my painting. As a portraitist, I’ve only painted a handful of landscapes but hope to paint more.  In this case, freed from considerations of composition and subject, I could enjoy sketching the landscape, without being a slave to accuracy (unlike the portrait part in which likeness is my necessary preoccupation).  Here's a larger view, with telltale ear and suit jacket shoulder:

Incidental landscape with telltale ear (still a detail), oil on canvas

How easily a wind twisted pine against pink tinged clouds against a blue sky evokes the northern Ontario (okay, northern, southern Ontario) landscape.  Made me want to trade my brushes for a paddle.

Two reclining nudes

Reclining figure study 1, gouache on paper, 11" x 7"

In Isabella Stefanescu's studio this Saturday we had a rare, daytime life drawing session with the model.  There was gorgeous light streaming through warehouse windows, birdsong outside, some French romantic composer playing in the background--Ravel I think.  It was great, until we were shushed by people in the neighbouring studio...

Reclining figure study 2, gouache on paper, 11" x 7"

Apologies to the people next door who were recording something and had probably expected the studios to be unoccupied on the Saturday of a long weekend.

That half of the year, well, we'll never be friends

Local Character Study #5 Black Squirrel with Granny Smith Apple, oil on canvas board, 8" x 8"

My winter-long love affair with the backyard squirrels is officially over.  As in Leslie Feist's lyric from Gatekeeper, this is the half of the year when we'll never be friends.  It's the half of the year when the cute fluffy animals struggling to survive the bitter winter and posing as ready models around my bird feeder transform themselves into wanton destroyers of beauty.  No tulip or magnolia or crabapple blossom is safe from the ruthless biters.  It's the season of anticipation when, when instead of flowers, alas, there are only bare stems and strewn petals. Ugh.

Local Character Study #4 Eastern Grey Squirrel Looking Out, oil on canvas board, 8" x 8"

The two admittedly cute squirrels in this post were painted with snow still on the ground.  Future squirrel portraits, at least those painted in the next six months, will be far less flattering.  If I wanted to be truly realistic, they might even have mange.

Thank you Globe Show attendees

Thanks to everyone who came out to see the Globe Studios Art Show and Open House this Friday and Saturday.  It was an intense ten-hour-over-two-days event featuring over 30 artists and hundreds of attendees.
 

What a great opportunity to talk at length to the public and fellow artists.

Globe Studios Art Show and Open House this weekend

I spent part of this beautiful day hanging my paintings at Globe Studios in Kitchener.  Twice yearly Globe studios opens its doors to the public for a tour of the studios and an exhibition of works by resident and local artists.  I am pleased to be one of the guest artists included in the juried exhibition that will line the halls of the studios. All of the participating artists will be present for the duration of the show. If you're in town this weekend, I hope you'll come by and say hello.

My thanks to Michelle Purchase, whose studio my work is hanging just outside.  Michelle has an exhibition of 40 or so of her beautiful prints hanging at the Red Brick Cafe in Guelph until this Sunday and as a result of having so few pieces left to show, Michelle generously donated her wall space to me, giving me a little extra real estate and allowing me to hang fifteen paintings.

Splish Splash

Splash #1 Common Grackle, oil on panel 8" x 8"

Sleek handsome and suave one moment, outrageous posturing goofballs the next: the grackles have returned.  I've missed their strutting, sky pointing, and puffing up to the point of exploding before releasing discordant squawks.  We have a peanut mix in the bird feeder right now and when a grackle picks one out, it parades around with its prize, dropping it and picking it up, washing it in the birdbath, in a sustained effort to break it into smaller pieces.

Splash #1 Common Grackle, oil on panel 8" x 8"

I'll be showing these two paintings among others at the Globe Studio's Spring Open House and Art show this Friday and Saturday where I'll be one of several guest artists exhibiting work alongside the resident studio artists. Click here for more information about the show.

Globe Studios Art Show and Open House

Spring Hunter: American Robin (detail), oil on panel

 The ultimate harbinger of spring.  Lethal foe of grubs and earthworms.

Spring Hunter: American Robin, oil on panel, 9" x 12"

I'll be showing this painting among others at the Globe Studios Art Show and Open House where I'll be participating as a guest artist this May 9th and 10th. Please visit the studio facebook page here for more information.

Can Spring be far?

Local character study #3: Black Squirrel looks over shoulder, oil on canvas board,  8" x 8"

We've sprung forward and I'm extremely grateful to have the one hour extension to my painting day.  The sap must be running because the rabbits have begun girdling my small trees and I'm almost ready to wage war.  But the squirrels as yet have no tulips to mangle, so I'm painting them as though they won't soon be my mortal enemies.

Eastern Grey Squirrel

Another study from the local cast of hardy characters on the other side of the glass.

Local character study #2: Eastern Grey Squirrel in the Snow, oil on canvas board,  8" x 8"

more to come...

The Local Scene

This has been the longest, most shut-in winter I can remember.  I've only made it out to life drawing a few times, but I've no shortage of models.  I've been painting the local scene.

Local character study #1: Black squirrel crouching, oil on canvas board, 8"x8"

 

 

 

You lookin at me?

Some toughs have taken up residence around the bird feeder, and it's not who you might think.  No hawks here, just doves.  Dove toughs.  They hang in the locust tree and whenever some smaller species lands near the feeder, they whir down and bully the little birds away with sheer size, and numbers, and that jerky, bobble-head, stink eye thing they do so well. 

Mourning Dove, oil on panel, 7" x 12"

Three-hour painted study from life

I've been taking advantage of the opportunity to paint from life at monthly three-hour single pose sessions at the Cambridge Centre for the Arts.  The brief single session forces concentrated observation and loose paint handling.  This one is from the January session.

Robin (detail), painted study, oil on prepared paper

Robin, painted study, oil on prepared paper, 11" x 14"

Two weeks in to the new year

Well, Happy New-ish Year!

I still have a couple of these gorgeous clementines in my crisper.  I suppose beautiful citrus fruit is one of the perks of winter.  Something to countermand ice storms and sudden thaws, fallen tree limbs, and a roof leak caused by an ice dam in the eaves trough.  

Two clementines, oil on panel, 8" x 8"

This painting was my Christmas card image for 2013.

Mercedes

Mercedes (detail), oil on panel

Mercedes, oil on panel, 11" x 14"

A three hour painted sketch of model Mercedes in oils.

Max and the Chocolate Chips

During a recent portrait sitting I discovered the usefulness of chocolate chips as a bribe for encouraging an active, two year old boy to sit for a pose, but I hadn’t considered the mess.  Here’s Max, nearly two, with his adorable chocolate chip smeared face, and mischief in his eyes: 

Max with chocolate chip smeared face, oil on panel, 9" x 12"

 And here’s Max, beautifully framed by Dimensions Custom Framing and Gallery:   

 

Max, framed

The framers and gallerists, Wendy and Ellen, liked my work enough to take a few of my pieces for their Toronto gallery space.  I’ll have six small paintings in their Small Works Holiday Show & Sale opening December 12^th.   The gallery is at 732 Queen St East (just east of Broadview on the North side) in Toronto.  Hope some of you can make it.

Bridget

Bridget, oil on panel, 12" x 16"

A painting of my gorgeous niece in typical contemplative mood in the late day sunshine.  Hope you like it, Bridget!

Wonder Woman glances up

Donna as Wonder Woman , oil on canvas panel 8" x 8"

A painted sketch of my good friend Donna as Wonder Woman, as requested by her adoring husband.

Summer gone but not forgotten

Here are some small gouache landscapes from my summer vacation spot.

Sea cliffs, gouache on art panel, 5" x 7"

Southwest Cove from the water, gouache on art panel, 5" x 7"

Owl's Head, gouache on paper, 5" x 7 1/2"