As announced in an earlier post, an oil sketch I painted of paper lanterns was selected for inclusion in Principia’s 2024 calendar and set of alumni artist note cards. If you would like to order either, you can do so on this webpage. If you would like to see what you are clicking into, you can go here–www.principiaalumni.org/events/upcoming–and scroll down to “2024 Principia Calendar and Notecards.” There is a thumbnail image of some of the items (but you can’t see any of them fullscreen or alone). Card sets and calendars are $10.
This will most likely be the last post for 2023. Stay tuned for Pirates on the Brandywine part two in early 2024.
Merry Christmas. May you and your families have a new year blessed with light, truth, freedom, and joy.
One of my paintings has been selected for inclusion in Principia’s 2024 calendar and annual series of alumni art cards. The calendar’s theme is light. In January, an online exhibit of all the art will open, and I will share the web link when it is ready.
For 2021, my workplace created an inspirational calendar that also had light as the theme. Since the audiences overlap and I had two pieces in the earlier calendar, I had to think a little about what to submit this time to avoid duplication.
The selected art is actually not a final piece, so I was mildly surprised it made the cut. It is an oil sketch to explore ideas and techniques, a stepping stone to an eventual polished work. Here is Color Study, Lanterns, Narita. (An unpretentious, factual title, to be sure. Such it is with studies.)
It draws from my trip to Japan in 2019. The last night, one of my travelling companions and I took the train from Akihabara to Narita. The evening was quiet and rainy. On the walk to the hotel, we passed some little shops and restaurants, and one in particular caught my eye. Lit colored lanterns and fish nets hung over the entrance. There was something attractively atmospheric, or atmospherically attractive, about it. My hope is that when I work on the polished version, I can recreate some of the mood.
That’s all for today’s news. If you missed my last post, please have a look–my newest book, A Psalm for When I Wander is available! (The first link is to the announcement & the second to the book page.)
Next time, I have what I hope will be a fun treat, no tricks. (It was not intended for Halloween but will complement it given the subject matter.) I will share highlights from recent visits to Delaware Valley museums noted for their collections of American art and illustration, especially Howard Pyle and N.C. Wyeth, both of whom gained some renown for painting boatloads of buccaneers. “Yawl sea” where this is headed? It will be all hands on deck for the seaworthy special entry Pirates on the Brandywine!
Once Handmade Hopewell (HH) finished, I could spend more time working on art again instead of working on presenting art. Here are recent animal paintings.
This sea turtle was “finished” a few weeks ago, after HH. To give a sense of scale, it is leaning against a door.
At the start, there were some energetic, sketchy elements I quite liked, eg., around the flippers, but most of those areas ended up getting more refined or painted over. Looking at it now, I wish I had preserved more of them. Even so, the painting satisfied my need to do something artistic besides re-painting tulips and working on my video for HH, and I am generally content with it.
The Wednesday after HH, I got a call from neighbors who asked whether I were willing & able to come up with something artistic & humorous that night to mail Thursday morning to a couple getting married that Friday or Saturday. Although these wedding pandas are not punny of themselves, my neighbors were encouraged to send the happy couple a note congratulating them on going forward with their wedding during the panda-demic.
There are also some bird paintings, but I will save them for another time.
The word “serene” kept coming to me during the creation of this painting. I started this with the remaining pigments on my palette after completing the Honu painting featured two posts ago. (Link goes to the post.) This painting is quite a bit larger than that one: 24″ x 30″. I had planned to hang it in my office at work, but a buyer came along before that happened. 🙂 I can always painting another one (or two or three if there are any interested parties out there).
Hope you enjoyed this little whale-watching trip. ‘Til next time.
Alooooooha! Two and a half weeks ago, I returned from my first visit to the Hawaiian Islands–Kaua’i and Hawai’i (the Big Island), plus a day on Oahu. The different environments, animals, and a number of the local art galleries, inspired some fun, artistic exploration once I got back to the mainland. That’s what I’m sharing today.
Some pen doodles inspired by some of the simple graphic designs on National Park pins. My traveling party saw green sea turtles (honu in Hawaiian) on two occasions: once at Punalu’u, a black sand beach, & again at Kaloko-Honokohau, a National Historic Park.
2. Ginger plant (acrylic, 8 x 10″). The ginger blooms in several different colors — red, white, yellow, & pink. The pinks & reds were quite striking against the green foliage of the rainforests.
3. Painting of a honu resting (oil, 9″ x 6.5″). This was painted more like a watercolor would be (in terms of layers & values). First I painted the yellow across the whole hardboard (such that it started off looking like a background color), and then the blues on top of that, preserving the lights. Many of the greens were actually mixed right on the surface when the blue & yellow paint met.
