Painting peonies

         I love to paint flowers from life and peonies are one of my favorites. Not only do they smell nice but they are so lovely- delicate and complicated at the same time. For the past 2 or 3 years I have been painting paintings of these lovely flowers because they are such a challenge. I had decided that every year I would paint at least one painting of peonies.

if you paint them in full bloom- there are many petals with which to involve oneself as well as their delicate coloring. The pink ones especially have petals that are such a light pink they are almost grey in some places but they are a deeper color in the centers. The next decision is how precise to paint them- do you paint every petal or do you leave some to the imagination which this year I have decided to do.

this is this year's attempt- also in pastel but decided to handle it in a looser style
i am happy with the way this one is turning out- it has the looser feel i was looking for

this is my attempt 2 years ago - as you can see more formal 

My First attempt is really rather formal. I rather like those  The Old Masters paintings spilling out of niches and besides I wanted to paint my Mother's vase. It is rather a formal gilded french vase. This is a pastel on pastel mat paper- a lovely french paper that  feels like suede but is really tough.

 

  For the past four days I have been in Baltimore soaking up all kinds of wonderful art. I went to the Walter's art Gallery and saw a wonderful exhibition of artists drawing or painting on their travels. There were two rather wonderful ink wash drawings that I am going to try. They were done in black ink rather than the brown ink washes one normally sees. I went around and looked at all the wonderful artwork that that museum houses.

I also went to visit the Zoll Studio since it was close to where i was staying. The work was wonderful and one of the teachers John Sills did a landscape in oil that was a vignette- very interesting. They seem to have some wonderful workshops there as I saw some demonstration pieces by Robert Liberace who is one of my favorites

this is one of the wonderful paintings I saw at the Walter's  and below is one of their landscapes. They have just catalogued their whole collection so you should spend some time and go through it- wonderful

This lovely painting by Constant Troyon is one of my favorites.

Weddings and drawings

     My Assistant Thomas and his wife of one year will finally get their wedding present from me.
We all decided on a painting of the building where they were married with them in it though not dominant. I usually like to do some studies on the spot but the people who own the building were somehow uncomfortable with that, so I had to rely on my pictures as well as a pencil study I was able to do.

Speaking of pencil studies,  a friend contacted me about whether I did sanguine chalk drawings of the landscape since they had seen a study of a head on my website. Actually I used to do many of them but have not in recent years. I did finally find one to show them. It is done in red chalk and pencil but i think I want to go back to those kinds of drawing studies since it is more complete than just a pencil drawing as it gives you another value with which to work.

I had forgotten how much I liked this technique. I actually use this a lot when I do figure studies.

Small pastel studies

 Have you ever been blocked and don't have an idea what to paint? I am sure you have- most creative people go through this from time to time. When I go through, this I either do drawings or small paintings.  I seem to have been a little blocked since the termination of my big  commission so I decided to do a few small pastels. I have not worked that much in pastels recently so I thought a few smallish ones would start the flow of ideas.
    The first one I did was " lemons". One of my students brought them in to paint and I thought they were so colorful and textured. I had a piece of rough textured paper I had prepared and wanted to try it

it was fun doing the lemons but the napkin was more challenging since it had to be smoother and that was more difficult on very textured paper.

My next small piece was an embrasure from a castle in Scotland. i did this one on wallis paper- not usually my favorite but it worked out here.
I have always loved this place and finally decided to do it. I used broad strokes when I did this one, and I was pleased with the result.

I have been very busy the last few months and have not been able to post for a while. I have been working on a large double portrait which is nearly done and about which i will speak in another post.
I have also been doing some interesting art restorations which might be of interest.

The first is a 16th century painting which seems to describe a battle that was a massacre but which also shows allegorical leanings to the crucifixion. The design of the figures is in the shape of a cross and the nude figures seem to be similar to Christ and the two criminals who were crucified with him. There are also figures in armour with a red cloak which signifies someone high up. Red was a very expensive color and very hard to get so it was only used to denote a nobleman or king or possibly someone very well-to-do. Its a very interesting piece because in the distance there are what looks like fighting skeletons- It could be figures that have been cleaned off in previous cleanings.
 This painting was really dirty and had a lot of smoke- type residue The sky has a lot of damage so  I will have to do a bit of patching there. I have not finished cleaning it yet which is why it looks a little smoky in places, but it is a very interesting painting. Besides it's really exciting to have a 16th Century painting in my studio!
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The second painting I had to clean was an 18th century scene of an Austrian or German town. it has some lovely things in it. I had to patch some terrible scrapes and fix the edges. it was painted on Cardboard and is in remarkable shape considering what the surface is. it has some cute details like laundry fluttering in the breeze and smoke coming out of Chimneys so one gets an idea of a peaceful unremarkable day- pretty nice feeling in this piece. it was a lot of fun to work on.

I really enjoy art restoration because you can learn so much about different techniques of painting especially if the work was well executed.

 It seems the holidays are upon us and there has been a certain amount of inactivity on my part in relation to this blog. Thanksgiving was lovely and I enjoyed it with an eclectic group of charming people who invited me. I was on my own this year since I have a big commission that is in process and needed the time to work on it. Besides my son was working so there was no point in doing the trek to Baltimore.

And now Christmas is here or nearly so and after working like a frenzy to get the house ready, I am finally in a place to post on this blog. I am hosting the pastel society'a annual Christmas party and expected 14 to show. There maybe more but things needed to be in some sort of order.

I have just completed a snow painting in pastel that actually turned out differently than expected but I like the way it was going. It's really due to the surface which was one of my old surfaces that I reworked and put a coat of art spectrum grit on it. When I started it it was turning out soft and a little fuzzy so it made me think of memories of past Christmases when I was still in Baltimore. I made sure I did not make it too precise because I liked the memory / dream idea.

 I decided to make it my Christmas card for this year

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL OF YOU OUT THERE

      Wi-fi seemed to be a wonderful thing- so yesterday it was installed and everything was going smoothly as long as I was in the studio.... but I better not be in my office in the house or it becomes spotty- although now it is working very well- let's hope it continues.....

 I have been asked to do a demonstration at the Muddy River Arts group in November. It was decided that I would demonstrate in pastel since that is one of my primary mediums- Then I find out that I am only allotted 45 minutes to do a demonstration---- 45MINUTES!!!! That is short.
  At first I was stumped as to what to do and how to approach it. I have decided to do a simple still-life with one of my old copper teakettles and lemons. I have started it and am going to do part of it as a powerpoint presentation and only do the demonstration in one area. I am approaching this as if everyone was fairly new to pastel since I am not familiar with this group. I will forego my usual emphasis on composition since time is so short, which is too bad but maybe I
could do it in a nutshell but still include it.

I am having a lot of fun with this still-life and wish I could keep going but I need it only partially done.

I chose the blue ground because it would make the copper and lemons sing and I am pleased with my  choice. I will write an update of the demo after it happens.