Todd Snider, Stuart's Opera House, sketches

Catching up on several concert sketch series today.
Last Friday went to Stuart's Opera House in Nelsonville, Ohio to see Todd Snider.
The crowd was very excited to see him. Funny and entertaining. I really liked hearing his newer stuff, even though the crowd seemed more excited to hear older material. The opening act was Ashley Flynn, she is the girl with the guitar in the sketch.
Also got a drawing of the emcee.
I really have lot of fun drawing at live music venues and going to Stuart's Opera House is a great experience

Liz Carroll and John Doyle,Evergreen Arts and Humanities Series, sketches

Liz Carroll and John Doyle at Washington State Community College in early March.
They performed for the Evergreen Arts and Humanities Series.
There were no seats available as I arrived a bit late, but I stuck around and got a seat after intermission. They were great. Fabulous players and highly entertaining storytellers. I got to meet Liz at an after concert get together. They were going to be performing at the White House for St Patrick"s Day.

al dimeola concert, pittsburgh, pa. jan 09

Here is a small group of sketches from the Al Dimeola concert I attended in Pittsburgh in January of this year.
Marvelous concert. I was seated in the back so I couldn't get a lot of detail, but I love the arrangement of the players onstage. I didn't know that Al Dimeola was that beautiful. Radiant actually. The guy with the hat and glasses is just a random person in the crowd.

party hat

liquid and open acrylic on wood panel
24x24
three stages
still unfinished
top is the latest version, bottom is the beginning.
I spent the last week sowing seeds and putting in a new row of asparagus as well as getting some painting time. Stayed out way too late last night, but what fun. I spent the day with good friend, visited the Kennedy Gallery in Athens viewed the print collection. Inspiring. Ate a wonderful meal, or wait, that was 2 wonderful meals. Came back home and went to hear some marvelous celtic music by Liz Carroll and John Doyle, followed by an after music get together with more good food and lots of interesting conversation. Went to bed, a bit wound up, not enough sleep. I think a nap may be in order.

More images soon

It has been a busy couple of weeks, but I am now on spring break. Yippee. the weather has been great and I have been spending time outside readying the garden beds. The greenhouse is in full swing. I have tomato, eggplant, pepper, cabbage, broccoli and flower seedlings all emerging. The worms are flourishing and I am debating about investing in another worm bin. I think I have enough veg garbage to keep another bin going and then I could have lots more fertilizer...hmmmm. Lots to do and I want to spend time in the studio as well so.... I will post more images soon....

untitled continues

the fool continues.... and more

While letting "the fool"(below) simmer away, I started on another painting last week. I intended to stay completely abstract, but a figure insisted on emerging, or at least I allowed it to come out. Mainly playing with liquid acrylic turquosie (pthalo), transparent red oxide and prussian blue. Needs a lot more time and may develop into something totally different. Who knows?
The image at the bottom is day 1 , with day 2 and 3 above. The top image is where it is at today.
mixed media. liquid and open acrylic, charcoal on canvas

































































I continue to make changes to this painting... still working....needed to stop and let it be for some time. I painted this on a gessoed canvas that I took off the stretchers.... now I need to mount it or restretch it. I should have done it before I started painting on it, but I didn't so I shall see how this all works out. Maybe I will work on that today.
I thought it was my batteries that were dead on my camera, but found out it was the actual camera that was no longer working. I purchased a new camera and am trying it out now. Of course, I need to upgrade my operating system in order to run the software. Argghh. I will need help with that. Using another computer to download from the camera right now, so I can decide if I like the camera or not. The image looks really light on my monitor even though I tweaked it a bit in photoshop.

the fool, continued

charcoal drawing 22x28
much easier for me to draw when the light is not as clear as I would like for painting.

Dead camera batteries and no electricity for three days. Big ice and snow storm. I actually had a very relaxed and lovely time without power. The house and studio were warm and cozy. I worked in the studio in the daylight hours, went crosscountry skiing in the afternoon and ate way to much food. I guess I thought I was going into hibernation. Read by candlelight in the evenings and went to bed early.The electric came on Friday evening, but we had ventured out to town, so weren't here to experience the initial excitement of electric power.Anyway the snow is still beautiful, but the skiing was scary yesterday because it is a solid ice glacier in many places.
About the painting. I am still working on it but letting it simmer now as I need to make some decisions about some of the awkward places.

snow day, the fool continued

I made lots of changes on this today, this photo is from last weekend. My camera batteries are no longer rechargeable, so the latest will have to wait to be posted
Stayed home and got to work in the studio today,because of a snowy day. It didn't amount to much. I was hoping for enough snow for cross country skiing, not today, maybe tomorrow.
Last week I got to ski 4 days in a row. Beautiful. It has been several winters since that happened.

the fool, in the beginning stages

open acrylic and mixed media on linen canvas
26x30

random sketches, students

Here are some random sketches of students working on their final drawings.
Grades are in and just a bit a few ends to tie up and I am on holiday break.
I mistakenly decided to rearrange one thing in my studio and now it is all torn up. I have to get it back in order before I can begin working on paintings. I hope it only takes one more day, but I have a feeling it may take longer than that.

clockfaces

I wanted to come up with a small gift item for a little holiday show I am participating in this upcoming weekend. I also wanted to make it from a previously used item. Recycled art.
SO... I tried painting on old cds which of course I have around. I painted a base of blackboard paint on the cd and then I drew on it with derwent drawing pencils, which I then fixed and sealed with matte medium. I am making them into little clocks with some works I got at a surplus place. I have been having a great deal of fun with these. Here is a sample of 5 of the many I have made so far. I have enjoyed playing with the round format and have lots of other ideas to expanc on this. If you need to get rid of old cds you don't need anymore, I will gladly take them.

a visitor at the firestation

My town studio is across the street from a fire station. I sometimes sit downstairs by the door and draw the many activites of the firemen. This day they had a visit from a woman.

songwriter day at the Galley, Marietta, Ohio summer 08

whipple tavern

morning diners

more civic duty drawings

Although I get irritated with having to do my civic duty, it gives me a great chance to work in my sketchbook and I do find watching people to be oh so interesting.

art opening

Art show opening
7-9 Oct 24
Marietta College
Hermann Fine Arts Center

Reorder/Represent


"Ralphie rules the day"
Here is a bad photo of the piece I will be showing.
Actually, this photo was taken before I was finished...it was truly a mixed media piece, I dug through all of the excess stuff in my studio searching for things to use. I discovered pieces that I had totally forgotten about.
Cyanotype, silk screen, monotype, ceramic, paper clay, florist foam, sticky tac and acrylic paint along with found and natural materials.
Hope to see you there

This is a different kind of work from my usual fare as you can see from the rest of the images on this blog. It was a lot of work, and I had a lot of angst over it. Oh right, I have angst whenever I am producing work. Always fun to start, but the transition from start to finish can be full of stress and anxiety.

random sketches from brighter day natural foods

Marty m playing bass on Fridays and a lady getting ready to eat that I sketched while she wasn't looking.
Sneaky