watercolor 96 /  by Philip Tarlow

at work moments ago on watercolor 96

12:03 PM: yesterdays early stage of watercolor 95 has been put aside. i wasn’t in the right space to continue work on it. so, since i’m my own boss, i started watercolor 96. inspired by how matisse sometimes divides up the picture plane, with something going on in each segment but all interconnected, i divided the paper into 4 areas and am immediately transgressing; letting one bleed into the next/ if my teacher were here she’d be saying “stay inside the lines, philip!”

more a bit later….

3:324pm: ok so obviously i worked all day on this one. of course it should have stayed as it was in the photo uou see above. but it didn’t. i do like the concept, so i may re-do it tomorrow and stop while i’m ahead.

starting watercolor 95 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 95 stage 1

3:35 PM: i was up at 4:45am. i woke mikela at 5:15 and we walked up the trail this morning. now that summer is taking hold, the earlier the better. it was 52F when we started our walk; a refreshingly cool temperature. i don’t know what we’d do if we lived someplace like houston, where it’s 78F at that time of morning!

my flat files following the september studio flood

i started a 13 x 20” watercolor, but didn’t like where it was going. so i flipped the watercolor paper and started watercolor 95 on the other side. this arches paper is pretty heavy, and there’s no indication i was working on the flip side.

as you can see, this is very early stage, so i’ll go back into it tomorrow morning. right now, i’m beat and have to go back to the house and lie down.

i was on the phone with the lumber company in salida this morning, ordering moulding for the new studio door, which replaced the one destroyed by the flood 9 months ago, back in september; the result of a burst pipe. the moulding will seal the door, which is now vulnerable to wind blown water from the west. there’s still some work to be done on the remaining damage from that flood.

on the LEFT: one of the drawers in my flat files just after the flooding.

watercolor 94 continues /  by Philip Tarlow

4:39 PM: i ocntinued work on watercolor 94 today. as much as i loved the spareness of yesterdays version, it needed more work, or at least tha’s what my most current aesthetic dictated. the area of white space, while still playing a major role, are more integrated into the composition as a whole.

BELOW: the 3 stages of watercolor 94 to date. areas worked on today: the rock on the left now has more patterns; in stage; the blue wavy strokes indicating rushing water are new; in stage 2, the small rock formation on the far right was just sketched in, and in the foreground, the 3 rocks with the blue wavy marks are new

next step, watercolor 94 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 94-stage 2 10x13”

DETAIL

11:37 AM: i have to stop early today, so once i found my groove, i did more work on watercolor 94. as it got closer to the time we have to leave for salida, i was overcome by the desire to introduce red marks in the lower half of the watercolor. the rest of the image is rather precise, and the marks on the large centrally situated rock are more interesting and evocative than similar marks in previous watercolors in this series.

i’m out of juice, so we’ll have to wait till tomorrow to see where this goes. right now as i gaze at it, there’s a quality in it’s spareness that i like a lot. is this our beloved crestone creek, or perhaps a sliver of the aegean sea? the fine line i’m walking is between description, abstraction and now, today, dream.

the white spaces in the blue water are inspired by the air bubbles in the creek water, created by the rushing, swirling water flowing down from the high peaks above. however they could be waves in the aegean sea i know so well, and the rocks could be the ones i know and have painted. for example the rocks at piso yialia beach on the island of andros.

this is the first time, in all these 94 watercolors, that something like this has happened. rather than gazing down at the creek, we could be scanning the horizon and feeling the cool aegean breezes…..

starting, albeit slowly, watercolor 94 /candidate for carbondale exhibition /  by Philip Tarlow

6:57 PM: i may decide to put several of my gaze series paintings in the august carbondale arts exhibition. on the LEFT is one i’m strongly considering, inspired by a 1st century fayum portrait.

i used mixed media and collage for this one. if you click on it so that it fills your screen, you will notice a portion of a map on the upper right and lefdt of the head. on the lower right is a piece of collaged newspaper.

watercolor 94 stage 1-at 3pm

watercolor 94 stage 1-at 3pm

3:10: this morning i had some issues with dizziness related to a molar implant; a not unknown side effect. i did the epley maneuver with some success, and i’ll probably do it a few more times today & tomorrow. amazing tool to have in your bag of tricks.

so i got a late start and made the drawing & a few first strokes for watercolor 94, inspired by a very recent trail walk.

BELOW: this is not the photo i’m using, but it’s one i love, shot the afternoon of november 25, 2017. gives a flavor of the magical light.

watercolor 93-stage 2 /  by Philip Tarlow

3:13 PM: after making brownies and going back and forth on viber with my son dimitri, strategizing about how to begin locating ‘70’s greek paintings in preparation for an athens retrospective, i returned to work on watercolor 93.

it’s not one of those spare ones like watercolor 92. rather, it has the complexity of some of the earlier ones in this series. the image it is based upon is rather complex as a result of the multiple layers of reflections in the little pool of creek water where i took the photo during a trail walk. so it’s more challenging to forget or let go of what i’m painting and remember that i’m just painting.

complex patterning can be elegantly simple. so once again, as with 92, i’m taking it slow, with frequent breaks where i do other stuff or suddenly turn my gaze towards what i’ve just done. a valuable hit can take place when there’s a space of time punctuated by rapid, darting glances. they instantly confirm or reject the desired overall simplicity and coherence. in the best of all worlds, a transformation occurs, where water, branches and sky transform into gorky-esque symbols and signs in space. at that juncture, they remind you of something earthly but beyond earthly; something familiar but nameless. something you once saw whilst cruising past venus, or in a forgotten dream. “am i really cruising past venus?” you ask yourself. “can this be happening?”

completing watercolor 92, stage 1 of watercolor 93 / 1978 painting of construction workers /  by Philip Tarlow

in 1978, at the very end of my 15 year sojourn in greece, i made a painting which encapsulates years of paintings of construction workers from a site just a stones throw from my studio overlooking the roman era tower of the winds. it was shown in a solo exhibition at ora gallery in athens, where it was purchased by a collector who ran in and literally threw the money, drachmes at the time, onto the desk of the director.

this is the only photo i have of the painting, which was shot before it was completed. if you look carefully, you will see that the face nand hands of the figure on the right have not yet been painted in

years later, i attempted to locate that painting. i knew the buyer had died. at a party on the island of andros about a decade ago, i was introduced to her daughter asked her if she knew it’s whereabouts. she did not, and said she had never heard of it or seen it. that makes me very sad; it’s such an important painting in the trajectory of my career as an artist. i haven’t given up, and so i’m about to share this post with all my greek fb friends in the hope that one of them will respond.

watercolor 92

2:46 PM: watercolor 92 didn’t need much more work, and i needed to be cautious about not overdoing it on this one, which has such a delicate balance. starting the drawing for watercolor 93 gave me the space to leave 92 alone while it was still fresh and singing.

watercolor 93 stage 1

staying with my current mood, which dictates that i proceed slowly and be vigilant about only making marks or using colors when i’m in my groove, watercolor 93 is very sketchy and spare in this first stage. it’s inspired by an image i’ve attempted before, at a point when i was in a looser, freer mood. it’s based upon a photo i shot on one of our walks, of a reflection in a quiet area of the creek, where the water had formed a small pool reflecting the trees above. there’s a magic to it that is, i think, better transmitted by staying more closely true to the actual image, which requires a more detailed drawing.

so this is a switch from how i had been working until last week, sometimes completing one or even two in a day. switching it up like this, although not consciously planned, is a way of keeping it fresh. so i’m really looking forward to the next stage tomorrow morning, and that’s a new feeling.

watercolor 92, stage 2 / looking back 6 months /  by Philip Tarlow

5:15 pm: what was i up to 6 months ago, in december, 2019? that was before my tendonitis restricted me to making small works on paper, and i was engaged in my sound of a flute series, all 78 x 26” on linen. this is a detail of one of those paintings, all of which were inspired by 18th century painter/calligrapher/poet ike taiga. i continue to read about his life and work, which continues to excite me.

watercolor 92, stage 2

2:25 PM: i’m taking this one very slow, and with long breaks between new marks. i received 10 new half pans of winsor newton watercolors yesterday, which had been back ordered at blick. amongst them was the blue you see center-left, which so far is critical to the composition as a whole. i’m amazed i got anything done today. i didn’t get much sleep due to an unexpected, uninvited guest: a little mouse who made so much noise it sounded like a much larger animal.

i’ll resume work on this tomorrow.

crown / a new watercolor 92 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 92 stage 1

4PM: once again i made the mistake of messing with the watercolor i made yesterday. i don’t like what happened, so, while i din’t destroy it, i put it together with others i feel are questionable and am naming this one i started today watercolor 92. i don’t thing there will be a problem resuming work on it tomorrow, since i don’t consider it resolved, and i think i should be able to continue in the same spirit.

this is a view of the creek i’ve painted four or five times before; i consider it such a beautifully balanced composition and distribution of colors that i don’t seem to tire of it.

5pm sky over the sangre de christo mountains

8am: yesterday we drove to salida, where i had my crown installed in the upper right implant. it took 40 minutes, and i’ve waited over a year due to various delays. still very unusual to not have a big gaping space in that area, and i’m shy about chewing over there. on the way back, we saw a beautiful 5pm sky over the sangres as we proceeded down the “t” road on our way home.

this morning we saw former secretary of defense gates discussing his new book: "Exercise Of Power: American Failures, Successes, And A New Path Forward In The New Post-Cold War World." his emphasis on our lack of strategy over the past 3 1/2 years was striking, and made me reflect on my own strategy, or lack thereof.

watercolor 92 /  by Philip Tarlow

watercolor 92 10 x 13”

7:39 PM: this morning had a very short period of time to work on a new watercolor. we took our walk at 6:45am, and i was able to get to the studio at about 10:30. we had to leave at 1:45pm to get to my dentist appointment in salida. so, if you factor in my breakfast, i had a couple of hours to get some work done, interrupted midway by a long phone call.

sometimes this is a recepe for success, leaving me no time to futz around. so this watercolor began it’s life in a good way, with play.