Glacial Lake + advice from the Master + LO plein air!

                                                        oil on canvas 30x24

 Contrary to how I always work, this did not come from a visit with a mountain. Not recently anyway. This unwound after covering two previous failed paintings, the last one a larger version of this view of Oswego Lagoon. I turned the canvas 180 degrees and began painting it with light colors. I was just trying to cover it up before beginning something new. Then this landscape took shape as I was concealing the dud. From the top working to the bottom, each new section fell into place. It was a strange experience and what is most odd is how specific a place it looks like. I definitely broke rule #5!

 Though I have trouble believing that is Richard Diebenkorn`s handwriting, the language and tone sound exactly right. These were notes he wrote for himself and he would probably be horrified to know they were now widely read. When I worked with him in 1985, he noted my interest in patterns but advised I must always 'violate' them. He was right. By interrupting the repetition, the whole feels less 'designed' and there is greater figure/ground integration.
 Such a beloved, influential painter! He was gone much too soon.

                                       Black Mesa from Chimayo-Night oil on canvas 48x30

Above was a piece done about a year before the month long workshop with Diebenkorn. I was doing lots of paintings with layers, stacking up the landscape elements like a tower.

                                             Parade watermedia on paper 46x32

 This was done soon after. I wrenched myself, with his encouragement, from those orderly rows.

 My show with Tom Cramer proceeds at the Museum 510 gallery space in downtown Lake Oswego. The official hours are limited Tues.-Fri. 11-4, but if anyone would like an 'after hours' look, I have access to the gallery. Just give me a call; 503 380 4731

 Tom and I will be speaking about the work in an informal talk Thurs. evening, March 19 at 6:30 pm.
The following Thurs. March 26, I will be giving a demonstration at the gallery at 11 am. All are welcome.

In my own studio, I will be demonstrating with watermedia this Sat. March 14 at 10 am. 5373 Lakeview Blvd. Lake Oswego 97035

 The city of Lake Oswego is having another plein air festival! Read all about it here! I`m participating and need some companions to paint with! My community is a beauty, lots of good places to paint! The public is invited to watch us.

 The exciting Willamette Falls Legacy Project is entering its next phase! It won`t be too long before something gets built! Oregon City is about to be reborn!

In closing, here is an article which was posted by encaustic artist Linda Robertson on Facebook. It`s about creativity and time management. It sure helped me understand my obsessive need to paint and the social fallout from that. It gets more intense with age. I`ve come to really resent sleeping for instance. When I was young, that was near the top of my list of pleasures! Now I force myself to bed. The great British artist Frank Auerbach began sleeping in his studio and refused social invitations at 78. He felt he was running out of time. I`m happy he`s still with us at and now 83.

                                                          Frank Auerbach


work for sale in my studio

I support President Obama

New Mexico Remembered

                                                         From Albuquerque to Home
                                                         watermedia on paper 16x12"

                                               Cottonwoods watercolor on paper 3.5x21"

                                                                   Santa Fe Baldy
                                                    watermedia on paper 40x27" 1988

 Memory becomes so interesting as I get older. Often it`s frustrating and completely unreliable but sometimes it`s like a long closed door is now open again. I was told this would happen. Be lucky enough to live a long life and you will revisit your youth again. I moved to New Mexico in 1976 at 22. Though I consider leaving it one of the best things I ever did, moving there was one of the bravest. I loved it immediately. Now after being in Oregon for 20 years, I`m having the sweetest small recollections of what it was like back then. Coming from Southern Calif., the clean air alone was exotic and exciting!
 So with the top two paintings above, I was fooling around with some new papers and these NM landscapes emerged, full of emotional significance for me. The beauty of my new home state was stunning and even though I was really struggling economically, it felt in many ways like a rich existence.


work for sale in my studio


                                                        

Chimayo Spring

                                                           watercolor on paper 22x15

Nice to be home again, nice to be working in my cozy man-cave/studio.
This is from the late 80`s, one of hundreds of images I had transferred from slides to DVD this winter. To my shock, a great many of them I have no memory of. I know what time of my life they were from, where I was living and by the execution, what my motives were but actual pieces, like this one, no recall. This was a prosperous time in my life, between recessions, and I think lots of stuff went out the door quickly. Anyway, I kind of like it. It will take me awhile to digest my month at Sitka, meanwhile here is a hopeful painting of spring for my friends in the East.


some available work

Starlight and Snow 3

                                                            watermedia on paper 20x16

Someone suggested I do a larger version.


available work in the studio

Over the Foothills

 This was begun during my residency at Brush Creek Ranch in May of 2012. It used to be bigger. During our rainy orientation tour of the ranch, I saw a huge stand of bare cottonwoods that I wanted to paint. Once I could, I pulled out a giant sheet of Yupo and began with watercolors. With a vista, I usually give the sky some intense attention early, knowing it will set the emotional tone of the painting. That went well but those trees resisted all my efforts. With just two weeks to paint in  Wyoming, I set it aside and did a lot of smaller pieces. So a year and a half later now, I cut the painting down saving my 'good' sky, sealed it with varnish, then made a new landscape beneath the clouds in oil paints. This does capture the no-nonsense austerity of the late winter environment I experienced there.
watercolor and oils on Yupo [plastic paper] 12x34


work in my studio

From the Beach to the Bluff + Chimayo at Dusk

                                                                  oil on paper 11x11
From my foggy visit to Oceanside last July. This is an example of Tonalism, which was an early love of mine. Here is one from 30 years ago;

                                                                 oil on canvas 30x40


available work in the studio

Over Idaho

This was painted from memory after a cross country flight. I always try to get a window seat and then have a stiff neck for a couple of days after. Many artists have been enthralled with those aerial views of the American West. There is something so fascinating in seeing the things built and planted by man juxtaposed on the organic shapes of the landscape.
watermedia on paper 30x22


work in my studio

Calapooya Mountain Summer

I taught in my studio today and did this as a demonstration of some techniques. It`s now predictable that I`ll end up being quite excited by the discussions when teaching. Hearing the different motivations, intentions and aspirations individual painters have is stimulating.
The painting is based on a drawing I did in a moving car traveling south on I-5 several years ago. The most casual sketch can contain enough information to evoke a memory of that moment and a more fully realized work later.
watermedia on paper 9x12


available work in the studio

Kauai 6

The hills and mountains behind the town of Hanalei. There was always serious weather  going on up there.
oil on cradled panel 20"x20"

Heat Lightning-Shasta Bally

Shasta Bally is the hulking mountain that dominates Whiskeytown Calif. Two years ago I was driving over a pass in the Trinity mountains and saw heat lighting over this peak. I think it is just an electrical storm too far away to hear the thunder, but we called it heat lightning in New Mexico. On a spring evening, the storms over the Sangre de Christo mountains would flash and illuminate the clouds purple. Across the valley, thunderstorms would be sparking the night over the Jemez mountains. Such a beautiful sight! and unfortunately one I never see in western Oregon. This is a second version, the first was a watercolor done the day after that memorable ride.
oil on canvas 36"x36"
My friend Lyn Relph has written a fascinating book about 'experience' as a way of 'knowing' rather than through received knowledge. The connections he makes between science, philosophy, the arts, religion, and technology throughout human history is truly provocative. I`m reading it a second time and not even a friend would do that if it wasn`t great.
Our Experience, Ourselves

Hanalei Sketch

This was done from memory after I returned home. Nothing is taken from the actual landscape but what I loved about that area is here. Though the earth is red with iron and visible in places, I used this orange hill to emphasize the overwhelming fertility.
oil on paper 6"x6"



available work [updated]

Taro Fields-Cloud Forest-Swamp

When the boat we had reservations on couldn`t guarantee a look at the Na Pali coast because of the weather, we said no thanks. Instead, we nearly killed ourselves climbing through the mud again to see the world`s highest altitude swamp. Quite atmospheric, cool and quiet, but we paid a heavy price to get there. Today is my last chance to see the Na Pali cliffs and we`re going to do it in a helicopter!
watercolor on paper 6"x18"

Hanalei Mountains

This morning we walked along Ohki Road through the Hanalei National Wildlife Reserve. Much more civilized than yesterday`s scramble uphill in the mud.
watercolor on paper 18"x6"

Road to Roswell

New Mexico Mountains.
Before Roswell became a hub of UFO nonsense, it was a quiet farming community in southern New Mexico. I taught a workshop there at the Art Center in the early 90`s and painted this from my memory of the drive when I returned home.
watercolor on paper 9"x12"


available work in my studio

Red Shasta Bally

Shasta Bally is the round, maternal looking mountain that looms above Whiskeytown Lake in Northern California. I painted in a cabin there near Brandy Creek as an artist in residence for 10 days. The whole area west of Redding was spectacular and mostly unpopulated.
oil on cradled panel 12"x12"


work now in my studio

Brush Creek

When I arrived at the ranch on May 1, the cottonwood and aspen groves along the creek were still mostly dormant. A Rocky Mountain winter takes a long time to let go. This particular place looked like it flooded repeatedly. There were rocks strewn about, broken trees and lots of dead vegetative stuff in heaps. It looked like a bone yard. But cottonwoods, despite their relatively short messy lives, are genuinely majestic. In the two weeks I was there, this circle of trees came alive! High above the chaos on the meadow beneath them, the branches sprouted tender new leaves and the atmosphere became ethereal.
oil on canvas 40x54


available work

Overcast Yellowstone Study

A view north of Mammoth Hot Springs. The clouds didn`t lift to let me see what was back there.
No doubt it is spectacular. Driving up to the Springs from the geyser basins in the south part of the park is nothing short of miraculous. Within mere minutes the landscape dramatically changes into something altogether new and breathtaking several different times. Last spring when I visited. the weather was cool and misty so the vistas were rarely completely visible. Not knowing what to expect, I didn`t mind at all. The clouds and fog just heightened the other worldliness of it.
oil on panel 8"x8"


Available Work

Eastern Oregon Study 4

I`ll be having an opening this Friday night the 6th, at the Hanson Howard Gallery in Ashland OR. I want everyone near southern Oregon to stop what you`re doing and come say hello.
acrylic on Yupo 12"x9"


Available Work

Across the Refuge 2

This was a demonstration painting I began for a class yesterday. It was a new group I was working with so my intention was to show the combination of watercolor and acrylic techniques I use. My personal project was to see if I could create a lively neutral space in support of the sunlit areas in the distance. watermedia on Yupo 23"x16" Available Work