Red Letter Day

This is a red letter day in my life as an artist!

I painted this painting of my friend Therese's homeplace three summers ago. Today I saw it exhibited in the Cincinnati Art Museum, along with a painting I recently did of the Taft Museum of Art. Let me explain.

This summer, CAM is featuring a See America exhibit and they wanted to display some of the work of local artists as part of that. Mason is one of the fastest growing cities in Ohio, so the CAM has a partnership with the Mason-Deerfield Arts Council, of which I am a member.

Almost everyone I paint with on Mondays has at least one work on display and while I was there, two museum employees told me to be sure and see the exhibit and how impressed they are with the quality of the work. I was too! I almost couldn't breathe when I got off the elevator on the ground floor near the DeWitt entrance and saw our paintings. They looked awesome!! I was so proud and happy for all the artists, including myself.

Of course I dreamed that one day I'd have something hanging in the Cincinnati Art Museum. But I never thought it would be while I was still alive to see it! What a great moment. Our work will be up all summer, until mid August, so sign the guest book if you stop by and see it.

Amazing, too, how much better things look displayed and tagged properly. I'll have to pay more attention when I hang things at the studio and at outdoor shows.

For more about Mason-Deerfield Arts Council, see http://www.masonarts.org/.

My first vertical

Can you believe I haven't painted a vertical or square painting in more than five years? Time to rectify that situation. I think I got a pretty good start on The Ascent today, as I painted with my mentor and friend, Elmer Ruff. He looked at my brushes and suggested I get some bigger ones if I'm going to paint these big canvases. I didn't think of that but he's right. And he gave me a good idea for the Music Hall Christmas painting too.

This is going to be a special painting because some other close friends are a big part of it! The 24 by 30 inch canvas came from Betty and Margie, who got me to start painting again five years ago. I undercoated it with cerulean blue paint that was once Lana's mother's. And the subject, the Ascent, was suggested by my friends who work at Art on the Levee, where my last large painting of the Roebling Bridge sold in just a few days.

I'm picking up a giclee of that bridge painting on canvas next week and if it looks as good as the proof looked, I think a lot more of them will sell. I hope so.

This is the perfect subject to inspire me to paint vertically. I'm very inspired by this building. How did he think of it? How were they able to build it? How is it still standing? The photos I took make it look so different from every angle. My paint dried up and I ran out of time today but I look forward to working on this one again soon.

Tomorrow is Final Friday at the Pendleton from 6-10 pm. Before the guests come, I've undercoated another big canvas from Betty and Margie and plan to start a new Roebling Bridge painting on it. With bigger brushes, maybe I can get going on the Lebanon Christmas parade painting again too.

Today's Plein Air Painting
Missed painting with the Mason group on Monday, so today I met them in back of Gallery 42 for a plein air (outdoor) painting day downtown. It sure was a beautiful day for it!
Chuck Marshall wants us to paint on the city streets to give visibility to art and artists in Mason. So we agreed to work strictly on site -- no photos, even for reference. It's funny because a group of children came by and talked to me and one boy wanted to know why I didn't just take a photo and paint from that. I could honestly say that, in spite of the rules we set for ourselves today, no photo could ever capture what I was seeing in the bright summer sunshine and I think the painting reflects that. Could this have been painted on anything but a bright, sunny June morning?
Still fighting with the "oriental rug" syndrome (too fragmented) and I know this painting would have been better had I quit about 45 min sooner. I should have. Had to quit when I did because despite using a wet palette and spraying my acrylic paints, they totally dried up on me and I literally didn't have any paint left! Had fun though.
Something's wrong with my Olympus C-5500 Zoom digital camera. There's a "soft spot" in all the photos I've been taking, so I'll have to get it fixed or get a new camera.
Still working on composition for the "Idaho homestead" painting and two very large canvases. One will be another Roebling Bridge and the other either Music Hall or the Ascent as a vertical.

Moving Away

Here is the pencil drawing and two 8 x 10 acrylic paintings I've done for a collector who would like to give a gift to a friend who has moved away.

These 2 started with two different background colors and, because the acrylic paints I use are transparent, the background color usually influences the entire painting.

Which one of these do you like best? Do you think the choice of background color has anything to do with your preference? Or are there other reasons you like one better than the other? If so, I'd love to know.

Currently working on some family "homeplace" paintings and will have the story of one here later this week.