Lady's Colt

“Lady’s Colt” 8x10 inch oil on canvas board

The subject of this painting is an eight day old Morgan colt. I don’t remember his name, but his dam is Lady who belongs to a friend of mine. This is the third in a series of one hour paintings I’ve been assigned to do by my mentor.

This time I deviated from the assignment by using smaller brushes. As a result, it took me longer to complete this one than the others; more like two hours, fifteen minutes. Still, that’s very fast for me, and it’s very rewarding to finish a painting in a few hours versus the weeks and months it usually takes me to complete an oil painting.

I’m very much enjoying this new style even though I haven’t gotten the hang of it yet. It’s been a boost to my ego to find that I can paint something fast and loose and have it look like what it’s supposed to look like and not a big mess. Below is a close up of the little feller so that you can see the looseness of the brush strokes. The legs are shorter than they should be because I ran out of room at the bottom of the canvas. Clearly, I should have placed him higher or made him a little smaller. That’s one of the hazards of drawing directly on the canvas without a preliminary drawing for perfect placement.

I have no idea if these little paintings are marketable or not. I just know I’m having a whole lot of fun doing them!

Yuri - Second One Hour Painting

“Yuri” 8x10 inch oil on canvas board

Man On A Mission will soon be going to a new home, but for now he is drying on the studio wall and waiting to be varnished.

Doing these one hour paintings definitely qualifies for going outside one’s comfort zone. But even after just one successful painting (at least for me), it has fired me up to do more and learn more. It isn’t about creating a good painting so much as it’s about challenging yourself and learning things you might not otherwise in the process.

Today I tackled a second one hour painting, and this time I managed to finish it in one hour fifteen minutes, using those same #8 brushes which are about 3/4 inches wide. They are a real challenge for getting any kind of detail, let me tell you! And the purpose of doing these little paintings is to get away from thinking detail too much and concentrate on composition, values, and all the rest of the “big picture” elements in painting.

This dog is Yuri, a German Shepherd who belongs to the people who board my horse. He is big, rambunctious and friendly. He’s also very handsome. I caught him in a rare moment of quiet for the photograph from which I worked for the painting.

I’m fairly pleased with this painting as well. These one hour paintings could become addictive, and I’m already looking forward to doing the next one.

Back To Easy Rider

“Easy Rider” 11 x 14 pencil equestrian drawing

Well, it seems that my little painting of the JRT has made a hit. His owner sent me more photos of him and her new JRT and has given me permission to use one of them for a painting. It seems that I may be going to the dogs these days.

But, in the meantime, I made more progress on Easy Rider. I had hoped to get enough of it done to use in an ad in Horses In Art magazine, but a lingering sinus infection has slowed me down for the past week. So, I sent in another image instead. If you aren’t aware of this magazine, it’s a real treat for the horse art lover. You can subscribe online, too.

This dressage horse equestrian drawing will need some tweaking yet, and the background needs to be finished, but it’s coming along nicely now. Considering how long it’s lingered in the studio, that’s a very encouraging thing!

After an unusually long January thaw, we’re now back to real winter, with strong winds and blowing snow and icy roads. I’m SO glad I got new tires on my Subaru three weeks ago because they saved me from an accident soon after. The car ahead of me lost control on black ice when he put on his brakes (not a wise thing to do), but I was able to slow down enough without a bit of sliding to avoid him as he ran into the snowbank. Whew! Good winter tires DO make a difference!

At any rate, the weather makes the studio a cosy place to be on a blustery day, and I’m busy planning my next work to land on the easel or drawing board. Today we ran errands in Traverse City, and I picked up a new AC adapter-charger thing for my laptop. Now that I’m back in the studio fairly regularly, I’ll need it for viewing reference photos beside the easel. I have so many great digital photos to work from now, and I’m anxious to create some great art from them. I plan to create a series of Horse Show Dogs paintings in addition to the horse art works.

That’s all for now, folks. Have a great weekend, everyone!

"Man On A Mission"

“Man On A Mission” 8x10 oil painting on canvas board

I had an email from my mentor recently. “You need to do some one hour paintings! Use big brushes and heavy paint”.

I must admit that this assignment was thoroughly intimidating because I’m a very slow, careful painter, but I knew it would be an excellent exercise to “loosen me up”. For my first attempt, I chose a foal photo, but decided that it was too complex an image for my first one hour painting. So, I found this simple photo of Spinner, a Jack Russell Terrier who belongs to a friend and sometimes riding instructor.

Yesterday I forced myself into the studio, and this was the result. I used a #12 bristle flat to apply a tone to the canvas and then used #8 synthetic flats to draw and paint the dog and the background. I cheated a little by using a round bristle for some of the small details, but that was it. I managed to do the dog in one hour but then spent another hour applying the background and fussing over the dog. I probably could easily have stretched the time into another 2-3 hours to refine everything but resisted the urge and put down the brushes.

I’m supposed to do a couple of these per week and already have a German Shepherd picked out to do next. It’s quite a departure from my usual cautious and detailed style and requires real discipline to resist the urge to pick, pick, pick at the painting. Now I’m looking forward to doing the next one.

I don’t think I’m in any danger of becoming a “loose woman”, but you never know.

Riding Into The New Year

Happy New Year, everyone! Did you all have a satisfying holiday season, and are you ready to plunge into this new year with renewed optimism and determination?

As for my part, I’m doing something different from my usual New Year routine. Instead of spending days on the end of year analysis and setting goals for the incoming year, I’m starting off by spending some time in the studio. Maybe this way I can keep the momentum going and not get side tracked by extraneous “stuff”.

Since “Easy Rider” was still on the drawing board, it is the first piece to get attention, and I’m getting very eager to finish it. There will be many adjustments to make as I work out the lighting issues, but it’s looking good so far. But, there’s something about that left foreleg that isn’t quite right. Could the head be a tad too large? Was there some distortion in the reference photograph that I didn’t notice until seeing the drawing in the small version? Hmmm.

This equestrian dressage drawing is approximately 11 x 14 inches in pencil on paper.

For my next project, I’ve already picked out a photo of a kitten; our own beloved Annie whom we lost last Christmas. I’ll be doing that in pastel before plunging back into the oils.

Easy Rider Rides Again!

During all the Thanksgiving festivities, I managed a little bit of time on this drawing. It’s been quite a while since I worked on it, and I finally figured out how to correct the reference photo which shows a horse doing passage incorrectly. I was bummed when this was pointed out to me, but knew all along that it had to be changed.

Over time I looked for photos in magazines of horses at the same angle but never found exactly what I needed. Then I found the Breyer model dressage horse Keltec Salinero doing passage and knew I’d found my solution. I set him up next to my drawing table and angled him to match my reference photo and redrew the legs on a piece of tracing paper. After tracing the changes back onto the drawing, I began shading again.

It may not look like much progress since the last time I posted, but it is a huge step forward to finishing this drawing called “Easy Rider”.

Rainy Day Splendor

Fall is always a very busy time, and this year has been no exception. However, I did work on this little oil painting study again, and it’s pretty much finished. I’m calling it “Rainy Day Splendor”. By the time I got back to it, more leaves had fallen and the colors had changed, so I had to go partly by memory. But, it was still overcast and rainy, so the light was pretty much the same. And now, all the leaves are down and there’s nothing to be seen except bare branches.

We’ve had beautiful sunny and unusually warm weather for the past week, so I’ve been busy washing windows and other such things and dealing with a health issue which really threw me for a loop for a couple of weeks. But, the situation has turned around, and I’m back to being much more productive and much more relaxed.

Last night I finished revising the line drawing for “Easy Rider” and traced the new set of legs on the drawing. I plan to get back to work on it in the next few days and will post my progress as I go.

That’s all for now.