New Work

The two finished oil pieces directly above were the result of visits I made to Old Deerfield during this past July and August. I set up my easel and began the sidewalk-scape looking for much more detail than the final result reveals. It was a hot but comfortable day, a bit of humidity in the air, enough that distant points in my field of view faded some. The image I've presented here isn't the best quality reproduction....some of the colors just don't look like the real thing...but a bit of the mood comes thru and I like the piece and want to share it. The Hopper-like look in the building/shadows picture just kind of evolved. Again, I began the piece (using a reference photograph taken in Deerfield during one of the visits described above) looking for more detail than the final piece has. It was started and finished in my studio; never was set up on location. The color as presented here is not true to the original. The yellow being a yellow-green in the original piece. So much for my attempt to photograph my work and scan it to this location! When I use the skills of a professional the results are much better.

The pen and ink sketches were completed recently and were done from photos.......don't know why the weren't completed from life except a lack of time at the time!!!

The trees at the top are a work-in-progress; oil on canvas. The subject are a cluster of trees I've painted many times; an earlier posting of a pastel is on a prior page. Now, I am painting this picture using reference to the earlier pictures.

"What we talk about when we talk about love" and other images

These sketches are preliminary to a picture I hope to complete based upon Raymond Carver's short story "What we talk about when we talk about love." Carver is a favorite of mine, both his poetry and short stories. To me, he wrote like Hopper painted; often the subject is something from the everyday but from a particular point of view, a sober even somber view of the mundane. Carver's life was fueled by alcohol and apparently in addition to self destructive tendencies he occasionally became abusive, violent. "What we talk about...." includes conversation between the four characters, drinking heavily as the sun sinks in Albuquerque, about what it means to be in love and how lovers behave with and toward the other in the couple. The two couples in the storey bring their individual experiences to the table. There are stories of divorce, reconciliation, drinking, violence and the ability of the spirit to somehow sustain love through it all.

The sketch at the lower left with the table and shadow lines is what I hope will evolve into the final setting for the scene I hope to paint. The drawings above are my first sketchbook attempts at representing the characters; I've moved to a larger format and started a charcoal rendering I hope will help me finalize shapes, positions and facial expressions.