Sunset, from a Dune at Lake Michigan,
What are the accompanying sounds? Below, waves splashing against the shore and all around me, happy voices articulating multilingually.
Archives for photography
peacock
Early morning walk in Greenwich Village.
Inspired by one of my heroes, Richard Estes. Reflections, reflections, reflections…
Skies to Observe for the upcoming Goldwell Residency
Rackstraw Downes Mixed Use Field on Texas Coast, 1987, oil on canvas on board, 11 x 58 inches
As someone soon to be facing how to paint a large desert sky spread across a large desert panorama, I’m circling the question of the possibilities available.* The Goldwell Foundation, where I’ll be painting,locates itself physically near Beatty, Nevada, on the northwest region of the Basin and Range country, 8 miles and one mountain range from Death Valley. I’ve done lots of small studies there. Now I’m contemplating the Big One. Desultorily contemplating…..
I have no theories, only pictures.
golden ratio
Art supply companies sell pre-stretched canvases, wood and hardboard panels with only a limited number of dimensions. Standard width/length ratios are 1 x 1, 1 x 2, 2 x 3, 3 x 4 and 4 x 5. If I want to use a photograph of my camera as a motif, a 2 x 3 panel would be the most suitable to represent the full picture. Musing on dimensions, the golden ratio came to mind – 1 x 1.618 – easy to remember because 1.6 km equal a mile.
Here is a photograph cropped to fit the golden ratio with respect to width and length:
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Channeling Emily Carr and thinking about Place
Some of you already know that I’ve been copying Emily Carr paintings for the last week or so, attempting to understand more fully how she does forests and trees.
Emily Carr, Cedar Sanctuary, 38 x 26″, Oil on paper, 1942
I’ve learned a lot through this exercise [ including the rule that I must paint-over or otherwise destroy the copies I’ve made before someone comes into the studio and exclaims with pleasure over them. Such an exclamation forces me to admit that what the complimenter is seeing is a copy, causing embarassment all round.] Carr’s finding of shapes in the complexity, of making color within the shapes, and of “draping” her branches are all valuable for my own art-making thoughts.
However, during this process, I had other kinds of questions occur.
Water rhythm
To learn about fluid dynamics and how to depict it, I will now use this picture as a motif for painting:
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Light makes space
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I occasionally worry that my tendency to analyze—some might call that an understatement—could be a negative influence on my work, causing me to lose spontaneity or fall into one rut or another. But I’ve now proven to my satisfaction that any effect is both unconscious and ineffective. Here’s how it happened.
