Two Watercolors and a road trip

                                                       September Marsh watermedia on Yupo 12x9


 A little corner of Bryant Woods where I walk frequently. Looks nothing like I intended but feels like what I saw. That keeps happening and I think it`s interesting. Same with this one;

                                                            Untitled Iceland watermedia on Yupo 12x9


 I found the south Icelandic landscape to have a raw austerity yet it was lush. Every day was overcast and it often rained. Green mountains like in Kauai rose just beyond bleak windswept beaches. Being there in mid July, I probably saw the island as verdant and benign as it ever is. Watching storms roll over the mountains was a daily experience.


 My show in Coos Bay ended on Oct. 1st and we decided to retrieve it ourselves and make the trip a little holiday. I rented a van and got inside information on the good stuff in Bandon OR. I wanted to be near the ocean and Coos Bay is a port. My source delivered. We stayed in an old motel perched on a bluff overlooking the Pacific and the beach below was crowded with sea stacks, riddled with caves! My inner twelve year old flipped out!

 Near minus tides with the weather parting as we arrived and closing in as we left. The drive on OR highway #138 was sublime in the gentle rain.


 Guess what, I won the Lake Oswego plein air prize with my big watercolor "Iron Mountain";

                                                          watercolor on Yupo 26x40

 I had a piece of sheet insulation that was almost the exact same size as a large sheet of Yupo that could be my support. I figured if I worked fast in black and white in sunny weather, I could manage the big dimensions. Here is a process shot;

 I was with my friend Mitch and he was painting me as I painted;

                                                                 by Mitch Burrel

 Really fun plus I won some bucks and a set of Gamblin alkyd oil paints!


  Mary Alice Beard is spending her retirement savings buying my paintings. God bless her. I just sent Metolius Morning to her and she wrote a poem about the painting;

                                         Wordless, the morning sun
                                          slants through the trees,
                                          nudging the river awake.

                                          Waterlight rises.
                                          Dancing ripples push
                                          mystery into the shadows.

                                          Nothing new here.
                                          All is new here.
                                          Behold the day.
                                                                 _Mary Alice Beard 2016


 I love it! The magic in the ordinary. What I hope for in my work.

                                                         Metolius Morning oil on canvas 30x48


Creativity is a birthright and good for your health. Research is proving it too. Check this out.
Ever created in a group? There is a hum of satisfying concentration whether it`s a life drawing session, working outdoors on location,  trying something new in a class, playing music with friends or rehearsing a play. It makes you glad to be alive when you make something.


In my humble opinion, here is a perfect painting;

                                                                      Phillippe Croq


I wish I painted that!


 In this latest Donald Trump scandal of sexual predation, Armistead Maupin gets it right:

 "Here's what I've been noticing: All these panicked Republicans saying: 'As a husband and a father, I'm offended.' How about as a man, period? How about as a human being? To these assholes, women are afforded dignity only if they can be defined somehow as property. MY wife. MY daughter. It all comes back to the man in the end. Always has."

I`ll close on a positive note, kitten in a sink. My brilliant Lyndon.


I`m with her!


work for sale in my studio