Even great painters have bad days
The Harlot of Jericho and the Two Spies, c. 1896-1902, by James Jacques Joseph Tissot This morning I came across Tissot’s The Harlot of Jericho and the Two Spies, above. Tissot was a fine painter, but one has to wonder what he was thinking to portray Rahab as a man in drag, with a 5 o’clock …
Spring is just around the corner
Spring plein air painting of an upstate farm, by little ol’ me. On this last day of February, when it’s 2° F. and blowing, it’s good to recollect that spring is just a moment away. Officially, it starts in twenty days. Unofficially, here in Rochester the snow pack should be melted by the end of …
Sometimes metaphor is an uphill battle
Winter lambing, underpainting, by little ol’ me. If you were properly brought up on James Herriot, you know that a late winter blizzard can play havoc with lambing. This is not just an historical oddity; last spring a mid-April blizzard in Northern Ireland killed 17,000 lambs and sheep. Cold is not their only enemy. Weak …
Abstract-Expressionism bails me out
Underpainting of a hailstorm. That’s painting #6 underpainted; one more to go. When I had a composition problem on this underpainting of a hailstorm, I reached back to an old friend: the color field painter Clyfford Still. Living on the Lake Plains as I do, I know that a level field is perfect for growing …
How many artists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Much better. Underpainting done. Boys remain, rocks have changed. I decided to take one more look at Friday’s painting before scraping out the boys on the rocks and repainting them. I used Photoshop to analyze the painting; it’s much easier to hit CTRL-Z than spend three hours repainting something you shouldn’t have changed. Turns out …
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