2:51 PM: still life with refugees 42x42”, following today’s tweak.
2:49 PM: the upper left portion of the composition was too heavy and interfering with the flow. so i went over it with a yellow-ish white, which i think did the trick.
BELOW: before (left) and after todays tweaks
still life with refugees, 42x42” as it looked moments ago, after revising the band of color on the bottom
2:32 PM: as i said i would do earlier, i revised the band of color on the bottom of the composition, so the painting looks much better but still needs work. here’s a detail of one of the musicians from the collages i applied earlier today.
still life with refugees 42c42” as it looked at 2pm today
1:58 PM: i continued the modifications i strated this morning, working mostly on the perimeters of the painting. i’m not completely satisfies with the light blue horizontal band of color at the bottom, so that may change later today or tomorrow.
still life with refugees, day 3 12:20pm
12:35 PM: this morning i collaged some drawings i made of musicians playing at the elton john/bernie taupin gershwin prize concert on april 8th. i had shot photos from the tv and turned a few into drawings, with the intention of using them exactly as i did this morning.
still life with refugees, 42x42” day 3
words & worlds, 42x42” day 9
3:48 PM: i painted sporadically throughout the day, going back & forth between these two paintings. i flipped still life with refugees as i sometimes do do avoid getting stuck on a particular composition. so elements of photos i shot a few years back of the acropolis museum views from above, as well as the guy doing a handstand, from the 2020 olympics celebration, have entered the picture.
both paintings are still in process and i’ll pick up where i left off tomorrow.
3:32 PM: this is day 1 of still life with refugees, 42x42”
words & worlds as it looked following the additions i mention below.
2:11 PM: as i began work on still life with refugees, i ambled across the work table to words & worlds. “black,” i thought. so i introduced some black to the upper left quadrant and then added some japonese inspired yellow patterning. earlier, i had introduced a few green marks inspired by a vuillard fabric in one of his master paintings, which have become an integral part of the composition.
12:56 PM: today i’ve got both paintings on my work table and am going back and forth between the new one and the previous words & worlds.
words & worlds, 42x42” oil&collage on linen, as it looked following the modifications i made this morning
12:16 PM: words & worlds seemed too busy when i made my first glance this morning. although i saw some beautiful passages and strokes, the composition as a whole seemed confusing; my eyes kept bouncing around and couldn’t find anyplace to land.
so i untroduced a warm grey around what i feel are the most striking, evocative forms and am moving on to a new one, the exact same size:42x42”
i’ll see how i feel about it later today.
3:47 PM: late this afternoon i started a new painting, which is also 42x42”
it’s inspired by photos i shot last night during a program about victims of the war in the middle east.
day 1 of israel-hamas, 42x42”
3:20 PM: more collaging happened this morning. for example, on the mid-right you’ll see a collaged piece of a map of texas.
the bird on the left has appeared in earlier paintings; she likes showing off her black spots.
as a whole, comparing this to other recent paintings that are on the wall to the right and left of this one, there seems to be more certainty. the newly added blues and yellows make it pop. and, while there are human forms throughout, they are less distinct than in previous paintings in this series and integrate more into the composiiton as a whole.
1:21 PM: this morning was collage time. i made some ink drawings on a large roll of paper, then cut them up and collaged some of them onto words & worlds. as usual, they required careful smoothing out, using a few of the tools i have for that purpose. then i went into a few areas that needed simplification with white titanium-zink oil color, and added some drawing in siena where i felt it was needed.
making the drawings to be collaged
collaging the drawings onto the painting
DETAIL
day 4 of words and worlds 42x42” oil on linen
4:19 PM: this is day 4 of this painting, which started out as creekscape, it’s new title is words and worlds.
how i work when it’s flat on the table is quite different from when it’s tacked to the wall, as it now is. that’s likely because my plotting mind is less engaged and my strokes and marks are freer. it may well go back on the table tomorrow.
untitled as it looked at the end of my painting day, as a vertical and horizontal composition
elton&bernie drawing #1
2:18 PM: i’m adding to the drawings i’ve made for the oil i started a few days ago. i had titled it womens basketball but it’s going beyond that, so there will be a new title.
this drawing is based on shots i took 2 nights ago from the amazing elton john-bernie taupin concert.
elton&bernie drawing#2
womens basketball day 2
3PM: these are the first 2 drawings for womens basketball. the size of the final canvas has not yet been determined.
