Wood Duck

Just as I was about to call the gallery in McCall that carries a couple of my paintings they beat me to the punch. Basically they wanted to know if I had some smaller paintings for the holiday crowd...the kind that were less expensive because the economy is kind of soft and art isn't moving real fast. So of course I told them sure and decided to paint a couple duck paintings before next week. Ducks really aren't my thing but this 9x12 turned out fairly nice.

King Of The Flats

I just finished this one this morning and it went faster than I expected. Sometimes paintings do that and it's always a pleasure. This is 18x24 and I especially like the atmosphere (it's Katmai National Park in Alaska). The brown bear turned out well without it standing out too much from it's surroundings. This integration is important to achieve a realistic rendering of the entire scene. I like it.

Another Painting

I'm now working on a nice bear painting in an Alaska setting and it's turning out nice. I guess paint what you're good at and one of mine seems to be bears. Got some snow last night so used the snowblower this morning to make sure it was working. A bit hard to start but eventually ran ok. Thought I'd just give you another painting to enjoy so here it is.

I like moose too...think it's the challenge of painting their antlers. This was a big hit with the kids at the summer art show.

It's Just Today

Believe it or not I'm sort of multi-tasking...at least the way we do it in the mountains. Of course I've got another painting started down in The Cave and for the last couple of days I've been managing some knives for sale on ebay...did I mention that I've got the archery bug again, first time I've had it since I was a kid so I bought a bow (traditional long bow) on ebay and some arrows. I'll have to wait until spring to set up a target but at least it's another thing to look forward to. Thought I'd put up a small landscape for you to look at if you'd like. It's Mt Oberlin and Mt Cannon in Glacier National Park (Montana). Now back to multi-tasking...am supposed to write the "Christmas Letter". I know...I know......

One Of My Favorites

This is the larger version of one I painted a couple years ago when I was still living in Boise. The funny thing about this painting is that I remember I wasn't really in the mood to start one but thought I'd give it a try. Sometimes a painting just seems to paint itself and this was one of those times. When I finished I thought it was good enough to enter in Art For The Parks, a national artist competition, but then discovered the 16x20 format was too big for the minis and too small for the regular competition. So I actually repainted it in 18x24 which you see here but it was not accepted. Oh well. Anyway, it's the first time I discovered that a yellow ochre glaze can work wonders on the right animal.

Final Cougar Painting

This is it...the final of the cougar painting. Am pretty satisfied and obviously did alot of things to it between the last time and now. Actually it's the first good cougar I've painted...the others just did not look right. Anatomy is sometimes difficult. You will note I deliberately kept the background and the foreground reasonably simple to not detract from the animal. Hope you found it interesting going from the initial sketch to the finished animal. I still like the title "The Stalk". Let me know if you think of something else.

A View Of The Cave

It's Thanksgiving morning and that's always big meal day for me. Of course I'm going down to the cave to work on the painting which I may show you later. In the meantime I thought you might be interested in this one picture of the cave. It's the room where I moved some of the equipment from the garage to work on knives this winter. What you see is a drill press, scroll saw and a vise. All that needed besides the belt sander which, of course, remains in the garage because of the dust. It's 8 degrees this morning and still no accumulation of snow. From my upstairs window I can see Tamarack Resort has some and I know they are making snow.

Can't Stop Now

This is the way it goes when the painting beckons you back. Someone once said it's takes two to paint, one to do the painting and another to stand behind them with a baseball bat to let them know when to quit. Anyway I obviously just had to take the animal further with some glazing and brushwork. Still basically using the same colors, yellow ochre, van gogh brown and burnt sienna. Trying to make the animal "pop" a bit without profiling it too much. Also decided some gray rock in foreground would be appropriate to emphasize the silent stalk a cougar would make. What do you think?

Back From Boise and Painting

Well, I'm back from Boise and thought I'd take this painting a bit further so I went down to The Cave and got more serious about the animal by blocking in some darks and lights relative to the neutral ground of the body. Colors I like to use are Van Gogh brown (dark) and Yellow Ochre (light) with tints of Burnt Sienna. I'm mostly an earth color guy. Also sketched in some trees to the right to give the background a little depth. I think some wildlife artists paint the eyes first but that seems to spoil it for me. I'd rather focus on the landscape and the animal for awhile and save the eyes for a treat toward the end. Besides, I don't want them staring at me throughout the painting process. I was hoping this would turn out well because it's the first time I've ever shown a painting in progress and can you imagine painting poorly in front of everyone?

Starting The Painting

Before Peg and I go down to Boise tomorrow morning to take care of mom (92) I decided to get the cougar painting started. First I'm using a 16x20 masonite panel that is gessoed with a medium umber tone (white and dark umber). Then, hopefully, I did a better sketch of the animal. Don't know why I have a hard time with this particular animal but I do. It's made a bit more difficult because there is a small amount of "foreshortening", a fancy artist word for the front of the object is more towards you than the back. Then I mixed up some hooker's green and payne's gray to block in the background. Very important if you are using acrylic to go light around the animal's profile or you will get ridges that are difficult to deal with when you paint the animal. Using oils is not so much a problem. Then with a touch of the green mixed above with more liberal amounts of raw sienna and unbleached titanium I sketched in the ground. You might note that I started leading the foreground toward you to create the illusion of depth and the tension of the animal coming forward. Right now I'm thinking a good title is "The Stalk" but who knows. Got any ideas?

The Sketch Of The Cougar

Over the course of doing a painting I thought I'd show you some of the steps so I went down to The Cave this morning and did a quick sketch of the cougar I'm thinking of painting. I didn't use to do this enough and ended up with animals that didn't look right. Also, doing a sketch sort of develops a "memory" of the animal and shows me what my bad tendencies are going to be. For example I have a tendency to make my cougar's heads too large in proportion to the body. Drawing also helps initially determine where some of the darks and lights will be. It doesn't have to be a great drawing, just good enough to get started. Took about 20 minutes with just a regular #2 pencil and a piece of paper. You'll never know if you can draw unless you try.

Latest Painting

I thought you might like to see what I've done recently before I got distracted by my knife sideline. As you can see I like to keep it simple without too much detail like the late Bob Kuhn. This is a grizzly in the Yukon called "Scent Of Winter". The great thing about painting is that you can take different elements from different places and put them together like I did here. The landscape is from a photo I took on my Yukon trip and the grizzly is something I saw in a book. Anyway I hope you like it. I'll try to take a picture of a couple knives I've been working on and post those too.

The 30 Year Painting

Previously I mentioned that I decided to take a kind of lousy painting from 1977 and just repaint it so that it at least looked respectable. It was so bad that my ex-wife didn't even want it in the divorce so this was a challenge. Basically I just repainted the whole thing over the heavy texture of the original and it didn't turn out too bad. It's a tidal pool on the coast of Maine...kind of a heavy atmosphere but the composition and patterns intrigued me. Anyway it's better than the original so here it is for what that's worth.

It's Cold In The Garage

Actually did go out in the garage yesterday (about 20 degrees) and it wasn't so bad bundled up. Roughed out a couple of really nice bowie knives on the belt sander. Am becoming a better knife maker and I do sell some of these on ebay from time to time. I think soon I should discuss how to become a painter and my wife tells me it is possible to post photos with a new post so maybe I can show you a painting in progress. She says she is going to update my internet art site with some better pictures and a couple new paintings so it should be soon. Check it out by clicking on it in this blog page.

It's Cold Outside

Only 15 degrees so I'm down in The Cave finishing one of my more unique paintings. It started as a painting of a cove in Maine in 1977 and then I thought it was good. I was busy with other things then...moving to Colorado and thinking about being a dad in spring of 78. So basically I hurried my paintings. Somehow I never threw this one away and when it surfaced the other day I thought I could make it better. I did and now I like it. Interesting..now I've got a painting that spans the last 30 years, 77-07. Am thinking about spending a little time in the unheated garage today because that's where the belt sander lives. Obviously can't use it inside The Cave but at these temperatures I'm thinking about it??

Need To Get Back To Painting

Well...I'm still working on that knife sheath and last night it rained very hard with heavy winds but it melted the 4 inches of snow we received earlier. I need to get this particular knife thing finished so I can begin my next wildlife painting of a cougar. My wife tells me there are alot of boomer hobby sites out there so you need to find this one.

Morning In The Cave

I thought I might add that while my wife was creating this blog for me I spent the entire morning in The Cave making a good landscape better and fabricating a sheath for my latest knife creation. I certainly appreciate her work and am gratified that I can share it with you.

Where Is Everbody?

I just created my blog this morning and boomers aren't pouring in (or anyone else for that matter). I would say everyone is at work but it's a holiday so a good time to find my blog among the millions out there. So let's get with it. You will find me quite different than some.

Let's Call It A "Hobby"

You need something to do when work no longer consumes your time. It's best if that something is relatively inexpensive and you can do it on your own. So, let's call it a "hobby". Obviously it can be a multitude of things and nothing is out of consideration. You are only limited by your inability to take the risk that you might try something at which you might fail.
I chose painting, specifically acrylic landscapes and wildlife, and the pursuit of this particular art form has never failed me and I will talk about that in this blog. Along the way I also became interested in making knives rather than just buying them. It is amazingly gratifying and there are excellent sources for materials just as there are for creating art.
These are just my current "hobbies" and I'm sure I'll pick up more along the way.Tell me about your hobby or ask me how to get started on mine.