This is the last day of painting before open studio, held on Friday evening each week of the program. My little paintings are lined up in a row. This is an opportunity to see what everyone else has been doing this week, and to connect with the community of fellow artists, musicians, and visitors from the area. ABOVE: Red Barn, oil on linen panel, 8 x 10 inches (20 x 25 cm), 7/29/11 Open … [Read more...]
ANE / Bennington — Week 2, Thursday
No painting is an island — good follows bad follows good. I'm doing two paintings a day at ANE. Sometimes the morning's is best, sometimes the afternoon's. Everything is either 8x10 or 9x12 inches. Sometimes the small one is better, sometimes the large one. In my mind's ear I keep hearing George Nick say, "I doubt the tree looked like that. The sky was not that dark. I don't believe the grass was … [Read more...]
ANE / Bennington — Week 2, Wednesday
"Summer afternoon — summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language." — Henry James, quoted by Edith Wharton, "A Backward Glance", (1934) While painting outside, the constant sound of buzzing, clicking, chirping of bugs and birds can be heard in between the alarming ka-chun-king start-up whirr of a giant air conditioning generator. Men shout … [Read more...]
ANE / Bennington — Week 1, no. 3
Last painting was done on Friday in the acryla-gouache figure class. The female model alternated between two poses within the same paintin, while the third figure is from a photograph. Saturday we had final critique and discussion of the week's work. ABOVE: 3 figures, acryla-gouache on panel, 16 x 20 inches ( 41 x 51 cm), 07/22/11 Eleven paintings in a week, acryla-gouache on panel, … [Read more...]
ANE / Bennington — Week 1, no. 1
During my first week at Art New England, I am in a class called "The Figure in Context" taught by Susan Lichtman. The first night we were assigned two homework paintings: a quick twilight landscape and a still-life, leaving space in both to fit the figure. We did a direct painting of the figure on the first morning of class. In the afternoon, we painted her into the still-life using light tones … [Read more...]
ANE / Bennington — Week 2
Week 2 of Art New England / Mass Art workshop at Bennington College, Vermont. After all this time, I was thrilled to finally be in a class called "Advanced Painting." As a complementary medium to working in oil, we were shown methods of using pencil and a slurry of graphite powder in stand oil/OMS on mylar. It's a deliciously slippery medium to use for filmy values. The drawing/paintings have … [Read more...]
ANE / Bennington — Week 2
My time on the road included a side trip to visit Tad Spurgeon. After years of appreciating his work online, Tad generously let me interrupt his painting time to meet him and see his work in person. His studio is a wondrous cavern filled to the brim with paintings stacked and hung on every surface; it is a marvelous workshop of intense explorations. His extensive experiments with materials are a … [Read more...]
Still-life Series
Paintings shown here were done during a one week independent study at Art New England / Mass Art summer program, Bennington College, Vermont. ABOVE: Chicken, oil on linen (mounted panel), 9.75 x 7.75 inch (25 x 20 cm), 07/21/2010 Oil Jars, oil on linen (mounted panel), 7.75 x 7.75 inch (20 x 20 cm), 07/20/2010 Apples and Oil, oil on linen (mounted panel), 7.75 x 7.75 inch (20 x 20 … [Read more...]