Durham Art Guild - 55th Annual Juried Show

Last night I attended the opening of the Durham Art Guild's 55th Annual Juried Show.  I was fortunate enough to have two works selected for this show (Whitewater Falls #3 and Croatan Forest Forest #2).  The juror for the show is Maria Magdalena Compos-Pons, she selected a strong range of works which made for a tremendous show!

I was impressed with most all of the works, but a few artists definitely stood out.  I saw Kathryn DeMarco's work in last year's show and this year was again amazed at her mastery of color in a difficult media like collage.  In looking at her website, it is nice to see she is also a big fan of dogs and cats. 

This was the first I have seen Saba Barnard's works ("Free Flowers" pictured).  Like the works of Kathryn DeMarco the interplay of color is outstanding.  The skeleton forms doing everyday things like enjoying flowers and listening to music added even more intrigue to these captivating paintings.

Congratulations to everyone involved with the show!  It was definitely a hit!

Bob Rankin

This past Saturday I had the pleasure of working with Bob Rankin at the Art of the Carolinas. Bob is an immensely talented artist and is a huge patron of the arts in Raleigh.  In the three hours or so he spent painting on Saturday morning he completed two 30x40" works.  The first (which is not seen in this picture) is an abstract landscape of  what I think is a North Carolina Beach scene. The second is the painting shown in this picture.  

Like me, Bob likes to work in Matisse Acrylics. You can see some of the Southern Ocean Blue in the center of this work.  A brilliant color, a great painting and a great artist!

Tobacco Field at Old Milburnie Road

Recently I was invited by the folks at Savoir Faire to try the new Sennelier Acrylique.  Being such a creature of habit I am always skeptical about trying different paints, especially when I like the brand I currently use.  The scene painted is a tobacco field off Old Milburnie Road in Raleigh, NC.  The autumn colors were starting to really appear, and being the tobacco crop was not in season, the colors of the field offered some interesting reds and earth tone colors.

I began this painting with the sky mixing some Ultramarine Blue and Titanium White.  I immediately noticed the difference in the Sennelier paint versus other paints I have used.  My initial reaction was that it felt like more of an oil color than an acrylic.  Right out of the tube the paint was very thick.   For the sky I needed I thinner mixture that I could easily glaze over – the thickness of the paint prohibited me a bit in this process, but in the end it worked ok.  The remarkable thing is even after I thinned these colors down with a decent amount of water, the vibrancy of the color remained as if it were right out of the tube.  

When I started to paint the trees I really was impressed with the colors.  Even after I stopped painting for the day and came back 20 hours later, there was very little color shift from wet to dry.  

I like using Permanent Green Light in many of my paintings.  This tends to be a very transparent color and if I want to use it straight out of the tube and right on the canvas I generally need to mix a little white to make it an opaque color.  With the Sennelier paint I did not need to do this.  Much of the color seen is right out of the tube – no streaking or dulling of the color – Pure color in its pure state . . . really good stuff.

Art of the Carolinas

From Thursday November 12th through Sunday November 15th I will be attending Art of the Carolinas at the North Raleigh Hilton.  Art of the Carolinas is sponsored by Jerry's Artarama and features numerous workshops, products and interesting people.  This year I will be at the Matisse Acrylic booth.   Hopefully I will be able to do some painting, but even if I don't - the interaction with customers and other artists can be fun most of the time.

www.artofthecarolinas.com

Bill Wallace at the Sunflower Gallery

A few months ago I had the pleasure of meeting Bill Wallace, a fellow member of the Wake Forest Area Artists' Studio Tour.  Bill is a skilled wood turner and carver.  This is an art form I am completely amazed by.  Knowing the intricacies of different types of wood  is both an art and a science.  To combine this knowledge with skilled craftsmanship and art makes this a remarkable form of art.  Unlike painting I would think wood turning and/or carving leaves very little margin of error, There is no painting over a piece of wood that was accidentally cut too deep.

Bill Wallace, Janet Wallace and Lisa McCamy will all be showing their work at the Sunflower Studio in Wake Forest.  The opening is this Friday (November 13th) and the show will run through December 5th.

www.sunflowerstudiowf.com

Pocosin Lakes Wildlife Refuge

While visiting a friend in Columbia, North Carolina I got some great pictures of the surrounding landscape.  I did this painting on an 8x10" canvas and it is only a taste of the paintings I will do from this trip.  Whenever I take a picture that I will subsequently paint I look to capture sky, land and water.  This Pocosin Lakes Wildlife Refuge offered these elements and I was fortunate enough to be there at the right time of day and during good weather conditions.  The water was a blue/black color and during the early part of October the leaves were just starting to change color.  

Eileen and I took nearly 100 pictures from this trip.  I can't wait to paint some more.

Glazing a Creek Bed

Glazing is an important part of nearly all my paintings.  The short definition is paint thinned with medium to create a transparent layer of color.  I like to glaze things like creek beds, the layer of glaze creates a sense of a water surface where one can look down at the bottom of the creek to see rocks, sticks, etc, but still know they are looking down onto through water.

To begin acrylic glazing I mix about 20% fluid acrylic paint with about 80% glazing medium. (You can use heavy body acrylics but there is a risk of clumps not being mixed resulting in streaking when applied to the canvas).  I mix these until the mixture appears the color of the paint.  Being that the mixture is very fluid I use a palette with deep wells, so it does not spill everywhere.  It is also important that glazing be down on a table rather than an easel for that same reason.  In the instance shown I use three colors – This was a quick demo, but it was my intent that the different colors would show different levels of light refraction on the water surface.  Color experimentation is very important when glazing – Some colors will have stronger degrees of opacity and even when thinned with 80% medium they might not give the transparent look I might be seeking.

Another Inspiration from Dupont Forest

Triple Falls is located just a short way from the Hooker Falls paring area in the Dupont Forest.  This is a really fun area to explore, because one can venture right onto the waterfalls and do some light rock climbing.  Great exercise and of course spectacular views! 

This is painted on a 12x16” canvas and is done almost entirely in acryl gouache.  I love the collection of blues at the bottom of the waterfall.  Combined with a diverse palette of autumn colors, this makes for a very interesting painting, even on a smaller canvas.