Looking at Art

I love to look at art on the internet.   We've never had such access to so much art.  It's interesting how different art can look when it's presented in different forms, in small jpegs or in person.  Sometimes the small images enhance the artwork, perhaps certain sizes or styles.  But so much is lost -- texture and subtle color variation.  It's hard to visualize the actual size of the artwork, even given dimensions.  

Artists have devised so many ways to look at art.   I paint with a mirror behind me, so I can look at the art in reverse.   There are minimizing mirrors and mirrors painted black underneath.   We often hold the painting upside down.  All these things are done to create a balanced painting (check values, etc.).  Now we can post images to Facebook and blogs and other sites.  The critiques and validation is so helpful to artists.  When painting by oneself, it's often difficult to judge ones own work.  

Some people are able to paint a painting and declare it complete.  The mood and inspiration can be fleeting.  But viewing the art over time, in different ways, I'm usually compelled to change things. 

Here are some recent still lifes, some posted in previous stages.  I think these are finished!

       

Watercolor sketch

It's fun to take a break from oils and paint with watercolors.   Here's a quick sketch based on Annie's recent pose at the sketchgroup.  She recreated her pose at the Portrait Society of America's Conference where she posed for the artist paint-out.  

Weekly Sketch Group Art

Here are some of my recent paintings from the weekly figure drawing group
from Thursday:

and some from the past several weeks:

 And a couple of drawings:

The next two I framed after working on them some more after the Thursday Group:

Figure Pose

I started this at the most recent Thursday group:

Red Paint

I love red paint and have quite a number of tubes of red varieties, cadmiums and quinacridones.  Unfortunately my already red dog decided to enhance her appearance with some red paint.  Not quite sure which she had gotten into, I made a frantic call to Poison Control.  It seems that eating the paint is not quite as toxic as I had feared, and many hours later she seems to be quite fine -- though my white shag rug is not.   Breathing paint seems to be harmful as well.   Red can mean abundance in feng shui.

Latest still life:    Red Flowers

Year of Pink

This is the Year of Pink, as named by Pantone and I find that I have been painting with a decidedly pink palette. 

Whether it is the lovely Macarons de Paris from the wonderful local chocolate shop, Maison Robert

or a baby portrait.

Baby and Puppy,   or my latest oil sketch from the weekly Atlanta Artists Thursday group

I am certainly surrounded by an abundance of pink right now:

Jessica

Our model last week didn't show up so fortunately Jessica (talented artist) graciously filled in.
Here are a couple of drawings from the session:

by Elisha Fields (left) and me (right)