changes to both the paintings i worked on yesterday /  by Philip Tarlow

iced creek 32x36” oil on linen

today started earlier than usual. we were up at 5 so mikela could leave for a series of meetings in alamosa. when she left it was snowing heavily with very low visibility. once i made sure she was safely on her way, i was able to get to the studio much earlier than usual at 8am. there’s a rain & snowstorm happening today & tomorrow, and the wet snow downed on of the power lines, cutting our electricity. it was very dark in the studio, so i decided to spend the day stretching canvases. then the lights flickered back on & off again for an hour, eventually remaining on. so i switched plans & started working on the 2 paintings i had been painting yesterday. i love diving into a painting i don’t especially love; it allows me to go anywhere and with an air of abandon sparked by my delight at making the image totally different. today, i think this may have been the more successful of the two. i may make more changes to ice in motion 16, BELOW, tomorrow.

ice in motion 16 36x38” oil on linen

changes to iced creek & ice in motion 16 /  by Philip Tarlow

4:29 PM: last night i had an interrupted sleep. it may have been the result of 2 things: our experience last week at the edwards charter school & watching candidate for president pete buttigieg being interviewed last night. i won’t go into detail, but, at the end of my dream, i was in a classroom where feedback was being given to the kids & teachers. when my y=turn came, i felt enraged. i expressed my rage loudly, and it was about the way we were short changing the students by not telling it like it is. that we are basically lying to them about the reality of the state our country is in, and how we all bear responsibility for this.

so when i entered my studio i was still in a state. i completely re-worked what used to be motion 16, which looked like what you see on the lower left, and now looks like what you see on the lower right.

simultaneously, i made chages to iced creek, which i had worked on yesterday. it was too pat; too easy. i went into it with gusto, and now it looks like what you see on the lower right. mofre later; i’ve got some vision issues & a, going home to lie down.

iced creek & icy creek in tandem /  by Philip Tarlow

iced creek at 2:30 pm 32x38”, oil on linen

DETAIL of iced creek

i had been reserving this canvas for one more sky painting, but today i decided to continue the ice series. this one shows traces of the underlying creek drawing, as well as hints of a japanese scroll painting (peeking through the lower central portion of the rock) i was looking at. the blues and reds underneath have bled into the beige overpainting, creating a warmer feel than the earlier paintings in this series. economy of line allows the brown and copper marks within the rock to sing, and the white of the ice hugs the rock in a lovers vice.

before starting work on iced creek, i completely reworked icy creek, which had been a vertical when i worked on it yesterday. now it joins with the rest of the ice crew, with it’s tan-ish ground as a field for the play of ice, water & rocks. my vision has always been, in this series, for the ambiguous, suggestive, mysterious shapes to suggest to the viewer an unspecified event.they defy clear interpretation and allow the viewer to dream. iced creek, above, may not have attained this state as of yet. we’ll see tomorrow morning.

icy creek post-op /  by Philip Tarlow

1:14 PM:my gum surgery was friday morning. he took a piece of my palette & used that to fill in a space in one of my lower teeth. so 2 sets of stitches. yesterday there pretty out of it. today as well, but i felt the need to get over here to my studio & at least get something done. i removed the scroll project series of 4 raw raw pieces of linen from the wall & rolled them up. in the end, i’m not into painting on raw linen. at least not right now.

so i made a few changes to icy creek, which was a preparatory study for the scrolls. you might say i gave it a kick in the balls, with the introduction of black, pink & a red dot. below you see the 2/28 version on the left and todays version right.

this morning i recieved notice from space gallery that the may show in which i’m one of 4 artists participating, has a new title: environment remixed. here’s the invitation

3/18/2016 /  by Philip Tarlow

about 2 years ago i was in the thick of my gaze series.it started when i took a closer look at vermeer’s portraits. i realized that he was an even greater artist than i had suspected. he has attained more recognition from a wider audience as a result of the book & film about the girl with the pearl earing.

the original can be found in the mauritshuis, in the hague, netherlands.

i began making collaged paintings using old maps of maine given to me by my friend dan, and acrylic paints. at first, i focused uniquely on vermeer, but then expanded to fayum portraits, portraits based upon photos of 19th c.native americans, and more.

it was a period of great discovery for me. you can view the series here:

pink enters the scene /  by Philip Tarlow

the 4 scroll painting, as yet unnamed, following this mornings work

12:29 PM: i had very little time to work this morning. as i looked at this large composition, it felt too monochromatic. i mixed a little red into the white gesso i’ve been using in this painting and the resulting pink felt like it was breathing life into the forms. i’ll have 3 days to let it settle, then when we’re back we’ll see where i go next.

at work on all 4 panels /  by Philip Tarlow

the 4 panels, each 84x18”, as they looked today at 2pm. work will resume at the end of the week.

2:23 PM: today i cut the last 2 panels from the raw linen and started working on them. as i worked i saw areas of the first two that needed work, so i went back on forth, using the step ladder when necessary. i can’t recall ever working on this scale; the entiire composition is 84 x 77” the wrinkles you see, by the way, will disappear once the wooden dowels are sewn in on the top & bottom of each scroll.

for some artists this is not unusual. i would say right now, it’s my second favorite dimension, the first being about 16x20” i’d love to see it in a really expansive space, which is one reason i hope mike, director of space gallery, comes on board with including it in the may show, once he sees it.

scroll 2 of 4 /  by Philip Tarlow

4:23 PM: i think i may have completed the second panel of this four panel painting.

it seems kind of intense when i look at it dominating the east wall of my studio. i’ll know better tomorrow morning.

1:36 PM: this morning i started the second of the four panels or scrolls. the first one, which i did yesterday, now makes more sense. and once i’m done with this one, the third will make even more sense, as the entire composition comes into focus.

starting scroll 1 84 x 20" /  by Philip Tarlow

scroll #1 at 1:45PM: here’s scrol#1 as i end my painting day early to go visit our friend, who just arrived.

i’ll continue work tomorrow & also hang the 2nd scroll right next to it, possibly starting work on that as well.

1:21 PM: continuing work on the first scroll

12:11 AM: this morning i decided to launch straight into the first of 4 scrolls, using gesso & oil sticks.

note to self: i should really be leaving at least an inch unpainted on the top and bottom for the dowels that will eventually be attached & keep the canvas from buckling.

i haven’t done a maquette showing how all four scrolls will look together, so with each day that passes, that will be revealed. you, my dear visitors, who are wacked out enough to be following my process, will have the privilege of watching this as it happens.

there will be a break this next week when we’re traveling, and that is usually a good thing, allowing me to digest what i’ve done and evaluate where i’m headed.

and now, back to my step ladder.

study #1 for the scroll project /  by Philip Tarlow

2:51 PM: today i began making studies for my scroll project. it will consist of four 84x18” scrolls on unprimed linen, which will hang next to one another, about 4” apart, forming an 84x84” composition once they are hung. each 84x18 painting will be able to stand alone, or can be hung, as they will be in the may exhibition at space gallery in denver, together. together they will form one unified composition.

this first study was painted on a surface i just happened to have available, so it doesn’t conform to the 84 x 18 dimensions; it should be narrower, like 10” instead of 18. but it’s what was handy in the moment and has at least allowed me to feel that i’ve launched into this project, which i’ve been thinking about for the past few months.

in part, the inspiration was sparked by looking at and studying ike taiga and tokuyama gyokuran, both 18th c. japanese masters of the brush.

much of what they did was in the form of scrolls. i found one, which you see BELOW on the left, roughly the size of each of the four scroll paintings i’m planning: 77 3/4 x 15 1/2” . in western art, of course, these dimensions are rarely found, if at all.in the four fold screen BELOW right, ike has created a single landscape composition. i am deeply drawn to how the chinese and japanese masters of this period and earlier, going back to the 10th c. chinese masters, have created a language of marks and forms that could be called abstracted landscapes. with that language they have, in the best cases, managed to convey the feeling of place without describing place. and the best of them did this consciously, feeling that mere description was a lesser form.