continuing 8/24/21 painting /  by Philip Tarlow

3:24 PM: i’m taking it slow, as you will notice if you check out my 1:18 pm post. trees & leaves have appeared, as well as aspen trunks; one more collaged piece has been added on top of the red haired paddling figure; a yellow blouse has appeared on the female figure next to him. a lot may happen tomorrow, but I think this one will have a long, winding journey. but i’d like to keep the pinks & blues dominant.

clean up time, and then back to the house.

8/24/21 painting at 3:30pm

1:18 PM: here’s the current state; more when i’m back from the kiosk, where i’ll get the weekly delivery of fresh baked bread.

2 salida drawings /  by Philip Tarlow

6:50 PM: just back from our day in salida, where i saw my dentist, we had late lunch with a dear friend & we did some food shopping. i managed to make 2 drawings: one in the dentists waiting room, one at the restaurant. the conditions were not ideal, but i was really missing the opportunity i have whenever we travel to draw people, mostly in waiting rooms, airports, restaurants….

by the way, i had mentioned that we were going to get apple watches in salida, for us both to be able to check our vitals. we didn’t. they don’t give accurate readings & neither of us like the idea of having a computer on our wrists, constantly alerting us when texts, emails & calls come in.

cleaning up / stretching a new canvas /  by Philip Tarlow

stage 1 of 8/24/21 painting, 26x62”

3:49 PM: it’s only day 1 and i’ve already collaged a piece of the drawing I made earlier. this new painting is at it’s earliest stage, and will be continued on thursday. I won’t be in my studio tomorrow because of a dental appointment.

the figures you see are inspired by two events: the tokyo olympics and the nyc homecoming concert last saturday, which go rained out half way through.

12:29 PM: I got the urge to do some cleanup this morning, before starting the process of stretching a new 26x62” canvas. I started with my studio bathroom. it’s looking better, but the big change will come once we get the 20 ft. storage container we’ve been thinking about. that will allow me to get all the accumulated works, canvases, both & un-stretched & rolled as well as the stretcher bars, out of the studio space.

after the cleanup, I made the drawing you see here, to be cut up and collaged into my new painting.

BELOW: left to right: 2 paintings just hung next to my studio entrance; stretching the new canvas; cleaned up bathroom

stretching new canvases in preparation for the next round of paintings /  by Philip Tarlow

4:37 PM: today was about logistics. making doctors appointments for our denver trip next month; unstretching and restretching 8/2/2021 creek oil (i removed the masonite board it was stretched over, since the painting is complete and i won’t be collaging any more) and re-stretched it on the bare stretcher bars); and investigating the various options for the apple watch 6. mikela and i have decided to get 2 of these. she has never worn a watch, but recently we realized it would be a good idea to be able to track our vitals, and to have a way of notifying each other if we fall while walking up the trail. i walk faster, and am usually 5-10 minutes ahead. it’s kind of confusing, but i finally figured out that, if we go to the att store when we’re in salida this week, we can have them show us the watch & explain all the options. it tracks heart rate, oxygen levels, etc. etc. as well as altitude & other fun stuff.

the apple 6 smart watch

8/2/2021 creek oil which i re-stretched today in preparation for hanging it in the house. the 2 guys paddling are from photos i shot a few years back from the bridge in alamosa, co. they never expected their journey would end up here!

re-work of tokyo olympics 2 /  by Philip Tarlow

1:38 PM: following yesterday’s persian rose adventure, I looked at tokyo olympics 2 differently this morning. there seemed to be too much going on. plus, truth be told, I was looking for an excuse to continuing using the rich persian rose pigment I used yesterday.

I caught myself engaging in the very activity i’m so critical of in other painters: repeating myself. so I did schmeer quite a bit on, but quickly realized this is a whole different animal and painted over most of it with a warm grey, made even warmer by having the not-yet-dry rose underneath. it’s definitely improved, but not singing yet. just emitting sweet, gurgling sounds.

i’m treating this post as a break, and will dive back in shortly & report what happens.

PS: now that i’m glancing over at it, there’s something gorky-esque going on. he’s one of my heroes. a tragic figure with a tender armenian soul, who had a profound influence on dekooning.

DETAIL of tokyo olympics 2

tokyo olympics 2 26x62” as it looked at the end of my painting day today

revisiting 8/2/2021 creek oil /  by Philip Tarlow

1:34 PM: I had a hard time getting back to work this morning. I didn’t want to mess with tokyo olympics 2, which i’ve been creating over the past few days. and my eye kept going to 8/2/2021 creek oil which I had considered resolved. turned out it wasn’t.

so I started working back into it, using a persian rose pigment i’d never used before straight out of the tube without blending it with other colors. it’s made in Brooklyn, where I was born, by williamsburg, a small company that makes quality oil colors in small batches.

I borrowed some elements from yesterday’s painting, specifically the black rectangular patterning seen on the floor at the closing celebration of the tokyo olympics. it’s too soon to tell where this is going, but I must say it’s rather striking in it’s present state.

8/2/2021 creek oil as it looked moments ago in my studio

continued work/play: tokyo olympics 2 /  by Philip Tarlow

tokyo olympics 2 26x62” at the end of the day today

2:21 PM: I added another figure, which was drawn in but had no color yet. it’s a male figure in the lower right who is skating. his positioning anchors the whole composition, creating a syncopated rhythm which works with the theme of people dancing & having fun. i’m cooked, so i’ll clean my brushes and wait for mikela, who is driving back from alamosa as we speak and will stop by to look at the painting.

11:55 AM: mikela had to leave early for actionlab360 meetings in alamosa (50 miles south) so I arrived early in the studio and have been moving ahead with tokyo olympics 2. blue & light yellow bands of color now sweep across the 62” width of the canvas and a checkered pattern has appeared on the upper body of the central dancing figure. a suggestion of creek-scape has shown up in the upper region. the skateboarder with the yellow top leaps and others soon to appear dance, in a celebration ending the 2021 tokyo olympics. and i’m also celebrating: the arrival of my 4 five yard rolls of extra fine portrait linen. normally, this very fine textured linen is used for smaller scale works, mostly portraits. but I find it ideal for my style of painting; let’s call it painterly abstraction.

starting the color on tokyo olympics 2 /  by Philip Tarlow

3:27 PM: I took tokyo olympics 2 further following a quick trip into town to get some very fresh eggs from organically raised happy hens.

a tree branch spans the painting horizontally & you can make out some creek rocks drawn in above it. it will take a few days to get the whole thing moving. great fun working on my newly arrived extra fine portrait linen, which is super sensitive to every stroke of the brush or mark of a crayon. thus far one collaged piece of the drawing I made yesterday has appeared, on the body of the dancing boy in the center, making him sort of resemble a postman.

the skateboarder with the yellow top from tokyo olympics 1 has reappeared. a lot more will happen before it’s over, so stay tuned!

DETAIL of dancing woman

tokyo olympics 2 at 3pm today

12:28 PM: while listening to the youtube video of joni mitchell in london, 1970, i applied the first strokes of color. “don’t it always seem to go: you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone….” she sang. the first figure to receive my strokes is a guy dancing crazily to the music at the olympics final celebration, with black & green pants that have birds.

tokyo olympics 2 gets underway / "the same earth" by Lila troulinou, cover by pt /  by Philip Tarlow

preliminary drawing for tokyo olympics 2 26x62” as it looked at the end of my painting day today.

DETAIL of preliminary drawing for tokyo olympics 2

3:21 PM: so after stretching the primed linen over a piece of masonite to faciitate collaging later on, I began the drawing for tokyo olympics 2, which is 26x62.” this one too is based upon photos I shot on the tv screen of the tokyo olympics & the final celebration.

i’ll do more drawing in the morning, and it’s likely some oil color will appear. we’re taking our trail walk tomorrow, followed by a zoom with our friends in germany, so I may be getting a somewhat late start, like around 11 or 12.

i’m extremely grateful that I shot those photos from the screen, and that mikela hit pause when I requested, at just the right moment.

12:06 PM: last week I received my copy of “the same earth,” (το ιδιο χωμα) by λιλα τροθλινου. she requested and I gave my permission for her to use the painting you see for the cover art. it’s a painting I made in gouache on paper of a girl seated on a rock at pithara, a little waterfall on the island of andros.

it’s a historical novel which takes place on the island of crete, where two kids travel back in time and, in so doing, discover their identity and life’s purpose.

12:24 PM: today i’m completing the stretching of my new 26x62” canvas, and will likely start the drawing in a bit.

slight modification to "tokyo olympics 1" / a 1987 silkscreen titled “57th Street” / just made a drawing to cut up for next painting attaching the masonite /  by Philip Tarlow

8:17:2021 PT attaches masonite.jpg

2:30 PM: just screwed a piece of masonite to the rear of the stretcher bar to facilitate collaging. this will be removed once the painting is complete and the canvas re-stretched on the right side (the bevelled side) of the stretcher bars.

2:14 PM: as I prepare to stretch my next canvas, I made this large ink drawing of a drawer with my tools, designed to be cut into pieces for collaging onto the next painting

12:34 PM: got a late start today following our trail walk this morning. after gazing at tokyo olympics 1 hanging in the house last night & this morning, I brought it back to the studio for a few modifications. the purple shadow of the skate one of the boarder’s hands was bothering both of us, so I adjusted that. and while I was at it, I inserted that black rectangle beneath his feet, which is his skate board, as well as the flesh color of his left foot. I didn’t touch anything else, although I was very tempted to make one of my radical interventions. I think this one deserves to keep it’s spontaneous freshness and zing, so i’m moving on to something new. but first I have to stretch a new canvas from one of the 4 rolls of artful portrait linen pierre sent me last week. i’ll update once it’s stretched and I start the drawing for something new.

tokyo olympics 1 following my modifications this morning.

12:48 PM: I had a request for one of my ‘80’s silkscreens a few days ago. I created it while I was a member of fischbach gallery in nyc, in the mid ‘80’s. I still have a few of these here in my studio; if you’re interested in purchasing, contact me.