Category: Painting

5 x 5"

oil on panel

sold

I do a lot of small studies, mostly to keep painting while I'm think about my next piece and to feel out how a photograph or featured artwork translates into a painting.  A generous Instagramer, Cilia, sent me the photo I used on this new painting, one of her viewing Henri Matisse's Blue Nudes in the Kunsthaus Zurich Museum in Zurich, Switzerland.

Matisse completed a large series of 'cut-outs' after a surgery which left him in a wheelchair with a limited ability to paint on canvas.  He painted sheets of paper with various, solid colors of gouache, some more opaque than others, cut out organic shapes, overlapping and glueing, and created some of the most famous works of art in his lifetime.  Proving that adversity can take you to unexpected places you may not have gone before.

Mystery surrounds who is behind an Alabama mural that depicts President Donald Trump carrying out a mass shooting outside a school.

An anonymous street artist painted the piece on the wall of an empty downtown lot in Florence on Sunday night. The mural showed Trump pointing a handgun at a group of bloodied schoolchildren and featured the pro-gun control #NeverAgain hashtag.

Florence Mayor Steve Holt also described the imagery as “disgusting,” per WAAY-TV.

On Twitter, the work was praised:

On Tuesday, city workers painted over the mural, which was on private property, with the land owner’s permission.

9 x 12"

oil on panel

sold

My Mac died a couple of weeks ago.  I work on what they call a 'vintage' model.  I have to.  I run programs from days of yore - ones I built my website on, etc.  For about a week, I hunted down a 'vintage' replacement and turned it over to the experts and finally got my working studio back to normal.  Happy to report I'm no longer out of sorts.  

Meanwhile, I started this painting, working from a laptop screen.  It's a slower process but better than nothing while I waited.  So, that's where I've been lately.

When I stood in front of Ground Swell by Edward Hopper,  I stared for quite a while. What was that buoy doing there?  On an otherwise calm, beautiful day, surrounded by a sea of blues, there is this dark, ominous warning of sorts, alerting the people on the small catboat.  A sign of imminent danger?  Clouds signaling a storm is coming?  I looked for an explanation when I had time.  Hopper never offered one except - during the time he worked on Ground Swell in 1939, World War II broke out in Europe.  I think that explains it.

From the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.

~ Stay healthy and safe and get your vaccination.

6 x 8"

oil on panel

sold

The artist Jacques (James) Tissot had an eye for beauty and fashion, the son of parents in the fashion and designer hats business.  At a young age, he'd paint clothing in fine detail, a style surely influenced by what surrounded him.  He also knew at a very young age he wanted to pursue a career in art.

Allow me to tell you about the woman in Tissot's painting Mavourneen (Portrait of Kathleen Newton) - raised in England and Agra, India - her father rose from an Irish army officer to chief accountant for the East India Company, and worth mentioning, a strict Catholic.  When she was 16, her father arranged for her to marry a surgeon in the Indian Civil Service - she embarks on a trip to her wedding on a ship, where the Captain became obsessed with her and gets his way once they arrived.  She married the surgeon, hadn't consummated the marriage yet - felt guilty - went to a Catholic priest for advice - he told her to fess up to her new husband - he was enraged - filed for divorce - ship Captain said he'd pay for her trip back to England but if, and only if, she was to be his mistress.  She gets pregnant, refused to marry the Captain and ran off to live with her sister.

That's where James Tissot comes in.  They meet, he falls madly in love with her - she gives birth to another child said to be his - they live together in domestic bliss for a few years until she contracted tuberculosis.  Tissot suffered through her illness, she couldn't bear it all and overdosed on laudanum and died.  Tissot was so distraught, he laid next to her coffin for four days.  A true Greek tragedy.