November 25, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

6 pm: this morning i continued work on 11/24/17 collage by first making a quick sketh in gouache based on a photo i shot of one of the programmers on our team. then i proceeded to cut up the gouache and collage it onto yesterdays collage, as you can see BELOW. i may do more tomorrow.

then i continued working on the collage. three stages can be seen below:

a couple of unconscious people showed up at the site, popped me out of my reverie & interrupted my work, so the 2 gouaches are not great.

BELOW: todays 2 gouaches and 4 photos of the site:

2 new plein air gouaches and the early stages of 11-24-17 collage / November 24, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

4:49 PM: this morning i started 11-24-17 collage by making a quick sketch in gouache of a photo i shot several weeks ago of one of our team members. i then cut it up and ,along with a quick gouache study of a chinese landscape and began mounting them on a 15x20" piece of 300lb cold press paper. it has an appealing simplicity right now. as always, my challenge tomorrow will be to retain that elegant simplicity while adding elements that, ideally, enrich the composition and therefore the experience of the viewer.

Mikela & I went up to the creek this afternoon so I could paint plein air. It was 63F, breaking the previous record for this date of 58F. I dressed warmly, knowing that, even at 63 degrees, it can get chilly sitting in one spot for over an hour. As we approached, the wind suddenly picked up. Mikela took a trail walk and, as I started painting, the wind began gusting to 40mph! I stuck it out, barely.

the two gouache paintings that emerged have clearly been influenced by the series of collages i've been making over the past few weeks. the focus is less on representing or reproducing the elements of the creek-scape realistically, and more on riffing on what i observe before me. i've done that in previous gouache plein air paintings, in this case, riff trumps allegiance to subject matter.

11/23/17 collage / November 23, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

2:11 PM: i started a new collage today, after making a few tweaks to yesterdays collage.

gotta run so we can take our trail walk before it gets too late; more later....

STARTING A NEW COLLAGE / November 22, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

7:39 PM: i worked on the collage until 4 pm. towards the end i had the feeling i was overdoing it. when i got it back to the house, i decided it made more sense compositionally as a vertical.

i feel it still needs work, but not a great deal.a few of the slender dark blue collaged bit could be pushed back or eliminated. and the slender red/pink-ish collaged element at the top left is too obvious and not needed. and something else, which i won't know until i resume work tomorrow morning. "you're working on thanksgiving?" you might ask. neither mikela or myself pay attention to holidays, weekends, birthdays, etc.

2:17 PM: here's what the new collage looks like right now. i might give it a rest until tomorrow. the creek scape or the squash forms are no longer primary sources for the forms here. i'm simply taking my aesthetic to the next level.

1:01 PM: got a late start today and am just starting work on a new collage: 11/22/17 collage. i made some preparatory marks as a way of kicking it off with some fresh material.

more pics as my day progresses.

tweaks to yesterdays 11/20/17 collage / November 21, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

1:34 PM: i had brought 11/20/17 collage back to the house so that we could both review it. we independently concluded that this area, and in particular this brown shape needed work. it was drawing our attention to the detriment of the whole composition.

so i brought it back and did some experiments, cutting out that exact shape from another piece of white paper, laying it over the brown, etc. at one point i found this solution, but upon reflection that wasn't doing it.

finally, this solution evolved. i was multi-tasking, beginning some long overdue editing of important footage we shot lest year at a middle school near vail. so i wasn't fully in the groove. on the other hand, it gave me an opportunity to leave the collage altogether and return with fresh eyes. how i know this is the right solution is that i am no longer drawn to that area of the collage to the exclusion of the whole composition.

BELOW are the before, on the left, and after images of the collage:

a new 15x20 collage / November 20, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

3:10 PM: this morning i was in the mood to start a new collage. although i enjoyed working on the small gouache study of the snow capped peaks yesterday, that's not where my energy is at right now. unlike the previous 3 collages, i wasn't using the squash shapes and colors as a basis for the composition. i did however use a few bits from the kids paintings i mentioned. mostly, those are the green shapes.

it started out as a vertical and shifted towards the end of my work day to a horizontal composition.

right now, i'm loving the freedom afforded me by this way of working. there's a lot to be said for the randomness of collage, which, interestingly, allows me to hone in more precisely on the development of my aesthetic. i derive enormous pleasure from the solutions that present themselves moment to moment. and it's easy to self correct when i choose an obvious or repetitive one.

ps: what you see hanging around my neck is my jerry rigged solution for having both hands free when mikela calls from the house.

small gouache study of the snow capped peaks / November 19, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

2:21 PM: this cold has settled in my chest and i'm actually feeling worse than i did yesterday, so i'm going to lie down as soon as i post this. i was however able to start this small gouache study of the freshly snow capped peaks based upon a photo i shot yesterday morning from our bathroom window. i'm considering making a larger version in acrylic on canvas, but haven't yet decided. part of me is still in collage mode, and i've been having a lot of fun with them over the past few days. i simply didn't have the energy to make one today. our dinner party last night was really wonderful, but we didn't get to sleep until late, so that plus the chest cold have left me feeling kind of whacked out.

early stage of snow capped peaks gouache, 4x16"

what will i do today?? / November 18, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

2:41 PM: 11/18/17 collage at the end of my short work day. printed letters have not thus far appeared in this series of collages. playful, isn't it? we'll see how i feel about it tomorrow. although tomorrow is a short day as well; there'a a thanksgiving event at the charter school tomorrow afternoon which we'll likely attend.

1:27 PM: i started a new collage this morning, and this is the current state: i might do an hour more before stopping to go help mikela with preparations for our dinner party this evening.

11:16 AM: we're hosting a dinner party tonight, so it will be a short day. just got some very good news concerning our educational product, so i'm trying to calm down & stay focused on my work.

i'll post pics as usual once i get going on a new piece. in the mean time, here's a watercolor by my 10 year old grand daughter manio, which i think is a masterpiece, and a view of the fresh snow on the peaks.

new collage / November 17, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

3:00 PM: i made a new collage today, the same size as the one i made yesterday. it's not as simple and i'm not yet sure how i feel about it. but i'm framing it temporarily and i'll bring it over to the house and see how it looks in the morning.

since i'm using elements from the same 2 large paintings on paper i spoke about yesterday, done by 2 kids of a friend, some of the colors are the same, such as the pinks & greens they used.

you could say this one is more ambitious compared with yesterday's. it didn't pop right out, and involved a full day of work. the colorful squash we got at the outdoor market last month, which are sitting opposite me on my work table, continue to dominate the drawn forms.

a bigger collage / November 16, 2017 by Philip Tarlow

12:58 PM: today i'm making another collage, larger than yesterday's. it includes some elements drawn directly on the paper with graphite & crayon, inspired by the colorful squash we found at the outdoor market last month, as well as collaged elements, including bits from the large paintings on paper by our friend charise's 2 kids and a drawing made on 7/23/12 in houston.

in comparing this with older collages, such as the 2 made in 2014 you see below, i observe a greater certainty in composition, color and line. the result is a more coherent image, with fewer unnecessary elements. while there is no "progress" as such in art, one evolves. i can track the evolution of my sensibility and draftsmanship over a period of years. it's rewarding to see that, in spite of my glaucoma surgery on january 28 of this year, my vision seems to have actually improved, if it has changed at all.

i do feel that my museum visits on our recent trip to phialdelphia, where mikela was a speaker at AMLE: the National Middle School Conference, have had an effect. especially the day we spent at the barnes collection, as well as my solo experience at the philadelphia museum of art. which is why i always recommend to young artists that they spend as much time as possible looking at great art. it not only inspires us; it allows us to identify, by deduction, exactly who we are as artists and as humans.