on the go

As usual I work best when there are many paintings on the go, all in various stages of progress!

Found a piece of paper which has the most interesting wrinkled texture, so I put it on these small canvases and am beginning to paint over them:

Stepping Up

oil on 2 stitched canvases
11 x 20" and 11 x 24"

so this is what it's like...

how different from the pock-marked and paint-splattered walls of the studio!
doesn't it look nice?

moving pictures

Well, I dropped off all these paintings at the Axis gallery today, stopping to take a quick photo in the freight elevator on my way out of the studio.
My show will open thursday night, nov. 6 ....

the painting and I

more city sketches

#4:



#5:

3 to get ready

A few things I have been working on:

yeah, that's the latest "city sketch" at bottom right, not yet framed.

Those little "city sketches" have got me excited, so I am making more. There are bits of architectural drawings adhered to the canvas with clear medium - it seems appropriate to start a city with some drawings!



And here is a second version of an earlier work:


Don't know how this will turn out, but since I had all those little bits of panel lying around I thought I may as well use them & see where it goes. Perhaps it will turn out nicely, like the first one did:

city sketches

Framed this one - the frame is actually very dark blue.
I think the 3/4" profile canvases look much better in frames.


A little tip:

I have discovered that the lumber store sells mouldings by the foot - you know, the long thin strips of decorative wood used to finish the bit where the walls meet the floor inside a house, or cupboards &c.... well, these mouldings come in a variety of profiles and can be made into inexpensive frames! Very suitable for smaller paintings & may work on larger pieces too.

Just measure carefully, cut on a 45-degree angle, glue corners, use tape to hold it nicely together & put a couple of heavy-duty staples in the back of each corner. Let glue dry a couple of hours, remove tape and paint any colour you like. Easy as pie, almost!


Still have to make frames for these:




How fun it is to make these little things - so fast, and not so "serious" like the paintings I have been getting ready for my show the last few months.
It's been a breath of fresh air!
And who knows, maybe they will go in the show too.

A Little Something

... and here is a little something I did at the end of the day with some leftover paint on a scrap of a canvas - something about the quick energy of this one that I really like:


it reminds me of Dr. Seuss - the colour maybe

Velocity (phase 3)

oil on stitched canvas
42"w x 32"h

Towery City - lg

oil on stitched canvas
37"w x 68"h

actually still needs a little work...

looking at this photo I can see patterns that aren't apparent when I look at the actual painting

now I can see how to enhance certain things &c.

stay tuned!






...

Towery City - sm

oil on stitched canvas
14"w x 36"h



















...

Uptown

oil on stitched canvas
42"w x 60"h

Industrial Dreams

oil on 2 stitched canvases
32"h x 70"w

Space and Time

oil on 14 little bits of panel....
measures approximately 48 x 20"
(that vertical piece of shelving bracket is not part of the painting)

this little project was "shelved" for quite some time - actually the pieces were on the studio floor for about a year.
I walked on it, shuffled the table over it, splattered paint on it, &c.
then yesterday I picked it up and mounted it.
if you click on the picture to enlarge you may notice the lovely scratched and speckled surface - couldn't have got that if I'd been trying for it! haha

this is what it looks like from the side:

fairly simple mounting technique - small blocks of wood to float each piece off the wall.

painted the backs to create some reflected light in the shadows.

the floating effect is imperfect because some of the pieces are not perpendicular to the wall....

next one will see some improvements.

something a little different

I have been thinking I'd like to make some stitched canvases that are simpler, kind of landscape-ish but still with that structural stuff going on...
Been working on these for a couple of months, still not sure about them.

in stitches

This is what I have been doing for the last few days:



And this is what I have to show for it:


Today I will seal and gesso these canvases.
Already I have some idea of how to begin the painting - excitement!

Zones 1 & 2

Oil on stitched canvas. Forgot the measurements, both are somewhere about 13"w x 15-16"h.
Found the frames & stretchers in the "free" area of the common hallway. Took them apart and re-squared them, and voilà!
First time I've ever framed a stitched painting. I like it.

Urban Velocity

oil on stitched canvas
57"w x 38"h

Tried to calm down the sky a bit - still it's a very busy painting.
What a struggle with this one!
Perhaps I just have to accept it as is, just leave it.

Move on with other work.

Neighborhood

Well I am liking this one a lot - always the struggle between "I like it" and "but it looks unfinished".

So what constitutes a finished painting?

It is so easy to overwork things... I see other artists' works which are very loose and gestural, paint drips &c. and I really like them, but then with my own work I have this idea of how it should look "finished" - perhaps this idea is too rigid sometimes.