Daily Painting-again

                                       Sun on the Winter Marsh watermedia on paper 12x9


 Since I`m not burning hot with great new ideas, I thought painting whole pieces in a single day might be useful again. Ten years ago the practice kept me working through the deepest grief I had experienced.
   Carol Marine makes a convincing case for the habit as a way of learning efficiently. In her book Daily Painting, she asserts working small and often as a way to gain confidence and develop technique. It`s also a way to be active in the studio when the muse is away. Almost exercises without any expectation, it`s pleasant and satisfying. Nothing I liked much has come from it until this piece, a bright, brittle winter slough. Here are some of the others, all watermedia on paper 12x9.

                                                                  Distant Green

                                                                           [yupo]

 With perfect timing, this sweet little book arrived in the mail yesterday. It fits nicely in the hand and is filled with ideas, methods, proposals, concepts, and suggestions. And it`s illustrated with lots of paintings. The UK artist Joanna Goss contacted me a couple of years ago about using an image of mine. Naturally enough, I`m the section on Yupo;

 This is one of the coolest books on watercolor I`ve ever seen.

 That nice red head boy got married, God bless them.
Prince Harry served in two deployments in Afghanistan. Heel spurs were never mentioned. He also created the Invictus Games so that injured servicemen could also compete in sport.
I like Meghan too;

 After referring to a poem in my last post that I`ve searched 48 years for, my pal Elisabeth sent me this wonderful piece by James Dickey;


                                                       The Heaven of Animals

Here they are. Their soft eyes open.
If they have lived in a wood
It is a wood.
If they have lived on plains
It is grass rolling
Under their feet forever.

Having no souls, they have come,
Anyway, beyond their knowing.
Their instincts wholly bloom
And they rise.
The soft eyes open.

To match them, the landscape flowers,
Outdoing, desperately
Outdoing what is required;
The richest wood,
The deepest field.

For some of these,
 it could not be the place
It is, without blood.
These hunt, as they have done,
but with claws and teeth grown perfect.

More deadly than they can believe.
They stalk more silently,
And crouch on the limbs of trees,
And their descent
Upon the bright backs of their prey

May take years
In a sovereign floating of joy.
And those that are hunted
Know this as their life.
Their reward; To walk

Under such trees in full knowledge
Of what is in glory above them,
And to feel no fear,
But acceptance, compliance.
Fulfilling themselves without pain

At the cycle`s center,
They tremble, they walk
Under the tree,
They fall, they are torn,
They rise, they walk again.

                                                        Prow by Christopher LeBrun


 Isn`t this magnificent?! It is as urgent and inspiring as when I first saw it 35 years ago.
Pegasus! We`ve been waiting for you! What is the message?



work for sale in my studio

Matters of Scale

                                                       River Shore watermedia on Yupo 6x20


 Could you imagine this watercolor 10 feet long? Would that be interesting or too loud? The issue of how large my paintings should be has plagued me since I was young. I`ve tried hard to have a career with integrity yet this one issue has compromised my practice since early on. Practical concerns have mostly won out. Like many young people I moved more often than was desirable and the transportation and storage of big paintings was always a problem. I wanted to work large but they didn`t sell very well. The impulse to do them wasn`t pure either. Was I just clamoring for attention with their scale? Was that OK? There are so many logistical matters to think about in the life of a painter! Do they give the students any help with this in art school? Because I didn`t go, I`ve had to figure out most everything myself. In several periods of my career I just said to hell with it, I`m going to go big. Some of those 30 year old paintings are stacked fifteen feet away from where I`m sitting now writing this. The inability to find homes for the large canvases would then cause an over-correction. Nothing that isn`t comfortable to carry. Or later, nothing that won`t fit in my car. Then the pressure builds again and I have a new brood of bigguns. Now I have a bigger car too! One might think the answer is within me but it`s not! Not yet anyway. This isn`t a fatal dilemma, I`m not tortured by it. The primary thing is I`ve painted consistently for forty years.
Though my studio is large, the ceiling is low. There is a real limit to what I can get past my stairwell. And as I`ve gotten older, it`s certainly easier to manage the moderately scaled pieces. Sometimes I think I could be happy painting tiny botanical studies at a desk and at other times I want to do 20 foot long watercolor scrolls. So on it goes, round and round.
Maybe it`s mature to be practical, I greatly admire Thomas Nozkowski, and all of his stuff would fit on my back seat.

The painting above comes from a small patch of grasses and trees along the Tualatin River backed by a steep hill. It`s in a park in West Linn, close to the baseball diamond and is just spectacular to me. Somehow the light on this spot is always dramatic. The paintings below all derive from this same magical corner on the river;

                                                               Riverlight Study wm 12x9

                                                           Riverbank Study 2 wm 14x11

                                                                 Riverlight 1 oil 20x20

                                                                  Riverlight 2 oil 20x20

                                                             Riverbank Study wm 14x11

Hugh Hefner

 Allow me some words of gratitude for the life of Hugh Hefner.

I`m a feminist, I understand the arguments and controversies his life and business provoked. And I`ve always found him creepy. But he did the world a great favor in his effort to legitimize sexual desire. The Playboy 'sex friendly' attitude helped liberate a lot of compressed and suppressed feelings about sex. In doing this, I believe he helped women have more understanding and control of their choices and roles in life. He and the advice columnist Ann Landers were also among the first public figures to say the obvious; homosexual people are born and part of nature. I appreciate that.

 Now for some pure bragging. Watch my tremendously gifted cousin, Anya Cloud, in some contact improvisation here, with the great dancer Matan Levkowich. Exquisitely beautiful.

                                                                       Prince Harry

 I used to rail against the idea of monarchy. The notion of superiority by birthright was deeply offensive, undemocratic and racist! 

I hadn`t done my research. 

When I read of Queen Elizabeth`s active role in WW2, my beliefs began to shift. Now I understand the British monarchy at least, to be an example of moral courage, a model of service to the common good and boosters of the best Britain has to offer the world. Look through these pictures of Prince Harry at the Invictus Games. What a lovely humane young man! 

We used to have such a leader too.

 OK, my big Pinterest discovery is Heli Huotala, a Finn of great sensitivity to nature and of the properties of paint. I could live in one of her paintings.

                                                                  Heli Huotala

                                                                    Heli Huotala

                                                                  Heli Huotala

She is doing everything I hope to do.

                                                                High Summer-Sauvie Island

 My watercolor demo from two weeks ago on the coast turned into an oil painting. Things change!

 Last week to see my show at the White Bird Gallery in Cannon Beach OR!