A Painting A Day

This isn't a good picture. I took this late at night and couldn't get rid of the glare. Also there's a lot more red in this painting than is showing up in the photo. I will take another picture when I'm finished with it. I wasn't satisfied to just do an abstract today - I've been wanting to paint this one, so I got a good start on it. I really love the creepiness of these American Horror story paintings. They are fun to do!

It's icy and schools were closed today. So I had a little time this afternoon to start a painting. I didn't do a lot on the hands - but I'm really liking the abstractness of them. I have to say I find Jessica Lange fascinating to paint. She has such amazing features. Even now, at her age, she's still a very beautiful woman.

My friend's son modeled for our Live Paint group last night, and he had recently died his pretty blonde hair purple! So the hair color was really that color! Haha. This makes the third time I've painted him - more recently he is the boy in my Brother and Sister post. On his features, looking at it now, I feel like I may have exaggerated a bit - his nose a little too long, his lips a little too full, the neck a little too long as well. I may go back and work on it a little more over the weekend. Happy Thursday!

Did this last night. I used payne's grey for the background. I really like doing that. It makes the piece very dramatic. I used a lot of permanent green light. It just seemed the right base color to use for the light around the eyes, and for the medium highlights in the hair. If you really, really look at her hair it has a very greenish tint to me. I believe I've been finding this to be true of all the blondes I have painted.

This is on a 12 x 16 board. I am trying to get enough work together for my very first exhibit! So excited about that, but I wonder if I can part with a single piece. I don't know if I can. I want to "exhibit" but not necessarily "sell." I read somewhere that successful artists don't need to be collectors of their own work. That makes a lot of sense, but putting it into practice is hard.

So why have I titled this, "The New Religion?" I think for this show, my theme is going to be how we idolize movie and television stars. They are the new religion. I'm not condoning it, by any means, it's just a sad fact. Our new idols are the people we watch on TV.

Today I'm working on a piece of the character Tate in American Horror Story, and I've positioned him like a saint. Haha! I wonder how this will go over, since the exhibit is in a church?!

It's late at night and there's a terrible glare from my camera, but I went back to this portrait tonight and did a little more detail. The painting had dried a little so I was able to work with it.

I am still not quite happy with it. I am missing something - and can't figure out what it is? Maybe sleep?

I couldn't find a photo to work from at class this week, so Sue (my teacher) gave me a clipping of a painting by Casey Baugh. Great artist! Wow, so glad she told me about him.

My paint was way too oily so I had a difficult time getting the paint to do what I wanted it to do.

I'm planning on going back and working a little more on it after it dries somewhat. ;)

Went to Ann's studio for painting from life last night - this was the result. I do have permission from the model to use the painting. You can't recognize her anyway because the face is so abstract. I really need to work on hands and feet. I think it will do me good to do some individual studies on hands and feet. I might do that some at these painting from life sessions. I have to say it's wonderful to get together with a group of artists each week. I learn so much from them.

So last night when I got home I decided to clean the sludge out of my mineral spirits, and I had (what I think) was a wonderful idea. I was pulling all this gray gunk out of the bottom of the glass, and thought - instead of finding a way to dispose of this, why don't I use it to tone my canvases? It was a lovely color of gray. So I just used a cotton cloth and rubbed the gray on my canvases. I had enough sludge to tone about 14 canvases. I think they turned out really well, and it's a wonderful way to recycle. I can't think of any reason NOT to do this. Here's how they look:

I have to say that I'm finding oil painting to be very eco-friendly. I hardly ever use mineral spirits while painting (thanks to getting good brands of paint) so I only use the spirits to clean up my brushes after I work, and now I've found a way to dispose of the used mineral spirits, so I end up with no waste whatsoever.

Oh, and just a note about the cotton cloth I use to wipe on the boards. I am storing those in a tin can outside, and let the mineral spirits evaporate out of them. I have read that I can burn them and that way there is no ill effect on the environment. I use paper towels when I am only wiping paint, because the paint only has oil in it and is fine to throw away, but when I am using mineral spirits, I use cotton rags.

And one more little tidbit because I am trying to be such a thrifty artist. I was actually looking for brushes on ebay, and came across the deal of the century. I just bought 25 40ml tubes of Rembrandt paint for $25 from someone who had just listed it for buy it now. My lucky day!