CAPE MAY NJ 35 YEARS AGO

I spent a lot of time with my sketchbook and camera in Cape May in the late 1970s and early 80s.  My favorite place was the Back Harbor area, small and undeveloped and home to funky, interesting places.

Cafe Ole

Back Harbor Wharf

Lady Grace

They were exciting years for me.  Every drawing, every sketch was a new adventure, taking me one stop closer to a dream I was almost afraid to dream.

The daily dose of art DRAWING ITALY #3

I'm having a hard time leaving this portfolio of drawings.  Maybe tomorrow.

Bologna

Lunch in Parma

Street market in Bologna

The daily dose of art DRAWING ITALY #2

Motor bikes all everywhere in Bologna; they dart in and out of traffic like insects, driven by men and women of all ages.

Every building in the city has a terra-cotta roof.

From the terrace of my apartment (5th floor)

From the tower

The daily dose of art DRAWING ITALY

It's time to leave the OCD-like architectural paintings to some loosey goosey on the spot line drawings from Italy.  As you will see, most of them were done while I was enjoying espresso, food, and/or a glass of wine.  I do my best work under those circumstances.

Cappuccino in Florence

Dinner

Espresso on Via Ugo Bassi

The daily dose of art FROM HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

Almost all of my landscapes begin with a small pencil sketch - the "thumbnail sketch" where the ideas and composition is worked out.  Here is an example of such:

 The two sketches above, each about 4x4", were the precursor of the following paintings:

Wired Down  acryli  48x60"

Standing Alone  acrylic  8x8"

The daily dose of art THE QUICK SKETCH part 1

Nothing exercises the hand and the eyes better than the quick, on the spot sketch.  It is a skill that can be learned and improved with practice.  I've always found it more rewarding to limit myself to pen & ink for on the spot drawings, and pencils for preliminary sketching in the studio - a very arbitrary choice.

Today's sketches were lifted from my Emergency Room Journal. (5x7")

THE DAILY URBAN LANDSCAPE #46 CAPE MAY NJ

It should be obvious by now that I consider any painting without a barn or farm an urban landscape.  Today we leave Boston and travel to the most southern reaches of the Jersey shore to the Victorian town of Cape May.  I spent a lot of time photographing and sketching in and around the small town, and one of my favorite places was the back bay area.  Every year there seemed to be some new unpretentious enterprise cropping up.

THE DAILY URBAN LANDSCAPE #45 HARVARD

I went to Harvard, or at least near Harvard.  I see no reason to leave Boston after only one day, and I really enjoyed walking around Cambridge with my sketchbook those many years ago.  All of the drawings were done on the spot with a Parker 45 fountain pen.

The Harvard Lampoon

Oxford Ale House

Entrance to Harvard Yard

BARN OF THE DAY 75

Sometimes the quick, small sketch says a lot more that a larger, more elaborate rendering of the subject.  Today's BOD will actually be three of these small sketches.

Sketch #1 ink and markers

Sketch #2  Pencil with pastel higglight

Sketch #3  pen, ink, and pastel

I'm still working on the barns, preparing for a Gallery 5 show at the end of March.  Most of the work will be small, ranging from 4x4 inches to 11x14, with an occasional larger piece in the mix.  I'm using a variety of media which keeps the work interesting and fresh.  My two latest pieces are:

 Pastel on paper toned with acrylic inks and mounted on hardboard...11x14"

 Pastel sketch on colored paper...4x4"

At the same time I'm still working on the Paducah drawings, planning to show the work later this year.

Whitehaven...pastel, ink, and markers on gray paper...approximately 8x10"

I expect my productivity in the studio, which has been rather meager lately, to become even more so over the remaining days of 2011. At least this has been the pattern for the past several years, and I see no reason for it to change.

I've kept busy cataloging old slides of my early work and sending them off to be commercially scanned into digital files. The first batch has been returned and I'm quite pleased with the results. The cost is reasonable, the result excellent, and the time saved priceless.

And then there are the drawings...the small sketches in wc, ink, pastel, and markers.
They continue to fascinate me and provide considerable enjoyment.




One of these days I will get around to growing them into finished paintings.

THE QUICK & NOT SO QUICK and a note about barns

The not so quick...another barn, this one rendered with pen, ink, markers, pastel, and watercolor pencils.


The quick...a small marker sketch of Bee Bee's, a fantastic gift shop in downtown Paducah.


Why all the barns?

Barns evoke a number of feelings in me, some very personal. I am reminded of the cold winter days milking our family cow in our barn, leaning my head into the cow's flank to absorb her heat, while cats and kittens milled around the pail waiting for a squirt of milk. And there are the not so long ago memories of our barn on the Maryland farm...escaping the cold winter wind and relishing the warmth and the smells of the horses in freshly cleaned stalls. (note the that I'm focusing on the winter days and not the hot, sticky days of summer, getting slapped in the face by the cows tail as she shoos away the flies. I should also mention here that in Maryland Patience did ALL of the mucking...her choice. I got to enjoy the fruits of her labor.)

I am especially fond of the rambling dairy barns, where one or more additions have been tacked on to the main structure, often with only function in mind, resulting in a mish mash of architecture and texture...much to my great delight. Looking at these rural icons, many of them now abandoned or a little more than storage facilites, I wonder about their stories, and the hopes and aspirations of the farm families when the barns were new and ready to serve.

I am saddened to see so many of these wonderful structures, from the simplest to the most elegant, fall into disrepair and treated with such little respect and appreciation for all that they have provided.

JUST BARNS

I have abandoned all my restraint and given in to my addiction...BARNS -BARNS-BARNS. After years of struggling to avoid being known as the guy who paints barns, I know longer give damn. I like barns, I like the their practical architecture with the occasional flair, I like the way they serve the needs of the farmers and the livestock, and I like the way they survive abandonment with dignity, but most of all I like the stories they trigger in my imagination of the hopes and aspirations of their owners. So, in keeping with this new state of mind, here are the latest in my series of mini-drawings...all barns:

DON'T KNOW WHAT I'D DO...

without these small drawings. I seem to be in the grip of unrelenting inertia, unable to muster the will or the enthusiasm for anything other than reading, ruminating, and remembering. It is the remembering that generates this modest effort at making art. But I must admit that the satisfaction I get is as great as if I were completing a 48x60" canvas. So until something else comes along .....

More from Paducah:

STILL IN PHILLY

I'm not sure, but I think this playhouse is in the Rittenhouse Square area.


Ambrsosia Health foods in center city...I can't imagine it is still there.

MEMORY LANE...CONTINUED

Still stuck on the same course...waiting for the muses to pull (or push) me off onto something new. But until that happens I will continue to enjoy these sketching sessions with old photos and memories.


Chadds Ford PA...pen & ink and markers


Boston's Northend...pen & ink and markers


Chadds Ford PA...pen & ink, markers, and pastel