Festival Aftermath

This is the day after the Three Rivers Art Festival. For myself, it is a day of reflection and recuperation. A day of somber aftermath which is echoed in the muted grays of the overcast day outside my window. It is not a sad day, however -- in fact there is much to be happy about. It was a great festival, and I made a good many sales and met some great people. The first day was long but busy, with nonstop foot traffic. The second day was overcast and rainy, but I still managed to sell a painting during one of the downpours.

And here I am. The day after. The calm after the storm. The festival aftermath. I wonder how long this time of contemplation and recovery will last. I wonder if I will be up for another art market by the end of this month or the beginning of the next. I wonder if all that cold wet waiting I went through yesterday will lead to a sore throat or stuffy nose tomorrow. Anyway, I'll be sure to let you all know when I will resurface again.

Thanks to all those who made it out to the Three Rivers Art Festival. It was, on the whole, a fantastic event, and I plan to return next year if they'll have me. For now I have these two new commissions to complete for the holidays. Thanks again!

Name Your Price Paintings For Sale

UPDATE: These paintings may be still around, but I cannot guarantee that.

I'm getting ready for the Three Rivers Art Festival by clearing out some of my older paintings - paintings I will definitely not be bringing with me to the Festival in November. So these ten paintings (pictured in a group-shot down below) are up for grabs. I am not listing their original prices because that's neither here nor there - I will accept almost any amount. Name your price - keeping in mind I'll be paying for shipping and the fact that I'm a starving artist with a preschool kid and a wife to feed. Tell you what, if your offer is too low for me, I'll let you know - I don't want to lose any money on the deal - I reserve the right to refuse any offer.

Seriously though, this is the perfect opportunity to buy a couple of Christmas gifts. Click on the thumbnails to view larger versions. Let me know if you need exact measurements or any other information. Email me with any further questions and to place your "bids" (though this is not an auction - if your offer is acceptable then it's pretty much first come, first serve). I'll email you back to let you know if your offer is accepted or not and to let you know where to send payment, etc. My email address is wess at wessforeman dot com!

Thanks in advance!

--wess

My New H-frame Easel

I'm happy with the new easel I built. I haven't used it yet but it should work as advertized :-) I'm not quite done with it but it's basically finished - more on the easel and it's construction on my tumblr blog: wessf.tumblr.com. Pictured below is my old A-frame easel (obviously homemade) alongside the new one. It's definitely an improvement, but do you think this will improve my painting? Sadly, probably not.

Another batch of paintings

I had a tough week in terms of motivation and I ended up focusing on anything but painting for much of it. That said, here are four new paintings (well, I painted the gas pump months ago, just that no one's seen it yet).

New Orleans Street Car #10, 11x14", SOLDNew Orleans Landscape, 16x20", SOLDPremium, 30x24", SOLDAmerican Flag #6, 24x18", SOLD

Update on 2011-11-28 07:20 by wessf

All four are sold.

unfinished paintings

As a change of pace [and in penance for not posting any finished paintings yesterday] I figured I'd post a few snapshots of paintings in progress. Most of these are only initial block-ins of paint, lacking detail, but perhaps interesting to someone.

First two paintings below are birds-on-wire subjects [of course], both are 20x20". I plan to keep these simple and loose. Most of the work on these will be adjusting the "balance" of the birds in the paintings, and the technique I will be using will be to treat the birds and wire as negative space, whittling away at them by laying in the light blue/white of the sky around them, cutting into the darker shapes to form them. The first painting might need a few flying/landing birds to add more interest, and the second painting could probably use some detail in the house (like maybe some green slats on the face of it, leaving dark shadows between the slats).

I like the loose fingerpaint-feel of the streetcar painting below (11x14"). I also like the tone of green I've started with here - it's not quite the same as the reference photo but I'll probably stick with it. This one just needs a few choice details I think. (please forgive the out-of-focus-ness and odd lighting of these, by the way - I did call them "snapshots" on purpose, afterall!)

The next will probably remain the loosest of all these [I'm sensing a theme here]. I'll probably be adjusting some of the color in the sky a bit and adding more interest in the dark land mass below as well as laying in the white of the river in a thicker layer of paint. Other than that, I'm liking the abstract feel of this one. (you just have to trust me that the painting is ten times better in person than the representative snapshot here)

The last two here (both 14x11") are a bit less inspired. I'm painting the egret because I've had requests for egret/swamp type subject matter - it's rendered a bit stiff for me in its current iteration, so I'll be loosening it up some more, maybe adding some encroaching cypress branches or spanish moss or what-have-you. The cat painting is for cat lovers - who else - not sure how much more I'll work on this one. It's fairly interesting as is but I suppose it could use some more detail and the ever popular "what-have-you".

That's all for now. Thanks for stopping by!

Friday Paintings

Six paintings this time - two of these I painted a few months ago but I don't think I've posted online. I like the Lonely Milkshake paintings here - I suppose it's because I give bonus points whenever I can pull off good abstract painting - and that rooster is pretty intense, if I do say so myself [I might reduce those two "sharp" lines underneath the rooster's head though - they look out of place there]. The American Flag is probably the most realistic version I've painted [if a little soiled and dripping in mud]. I usually angle toward abstracting the flag series paintings, but I got to this point and figured it was finished.

A Captive Audience #11 - 11x14", SOLDDragonfly Parade - framed - 18x36", SOLDLonely Milkshake #3 - 30x40", N/ALonely Milkshake #2 - 30x24", $450Rooster - 14x11", N/AAmerican Flag #5 - 24x11", SOLD

I'll be posting my usual Friday post later on this evening - I've got at least a handful of new paintings from this past week. Right now I'm cleaning out the garage/studio. I'm fighting cobwebs and dust; wish me luck!

Friday Word Paintings

I need to stop calling myself lazy and just accept the fact that I finish paintings at a rate of four or five paintings a week. Anyway, here are three paintings of a slightly different ilk: Paintings of words.

Love, 18x18", $150Slow Down, 24x24", $400

Blue, 11x28", $200

Five Friday Paintings

I was a little lazy this week and didn't paint as much as I had planned but I made up for it in the last couple days. Here are the five:

Bluebird, 10x8", $50Chicken Suit, 22x28", $400Crawfish #3, 5x7", $20Red, 18x14, $150Two Dragonflies, 16x18", $150

Friday Paintings

Here's the next batch of paintings building toward the Three Rivers Art Festival. I have two or three others finished, but it's raining right now and that prevents me from photographing any of them - I might post them later today if I get a chance. Happy Friday!

 A Captive Audience #10, 12x12", $100A Captive Audience #9, 20x20", $300Concrete Angel, 30x24", $400A Gaggle of Geese, 30x40", $800

Update on 2010-08-13 20:24 by wessf

Managed to take two more photos . . . and here they are:

Beagle in Profile, 12x12", $150Geese Landing #4, 19.75x37.25", $400

Roxie Painting Process

I painted this daschund commission a while back. I don't think I posted any images yet, but I took plenty of photos of the process with this in mind.

Step one: (as pictured) procure a canvas - often-time I'll apply a wash of color just to eliminate the glaring white of the canvas to start with. Step two through four: block in the basic shapes and color. The idea is to use a large brush and cover up all the canvas - I almost think of this part of the process as getting to position one (position one being the fourth image . . . where you have a basic starting point, something to alter and eventually perfect - something to move toward the finished piece.)

Step five through seven: perfecting the image - taking away parts that shouldn't be there, adding parts that should. Altering color as I go and adding basic textures here and there, then moving into the finer details with smaller and smaller brushes and edging toward final textures and colors. Sidenote: when I get in trouble with a painting is usually when I start in with smaller brushes too soon - doing this tends to cause me to try for the final step first rather than last, and then anything resembling perfection in my mind becomes unchangeable and ultimately a major problem, unsurmountable without a total redo of the piece (because it's never perfection).

Roxie Commission, 24x18"Final piece turned out great I think. It's usually a good sign when you finish a painting thinking it's good enough to call finished and then see the painting or a photo of the painting again several months later and think, "Hey, that looks great!" There is much less detail here than there appears to be - there is detail where it counts and that's what really counts. Also, I kinda like the muted color pallet I went with here - it works, you know?

Wish to commission your own portrait? See my pricing page. Have more questions or comments? See my contact page. Thanks for stopping by!

New Paintings

Glancing around my makeshift studio I can make an educated guess that I've started and worked on at least a dozen (12) paintings this past week, but I've only got two finished and photographed for this friday morning. That'll be fine. Just means that there should be more than two in next friday's post. Perhaps three, maybe more. Anyway, here they are:

Seven Trees - 30x40" - $700

Green Lure, small - 11x14" - $150

For those interested, here are the four paintings I submitted with my application for the Three Rivers Art Festival. Click for larger size.

Announcement

Exciting news: I have been accepted to show my artwork at the Three Rivers Art Festival this year! Mark your calendars (well in advance). The Three Rivers Art Festival runs from Saturday, November 13th to Sunday, November 14th - 10am until 5pm daily, in downtown Covington. I will be there with a double-size booth full of new paintings. This is the biggest show I've ever shown in, and it should be exciting and exhausting and lots of fun. More details at threeriversartfestival.com.

Red Cat and Captive Audience

Two new paintings, one of which is two (called a diptych).

 Cat in Red Light, 24x30" $400

 Captive Audience #8, 2-20x20" $500

'A Captive Audience' Series

Continuing a series I sometimes return to whenever I run out of reference photos, I present four more from the "A Captive Audience" Series...

A Captive Audience #3, 12x12" $100

  A Captive Audience #4, 12x12" sold

A Captive Audience, Med., 24x30" $400

A Captive Audience, lrg., 30x40" $700

Patchwork Landscapes

Two new paintings. Interesting style, I think. Only title I could come up with was Patchwork Landscape With Moon #1 and #2

 
Patchwork Landscape With Moon #1 30x40" $650

Patchwork Landscape With Moon #2 24x36" $350

Batch of New Paintings

Took a while to get all these photographed and resized and uploaded and posted here, but here are the paintings I completed last week (all but the Tire Swing painting were started last week as well).

(above)

Tire Swing,40x30" $700

Yellow Flowers, 24x24" $350

Wave, 24x48" $400

Lure, 30x48" $800

(below)

American Flag #3, 48x18" $400

American Flag #4, 48x30" $600

Boiled Shrimp #2, 24x24" $350

Terrier Pup

Alright, I'm back to painting now. Here's my latest.

Terrier Pup, 24x18", $300 (click for larger image)

Painted this one late last night - took me maybe three hours, all told. Felt like only an hour or less the way it just came together. Painted it from a photograph of a friend's dog (though I did not bother making it look exactly like the dog . . . same breed and basically the same as the photo, but the owner might not recognize it as their dog, that's all).

One thing that has kept me from getting back into painting [perhaps] is the big unanswered question in my mind: What should I be painting? Both subject-matter-wise and style-wise, but mainly the problem of style. My paintings have a definite style, in terms of "my brushstrokes", "my sensibilities", "my color balance", or whatever, but have always varied greatly in what I might call "artificial style" - where I am always trying out new ideas or styles, always changing things up in that regard. Anyway, I finally put aside the idea of style . . . deciding that the majority of my paintings share a certain style that I tend toward anyway, and that's what I should paint. As in this painting, there is a certain amount of messiness to things - lots of movement within major shapes, lots of busy-ness going on. A trope of mine that one might call "wessiness", where the History of the painting is evident, where various layers-beneath-layers show through, giving the final layer a more interesting, exciting aspect.

So, that question solved in my head, it's on to subject matter . . . for that, I'll just take it painting by painting.

a very long, very unintended hiatus

I've not been painting very much these last few months . . . a few one-off paintings here and there, but not in earnest, as they say. It has given me time to dabble in other interests of mine - writing, reading, other things I can't think of right now but surely they were constructive in some relevant, enjoyable way - and, of course, lots of wasted time in between [but that's normal, whether I'm painting in earnest or not].

All that to say, I'm back at the easel now, brush in hand, poised and ready, set, painting! Feels good, though I'm struggling, as always, to find the right subject matter to put to canvas. Anyway, I should have a plethora of new paintings at the next NorthShore Art Market [October 10th], where I will probably be painting throughout the day as well. Meanwhile, if you have any suggestions of subject matter for me to paint [paint more of this or that, et cetera], post a comment or send me an email - thanks!