Mardi-Gras Gleenings begun

I started a new painting today based on a photo of my daughter at Mardi Gras in Mobile Al.
My mother-in-law wants me to do a painting from the photo but it will be a difficult photo to work from.
It has a direct and harsh because the photo was taken after dark. The smile while great for a photo will be difficult to paint. and parts of her arm are covered up in the photo by Daddy who is holding her.
I will also need to buy a moon pie because the one photographed is the wrong color and turned the wrong way for the painting.

I worked for about an hour or two and got some color blocked in but have a long way to go still on this one.

Hogan ongoing

Amazingly I was able to find some time to paint today while the kids were up and active. They played happily in the playroom which has been a welcome recent development. They also worked on a little coloring of their own on the easel in my studio. My son liked the painting of Hogan but wondered why I did not have the banjo in this painting.

Hogan

I was very excited to get photos from my trip to the farm in the mail yesterday. There are so many good photos from which to choose. I am very excited to work on several of them.

 I chose to start with a head and shoulders pose of my parents neighbor Hogan. He is such an interesting guy and could talk to you for hours if you had the time to sit and chat. I asked him to pose with some of his instruments and have pictures of him holding his banjo and some where he is sitting down with his guitar. He performs with several musical groups and is very good. The banjo he was playing he assembled by himself from various instruments.

I hope to paint him with one of the instruments soon but chose to start with this pose because I am not sure how large of a canvas I should use for a full body portrait.

I made this painting about full scale.

So far I have only been blocking in the shadows and starting to develop some of the areas in light. I was very pleased with the days work and am looking forward to working on it again tomorrow.

Trip to the Farm

A last minute decision sent the Kids and I off to the Farm for a week.
They had such a great time running with lots of space and enjoying the wonderful weather.

Everyday they helped grandpa with cores and I had many photo opportunities to catch a yearly update of Grandpa's Barn.

I also asked my grandmother and several of my parent's neighbors to pose for photos for future portraits. I am very excited to get prints and decide on poses to paint. I feel like I have been waiting for pictures to work on for some time. The only painting I have been doing is on a lily which I started about three weeks ago.

Hopefully some new paintings will be underway soon and I will have lots of photos to share.

Works on Exhibit.

Two pictures will be on exhibit for about three months at the Reston Chamber of Commerce Building.
"Shades" and "King of the Coup"


Drop off was this morning and I am afraid I made a rather pore showing. I decided last night that the paintings really needed to be framed and since the store was closed last night I had to make a run this morning as soon at the store opened. I headed directly over to the exhibit and had to borrow a screwdriver to finish framing the pictures.

Coming into an exhibit drop off with two pictures needing framing and two squirmy children was not a great idea. Most of the people were understanding but the lady who seemed to be in charge seemed generally stressed and not too happy to have a 3 year old informing her that he was GI Joe. One lady tried to help by getting something for the kids to draw on but ended up scaring my daughter and got her started crying. The people getting ready to hang the show had to close the conference room doors to not bother others in the building. Luckily I was able to locate a pacifier.

I will certainly be better prepared for the next exhibit. And while I will still probably show up with two kids in tow, It we are only there for a minute to drop off it should not give them as much opportunity to create havoc.

Grandpas Barn

Grandpas Barn has been so much fun to work on. I loved adding he tractor to the barn because it took about 1 minute and is very loosely painted but I felt like it just worked. I love it when painting happens with minimal effort. It just feels so much freer.

Grandpa's Barn

Several days work on Grandpa's Barn have gotten me to this point. I have yet to start the areas of skin and the background is just under painting and layout at this point. I really like how it is developing at this point however and am excited to get more work done on it. After a dry spell creatively it is nice to feel like things are flowing again.

My son says he likes the painting but it is not beautiful yet because I have more to paint. It is always amusing to get his input. He recognizes himself and grandpa however so that is a good sign.