In Progress: Junction

48"H by 36"W, on panel. 

(click for enlargement)  

 

Brightened up the highlights today. I feel good about this painting again, even though that bowl/dish shape is hanging in some sort of limbo. 

I also pulled a chair out of a dumpster. I'm not sure if it will find a home elsewhere, but I saw it turned over and fell in love with the rusty legs. It's a very good thing that I have a pickup truck.

Funding- An Eternal Struggle

I always feel overwhelmed when thinking about money. My studio-mate and I are seriously considering a larger studio space, which we are both in need of- my works are stacked in my garage and above the rafters, and things I don't even remember painting threaten to avalanche onto my boxes of regular crap (I.E. Toys, clothes, furniture). I'm in a total quandary, and though I know the way out of it, I don't want get a regular full-time job. I need to earn more money to pay for a studio, in order to make more work, in order to sell more work, yet I'll have to sacrifice painting hours to do more work outside the studio to pay for it.

There are works that I consider "garnishes." Sweet little paintings of things that do little more than advertise my technical skill. I think I need to make a lot of those sorts of paintings just now, to try to deal with my seriously dry financial well. Paintings of things that people like isn't at all what I'm about, but the need to have a product is driving me now. So I'm trying my hand at a few portraits and a couple paintings of people's dogs. It's not a problem to turn these paintings out, I'm just a little ashamed of them.

More images soon. I'm going to donate a painting to a local art organization to try to keep them afloat and I'm preparing to enter a state fair competition. So this depression hasn't completely affected my enormous ego, but it could surely use some feeding.

Fireplace Scene 1& 2

14"H by 11"W, on panel. 

(click for enlargement) 

 

 

 

11"H by 14"W, on panel. 

(click for enlargement)  

 

These are finally finished. I like them both, and I'm fairly sure that one of them is going to be claimed soon. Part of my objective in painting two virtually identical pieces is to keep one of them- my studio is looking like it's full of things that are perpetually in progress, and I need a few art pieces that will look nice around the room. Building up a store of art that can be given to a gallery for a month or so is also an objective of mine, even though having such a small space means that some of the art will be in storage for a little while before seeing much daylight.

Tangerine Living Room

6"H by 8"W, on panel. 

(click for enlargement) 

A much better photo of this painting. I'm going to amend that entry where I showed it before, because the picture was so inaccurate.

In Progress: Tumult

48"H by 36"W, on panel. 

(click for enlargement)  

Mapping out the main composition points using the shadows is extremely satisfying and a step that takes a lot of consideration, so today I sat this painting in the parking lot and looked at it for a long time. I committed to some heavy editing. This painting is probably only at the halfway point and will have a lot more layered upon it before I'm at all satisfied.

In Progress: Fireplace Scene 1 & 2

14"H by 11"W, on panel. 

(click for enlargement) 

11"H by 14"W, on panel. 

(click for enlargement) 

These works have got much more paint on them now, and are very nearly done. I'm not exactly sure that the colors in these photographs are right- it seems like a lot of the warmer yellows have cooled dramatically. I'll shoot them again next week and try different color adjustments.

As usual, writing at 2:30am makes me terse and a little less than inspired with my entry, but I enjoyed painting so much today that I had to make a post before sleeping.