Willamette River

This view of the Willamette River at Foothills Park was painted following a morning walk a month ago or so, when the trees were just beginning to show signs of life, and the last color of winter was allowed to shine in the rising sun.  In some ways, I still like my preparatory color sketch better:

And then, yet another face on the wall:

One Thousand Faces

I am on the path now of a thousand portraits, intent on painting that many in the hopes and expectation that I will certainly improve my skills by then.  If not, I will have to admit I took a wrong turn in my life and spent far too much time and energy trying to do something beyond my means.

These small portraits are from old photographs of strangers long dead, so it is unlikely I will disturb anyone with a lack of resemblance.  When I don't feel in the mood to paint anything else, I can always turn out a small portrait in an hour or two.  Let's hope they get better as I go along.

The Journey

A Poem by Mary Oliver:

The Journey

One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began,

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice--

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

"Mend my life!"

each voice cried.

But you didn't stop.

You knew what you had to do,

though the wind pried

with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations,

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night,

and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voices behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do--

determined to save

the only life you could save.

Early Morning on the Lake

(This photo is not from this morning, but is as close as I have on file.)

I sit at the large windows overlooking the lake and marvel at the harmony of the water, land and sky: it is early morning and the water is still, a glassy reflection of the ridge of firs and maples on the opposite shore.  I ponder how I might capture the ever-changing color of the water, so different each day, and I have made a few quick studies on other days: the lake in fog, winter lake, nocturne on the lake.  Today the water is deep in value, cool in temperature, a steely green with hints of blue, Hookers green, but more neutral and transparent, and where it meets the brighter reflection of the overcast sky, the ripples cause the light to shimmer, a scintillation where the two colors meet, a dancing blend.  The ridge of trees and homes is dark and moody, and the peach and cream sky above it is almost superfluous, and yet when the eyes take it all in, the heart flutters and the exquisite beauty of the scene is almost unbearable, made more unbearable by the certainty that I will never be able to find a mixture of paints that will come close to sharing this moment with others, or fix it in Time, craft a hold on it.  No, this moment is as ephemeral as the V-wake of the wood duck as he paddles in circles, lasting only the moment itself and then it is gone, taken back into the random dance on the water surface.  The light changes even as I watch it; I imagine myself madly mixing piles of paint, chasing the elusive, and I am helpless to do anything about it.  The Unbearable Lightness of Being.

I resign myself to the moment, to being a witness to the day, to being in it and yet apart from it, riding the current of the gray/green mood of early morning spring.  A bald eagle swoops low, skims the surface of the water, loops back lazily to swoop again in the same place and then retreats to a shoreline tree to eat his catch.  Another eagle glides down from overhead, joins his or her mate as they wing back and forth across my view.  A fawn tenderly one-steps its way up from the brush on the hillside, finds the feed we leave beneath the cedar tree and munches quietly, its little tongue darting around the lips, the jaw working side to side.  Down in the dark cove below, the Canada geese splash in short bursts as they chase each other, honking and fussing.  Life is so abundant and so present, I am filled with a thrill that becomes almost a nausea; it is overwhelming, my eyes tear up, the music in my earbuds, made by musicians far away in another time still somehow perfectly fits this moment, too, and Time slows down, crowds out the rest of the day: I realize that this is all I need, to be here now, living this moment which I know will not last, as it will be slowly abraded by the rising sun, the changing of the light - even now there are hints of cerulean working their way into the patterns on the water.

My desire to try to paint this scene seems puny in the presence of such beauty, and I am embarrassed to think I would dare to assume that any effort on my part could ever replicate even a portion of this.  But isn’t the point of painting to translate the emotional reaction to an event or to a place, frame it in two dimensions, share it with the world?  I need to reassess the purpose and the scope of my artistic intentions, find something less daunting, some motif more simple and direct.  This here outside my window, this I can witness on my own, my own private romance with the Light, and that must certainly be enough.

Retro Auto

This 7x7 acrylic painting was done from an old black and white photo.  I was trying to break through my reluctance to put down bold brushstrokes and leave them alone, and I failed in that goal, still allowing myself to fiddle and fuss and mess it up, though I intend to keep working at this approach in hopes that old dogs can learn new tricks.

Thinking that maybe a tight time limit might induce me to leave things alone, I tried this next one of my grandfather from an old harsh black and white:

It was slightly more successful, if only as a caricature, and it did capture an essence of Papa, who tended to look like an angry old Scot most of the time (but maybe not as scary as this ax-murderer!)

Spring Forward

La Contessa

The above is not necessarily of a contessa, but the old black and white photo reference had no information about who she was, probably from around 1900, and I need to call her something, so...

With this unexpected week of clear skies and bright sunshine, I am yearning to get outside and paint, but the one time I did load up my pack and set up for a quick plein air session, I found that it was simply too cold; my hands were shaking so much I might as well have been trying to paint while riding on a hay wagon.  So I resign myself to painting whatever I can see through the windows, from the comfort of central heating.

I try to paint or draw something every day, but I don't have a master plan, and sometimes I surprise myself with what pops into my head.  Yesterday, for some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to sketch something out of thin air based on the old expression "Eating Crow."  I was aiming for a look of resentment, but I think it missed that mark and hit sinister instead.  

Tom Miner Basin

Oil on Yupo

Try as I might, I was unable to get the free-flowing gentle coverage that Randall Tipton manages on Yupo, even after watching him work on it several times.  I guess I wasn't using enough thinner.  Or maybe old habits are hard to break.

It's not painting, but it felt like art

As an antidote to posts where I toss in a photo of a painting that I feel fell short of my goal, and as a diversion from the parade of work that is more exercise than success, I think I will post a few photos of earlier work I have done in an entirely different field.  I spent many years designing and building homes, and frequently that work gave me great creative satisfaction.

This home was built on 5 acres on the Tualatin River with rich alluvial soil.  I designed it after a trip to the south of France and the influence shows in the round three story tower at the back, the yellow of the stucco, and the fields of flowers out back.  For years I planted a large field in sunflowers, which added to the French feel.  The smaller building is a barn for storage.

                                

 The following house was influenced by both English and French design, with the herringbone brick nogging over native basalt stonework and the half-hipped gables.  For some reason this has remained one of my favorites, perhaps because it was so hard for me; I redrew the plans entirely three times, trying to break from my habitual style.  Sometimes we just have to love the most difficult child.  In this photo the house is nearly completed.

This kitchen is from yet another house, and it was quite successful in layout, very easy to work in, open to a great room on one side and a dining room on the other.

While I would love the challenge of building more homes, the market is not entirely conducive to the levels of risk involved, and I have moved on to other pursuits, but the need to create must find an outlet somewhere, hence my foray into painting.  Enough of the past for now.

It took a great deal of courage to begin a project as daunting as building a home: hundreds of thousands of dollars were at stake; failure and loss was always a possibility; the scope of the thousands of decisions and tasks was bewildering.  If I had waited to think through the entire thing before beginning, I would have been unable to proceed.  So I began with a concept, a plan that was well-considered, and a rough outline of the flow of work to be done and the confidence that I could do it and then I just plunged in blindly.  I dealt with issues daily as they came up.  I need to be able to translate some of the skills of this one type of work to what is needed in order to paint.  Why is it that we can do well at one thing, for example hold a job and show up to work everyday on time, week after week, year after year, and yet when we try to do something else, write a novel, for example, we procrastinate, waste time, can't harness the necessary effort?  Writers will tell us that first you just have to show up and start writing every day.  And yet most people who try to write will fail at this one basic principle.  What is it about the creative act that we set apart from all other sorts of work and treat differently?  What is it that makes it so elusive and causes us to be our own worst enemy?

Surfing the Web

An older plein air pastel study gone wild

Continuing to share some of the websites I find most interesting, I'd like to mention two places I visit for images of paintings which I might not otherwise discover.  Art & Artists  is a great place to discover work of famous artists not found in most books.  Poul Webb pools together extensive collections of the work of a particular artist and then spreads them over however many posts it takes.  Currently, he is posting on Edvard Munch, and the current post (number 5 of 20 planned) contains 65 paintings, so you can imagine how much of Munch's work will be available for perusal.  I find it fascinating to see the breadth and depth of a painter's work, to see the series done, the changes through the years, and the works very unlike the familiar (in this case, The Scream.)  There is also an index of artists so that it is easy to find the ones that may interest you.

Another website for discovering work of which I personally may be unaware is Lines and Color, by Charley Parker.  Each day he presents the work of someone he finds interesting, often with enlarged details of the work.  He includes contemporary fine artists, illustrators, fantasy artists and painters from centuries ago.  I look forward to the daily treat from Charley, and have seldom been disappointed.

Cellist 1900

For some reason being stuck on a couple of paintings, I try to break the ice with some drawing practice, just to get something finished.  I find that I enjoy most pulling up old photos from the turn of the century; maybe it's a romanticism for the past, maybe the photography was different somehow making it better for me for drawing.  But I think most of all I enjoy working on the face of someone long gone and trying to bring them back to life.  I sometimes reach a point during the drawing where I see a glimmer of life, make a connection with this woman or that man, and the work becomes imbued with more personal meaning.  We all will die soon enough, but maybe in some future some stranger will pull up an image of us and wonder who we were, what we were like, and try to find something in our face to bring us back to life however briefly.