Resolution

make a mark every day.  simple.  don't worry about quality.  this is about just making the effort. be quick.  don't think.  just draw.  do anything: draw on a piece of paper, drag a stick in the sand, draw on your phone, paint ... whatever, as long as you make a mark.  you ... have ... got ... to ... make ... a ... freaking ... mark.  that's why you're here, asshole.

there's Karin working on her computer across the room...

there's Warren Beatty on the cover of Esquire...

there's some dude from a magazine page...

Coalescing

after months, many months, of feeling lost in my approach to art, of feeling like i had either forgotten how to paint or maybe lost a compelling why to paint, i feel like, today, for the first time, things are coalescing.  the work from before (the creative collapse) and the work today.  literally today, not a metaphor for "recent".  walking by some old paintings in my studio just now, leaned against walls or propped on shelves, which typically get passed unnoticed, i saw or maybe felt a connection to the painting i just worked on.  this may sound kind of silly.  kind of "duh".  as in, of course there should be some recognizable connection.  thing is, i haven't felt it (or seen it) for quite some time.  whether it was missing or i just was oblivious to some organic shift in my work (euphemism for a creative slump), i don't know, but i am certain that my work of the last year or two has been terribly confused and without focus, and only rarely did i achieve a decent result.

painting

i think

i feel like, lately in the studio, i am either thinking too much or not enough...

parting the wild horse's mane

20"x20"
oil on panel

iPhone Phun

We got our scanner working again and found this drawing hanging around the studio. I have been working in charcoal again. Mostly abstract, but sometimes it is so sweet to just sit and draw something.

Looking forward to seeing you all and feeling thankful to have you all and to be a part of this creative process. Cheers!

done procrastinating

well, ok.  so i worked on a couple of frames this morning.  i donate a painting to work every christmas for an auction they do to raise money for charity, so that painting needed a frame.  then i have the CAP auction deadline, so that one needs a frame too.  then i did the laundry.  then i fiddled with the car to try to fix my wobbly steering.  i made a list of things to do today and checked off the things i had already done.  i talked to a friend on the phone for 18 minutes. 

i did all kinds of stuff to avoid this:

this is a painting from last friday.  i started it two weeks ago, but today i was faced with this... thing.  ugh.  where to go?...  it's big, too.  don't know if you can tell from this photo.  it's about five feet tall.  i don't know, but that just makes it all the more intimidating.

so, procrastination be damned.  nothing to it but to do it, right?  i mean, i am a PAINTER dammit.

so here are the marks i made today.  i had to move past that "central hub" motif i had going on.  it was choking the painting and choking me.  i think it's a better painting today than before, but only time will tell me what to do next. for now i'll just let it ferment a while.

Put some work up this weekend with my dear friend Paul Wrench. Just a few pieces, but nice to have some work out in public. Had some piano music to boot!

It does make a difference to get work out of the studio and to have others respond. Thanks Steff for looking at a piece I was stuck on, you're observations are always insightful.

sketch

another phone sketch, while sitting in the car with the cats while Karin shopped. I do love the accessibility of this medium. whatever gets you making marks, right?

Hello Friends! I am trying not to let the other parts of my life push out the visual part. I have been in the studio again, but this time of year I find the rich colors and world outside competes with my studio time.

I miss all of you and am going to insist we find a gathering before the year ends, and a show in 2014. I am going to return to posting once per week! Dave, thanks fro keeping us alive!

little drawing

trying to draw every day on the smartphone. is good exercise. challenged to make "my" marks with something other than paint.