Travis and Cali

Every picture tells the story.  Enough said.  Travis was laughing as we took these, as he tried to look mad it didn't work so well.

Guilty as charged.

Smokie, the Maine Coon cat he has had for years.  He was dumped and Travis adopted him, or Smokie adopted Travis. He is the coolest cat ever.  

Snow….again

As we all cheered for 70 degree days, we slipped back in to winter.  I actually snowed all afternoon.  Nothing was sticking, but with the grey sky and snow, it felt really cold.  So I painted indoors again.  I can't get away from portraits.

I decided to try to do my own linen panels.  It seems to work great.  This is the first time I have ever splurged on linen.  The fine weave is really nice.

oil on linen
9 x 12

Kill Creek Paint out

I got this far and quit.  I wiped the first one.  I am RUSTY painting outdoors.  Yicks I better get some serious practice in before Augusta!

After the first wipe out, and second failure, I regressed back to a portrait on that canvas.  It's a quickie and not finished, but I wanted to post real fast today.  It's a busy week.  Company in from Boston, and I am trying to prepare some meals.  

Cathy Kline

Susan

Marci Streep and others

Artist were scattered everywhere.

Ken and his thumb box.  He does amazing work.  To ice the cake, he is a super nice guy!

Dick Sneary and Susan (in red), with Cathy Kline and seated is Jane Flanders.

Cathy Thompson, another one of my favorite people.  She is a sweetheart.

Greg Summers, showing off painting two at one time.  Both very nice paintings too!  

Thursday March 13 at Clague's studio

These are out of order, and I don't have time to rearrange them.  I have a student coming at 4:30 and I am not ready.  Derald has Cait coming at 4:30 for a jewelry class too.  Tomorrow is a plein air paint out with MVIS at Kill Creek.  I am excited to go.  It is supposed to be 70 tomorrow!

Andrea's start

Ryan's work.  He consistently comes up with a nice painting.  

break time

I really wanted to use the selective start method from Tina's class that morning.  But I got cold feet and couldn't do it.  I need to try it at home.  I did use Transparent Red Oxide and Yellow Ochre for her skin tone.  We had such a beautiful model again.  And she was just as sweet as could be.  27 years old.  

Ryan starts to add color

Adam's

Andrea's.  Love those highlights.

I purchased a few Rosemary Brushes last year.  That sounds like a long time ago, but I didn't get them until actually December.  So with that in mind, this is what they look like today.  Sad little monkeys.  

These are supposed to be mongoose, but I have my doubts.  I compared them to Andrea's and they don't appear to be the same bristle.  

I am in communication with the company, and hope to either  get advice on why these are behaving like this.  Even my el cheap brushes look better than this, and they are old.  AS in years old.  I could be wrong, but I assumed (there you go, that gets you in trouble) they would be a much better brush to last a really long time.  

Ryan, Adam and the model.  Ryan probably did this block-in the first 10 minutes.  

Teddy Jackson joined us for the first time.  She took the workshop from Adam.  She had a really fine painting at the end of the evening.  She was raving about how wonderful the workshop was.  

We had a couple of new people I didn't know.  A man and his daughter.  She was a sophomore in high school, and had a really nice sketch.  What a great experience for her.

Eileen is behind Teddy's canvas.  She was full of vinegar last night.  She teased Ryan relentlessly.  She was having trouble with the nose, and kept asking him to paint it for her.  Finally Adam gave in and helped her.  She was so funny, she had us all laughing.  She was a little late, so at break she used her phone photo to continue to work!  Die-hard.  :)

I believe the woman on the left is Francine.  Next to her is Jacqueline's painting.  

Teddy's

There were about 10 of us.  Great group.  

Mini class with Tina

Interestingly Tina does not arrange her paint the same way each time!  This is her palette for the demo.  Terra Rosa and Transparent Red Oxide is on the palette.  Two that I normally don't use.  Kim Casebeer used Transparent Red Oxide in the workshop I did with her a couple of years ago.  I have not yet learned to like it.  But, I will try it again for the sake of this demo.  :)  I know you can teach an old dog new tricks.  It just takes patience.  

Selective start is what Tina called her approach.  This is the technique she has found successful through studying Richard Schmid's work and the methods of this technique found in his most current book.  This is the beginning of Andrea's eye.  No toning on the canvas….no sketching for placement.  She said that is all consciously considered before she begins a painting.  Viridian, Transparent red oxide, terra rosa, yellow ochre and white for the iris. 

Flesh tones mixed with yellow ochre, cad red and white.

Here is the set up.  Andrea has a black cloth background.  Tina decided her darkest dark and lightest light area fist.  Background cloth….darkest dark.  Bridge on Tina's nose, cheek and area of her face were the lightest lights.

I tried to take a photo step by step.  This was a slow process, and may require a serious meditation for me to learn.

The idea is to complete each area then move on to an adjoining  area.  

Tina took her finger and splayed out the bristles on her brush to paint the lashes.  She commented 'this is a one time deal'.  So my suggestion is don't pussy foot around with each eyelash.  Just aim and fire.  

Part of her eyebrow and a wisp of hair was added, which helped me out to frame the eye into a space.  

We were nearly 1/2 way finished with the class at this point.  Bridge of nose added.

Blocking in Andrea's right eye with the darker value.  

With lots of careful consideration, she place the corner of the eye.

Andrea did a marvelous job of modeling.  I was fortunate to get some good photo references so I can try this technique in my studio.  A perfect model when the eyes are the center of interest!

Tina had lots of large charts she had prepared over the years.  She referred to them several times.

2 hours of Selective Start technique!  Thank you Tina Garrett for sharing your painting technique with us.  And thank you Andrea Clague for modeling for the morning.