Spark Edition 2017

While everyone is out and about at all the New Years Eve parties tonight, I’ve been home playing fiddle sticks! To translate that, it just means I’ve been relaxing at home – stress free, mind you – watching movies and working on the layout for my new artist’s book edition: the Spark. 

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Auld Lang Syne

oceanwall

Whelp, Exodus is now officially over and the gallery is closed this week. However, if you have missed it and you still would like to see it, you can maybe arrange an appointment with either Renée Fox or Sarah Flora to see it before Friday, as I am not breaking it all down until Friday at noon.

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So Much to Tell!

roundhouse

Wow! It’s been a long time since I have posted. Do you know why? Yup. You guessed it. I’ve been incredibly busy. And now I am trying to write this thing before the sun goes down. It’s Friday after all, but I don’t think I’m going to make it. I will most likely post this tomorrow evening (Saturday).

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An Update for the Gods

I very recently posted on Carol’s Bloggie about how I set up most of my video installation in my backyard over Christmas. I forgot to X-post, so I’m just going to make a new post over here since it’s been a few days since that entry was posted. Then, I’ll probably link a new Kickstarter update to this entry – so don’t mind me. I might repeat myself.

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Behold, Some of the Props!

Lately, many parcels have been arriving at my house. I guess they are all sort of “props” for my art installation. I thought I should start taking photos of them for yucks, whether they make sense to you or not.

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לְחַפֵּשׂ

the-word-seek

Not that I post all that much on either blog, but I have been posting more on my regular bloggie than I have here, and for that, I apologize. For all I know I have different reader(s) here than I do on there. And maybe it’s been confusing having two blogs, I’m not sure, but that’s what has happened my friends. What can I tell you? One blog is a little more specific than the other, especially since this one will self-destruct in five…four…three…two…

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Ladder to Dad

Just finished today: Ladder to Dad

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This only took five and a half weeks, and it will be the biggest one in the show: 40 x 60 inches. It’s all oil on canvas. Some parts are thick with paint and some parts are flat, but I think I’m satisfied and I can move on.

I can move on and get back to work on all the other paintings and details for the show. Gosh, I’ve been so busy. And maybe spending so much time on one painting makes me feel like so many other things are passing me by, but that’s just silly thinking. Silly, silly thinking.

However, I have at least three more of these to do, and five more of the ones on wood. Think I can do that all before March? Plus the movie? Plus the rest of the watercolors?

I’ll try.

Anyway, I thought I would post progression shots of the above painting. Ready?

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First I used a very, very thin acrylic wash as an undercoat.

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Oil paint goes on top of all of it.

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Then I render things with a tiny brush so it’s a bit more detailed.

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This is the undercoat for the sky, which is a toxic oil mixture that gives me a migraine.

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This is the last thing I did to it before I scratched the lines in the sky. I covered it in oil paint and semi-blended a blue and lavender sky.

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Here’s the finished painting again so you don’t have to scroll up to see it.

That’s it for today. I napped for an hour afterward.

Caught Up in Circles Confusion is Nothing New

Well Happy Halloween!

rise

This picture is from The Rise of the Jack ‘o Lanterns, which I saw last night. It was really cool! Those are all carved pumpkins and there were thousands and thousands of them. Pretty mind blowing.

I’ve been battling a little flu bug/Ebola thing, but it’s nothing too bad, just feeling a little crappy physically. I tried to take it easy yesterday other than going to this event last night, but today I mostly worked.

I wrote the above a couple of days ago and I thought I would come back and re-edit this entire post because I was pretty sick when I wrote it and forgot half the things I wanted to write in it at the time I was writing it, so here we go…

I’m working on a 40 x 60 inch abstract landscape in oil. This is just the underpainting.

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Now it looks like this, as of today, which is Sunday, November 2nd. (Sorry about all the nasty shadows.)

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I also managed to complete a few others that I had mentioned since last time, like Peyote’s Walk:

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Rock Creature:

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Unexpected:

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Threshold:

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and Emanations:

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I know it seems like I’m getting a lot of work done, but I’m still behind, and now I find out that the gallery would like to move my show up two weeks into March, which as you might guess, is quite the conundrum since I’m hardly on target as it is.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do about this little problem yet. I’m either going to have to edit the show that I intended to exhibit a bit, or bring in a few older pieces to tie into the exhibit – which wouldn’t be totally weird since I make reference to a few older paintings in my movie.

So the new opening date is now Thursday, March 19th, 2015. You got that?

In other news, the movie is coming along, slowly but surely. We just recorded the final voice over. The movie is narrated throughout by yours truly.

I also now have the little television that the movie will be playing through at the show and it’s so old skool cool, it’s not even funny. See?

tv

It’s from 1975. Classic! It’s small, but that’s the way I wanted it. People will be sitting on lawn chairs inside the tent and watch it at a close distance.

I have four chairs so far that I’ve been storing in my studio. I’m not really sure how many I will need.

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I don’t expect 20 people watching this thing at a time. I’m sure more people will be milling about the gallery.

As for my scheduling, it’s going to be really tight. I need as many days to work as possible. I get tired a lot, so it makes it a little difficult, but it is what it is.

I have discovered a few little time savers here and there. I can share them – like canvases take longer than gessoboards, and painting flat (once you’ve drawn out your composition that is) is faster than painting upright. But now that I’m onto larger pieces, that might not be possible. We’ll see. I might have to stand and paint flat at my upright cutting table.

Painting this large one is going to take some time. After I am done with it, I’m going to feel like I got myself over quite a hurdle.

I also will work on the largest panel next. I haven’t even prepped it yet. It still needs to be sanded and sealed, but I know exactly what it’s going to look like already! 🙂

It would be nice to have that done before my curator, Anne Hromodka, comes for her studio visit on the 14th. The only thing is – I’m also doing these small watercolors too. They are actually for the movie. I am also framing them to display them in the show. They are animated in the movie (just a little) and each represent a “burden” I’m leaving behind in my life. There will be 11 in all. I think I have already showed the one that represents “depression.”

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Anyway, those all need to be completed by the 11th to be incorporated into the film, plus Photoshopped into transparencies, so I don’t know how much I can get accomplished before the studio visit in actual fact. I’m at least half finished with the watercolors though. Hurrah.

God, this must be so boring!

Anyway, that’s it.

Working, Working and Working

I’ve been scarce around these here parts, haven’t I? I am just hoping that some of you are following my studio blog to see what’s been happening in general. I suppose I’ve been so busy working on the project that I have just been remiss in posting any entries on this blog lately, but I am getting through the paintings as fast as I can.

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This is the most recent piece that’s actually been completed. It’s called Homestead for the Clown and it’s just 9 x 12 inches (mixed media on birch wood). There were be quite a few small pieces in the show since I’m not so keen on working huge these days.

However, there will be a few larger pieces too, but nothing ridiculous. The largest birch panel is a 36 inch square.

As for the abstract landscapes in oil, I am going to do my best to make at least one that is 40 x 60 inches, which I think is pretty big if you ask me, which you didn’t. That’s the largest that will fit into my car though.

The car won’t matter since I will have plenty to cram into a rental truck. I have plenty going into the Project Room, as small as it is, as well as paintings for the walls. All of that won’t fit into my car unless I did a couple of trips to Venice from the East Side, which is also plausible. We’ll see.

Right now I have been working on the fourth and fifth abstract landscapes and it still feels like I have so far to go to get to my goal (which are a minimum of nine paintings) since they are only going to get bigger from here. M theory really is that the bigger they are, the faster they will go; I won’t have to spend so much time with a 000 brush anymore.

This is the last work-in-progress pic I have the the fourth one:

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I reckon I can finish it by the end of the weekend if I’m lucky.

Here’s the other one I’m working on:

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This one is on a 20 x 24 inch panel and I can already see that the panels are taking less time than canvases. I don’t know why, but they are. I always do the foliage last by the way. It is the most fun part for me and I like to save the best part for the last part – cuz I’m a little kid like that.

As for my movie, it is coming along very well and I meet with my collaborators once a week to get things moving. Then we both (all) have tons of homework to do in between meetings. So far, I am really happy with the way the film is turning out and I am excited about it being part of the show! I just hope it’s as cool as I think it is.

I finally got my dates for the spring show at Shulamit Gallery, which will be April 2 – May 30, 2015. The only thing is that the following Saturday is the first day of Passover, so I’m still not sure when the reception is going to be.

I don’t know if I mentioned this, but I had to buy a new tent for the Project Room. It’s better. Trust me.

That’s it for now. I’ll try to do more check-ins more frequently if I don’t get too out-of-my-mind busy.

Thanks for reading!