AIRSTREAM

"Airstream in the Desert" 12" x 16" oil

This Airstream trailer struck me as
an odd image in the middle of the
desert. Its sleek shape and shiny
exterior stood in direct contrast to
the surrounding rugged desert terrain.

I tried to paint it on location, but the
wind and dust were blowing so hard
I couldn't find a spot to set up. I tried
to use my jeep to block the wind and
provide some shade, but sometimes
the best intentions go unrewarded.
So I had to settle for a photograph
from which I did the painting.

DAILY #7

"Lope" 6" x 8" oil

The best part of this painting was eating
the cantelope when I got done. Went
out this morning to do some plein air
work. After two wipe-offs I decided
maybe my time would be better
spent in the studio. So I fixed this
bowl of fruit, painted it and ate it. Beats
a bad day in the field anytime.

DAILY #6

"Flower Pattern" 8" x 10" oil

This time of year it is not unusual
to find me in a neighbor's yard with
my plein air setup doing a study like
this one. I do not have a green thumb,
but I have plenty of neighbors who do
and, I think, they like it when I stop
by and ask if I can paint their flowers.

GOATS

"Goat Barn" 9" x 12" oil

This little goat barn is right around the
corner from my house. I drive past it
several times every week. The Boer goats
no longer occupy the barn and the property
is marked for demolition any day now.
I painted the barn plein air and added
the goats in the studio.

I must not be a good goat painter because
when my good friend Bob Rohm saw the
painting he joked, "So what are all those
Springer Spaniels doing in the barnyard."

TUESDAY, MAY 19, 2009 DAILY

"Fruit Bowl" 6" x 8" oil

Thought I would go ahead and post
this because I am having laser surgery
on my right eye later today. I have a
tear in my retina that the good doctor
is going to close with a few well-placed
zaps of a laser. He says its nothing serious,
but lasers being shot into my eye sounds
like serious to me. So just in case I am
out of commission later and can't get a
painting done, here's today's
piece. Enjoy.

NEW WEEK, NEW DAILIES

"Copper Orange" 6" x 8" oil

Its a new week of daily painting and
a new week to push paint. Life is grand.
Have to take time this week to do some
studio work, but plan to keep producing
the daily work as a warm up. I'm
finding it to be a great start of the day.

I have my painting time down to 30 minutes.
I don't do many still lifes, but
this has given me some motivation
to try a larger piece. We'll see how
things go as the week progresses.

Went to the InSight Gallery grand
opening last weekend in Fredericksburg.
Got to meet some very talented artists
including Carol Anderson, Joan Potter,
C. W. Mundy and Mark Haworth. Took the
time to visit with painter friends Chuck
Rawle, Kay Northrop, Jill Carver and
Nancy Bush. Food was great, art was
unbelievable and conversation entertaining.

BUDDY

"Buddy" 18" x 24" oil

This is a painting of one of my best
friends in the whole world. He could
care less if I just painted a real stinker
or if I'm just having a bad day. He sleeps
in this big chair as I paint. On this
day he would doze off, I would call his
name. He would give me this glazed over
expression. He would slip back into a
deep sleep only to have me wake him
by calling his name. This went on for about
two hours as I painted him. He finally got
fed up and moved to the couch in another room.

NEW DAILY PAINTING

"Mugs" 6" x 8" oil

This daily thing is an interesting
exercise. I am trying to keep painting
time down to 45 minutes or less so I
don't fuss around too much and
make quick decisions about color, edges,
design and all those things I think
about in a larger painting.

Won't be posting tomorrow. Gotta go pick
up my son from college for the summer.
Once I get five paintings posted I will
be starting an Ebay page. Something
to look forward to.

PUSHING COLOR

"The Play of Color" 12" x 16" oil

Recently I have begun to really
push the color in my work. Those
who know me know I studied
with Scott Christensen and Matt
Smith a couple of times each. Two
of the best landscape painters in
the country, but not known
for intense color. My goal is to push
it a little outside my comfort zone
for a bit and then bring it back
into what I hope will be a palette
that I will stay with for a while.

Painting late afternoon scenes like
this will help the process because the
light is more intense in both the warm
sunlit areas and the cool shadow areas.
We'll see how it goes.

NEW DAILY

"Lemons in My Cereal Bowel" 6" x 8" oil

OK, so a painting every day is going to
be a tough road to hold. I'm going to have
to have weekends off. I set up a
permanent still life station in the corner
of my studio and dropped by a local
market to pick up fruit and flowers for
the next few paintings. I am a man on a
mission. This feels good.

Don't really know if there are any rules
about this, but I will be posting landscapes
as well. It is not in my personality to just
paint still lifes. At heart, I am a landscape
painter. That's what really gets me going,
so throwing in a landscape here and there
will keep me interested in this daily
painting experiment.

JUMPING OFF THE EDGE OF THE CLIFF

"Tea Time" 6" x 8" Oil

After much back and forth in my own
mind about daily painting I have decided
to jump off the cliff and make it happen.

Part of it comes from seeing how quickly
artists like Qiang Huang and Carol Marine
have grown after following their blogs for
the last six months. You can go back to
their previous blogs from a year ago when
they first started daily painting and see how
much their work has matured.

The other part is I just bought Kevin
MacPhearson's book "Reflections on a Pond"
where he painted the same scene out the
window of his studio for a year. Kevin is a
master painter whose work I have admired
for years, but even his work changed as the
year went by and he produced painting after
painting for a year.

One of my goals this year is to be able
to produce larger, finished (yea right) plein
air pieces. I think this will help me produce
larger studio pieces while maintaining that
loosey goosey plein air feel to the work.

So this post is the first of my daily paintings to
be followed by 364 more until this time next
year. We will see where it takes my work and
whether or not I get the results I am seeking.

BIG BEND REVISITED

"So Much Color, So Little Time"
12" x 16" Studio oil

Talk about a challenge. Bright late afternoon
warm sunlight hitting the face of the
canyon against the cool purplish-blue
shadows. Throw in the bright orange reflected
light bouncing off the ground into
the under belly of the canyon wall and
you have a painter's dream and nightmare
all at the same time.

I did a 6" x 8" study on location which really
defined the larger studio piece. There is
no way a camera can capture the wide
range of values in this landscape. The
location study saved me...once again!

CHANGE OF SCENERY

"Weekend Jolly" 12" x 16" Plein Air Oil

I'm still on a Big Bend high and am still
producing paintings from my trip from
two months ago. Traveled to a local
lake and painted this sailboat
yesterday just to get a change of pace.

Now that I see it on screen I think I'll
go in and adjust the water color to a
yellower-greener color typical of Texas
coastal waters instead of the lake color
I depicted. I'll repost the newer version
after this one dries and I've made the
adjustment.

It's been over a month since I was last
in my studio. Feels great to be producing
a couple of larger pieces.