” Morning Brew ” – Finished Painting

” Morning Brew “ 8 X 10 oil on linen

 

This was the burnt sienna wash shown in the last post.

Here’s what happened with the Elevens recently. My solo show at Bassin Fine Art Gallery, St. Croix, opened on December ELEVENTH. The show closed on January ELEVENTH. And Shazamm, I sold ELEVEN paintings. With great and bowed thanks to collectors, friends, unexpected walk-ins,  architects of secret surprises and other random appreciators. And to the delightful and professional gallery owners who provided a stunning stage for viewers and paintings. Thank you all.

Dick Blick and King of Frame– I hope your operators are standing by, I’ve supplies to replenish.

 

THEY are not standing by………..

Doing what they do best: laying or lying by. Standing is for when there’s food or promises of beach.

Attention humans in need of an exquisite place of your own to lay around in or beach at:

Take a look around Southern Breezes Villa here on St. Croix. Swoon. Then rent it and come for a visit.

Back In The Saddle Again – Work In Progress

Moving towards painting without drawing first. Didn’t say how I was progressing in that arena, just hoping that someday I might befriend proportion and scale without drawing first. Until then……

Willow charcoal is loose, ethereal, rubs off if you exhale too close to the canvas. Good for keeping loose, so I purposely remove some line work as the paint goes down or else the dastardly pitfall of filling in can ruin the gesture.

So just as Stella was getting her dormant groove back, I had to leave this piece and be away for a week. I’m going to seriously try not to muck it up since painting on top of already dried paint sometimes leads me to that dreadful trap of adding too much, playing the game of chasing values and almost reproducing an entire second painting over the dried one underneath. I said I’d try.

Please hope I succeed.

Now THEY have succeeded in convincing me that after a week away, walking them would have more merit than watching me twist in the wind figuring this stuff out. ” Oh, just take us for a walk and forget about your whining”……….

You cannot ignore 4 eyes and 4 ears of this magnitude of cuteness and continue your mission.

I tried.

Really, I did.

Trying to ignore them.

I know when I’m done for.

Walking, it is.

I am a sap.

Work in Progress, But a Different Sort

I was invited to do the cover art for a Virgin Islands-centric publication that’s widely circulated in the territory. Two separate covers- one for October, one for November.

The editor had a general topic in mind  and left the execution to me. The subject incorporates our amazing stilt dancers called “ Mocko Jumbies ” known as our Guardians of Culture.

Pencil sketch for the angular poses and foreshortening I was looking for.

They loom 12 feet over the crowds on 5-6 foot stilts and parade down cobbled streets with agility the rest of us couldn’t know of in sneakers.

I’ll post the finished piece and the official cover after it goes to publication.

But I enjoyed the process of sketching out ideas, working out color placements, and experimenting with mediums and techniques that I haven’t used in years.

Watercolor sketch for color and perspective ideas…

Working out some scale and composition ideas. Exaggeration is good for eye appeal.

Gouache on canvas- a new combination of effects. Lots of experimenting on cotton canvas panels before going for the finished piece.

Now I’m starting on the second cover- different theme.

Aiming for productivity despite the cutest damn puppy ever:

AND, the looming threat of Tropical Storm Bill, churning up the Eastern Atlantic, moving towards, we hope, not us.

The Swearing in of, and not at, The Muse

Maybe it took the not so subtle shift of 180 million people leaning towards the  hopeful, optimistic, proud and unified. But the days’ and weeks events have put me back in step.

A seminal shift it was. As the oath was taken, the oaf was taken- away by helicopter.

Don’t look back, you’re not going there, as my favorite needlepoint pillow used to say.  Yesterday, there was a sense of a  fresh start, the feeling that we’re in very capable hands.  No matter how many times the blackboard got erased in 3rd grade, it never looked right until, at the end of the week, it was washed. New. Clean. Ready for the clear absorption of the next lessons.

Her capable hands are a work in progress. This might even become a study for the next one.

New Years this year, fell on January 20th.  Hello Muse.

I’ll be away from the studio and home for a week to spend time with my mother. I’m leaving a plate of cookies for the muse so she doesn’t run off. I think this time, she’s here for all of us.

St. Croix-nicity’s One Year Anniversary

Almost to the day, one year ago, friends came to visit. They both had blogs- one a photographic blog, the other a politically focused one. I’d read theirs and enjoy them but never thought of authoring one myself.

I didn’t even like the WORD blog. I knew it was an acronym for web log but to my ear it sounded more like a blending of ” blah and gag “. Not an attractive imagery, wouldn’t you agree?

My laptop was seized over breakfast one morning and the birth of St. Croix-nicity began.

Apparently friends don’t let friends go without blogs.

Mary Schwalm, a great photographer, set up the banner photo at the header. Her blog is a quick study- just great images, little text and very sharp, hip titles for her photos.

Judy Wolfe– whose movie reviews, photos and art pages and political insights I’ve loved for years, manned the keyboard and I had the pleasure of just answering yes or no to questions of layout, structure, gizmos, widgets and links.

I’ve been visited by people in:

Islamic Republic of Iran

Slovenia

The Green Zone- Iraq

Viet Nam

Bangladesh

Belgium

Japan

Portugal

Turkey

Five thousand eight hundred sixty two visits and 33,972 page views.

Brilliant outreach for someone who dislikes flying.

Amidst those 5,000s’ have been some wonderful exchanges of information, encouragement, tips, and generous sharing among and between other artists. The feedback, the teeth gnashing frustrations of scraping yet another surface, the light-bulb of an a-ha moment, and the connection to people otherwise unknown to you is the joy of this blog and the exoneration of those two kitchen witches who started me on this journey a year ago.

Am I ever grateful.

Two days from today those same two harbingers of fall visits and blog hostage taking, are coming back. I’d hoped to finish another painting before they got here but got only as far as the drawing:

Taken from a photo I took last weekend at one of our farmers’ markets.

Another Work in Progress, he’s got great shadows and lines but the painting will have to wait until these two conspirators leave.

This years visit will be the G7and G9 summit- Canon Camera owners all of us. They know how to use them, I’m just learning. I’m expecting 6 days of de-briefing in the kitchen but thankfully, no Katie Couric interview…….

Locally Grown- New Painting in Progress

When I first moved here from NYC 7 years ago, I was in for an awakening in the produce department of our supermarket. Everything is shipped in from the states ( so you pay for food AND fuel ), and the produce is old by the time you get it.

I was introduced to Mr. Carter, above, a farmer, living here for the past 50 years and a strong believer in organic farming. Using a quarter acre of his land, my husband and I grew: lettuce, watermelon, peppers, squash, basil, chard, and fennel. And sold it at our local farmers’ market. We no longer grow, but still shop at the market to support the farmers who still do. We’re a fairly dry island and water is unpredictable.

It’s easier to paint a farmer than to be one.

I started the sketch on a toned canvas using vine charcoal- I love its’ softness. Then I washed in some tones to get composition.

Mr. Carter does have a face- I’m having some trouble getting it right so in the name of patience, I’ll get on it tomorrow after it dries a little more. The pants and the boots are NOT giving me trouble.

Works in progress remind me of the bride in curlers, no makeup, old clothes and sneakers. Then the stages of makeover, and layers, and magic, and good lighting and a loving congregation, and presto! She’s a beauty. I’m hoping some of that happens here.

Mr. Carter and Miss Bonnie as St. Croix Gothic.

Traded a pitchfork for a palette knife- neither job is easy.

I’m going to Florida to see my mother for a week – leave me some comments to come home to. Even constructive ones on finishing this piece.