Sunny Corner

I found it easier here to think in terms of composition
and light and not worry about details. Wise artist friends
have told me I should allow viewers to supply details
or complete unfinished areas in their imaginations. I
try to be conscious of that while painting but don't always
practice what I'm intending . . . This will be one of my
offerings in an upcoming holiday show at the Hunt Gallery
in San Antonio. It's on Saturday, December 5th from
1 - 5pm. There will be drinks and munchies and maybe
even some very good deals!

Galveston Wharf Building 6

Same building as in previous posts but this time, I
hoped to create a "white" painting. My intention was
to spell out very little but it may still need more work.
The actual painting looks better than this photo—it was
hard to shoot and color correct.

Galveston Wharf Building 3 and 4

Same building in Galveston as the previous post . . . this building
has different architectural elements and many windows, some of
which are arched and some a hybrid arch. Some areas of the facade
are pretty clean while others are dark, dirty and rusty. It's one subject
that can be cropped so many ways to look for different compositions,
colors and to play with scale. This old girl probably has a lot of
interesting stories to tell.

Galveston Wharf Building 1 and 2

These are two 8 x 10 studies of an old neglected building in Galveston,
with 2 more in the works. I've been working on several larger canvases
but am not yet satisfied with how they're developing. Switching gears
usually disrupts whatever single-minded obsessive rut I seem to fall into.
There are several layers on these, some where everything is spelled out,
then scraped and softened, then repainted. Sometimes I get too focused
on what I'm observing and don't pay enough attention to what's happening
on the canvas. Working in layers feels natural to me but it was mostly to try
to get things more "right." Now I'm watching the layers create optical grays
and a skin or patina so that the paint itself seems as important as the
subject. These may need more work but they'll be set aside for a bit and
looked at again later. (The other rut I'm prey to is overworking and ruining!)

Another Day in Paradise

It was fun to concentrate on color and making marks and not think 
at all about accuracy. I take photos of buildings all the time but I'm
not really interested in reproducing them on canvas. I've wasted a lot
of time moaning about not having a subject I'm excited about.
Then it struck me that I could assemble different architectural features to
give myself a structure to hang paint on. I drew a b&w composition in my
sketchbook and used it as a model. Color was made up and maybe it's
too simplistic but it's an experiment to alter my thought process, practice
straying from reality and try to get closer to a marriage of representation
and abstraction.

Galveston Beach Side

This was not a very interesting scene, taken from a motel
parking lot, but I love palm trees and love painting them so
I snapped it. I thought it was finished months ago but it
was pretty blah. Reworking was an opportunity to use my
imagination which I forget to use sometimes because I tend
to get hung up on accuracy and trying to be faithful to a scene.
Going forward, my intention is to focus more on color, texture
and paint manipulation. And to make stuff up!

Piper-----sold

This painting was included in a gulf coast-themed group show
(done from a photo taken in Galveston).

Working Galveston

This painting is from a photo taken on the working side of Galveston
Island. It will be included in a Hunt Gallery group show based on the
gulf coast, opening May 14th. It was a very complicated scene with
so much going on, I kept getting lost. It was great practice on editing
and simplifying.

New Morning and Crossing

 New Morning 16 x 16  Oil on panel

Crossing  22 x 30  Oil on canvas

Headed Home

It's not often that I'm stopped in traffic on the freeways of San
Antonio. It was dusk with car lights coming on and the city
buildings haloed in the distance.

Patchwork City (Sold) and Laundry Day

Patchwork City  22 x30  Oil on canvas

Laundry Day  16 x 16  Oil on panel

I was taken with this scene because of the light and pattern. All
the geometry provided the opportunity to think more abstractly and
experiment with textures. This is one of the paintings in my recent
exhibit—it was really great to see the work framed, lit and presented
on gallery walls.

Two-person show at the Hunt Gallery

If you're in San Antonio,
I hope you'll come to the
opening. Another version
of the digital invitation
and the paintings on
exhibit can be found at
http://www.huntgallery.net/