New Work No Titles

                                                                      1. oil on canvas 20x16

                                                                   2. oil on canvas 20x16


 Same old problem, what to title new paintings of familiar subjects?
I`ll get to it later.
Every painting begins with an intention that originates from an experience. How they conclude is more often than not quite different. There is a point in the process where to insist on the 'vision' would sacrifice what is happening before me, the true pleasure of exploration. Forget about the idea that launched it! Funny thing though, it usually circles back around and reclaims the most important part.
 The wetlands in #1 were inspired by the Fanno Creek marshes near where they join the Tualatin River. They`re near my home and I visit a lot in winter. What I love about them is the dense variety. So many textures and colors doubled by the reflections and amplified by the bird sounds! And so inhospitable to anything heavy! Like me as I sink into the mud. When I paint them, I want to layer all the elements into an interconnected teeming whole. So while I may have photos or sketches of particular clumps of grasses and trees, ultimately they may be included or not as I grope toward something serene yet kinetic.
 #2 comes from viewing the autumn color against the bright reflections of clouds on the river. I began by including the wavering reflections of trees and soon realized it was too confusing. In removing them my vividly colored leaves were visually unanchored. So I added chunks of green vegetation with spidery stems linking each mass together. Now it doesn`t exactly look like what I saw, but the buoyancy of that sunny Fall day is there.


 As this election season came to life I thought, this year I`m going to vote from my heart. I`m going to vote for Bernie Sanders. He has walked his talk for decades and his decency is obvious.
I believe politics is the real world enactment of our spiritual values. This is why I`m a Democrat. My Dad explained it very simply, 'Democrats are for the little guy'. This is also in accord with the Christian teachings I was raised with.
So I planned to vote for Bernie in the primary and I hoped his success would keep Hillary humble and honest. I believe it has. Then I read this article claiming a vote for Sanders was a vote for Trump. That`s so provocative! But it made sense and caused me to remember the McGovern campaign I worked on in 1972. That good man was slimed beyond recognition, he never had a chance. The same would happen with Sanders I fear. I`ve decided it`s not worth the risk. President Trump? That is too scary to imagine.

                                                             Miroco Machiko


 I`m crazy about Miroco! She completely turns distinctions between illustration and fine art on their head! She`s bold and playful, inventive and fearless! Such fresh air!

 This photo is so painterly! The color alone is gorgeous and the composition is both stylized and dynamic! 'Dalmatian Pelicans' by Marko Konig



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Camassia Oaks

                                                        Camassia Oaks oil on canvas 20x16


 I`ve painted these three oaks several times but never felt I succeeded. So when I was in Camassia last week, I stood on a rock above them and studied them carefully. I`m getting closer.

Laura Foster became my friend years ago after she bought a painting. When we met, she told me she wrote walking guidebooks. Later while shopping I saw "Portland Hill Walks" at Fred Meyer [northwest mega grocery store] and I bought it.
This was way more than maps and landmarks, it was crammed full of history, cultural context, botanical and architectural details, vintage photography and practical information such as where to get a drink of water and use a restroom. John and I would do one of the 'walks' every Sunday followed by Burgerville. The Oregon City walk was one surprise after another, sort of like a scavenger hunt.
 The morning after my mother died and my studio flooded she was at my house  hauling away wet cardboard, organizing my packing supplies and offering needed moral support. Within an hour, her wonderful hydrologist husband Kevin arrived and assessed the situation and told me what I would need to do. Though I refused to even shake his hand, he still caught the wicked chest cold I had.
True, selfless friends.
Laura is publishing a new book on the Columbia River Gorge and I can`t wait to get a hold of it. I want to know where to go that does not involve a waterfall! And where to eat!! When we`re living in Camas, the Gorge will be near and beckoning, and I know the guide will be super helpful. Watch her describe the book in this video.


 You visitors that are artists, listen up. Imagine you get out of bed in the morning and before you`ve even had your coffee, you`re at the kitchen table drawing! Yes drawing, dreaded drawing! I swear, this Procreate drawing app with the pressure sensitive drawing stylus is mesmerizing! No more tedium! Putting in a background color is instantaneous, shading is fast and easy, corrections are immediate! I could spend all day with this thing! Its great advantage is there is no artifact. And that is precisely why I don`t give it all my time. I need to make a living. But for 'research' such as life drawing and location studies, it is ideal.
This was a quick one;

                                                                Oswego Lagoon-Ipad


This is how I did it;

Here are a couple of others;

                                                            Oregon Refuge-ipad

                                                                    Forest Details-Ipad


 Now that we finally have an open door with Cuba, I hope to see one of the lyrical, dreamlike paintings of Tomas Sanchez some day.

                                                                         Tomas Sanchez


Ongoing through March during regular business hours at the Johnstone Financial Advisors;

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Fanno Creek February

                                               Fanno Creek February oil on canvas 30x24


 My first painting of Feb., from the acre or so of wetlands where Fanno Creek joins the Tualatin River. [Easy to get to from Durham Park] Certain little places in the landscape grab and hold me, this is one.

We`re planning to move to Camas WA in the Fall to be nearer to my family. The hospice experience with my Mom made me realize I wanted to be closer to my brother and sisters in law. We worked so well together in caring for her.
But I will miss the special places in and around Lake Oswego I`ve become attached to.


 And speaking of Mom, she left her sons a little money! It is a bittersweet gift because she worried she`d outlive her funds but she didn`t.
Now I`m spending it and this would please her.
We`ve ordered a new sofa which is being made in a neighboring community.
I bought a painting! This is something I rarely do because I already have a couple  thousand paintings of my own. Look at this gem!;

                                                                 Melody Cleary


 There is no way I can look at this and not feel better. Thank you Melody!


In December I was in the home of Ruth Armitage and she showed me her new Ipad Pro as well as her snazzy new drawing stylus which she used with the drawing app called Procreate. I have used Art Rage and Brushes and found them complicated and frustrating while using my finger as the 'pencil'. But David Hockney, who is older than me, had mastered them so I kept trying. Ruth said Procreate was easy and she handed it to me. Within seconds I could tell this was altogether different. The great innovation was the pressure sensitive stylus. This allows for all the nuance in human emotion that comes through the hand. And it`s fast! So I just bought one too and I`m very excited. It will be terrific to take out on location with my plein air friends. These are my first attempts;

 Separated by an ocean and a continent, I have finally found my soulmate in painting. She lives in London but loves what I love. Elizabeth McGill paints the ambiance of forests and parks through painterly, expressive means;

                                                                 Elizabeth Mcgill

 Nice little reception last night at the Johnstone Financial Advisors. Turns out deep blue is the optimal color to display my work against!  The building is a wonderful example of optimistic, flamboyant 1970`s architecture. Take a look, get some advice!

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Understory

                                                             Understory oil on canvas 36x60


 I`ve been locked in mortal combat with this painting the last 10 days. This is the second painting on this canvas and the process made me wonder if it ever got easier? Doesn`t experience count? I`m so sick of it, it will just have to be 'good enough' for now. Elizabeth Gilbert makes the point that perfectionism will make us crazy and that sometimes it`s best just to accept the work when it isn`t our best. Move on to the next good idea. All I wanted was to create an intimate sense of summer. Maybe I did...       No more green for a while!


Unknown works of Richard Diebenkorn have come into view at the Van Doren Waxler Gallery in New York! Look at this beauty;

                                                             Richard Diebenkorn work on paper


 And his sketchbooks were donated by his wife to Cantor Arts Center at Stanford and every single page is online! There is no better way to know what an artist thinks than by perusing their sketchbooks. They are the thing I grab when the house catches fire.


 Good news, bad news. Your spouses were right. There is enough research now to confirm that creative individuals have very high levels of psychopathology. But they also test extremely high for psychological health. It seems that contradiction and paradox are the norm. As if we need to be told! The coexistence of opposites is the engine of creativity.

                                                          Silver Sand oil on canvas 5x5

The Johnstone Financial Advisors give great advice, like good art, drink nice wine, and serve delicious hors d`oeuvres. Come meet them and me this Friday evening Feb. 5, 5-7 pm. The location is on 3rd St. just a block south of A [toward the lake] in downtown Lake Oswego.

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Coastal Creek - winter wetlands

                                                        Coastal Creek oil on canvas 48x36


 Finally something new and big! I wanted a larger version of this. After complaining so much about summer and the overwhelming green, I do this in the dead of winter! I really don`t like being so perverse but there you go.
Those streams pouring off Cascade Head are so pure and undisturbed, I hoped to get a sense of the lush vitality of those summer forests.

 Here are some winter paintings. These 12x9 studies were painted ten years ago and the subject is the dormant wetlands of the Crystal Springs right in the middle of the Reed College campus. The beautiful little canyon thrives due to volunteers and careful stewardship. I spent a lot of time in its cool shade while living in the treeless Brentwood Darlington neighborhood in Portland. Angelita Surmon has also painted a body of work based on the canyon.


 I had never seen the name and I still don`t know how to pronounce it. Whether Diarmuid Kelly was male or female was also a mystery. Then I stumbled on this video.
 A dude, and he can paint like a master!
 I saw the piece below years ago and thought it oddly enigmatic. The figure's hands have a gesture of blessing or surrender and he seems to be lying in a livestock water troff in a convalescence of some sort. What`s going on?

                                                              Diarmuid Kelly


 Here is one of his gorgeous still lives. He even got the fuzz!!

                                                          Diarmuid Kelly-peaches


 In a collaboration with the Lake Oswego Arts Council, the Johnstone Financial Advisors are displaying a dozen of my paintings, the majority of them large. They look better than I`ve ever seen on the deep blue walls. Visit during normal business hours or come say hello at the reception Friday, February 5th.

I just finished Audible.com`s incredible reading of Wallace Stegner`s Angle of Repose. This historical novel of the American West is a rich and thorough examination of a marriage. The narrator, Mark Bramhall, is such a gifted actor, every character is vibrantly believable. It`s a long book that I savored and it helped keep me afloat during the dark December.

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Fen Forest

                                                              Fen Forest oil on canvas 20x16


 Finally a new oil painting! A fen is a wetland and this one is Oxbow Slough on Minto Brown Island. At the water`s edge, the bare lichen covered trees are a chaotic tangle of brittle branches. I was there last weekend with my camera and in my painting clothes knowing it would be muddy. Maybe I looked like a groundskeeper because two foreign families stopped me for information. I had to tell them I was a tourist too. That island makes me wish I lived in Salem!

 It`s been beautiful out there! We are in our tiny brief winter and I`m trying to get out in nature as often as possible. The stark clean landscapes will soon be budding for the annual onslaught of green. Now is the time to see the rich colors of winter.

                                                                Oswego Creek

                                                                Oswego Lagoon

                                                               Durham Park

                                                                   Minto Brown Copse


 I was so proud of our president`s executive action on background checks for gun sales and even prouder to see his tears of grief for those children just mowed down at Sandy Hook elementary school. It takes a brave man to show his emotions in public. Gun violence is a national disgrace we must confront with stubborn common sense and rigorous new laws. I`m all for the second amendment as it is written, and for sportsmen and honest self defense. But no one goes deer hunting with a machine gun.
 Then in the State of the Union address, he used the phrase 'unconditional love', that ultimate Christian challenge and dilemma. How do we love our enemy? Do you think any Republican presidential candidate ever considers that question?

President Obama`s many accomplishments are explored in this article from Politico.

                                                          Winter Still Life by Fred Cumming


 Fred Cumming is known best for his moody evocative seascapes of the English coast. Yet this still life is one of my favorites. The contrast between the bleak slushy field outside the window and the humble warmth within is so touching. Sort of like a microcosm of civilization valiant before the brute forces of nature. The guy is a visual poet! His website has a new video of him painting and here is an older one of him working on location.

                                                Chimayo Spring watermedia on paper 36x20 1988


 Those of you in truly cold places may be dreaming of Spring already. Be patient and try to find pleasure in the winter too. I tell myself this every summer when the heat is oppressive and the air is dirty. I want to enjoy my life in every season.


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Random Paintings

                                                         Columbia watermedia on paper 22x14


 Not much of anything good is happening in the studio so I thought I`d post some things that never appeared before or a long time ago.
 My brother Mike said he felt adrift and that word applies to me too. Mom was such an intense concern the last few years, now that she`s gone there is aimless quality to my day. Which of course I try to fill with worthy painting but it`s not working out so well yet. Next Saturday we`re going to Minto Brown Island on the way to visit John`s parents. That always gets me thinking!

                                                    Pears 3 watermedia on paper 12x9

                                                  The Lifting Fog watermedia on paper 16x12

                                                      Chimayo Badlands watermedia on paper 22x14

                                                              Iris watermedia on paper 12x9

                                                   Saplings near the Water oil on canvas 24x24

                                                            Falls acrylic on canvas 24x20 1976

This is another of my Mom`s paintings. Would it be unethical to fix it?

                                              Up from the Creek oil on canvas 16x7


My website has undergone its annual update!

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