California Lemons, ll

Although these lemons above are still lemon-shaped, some of them (to come) are definitely mutated forms. I did see recently in Central Market some fruit called Buddha's Hand that was essentially a lemon, but was shaped like a cluster of narrow lemon fingers all emanating from a sort of palm. When my odd shaped California lemons are beyond painting, I look forward to some exploratory surgery.

Been to L. A. #1

My first landscape. Although I like this genre, I haven't felt the pull of it until this last trip to L.A. All those palm trees jutting out from the tops of squashed together houses and the sky cut by wires and cables. And low heavy skies, very moody.

California Lemons

Back from LA....where everyone has a lemon tree in their back yards, or maybe an avocado or orange tree. It's so exciting to see the leaves STILL ATTACHED to the lemons!

Light socket and Spatula

Merry Christmas Everybody!

Here is a short prayer from Jim Morrison:

Oh great creator of being, grant us one more hour to perform our art and perfect our lives.

Crabapples and Japanese Glass

Whites! (Scary.) But this is the most wonderful glass, very thin and delicate. I love to look at it and hold it and drink out of it and paint it and whatever else I might could figure out to do with it.

Light Socket and Salt Shaker

Just one or two more of these...it's sort of like making batches of cookies, and tweaking one thing each time to see if you can improve or move the whole cookie recipe forward.

Split Pomegranate

6 x 6 inches oil on Gessobord

I tried to channel Lorraine Shirkus for my edges, which want to be sharpish.

Light Socket and Glass

Light Socket and Ribbon

This has been an interesting little series, I have learned a lot about composition. I tried to keep everything as simple as possible. I also moved the stuff around until it clicked in to an arrangement that was compelling and tied the color to the surface, emphasizing the flat square. It's been good ellipse practice too, so many of them in that one socket. On this one I did not overwork it and I was able to build the form and its transparencies as I went, rather than tensing up and figuring it all out beforehand. The painting experience was much better, more freedom. I am almost at 300 paintings -- oy vay!

Light Socket on Mirror

Light Socket and Black Box

I can't help myself, another one. I turned the socket upside down here and used a round brush and thicker paint. I'm trying to find my way to something, but of course I don't know exactly what that is, just that the old way isn't enough of something, or maybe too much of it.

Light Socket on Aluminum Foil

Yet another.

Light Socket and Banana

This old light socket is still holding my interest.

Light Socket

I am pleased with this one, even though it's nothing much. It sits well for me or something. Terrible glare though, black is tough to shoot.

Study of Forms

This gives me some relief from so much color.

Decorative Squash

I was thinking I would be more subdued in this painting and not use red at all or even any form of it, but it snuck in anyway.

Still Life With Chair

This is my December entry for the challenge group, Some Texas Artists Like to Paint. The topic for this month is Chair. To see how others have handled this subject, please click here.

Abroujo Whistle

This is an old clay whistle I bought in Mexico several years ago and painted for fun last week, so I offer it up as my post. I think it is a devil. I have always loved it - it is such a power packed little form, all madness. Today was actually a good painting day but nothing I did was worth much so I wiped. I learned lots, though. I have been painting that bastard white cup (day before yesterday) for months and it offers all sorts of problems: the cup itself is all ridges inside with a thick rim that fools my eye regarding the elipse, the handle is clumsy and fastened weirdly to the foot, and on top of that, it is white, or rather a creamy, grayish bleh. I think I appropriated it from a friend's house, thanks a lot, Kris, because it is very small and fits well in the hand if you are drinking a bit of strong coffee. It is a staple of my still life stash, and I return to it frequently to see if I have mysteriously acquired the skills yet to get it right. I've been at it again this week, and finally decided that the way to tackle it, is to break it down into small pieces: I don't have to keep going in a straight line until I get it, I can do it every morning as a warm up, and then wipe it, and if it takes 100 days, that's what it takes. So today's was pretty good! I am encouraged and thinking, pretty soon I will have a cup painting, and believe me, I will be crowing when that happens.

Oh yes, I used Cadmium orange in this...I had some on my palette from portrait work. It's such a different orange from mixing it, sort of a tough orange.

Oranges and Eggplants

More grappling with looseness, and also this is a glass bowl, not plastic, and the rim of it is completely square. Interesting result of doing that plastic bowl so many times: this one was so easily perceived, I could get right to it.

Bete Noir, White Cup

Yikes, I did this cup so many times I am now blind.

Home Grown Peppers

Another day of painting and wiping, so at the end of it I painted up a little one for posting.

Sort of cranking one out but in a good way.

Ashley in a Black Ht

Another portrait in the hat...I was pretty quick with this, trying to keep moving and relaxed and the forms as simple as possible. Sorry for the glare, black is so hard to photograph.

Study with Green Tomatoes

Huge brush, harsh light, lots of paint, loose as a goose.

Study, Browns

so...ripping along, keeping it as loose as I can, not staying too long on any one thing.

Support team: thanks for those helpful words.

Loosening UP, Study!

I changed to an 8x8" size, maybe jostling things around a bit will be helpful.

Persimmons on Blue

Have hit slough of despond, another day of baaaaaad painting. This one, not so bad, from last week, wiped the earlier ones.

Bowl of Grapes and Persimmon

This is a painting I did last week and didn't like so much because of its stiffness and the slight wonk of the bowl, but am now posting because everything I did today was worse. I decided the best way to loosen up is not to be afraid of not making a "good" painting, and so just do several no pressure exercises taking chances and seeing where things go. And so I did not get a good painting! Back at it again tomorrow.

Green Tomatoes and Eggs

Well, I didn't see this one coming, I set out to do really loose and then here I was. It is sorta loose. I have been looking at loose work and absorbing. It looks to me like the key to it is genetics. Can I re-wire my nervous system is the question. But I have gathered some good advice from someone's site --so sorry! can't remember now where I got this -- for simpler and more spontaneous painting there are three requirements: a big brush, harsh light and thick paint. That I can do.

Two Persimmons

Glad to be finished with that bowl, thanks everybody for all your support. It takes a village. My next task is to looooooosen up. And also, to be economical in paint strokes. To loosen up economically. I have to think about what conditions could lead to that goal...

Plastic Bowl Number 10

Voila! Done.

Plastic Bowl Number 9

These are crab apples with actual leaves attached!

Nearing the end - I have learned a lot with this. Three or four in I thought, big mistake, boring, tedious, etc., but it has been good. One of the biggest things is: accurate drawing is only necessary if your particular system of logic in your painting requires it. (my opinion) If the visual logic is inconsistent, the integrity is violated, and things fall apart. For me in my work, accurate drawing is necessary, so I have to learn it. But I delight in artwork that does not operate with that same logic and do not find it the lesser. Another thing: It's not about the bowl, although the ability to make the bowl look like plastic is a good skill to have up your sleeve. Another example of technique always taking a back seat to the overall statement of the painting. And another thing: when you do things over and over (changing a few things here and there to keep from going barking mad) you learn extra things that sneak in in spite of a laser focus on one thing, here the arc of the lip. Other pieces of information eventually shift together into a whole that passes into your understanding somehow when you aren't even trying. Isn't that great?

Plastic Bowl Number 8

This one was......fun!

(Bwha - ha - ha, only 2 more to go!)

Plastic Bowl Number 7

I can see the end from here, three more to go.

Plastic Bowl Number 6

Ai yi yi, 10 is a lot of bowls. Thanks you guys who are keeping me pumped for the duration.

The bowls get easier, slightly. It turns out this sort of curve is called a chord ( a strait line connecting the ends of an arc in mathematics) and is just impossible any way you do it!! What was I thinking...

Plastic Bowl Number Five

Can this be only number 5? It seems like so many more.

Plastic Bowl Number 4

This bowl is difficult because of drawing issues, not painting ones. The sides are squared and curved. Whatever, it is good practice. This painting was also good practice for values and I did better than I thought I would on that little ceramic whistle in the bottom corner. It is so mysterious and packed with mojo, very compelling to paint. This is on black gesso and I used a round brush for most of it and then went to a small flat brush for the whistle, but I should have done the whole thing with the one brush. It was just getting so crowded down there I couldn't maneuver with ease.

Still Life With Sky

I have recently joined a challenge blog, Some Texas Artists Like to Paint, and this is my first submission. The challenge theme for this month is sky! Please drop by and have a look at what everybody has done. You can click on the lettering at the top of the widget which is

to the right and lower down on the home page of this blog.

Plastic Bowl Number 3

I am including these shots of the beginning stages for the benefit of my extended family who have asked what is black gesso. Usually the ground is white and a thin wash of umber or another color is used to subdue the white because it sometimes is so overpowering that it interferes with color mixing. Whatever color the ground is affects the rest of the color, for instance a bright red ground will give a red cast to the entire painting, some bits of it will peek through.

Today the bowl was easier. I love its thin walls and the way it holds color in its edges. I poured in something called Big Red that I found in the back of my refrigerator, who brought that to my house???

Plastic Bowl Number 2

This bowl is a bear. I am trying to do my "welcoming with affection" all things, including the bowl, but I admit to gritted teeth. Also, I used a 3/4 inch flat brush so I couldn't manage too much detail. I understand now that the wide brush makes you first grasp the desired shape in your mind and with practice all the correct shapes fall together to make the form. "Fall" is the operative word, which requires an overview of the relationships of parts. Am still liking the black gesso.

Plastic Bowl, Number 1

I have been working on this plastic bowl for three days already and could never bring it off -drawing problems mostly. By that I mean each of the three days I tried it anew, but wiped it down. Today's is very tight but is the best of the lot and a good place to begin a series of them. I figure if I do ten I should know the ropes. The interesting thing about this plastic bowl is that the rim sometimes picks up the color of something else. I didn't have the light in the right position this time for it to occur, but next time I will make it happen...the plastic is cheap and thin and provides the thinnest sliver of light. Also I am again on the black gesso and I really like it.

Vienna Sausages on Pink

A last shot at the Vienna sausages.

Fig Studies

Yes --- Black Gesso! I bought some and used it underneath the second painting, the one just above this copy. I'm sorry the photo of the top painting is so glarish, it makes it difficult to compare them. The black gesso was fun to work on, BUT there is a diminishment of light in it. The top painting was done on white gesso with no toning at all, so there is maximum light. This is, though, only my first time to use the black so maybe you can compensate for it by having your paint really thick and laying it on in one go, no mucking it around which always thins it. And ruins it, too. Using the black was thrilling - the color of the paint as it goes down on the black ground is electric right away, very exciting. There is not that much difference in the two really, but if you saw them in person you would know right away which one was the black ground. I used the flat brush again, a number 10. I can see reasons for using both the round and flat, I guess maybe the more important issue is actual size. But that black gesso is a kick!

Figs on Green Plate

One more run for the figs. I am still using a pretty large round brush and mostly it feels right. It does not leave a chop in the paint like the bright -- but I do like the chop. I have to think about it. I'm not sure I want to see too much evidence of the brush, but neither do I want it smooth. More testing necessary.

Four Figs

I bought 5, but one was weeping and so had to be eaten with honey and gorgonzola.

Barbecued Vienna Sausages

Oh the poetry of Vienna Sausages. In Alabama where I grew up it was pronounced Vi - ayna, yes, hard to believe this, but true. The barbecue ones cost 10 cents more a can, but as they are drenched in thick red sauce, they are more fun to paint.

Little Apples

This time I went to little leftover dark apples and moved the easel farther away from the light box, so there would be more space around the forms. I tried to concentrate on what else was there: there were these electric green shadows under the apples which I didn't quite get, and also the luminous green of the cloth. The apples actually were the least compelling part of the set up. So it was interesting getting the darks down for them, sort of like exploring. One thing I have really learned on this exercise is that there are patches of grayed color on the edges of forms - I can see them now on everything. They are almost invisible, very delicate. I like this painting the best of the apples so far.

Bowl of Apples

More apples -- I am trying to do them quickly (but sensitively) and not make them more important than the rest of the painting -- and I also saw Linda Popple's bowl of clementines and it was so simple and straightforward and beautiful I thought I would try the same approach.