Work in Progress - Farmall Tractor

I've been playing with this new painting depicting an old Farmall tractor.  I have a soft spot in my heart for these tractors, since Dad had one on our 120 acre dairy farm, and he's sometimes let me drive it.  Farmalls were manufactured by International Harvester, and were common on small and medium sized family operations. I painted this from a reference photo I took at the recent Walworth County fair, a place that also is nostalgic for me.

There is a local painter who often paints pictures of tractors, and I emulated her style here, with exaggerated color, simplified forms and abstracted backgrounds.  This is the acrylic layer where I work out my composition and play with color.  When the painting feels about right to me I paint over this layer with oil paint, making alterations along the way.

UPDATE - This is how the painting finally turned out, oil over acrylic.  I pushed values more, and added some magenta to the cool areas on the tractor.

Unusual Perch

Unusual Perch

8x10 inches, oil

So earlier this summer I painted, as a joke, a cow portrait for a friend of my sister-in-law, up in Door County.  The friend was pleased, and claims "the eyes follow me everywhere."  Right.

Anyway, my sister-in-law, got all droopy and said that she liked cows, too.

This is for her.

Algoma Lighthouse

8x10 inches, oil on Crescent Board

Yesterday was our 43rd wedding anniversary, seems impossible we've been married so many years.  Anyway, we had a nice evening out at a local supper club, and enjoyed ourselves very much.

Earlier in the day I decided to take a stab at painting the very familiar lighthouse in Kewaunee county, where my dear aunt lives.  I've taken dozens of pictures of it over the years, but never tried painting it.  I was sure I had some 8x10 inch canvases in the closet, but no, I did not.  So I used a scrap of Crescent Board, and worked quickly with thinned down oil paint.  

Not so bad.

More of the Same

charcoal - 20 minute pose

Monday evening was another figure drawing session, enjoyable for me, though I don't think our model was feeling very well.  This was my favorite drawing from the session, though I don't especially like how her arm looks in my drawing.

I begin my new chemotherapy sessions on Friday.  Since I optimistically thought I wouldn't be doing chemo again, I had my port removed in April, and now I must have a new one implanted, also Friday. I have some new hats and a new wig set to go, but must admit that I am not looking forward to the medical routine, bottles of medication, and losing my hair once again.  However, since this is apparently the only tool available in the box, I guess we'd better get using it.

I hope I can continue with my Monday evening drawing sessions.

Enyo

I've been attending a summer figure drawing group for several years, enjoying the pretty drive on back roads, drawing a couple hours, and treating myself to frozen custard afterward.  I couldn't attend last summer because of my surgery and recovery, but this summer I am enjoying myself.  I'm keeping it very simple, just a few sheets of newsprint or slightly nicer drawing paper, vine charcoal, and a kneaded eraser.  The model last night was a lovely young woman; my drawing her does not do her justice.

My health news continues to be disappointing.  I am not a candidate for further surgery or radiation, so we're going with the chance that a different chemotherapy regimen will shrink my new spot, and extend my life.  I find that I cannot hold that thought for long without panicking.  So, I concentrate on things right now that give me pleasure - watering my flowers, drawing and painting, meeting with friends, drinking wine.  I have been mourning the thought of losing my new hair, which after months of being bald, gives me great happiness.  So, yesterday I went to a photo shoot (with my hair), and I plan to use the spiffy new not-bald photos on social media and at the gallery where I show some of my artwork.  It's OK.  I have hats and scarves.

Right now, staying positive is an act of self preservation.

New Portrait and More of the Same

Coh-O-Ha, 8x10 inches, colored pencil

It has turned dog days hot here in southern Wisconsin, stuffy, humid, and pretty much awful in my upstairs studio.  Nevertheless, I did finish this colored pencil piece for Julia Kay's Portrait Party online.  I made it to figure drawing this past week as well, which was very enjoyable.

I also had a series of medical appointments the past week which confirmed that I have a recurrence of my cancer.  I've had two biopsies (one good, one not), a CT scan and an MRI, and a consultation.  No decisions have been made yet on treatment.  That has to wait until after the 4th of July.  

Looks like it's going to be another crummy summer.

One Day at a Time

Martin, colored pencil, 8x10 inches

I just finished a new portrait in colored pencil, just in my sketchbook, for the online group, Julia Kay's Portrait Party.  This group has been very inspiring to me, and I've enjoyed being challenged to do my best work.  This is Martin Beek, whose paintings I have admired for quite a while. I have another started, but life has gotten in the way.

What a roller coaster of emotions the last year has brought, thanks to last year's cancer diagnosis.  For the past three months I have been on what I called my cancer vacation, since in March my CT scans showed that radiation had apparently shrunk my abdominal spots, and eliminated some gynecological ones.  So, no oncology treatment for a few months.  I got my cataracts fixed, and we went on two cruises. I've had two haircuts, which made me improbably happy.

Then, in May, some symptoms returned, and I had a biopsy which did not indicate cancer.  This week I had another CT scan, which came back looking OK, and still another biopsy, which did not come back looking OK.  For a day I felt confident, and now today, not so much again.

I am learning that this is what life with cancer is like.  Sometimes hopeful, and other times terrifying.  Sometimes both in the same day.

So, now I have another whole raft of medical appointments, and I do not know what the doctors will plan for me.  I'm not at all sure how many Monday evening figure drawing sessions I'll get to this summer, how many times I'll be able to visit up north, or if I'll be able to, as I hoped, write and lead a new cemetery tour featuring some fascinating local people.  In short, I cannot really make firm plans.

But I should be able to draw more.  I just need to keep focusing on what I can control, and take it one day at a time.

More Figures and Random Thoughts

Monday evening was the first regular paid session of Community Figure Drawing at Whitewater, and there were two models, Joseph, who is very experienced as a model, and his protege, a young woman named Sage.  For being her first time, she was also remarkably confident and composed.

The sessions last three hours, from 6:30 p.m. until 9:30, but I leave after two hours, just so I can get home at a reasonable time to relax before bed.  I also like to drive at least part way when there is still some light.  So, often I only get to draw a few minutes of the last long pose of the evening.

This is what I accomplished in the last fifteen minutes of the session.  It isn't very polished, but I like the immediacy of the lines.  This is Sage drawing Joseph, so involved in her drawing she barely moved at all.

Besides going to figure drawing, I went down to the gallery where I sell (or do not sell) my art.  I have a small bin with matted works on paper, where my prices are very, very reasonable.  Some have sold, but most have languished there a year or more.  So, I took them home, looked hard at them, removed them from their mats, and threw them away.  Why?  They clearly didn't appeal to anyone else, and they had an aura of failure.  Nobody loved them, so I found it hard to love them either.  I dug into my stash of unmatted pieces, and took the new pieces to the gallery where they will either sink or swim.  It's hard, sometimes, admitting that a piece of art you created out of thin air, that you liked well enough to send out into the world just isn't very appealing.  But just getting rid of them felt surprisingly good.  Like a purging and fresh start.

We'll see.

Figure Drawing UWW Summer 2018

One of my summer pleasures since about 2012 has been attending the Community Figure Drawing open studio at UW Whitewater on Monday evenings.  There is no instruction, just three hours with an undraped model for participants to draw or paint.  The fee is reasonable, and nobody minds if anyone comes late or leaves early.  I enjoy driving the back roads there and back, and treating myself to frozen custard on the way home. 

It's a joy.

Last summer, because of my cancer diagnosis, surgery, and chemo sessions, I did not attend figure drawing, and I felt the loss.  But this year I am pretty much back to my real life (with asides for CAT scans and check ups), and I have had cataract surgery so that I am no longer fearful about driving at night.  So anyway, I went back  to figure drawing Monday night.

I will admit that I was uncertain about whether I could still draw worth a darn, but just told myself that this activity is not a contest, and that the pleasure was in the process, not the results.  Sometimes I have to take my attitude aside and lecture it about these things. In the end it turned out OK, and I enjoyed getting back into drawing from direct observation, and a little larger than I do in my studio or journals.

These are some of my drawing from Monday evening.  I have a special fondness for the five minute poses, since they force me to really concentrate and go for large shapes instead of details.  The last one, the face, was done in fifteen minutes, because I needed to leave my 8:30 p.m.

Easter in the Studio

Easter was quiet at our house. We shared a nice breakfast and the newspaper, and spent time putting together our gear for an upcoming trip.  Then later in the afternoon I decided to play around with adapting a photo I took and altered from our 2016 trip to Yellowstone.  I had a couple goals: to play around with the colors and composition, and to use up a 12x24 inch piece of watercolor paper that had been prepped a couple years ago, but never used. 

So, I did this all in one go, with acrylic paint and fairly large brushes.  It's certainly more dramatic than the original photograph was.

I think I've worked out enough in my mind to try the same subject in oil on canvas later.

Homage

This afternoon I spent time copying a painting by my friend, Jack.  His style could not be more different from mine. He often works very large, mostly in acrylic, and always from imagination.  He strives to spontaneously capture the effects of light upon the landscape. 

I almost always work from my own photos, or from life. I tend to paint people or objects, rarely landscapes.  I rarely invent any subject, and seldom use such a light palette.  But I like his work, admire his willingness to invent as he goes along, and appreciate his generosity with criticism and advice.  He was leading a class this week in which he encouraged students to use large brushes, and bold strokes, so I decided to see if I could come close to his style.  Except I worked in my quiet studio, using my recycled mat board and water mixable oils and cold wax medium.  Not so bad, even though the idea was his, not mine.  Sometimes it helps to try out other subjects and styles, and it stirs up the "little gray cells."

At least I hope so.

Playing With Pears

I've been playing around with some old exercises from Robert Burridge.  He does workshops all over the USA, and I've taken two of them.  In his workshops he always uses acrylic, since it's nontoxic and dries quickly.  But instead of using acrylics, I decided to play with his method of painting pears using a little patterned collage paper and water mixable oil paints. 

None of these little paintings are especially impressive individually, but I like them like this, done in a series.  Each one has a different pattern in the collage paper under the pear.  So each is similar, but a little different.

I also liked using up old materials.  Here I used old leftover mat board cut to a 11x14 inches, or else old watercolor paper ripped to the same size and coated with gesso.  It irks me to waste materials, especially when I'm just playing around. All of these can go right in a pre-cut purchased mat, no fuss.

Updates

It has been more than a month since I've posted here.  Most of my life has been centered on health issues.  I had a biopsy on a suspicious spot in my abdomen that happily turned out to be benign, so the plan here is to forget about cancer as much as possible until my next checkup in June.  My hair is growing in and looks sort of radically stylish, and I think the nerve damage in my feet from chemo is improving, little by little. 

With the scary health concerns on the back burner for now, I've been doing more of what I enjoy, reading, getting outside, and playing around in the studio. This little eight by eight in inch oil was actually based on an online demonstration. The idea of the demo was that its easy to use large brushes on small paintings.  I went out and got myself a no. 18 bright brush (similar to a flat but with shorter bristles) and gave it a go.  To tell the truth the big brush was only for the background; the details on the orange were done with smaller brights, sized 10 and 12.  Still, it was a way I don't usually work, and following the steps on the online demo was interesting.

Other than these things, I'm looking forward to getting my cataracts fixed this month.  Little by little it is getting harder to see in low light and drive a night, to say nothing of reading subtitles on foreign films.  And when we go on our Caribbean cruise in April I want to see as well as possible. 

Downtown

Downtown, 8x10 inches, oil

This is my most recent small painting, a very stylized view of downtown Janesville.  I don't often paint landscapes, but I was playing with applying filters to some of my reference photos, and decided I rather liked this view. It's not very big, more of a study really.  I enjoyed the simplified shapes and intensified colors here, though whether it's great art or not I do not know.  Actually I do know.

I spent most of January finishing up my radiation treatments here in town, and then doing a series of four more treatments in Madison.  I am happy to report that they seem to have gone well, and that I am feeling very well and my hair is regrowing, although it is very short.  I'm still wearing a cap most of the time, just to keep warm.  I am reassured though, that I am not destined to be bald forever.

Winter Bridge

21x21 inches, oil on canvas

Winter Bridge

I finished this painting yesterday.  It had been close to done for more than two weeks, but I just ignored it until I realized that it was quietly driving me a little crazy sitting there unfinished.  The subject matter is the Japanese bridge at out local botanical garden.  I took the winter photo several years ago, but then experimented with altering the original photo with a filter program, and cropping the image to a square format.  I painted from the altered photo, and was pleased with the results.  This painting is larger than I usually work, and a departure from figurative work. I'll take it to the gallery tomorrow.

Forest

Forest - oil on canvas, 12x24 inches

This painting is unusual for me.  I don't paint landscapes very often, since my usual preference is for figurative images.  But lately I find myself playing around with drawings of trees, fields, and water.  Maybe the weather has something to do with it - since I'm not outside as much as I was in the summer and fall.

I fell into a strange rhythm while painting this one.  One day I would like what I had, though still knowing that I wanted to work on the composition, or the range of values, or the simplification of the image.  The next day I'd work, and really dislike the change.  The following day I'd be happier with the changes I made, and the day after that I'd be ready to toss the whole thing out the window.  But eventually, after about a week or a bit more, I liked it well enough.  So I quit.

I think what I need to do now is wire the painting and live with it hanging on a nail in the studio for a while.  Then I'll know better if it's really finished or not.

Amy for JKPP

Amy, for Julia Kay's Portrait Party

colored pencil on toned paper

This is my most recent portrait for the online group, Julia Kay's Portrait Party.  I find using colored pencil to be very engaging, and really soothing to do.  Lately, with the health problems I have been facing, working on a drawing like this takes time, and focuses my mind on something positive.  It's not obvious in this photo of the drawing, but the darkest areas are built up with browns, Tuscan red, indigo, and black colored pencil.  In the skin tones I also add a light warm brown, so there is some tonal variation and complexity.

I enjoyed working on this portrait because of her warm smile, and because there was a wide range of values, something I look for in a source photo.

Fiona, JKPP

Fiona, Ebony Pencil and White Colored Pencil

for Julia Kay's Portrait Party

This is my most recent sketch for the online group, Julia Kay's Portrait Party.  The group started on Flickr, but more recently has an offshoot on Facebook.  I've tried all sorts of styles using the photos pf Portrait Party members worldwide - blind contour drawings, watercolors, realistic and very stylized paintings, monoprints, all sorts of things.  Over the past year or so I have labored over detailed colored pencil drawings, many with added background textures, drawings that took days.  

This time time I decided that what I got done in two hours was it.  No long drawn out laboring for me this time.  So here is Fiona, with just some simple cross-hatching and white highlights.  

And I like her fine.

Susanne for JKPP

I haven't done any art since my June surgery, but I did manage to finish up this colored pencil portrait for the online group Julia Kay's Portrait Party.  For a while I was just to tired and shaky, but lately I just have been procrastinating.  So yesterday I just told myself I'd sit down for an hour and whateer happened, happened.

Why is it so hard to return to something you enjoy, after a long break?

Colored Pencil Portrait - Nadya

8x10 inches, colored pencil on tan notebook paper

I completed this portrait of Nadya, a woman I have never met, but is a fellow member of Julia Kay's Portrait Party, before Christmas. I like it well enough, though I wish I had done a better job of differentiating the dark tones of her shirt from the dark background.  I kept layering, and I may have gone one step too far.  Still, I think it captures her graceful appearance.

I turn sixty-six today, and am grateful to be relatively healthy and able to pursue my interests, such a local history and my art.  I look my age, which is startling every morning when I stand in front of the bathroom mirror to brush my teeth.  I have unruly salt and pepper hair, smile and frown lines galore, and a rounder figure than I care to think about very deeply.  Still, in my mind, I am more like, say, forty-five.  There is a disconnect between how I think of myself, and how I see myself in the mirror, and indeed how younger people treat me.  This sort of thing hit home at the annual family get-together at Christmas time.  I now am the oldest person in the room, except for my husband and brother-in-law, who only are older by three months.  I occupy the position my grandmother once held, a little more dressed up than the younger relatives, a little overwhelmed by overly excited little ones, a little tired and ready to head back home to rest. 

I have never liked the timing of my birthday, falling as it does between Christmas and New Year.  I always resented it a little when birthday presents came in Christmas wrapping paper, and always had to do with winter clothing.  This time of year everyone is busy, and a little over-fed, so a birthday like mine gets little notice. Of course these days people think it's silly for a retired gray haired woman to even pay much attention to birthdays.  Nevertheless, I took myself out for an Egg McMuffin this morning, and tonight we're planning to get a nice meal out, possibly featuring a martini.  My dear aunt sent me a pretty birthday card (such a rare thing these days), some long time friends and left a happy birthday song on voicemail, and my Facebook friends have been checking in with greetings, so the day has not gone unnoticed.

It's good to find the sunshine wherever you can.