"The farrier at work"

This is the under-painting for an oil painting on cavas mounted onto board. It is difficult to photograph oils because of the reflection. The best medium to photograph is gouache because the chalk in the pigment reduces the reflection of the flash. Even without the flash, the oil reflects. You can click on the image to enlarge it more, though there is no detail yet, only the large shapes so far, done in flat colors for a base.

Windy Day

Sold.

Here I continue to experiment painting horses responding to the weather. This piece of silk is about seven inches square and was first dampened and stretched onto a board using staples to make it taught. It is a nice surface to paint on with ink, and stays put, but with this method I can't paint on the reverse side simultaneously, which I often do for enhanced sky effects.

more watercolors

Today I was going to tidy up the studio, but in the process I found some very soft and creamy, raw, cotton rag paper from I don't know where (no watermark). So I am working instead which is better. First I draw with graphite and then I smear some paint around, sticking to a limited palette of three colors: yellow ochre, burnt sienna, and indigo blue. This is almost the Velasquez palette which would have ultramarine blue instead of indigo.

lesson

I spend time watching people train horses. One of the things they often do is exercise the horse on a longe line. It easier for the horse to balance without a rider on his back. Trying to paint this includes thinking about how the muscles work and where the light hits the body. I also think about what is going on in the horses mind and try to capture that mood in the painting. This is a nervous young mare who is trying to trust a new trainer. She has lots of energy and I hope the painting conveys that.

horses on silk

The weather has changed, and so I have painted these mustangs running in excitement as horses do when the wind brings in a new weather system. Horses have long been a standard in Chinese art, representing both freedom and strength combined with grace.

This painting is sold.

I have added color although it is much bluer, less green, than it appears here. I might darken the colors somewhat, but am not yet sure that it is a good idea to make the clouds stand out more.

sumi horses painted on Chinese silk

I am now working on a commission and trying to paint something similar to a painting that sold last May. Many people expressed interest in the painting and one has asked for one like it. I normally don't accept commissions, but this is for a friend of a friend, and so...I will try. I often paint what I think of as wild horses, or mustangs, running free, though one of these paintings looks more like two ponies just running in for their dinner. I love horses and painting on silk is a departure for me; it is quite different from painting on rice paper because it is heavily sized and that makes it tough to get the soft grays I usually strive for. It is good to experiment, however.

And so I will continue to paint horses on silk for a while...

8-8-08

Today's ditty, painted while working at the gallery. A light-hearted watercolor sketch on rag paper done in the midst of a bustling crowd of tourists. Colts playing at the beach...

Here is a sketch of the beach view I enjoyed last week. It was misty and rainy and so the sky stayed pale most of the time instead of the intense summer blue it can be at the ocean.

Back from a week at the beach where it rained a lot, but I did manage to complete one small painting of the wild fushia bushes which feed the rufous hummingbirds.