Art at VMRC

"The Red Shed" - 8"x8"

I'm happy to report that I'm back at the Virginia Mennonite Retirement Community's annual multimedia exhibition with "The Red Shed." The exhibit opens today at the Park Gables Gallery at the VMRC complex in Harrisonburg, Va.

Art at VMRC is a top-notch show -- it features a panel of respected jurors, a beautiful space that draws truly interested visitors, and extraordinary management and care by the volunteer organizers of the exhibition. And, because of the widespread call for entries that appears in national magazines and  online listing, the quality of the selected work is outstanding, and covers a wide range of mediums and styles.

This is the third time I have entered, and the second time that I have work accepted (I had two pieces in the 2011 show). And I pinch myself when I receive the letter saying that I've made it.

The show dates are May 26 through June 30, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. each day.

The awards reception is next Sunday, June 2, from 2 to 4 p.m.

For more about the show, visit the VMRC website at http://www.vmrc.org/v.php?pg=48. This site includes a link to a pdf file where you can see images of the pieces included in the 2012 show.

I can't wait to see what the exhibit will include this year!

ArtScape in Winchester

"Yellow Wings" - 14"x11"

Continuing with updates (I've not done a good job of posting in quite a while), my "Yellow Wings" painting was accepted in the 2013 ArtScape program in Winchester, Va. This is the first year that I have entered a painting for review.

Now in its fifth year, ArtScape is a collaborative effort between the Shenandoah Arts Council (www.shenarts.org) and the Old Town Development Board/City of Winchester (www.oldtownwinchesterva.com). Artists submit images, and jurors choose the winning submissions. Entries include paintings, photographs and images of 3-dimensional pieces.

The winning pieces are then delivered to the arts council, where they are photographed by a professional photographer. In the meantime, local organizations and businesses are invited to view the original artwork, and they select which pieces they would like to sponsor.

All of this comes together with the creation of banners that include the artwork, the artist's name, and the sponsor -- and then these banners are displayed from light posts in the Old Town area of Winchester, mostly  on the pedestrian mall at the heart of the downtown. The idea is to create an outdoor gallery for the public to enjoy.

Later in the summer, the original artwork will be auctioned off at a fundraising event for the arts council, with  proceeds divided between the artist and the arts council.

So, with all that said, here are images of my banner, sponsored by Blue Ridge Hospice (http://www.blueridgehospice.org). Blue Ridge Hospice uses a butterfly as part of their corporate imagery, which is why they were interested in my painting.

I took these photos right after the banners went up along the mall. The workers have since straightened the banners so they don't tilt at the awkward angle you see in the lower image.

The ArtScape program went through a host of difficulties this year with the extensive renovations to the Loudoun Street Mall earlier this year. There were many unknowns when they released the call for entry. As it turns out, the new light posts are shorter than the old light posts, so that required a redesign of the banner sizes and orientation. They are much smaller than they had been in previous years, but I hope that things can be worked on next year to make them larger.

If you are traveling through Winchester, stop downtown and take a stroll along the pedestrian mall. My banner is on the south end of the mall, near the Godfrey Miller Home.

Side Alley

Side Alley - 8"x8"

So another piece of the Wardensville series is done. I really like the colors with this one...perhaps Bill Vrscak is right with his limited split primary palette! I know that I really struggle with mixing greens, so I want to play with this concept more and see if it helps solve some problems that have halted my progress on some paintings.

Now, regarding my news about this series....in addition to the small showing of the paintings at the Wardensville High School alumni dinner in September, I am donating one painting to the Wardensville Scholarship Fund Association. I'm still not sure if they have decided on a silent auction, a live auction, or on chances, but the proceeds from the sale of the donated painting will benefit the scholarship fund.

The subject of this painting will be the old Wardensville School -- I won't reveal more than that yet. Stay tuned to see how it looks!

Alley

Here is an in-progress shot of another painting in the Wardensville series...I'm trying out some ideas from the recent Bill Vrscak workshop I took at the Morgantown Art Association. You can see some of Bill's wonderful paintings at his website www.billvrscak.com.

Bill uses a split primary palette - warm and cool versions of yellow, blue and red. He also stresses the use of value sketching to develop compositions, and believes that the best paintings come from the worst references -- the more the artist has to create to make a composition work, the better. Otherwise, he wonders, why go through the effort of painting a scene from a beautiful photograph? The photographer has already done the work and there's little that the artist can add to the scene.

I filled up a small notebook as he talked and worked on demo paintings -- he shared so many wonderful ideas with the group. I need to sit down and retype everything to help me digest all of the useful information.

There is good news regarding the entire Wardensville series that I'd like to share. I'm going to have a small showing of the paintings at the Wardensville High School alumni dinner this fall. I thought it would be a good venue with folks who know the town intimately. I hope the group will enjoy my efforts to bring life to the scenes we often overlook.

There's another announcement regarding the alumni dinner that I'd like to make, but I think it deserves its own post...stay tuned!

Shadow Play

"Shadow Play" - 8x8

Well, I just finished the second (or third?) painting in the Wardensville series.

As usual, my emotional pattern remains intact - high hopes at the onset, an early setback where I think I've ruined it, a stubborn refusal to quit, a rescue and recovery mission where my hopes take flight again, and then a slow, anti-climatic finish, and finally some disappointment.

I suspect this is how every artist feels during the process of every painting. Why do we go through this? I think most painters I've talked to say it's the process and the vision, but rarely the results, that provide the rush we crave.

Joy

"Joy" - 8"x5"

Finished!

I've been working on this rose as a commission since the start of the year. Once again, I decided to challenge myself with yellow and, as usual, yellow put up one heck of a fight. See my earlier post on yellow to learn more.

The primary yellow here is MaimeriBlu's Permanent Yellow Lemon (PY175).

Benzimidazolone Lemon is considered lightfast, which is why I chose it for this rose. It's difficult to find a transparent cool yellow that is lightfast, meaning it won't fade or shift to an unsaturated gray after prolonged exposure to light.

The other pigments I used were W&N's Permanent Rose and Cobalt Blue.

This is the second painting I've done of late where I've confined myself to a traditional triad of Blue, Red and Yellow. As was the case for "Red Shed," it's hard for me to work in this way. Cobalt Blue always seems so gummy when I use it for shadows -- and since the yellow is so dominant here, I felt as though I was fighting the little grainy flecks in every dark area.

In contrast, using the Lemon Yellow with Permanent Rose made for brilliant orange mixes...the best I've seen in any of my paintings, in fact. So this mixing discovery is one positive I will take from this project.

I hope my client enjoys the painting!

New year! New opportunities!

I'd like to wish everyone a Happy New Year!

I'll start off 2013 with some wonderful news. I learned early in December that Mumbles and Squeaks has earned entry in the 2013 Southern Watercolor Society show!

The show juror, Mary Ann Beckwith, selected 80 paintings from a pool of 410 works submitted by 241 artists. By SW rules, only one painting per artist was permitted.

This is the first time that I've tried to enter a large watercolor show, so I was very surprised to have made it. When I look at the work of the other artists who are included in the show, my amazement multiplies.

The show will open at the Gadsden County Arts Center in Quincy, Fla., on Feb. 8 and run through April 27.

My next challenge will be shipping the painting. I got a little bit of practice on shipping art earlier this month, so I hope this part of the challenge won't be too stressful.

You can learn more about the Southern Watercolor Society at their website: www.southernwatercolorsociety.org.

Merry Christmas

 I've nearly missed the season, but here's my holiday image for the year. 

I'm not sure how many cards I made using little prints of this painting -- I used up all my blank cards, so that ended the card's run at the start of the week. 

I hope the recipients enjoy their cards -- I don't bake or do much decorating for Christmas anymore, so this activity has become my holiday treat.

Best wishes to you and yours!

Comparison

This is the final painting of Mumble and Squeaks.

And here's that failed version from earlier this year that I allude to in my previous post. You may not see the splotches easily in this image, but believe me, they are there!

And now the "rest of the story"

With apologies to the late Paul Harvey for my post title -- here's what happened between versions of Mumbles and Squeaks.

The problems with the first painting: Shadowed areas that got too dark too fast, and keeping those shadows even, yet interesting.

When I got too dark, I panicked, and tried to scrub things out. That ruined the surface of the paper, and then it would not hold paint without bleeding all over the place (ah the benefits of sizing!).

But the larger issue was the diagonal shadow cast from the little roof above the second-story door. That shape drew me to the scene to begin with, and it was so complicated, I could not paint it quickly enough to keep the wash even. Even trying to pre-wet the area with clear water didn't help me. I started getting splotches where wet areas would meet nearly dry areas...it was a mess. And I was so busy trying to just get the wash down, I was not making it look interesting -- it was just an ugly, splotchy shape.

So I walked away for several months and thought about those problems. I transferred a fresh drawing to a new piece of watercolor paper, but I decided that I would not put brush to that piece of paper again until I had developed a more thorough plan of attack.

My solution developed after watching a snippet of a John Salminen painting video. As you know, I'm a big fan of his work (see why at www.johnsalminen.com).

This video snippet was part of an advertisement for one of his painting DVDs, and it showed him using strips of cheap masking tape to mask out an area of a painting. He layered multiple layers of tape over an area, and then used a very sharp knife to cut through the tape and expose an area of paper, which he then painted with a wash.

Watching this, I questioned how it was possible to cut the tape and not cut the paper -- but I thought it was worth further exploration.

It turns out, if your knife is sharp enough, then you can feel your way along the surface of the paper without damaging it. So after several practice attempts, I decided to use that technique to mask around the primary diagonal shadow shape.

Since I had the freedom to lay paint on quickly with the shape's edges protected, I started playing with brighter colors in areas that I thought would have reflected light. Since the entire painting is painted with four colors -- essentially a yellow, red, blue and green, it was easy to brighten areas but keep the overall color palette in harmony.

Once I had that essential shadow shape down, I pulled off the tape and began to work on the rest of the painting. As the layers went down, I went back into the cast shadow several times to darken some areas and highlight others. With the primary shape defined, I found it easier to paint in that area and keep layers even.

So, I can't imagine doing an entire painting with that kind of layered masking approach, but I did find it helpful in getting a complex shape down on the paper. And it helped me get a painting finished!