A Breathtaking Moment

Fog dampened my cheeks and the landscape lay before me in a variety of grays.  One good thing about the landscape when the sun is blocked by thick cloud cover is that the shadow shapes don’t change.  The lighting is consistently dreary.  I was determined to explore the nuances of blue-gray, purple-gray, and yellow-gray.  A thin layer of washes covered my canvas and I began mixing thicker paint.

A fifteen second moment of brilliance

Suddenly the wind picked up, the trees rattled leafless branches and the clouds parted.  Sunlight drenched the foremost bank of trees across the road causing them to sparkle like diamonds set against dark neighboring trees still cloaked in the shadow of clouds.  I gasped, grateful to be witness of such spectacular beauty and happy that I was wet, painting on the porch rather than dry, painting indoors from a lifeless photograph.

Hah!  I recognized the moment as a test of my convictions.  I want to use the landscape only as a starting point, an inspiration, a reference.  I want to study it for clues of colors I would not think of, for shapes I haven’t played with, for textures and movement that will give life to my painting.

I continued to paint, holding in my vision the moment I witnessed and inventing colors rather than match the landscape that had returned to slight variations of gray.  The break in the clouds had closed.

Painting:  Oil on 10.5″ x 14″ prepared wood panel.

Limited Palette: Scarlet Lake, Cadmium Lemon, Cadmium Yellow, Cobalt Blue, Titanium White

 

Dishes in the Drainer

I don’t dry dishes.

Dishes in the Drainer

I draw them instead.  The Ciao Copic Markers make it so easy to indicate values quickly to test the strength of the composition.  They are portable and fun.  Combine them with a fountain pen and you can sketch quickly without worrying about drying time … ignore the pun.

Drawn first with a fountain pen filled with a mix of red and black Noodler’s Inks, followed by Copic Markers for value.

 

An extra twenty minutes

Fortunately, my dentist (the awesome Michael Liberto) has an office one minute away from the parking lot at Echo Lake Park in Westfield, NJ.

View across the lake

I arrived twenty minutes early and opted to paint from my car rather than read a magazine in the waiting room.  I needed to leave more open space in the dark trees on the right.  Not liking the shapes I’d made, I ended up blocking in the whole area.  Time well spent.  I learn something new with each stroke.

Sketch:  Pencil and Watercolor on watercolor paper

 

The Sun Emerges

Yesterday’s snow vanished in the afternoon rain.  The colors were totally different this morning in spite of the fog.

Warm Morning Glow

I used the same limited palette that I used to paint yesterday morning’s fog (see the post on Creative Color Blog) with the addition of Sap Green.  The pigments are Scarlet Lake, Cadmium Lemon, Cobalt Blue, Sap Green and Titanium White.  I had Sap Green on my palette yesterday, but the weather conditions prevented me from dipping into it.  As I mixed my first color, the sun broke through the blanket of fog and the landscape responded with wonderful, warm winter neutrals.

Oil Sketch:  5″ x 5″ on prepared birch panel.

 

Rotary European Style Phone

Late at night before I drop into bed I enjoy ending the day with a contour drawing.  Ciao Copic Markers are great for quickly adding values to the contour drawing.

Rotary European Style Telephone

This phone has lived beside my bed for the last sixteen years.  It was one of those things I always wanted.  Okay… I’ve had enough of it now.  For the last five years it has been a nuisance and I am now done with it.

Drawing: Drawn first with Noodler’s Flex Fountain Pen filled with a mix of green and black inks, followed by Ciao Copic Markers

 

Winter Withered Buddleia, Butterfly Bush

The withered buddleia bush presents a stark silhouette against a background of snow.

Winter Withered Buddleia Bush

I hadn’t noticed the delicate, twisted shapes of the buddleia bush outside my window when the background was the grass of the backyard.  After the snowfall, the grass hid beneath a thin blanket of snow, turning the background from a middle value neutralized green into a light value, white backdrop for the dark value, dried blossoms and withered leaves.

Sketch: drawn first with fountain pen filled with a mix of red and black ink, followed by watercolor.

 

My Father’s Fire Fighting Boots

Six decades ago my father fought forest fires in Idaho.

My father's boots

He and his lab partner, Merle Bunker, hitchhiked to Idaho from Indiana, stopping along the way to invest in a good pair of boots.  We found my father’s boots in the attic in Martinsville when we cleaned out the house in September.  Why did he keep these boots long after he stopped wearing them?  Why do I still have my Super Guides hanging from a nail in my own attic three decades after I stopped mountaineering and ice climbing? Hmmmmmmmm.  Maybe I should draw those, too, so that I can let go of them.

Sketch: Contour drawing drawn first with Waterman Phileas fountain pen filled with black ink followed by Ciao Copic Markers.

 

Snowy Birthday for Tom

Plans often change along with a change in the weather.

Snow Covered Farmhouse

It continues to flurry and grow colder.  I opted to sketch, gazing through the living room window rather than brave the wind and snow on the front porch.  The rotation of the landscape is something I want to play with a bit more in the future.

Sketch: Drawn first as a line drawing with a  Waterman Phileas Fountain Pen filled with Noodler’s Black ink, followed by watercolor using only a Kuretake water brush as my source of water.

 

A New Chapter

And so ends my last day at the Prop Shop….

One of the amazing views from the barns

Most of my life I have been self-employed, a full-time artist.  Once I listed all the odd jobs I have had in my life to survive as an artist.  When the number  surpassed the count of 100 I stopped counting.  I worked at the prop shop longer than I have ever worked at any one place.  I believe that I also hold the record for having worked longer at the prop shop than any other employee.  It was a perfect fit for a long time.

We didn’t take scheduled breaks, we didn’t have running water.  The port-a-john was always clean, but a bit icy in the winter.  We depended on portable heaters of one kind or another to stay warm and large fans to stay cool.  We did, however, always take time to search for rainbows after a storm, to keep watch over courting geese, to call a stop to work whenever the weather brought alarming beauty to the sky and land around us.  We laughed, we cursed, we teased one another without mercy.   As happy as I am to move on, I don’t regret a moment spent working for Linda and Lowell at Anything But Costumes. I am grateful.

Photo: Sunset above the barns about a week ago.

 

Last Day at the Prop Shop

I’ll miss all of you, too!

The best ever Farewell Gift!

Today is my last day at the Prop Shop.  Wednesday night Linda gave me a farewell party at her house and presented me with this painter’s palette signed by all of my co-workers.  Sooooooooo much more meaningful than a gold watch!  I love it.  I’m leaving behind a great group of people with whom I have enjoyed working.  People have come and gone while I remained, stitching together the holes in my life.  Life itself will continue to rip and tear at my personal quilt and I can’t wait until the mending is complete.  It will never be complete.  For me, it is better to fill the next thirty years with days of dedicated painting and to leave this world with a torn and tattered quilt than to live among blank canvases and unexplored territory of color and shapes.

Fortunately, today will not be a sad farewell. We have already set up the third Wednesday of each month to be card night!

Thanks to everyone, Linda, Lowell, Luke, Danielle, Sarah, Sue, Maria, Deb, Heather, Rocky, Henri, Allan and Josh.