Mino Re
  • Home
  • The Art Blog
  • Galleries
    • Cast Stone Sculptures >
      • Anatomical
      • Classical Antiquity
      • Celtic Designs
      • Sun and Moon
      • Fantasy and Faerie
      • For Pet Lovers
      • Heart Art
      • Mandalas
      • Paisleys and Fractals
      • Nature
      • Sea and River
      • Small Gifts of Stone Art
      • Zodiacs
    • Internally Carved Acrylics
    • Paintings Gallery >
      • The Outdoors
      • Florals and Still Lifes >
        • More Florals and Still Lifes
      • Nudes
      • Portraits Gallery
      • About Painting >
        • Colors for Materials
  • Architectural Precast
    • case studies >
      • Case Study details
  • Cast Stone Sculptures
    • Cast Stone Sculptures
    • The Process
  • Contact Us

How did I miss this?

4/10/2010

0 Comments

 
Picture
In January I did another portrait of my west coast granddaughter Luna and somehow forgot to post it, so here it is belatedly.

Picture
0 Comments

Luna

12/24/2009

0 Comments

 
Picture
This is the second and latest portrait of my west coast granddaughter, Luna.

0 Comments

Another One...Just like the other one.

9/25/2009

0 Comments

 
Picture
This is quite similar to the previous painting, Mountain Scene, because I know when my daughter sees the other she's going to want it (she better) but she can't have it as it is destined to live its life for the foreseeable future in hallowed halls which shall remain nameless except for the initials JHU.
So she gets this.

0 Comments

Mountain Scene and Three Part Base Coat Again

9/25/2009

0 Comments

 
I love some of the photos my wife took in California on my son, Silvio's land. I like the dry grass and the golden tones contrasting so readily with the trees steeped in shadow due to the sun's ever presence during the six month dry season.
Picture
Once again I find the scene clearly divided into three obvious areas: the sky, the somewhat distant mountain (it is about one to one and a half miles away) and the foreground which I'm now only indicating as grass, though there will eventually be more. The base coats here are composed of combinations of colors and not homogeneously over mixed, but mixed a bit on the painting surface. The mountain is orange and Cerulean Blue and Chrome Oxide Green. Two separate batches were mixed, one leaning toward the warm, and the other with the same colors but heavier toward the green.  There is a warm and a cool version of similar colors because distance imparts a certain degree of homogeneity to all colors, i.e., they are neutralized.  Foreground was a blending of Burnt Siena, Yellow Ochre, and some miscellaneous greens and violets. This seems to be more complex than a white or black surface from which to start, but I still consider this a base coat. This is ten minutes work in acrylic.

Picture
This is at four hours and at the end of the acrylic phase. I've introduced trees on the mountain and tree and vegetation in the foreground and the tree's shadow in the grass. The trees on the mountain were done first in a blue-violet, and then the sunlit areas on those trees in a neutralized green, slightly shifted to the blue for distance. That could be done with a Veridian and orange (or Cadmium Red Light) and Cerulean Blue.

Picture
0 Comments

One Last (?) Redwood Cries Out

9/25/2009

0 Comments

 
to me and I feel like lashing myself to the mast. We actually have a mast for these crises. Ok, we don't.
Picture
This shot of half of a base coat gives it away that I am working on a wood panel. In this case the base coat didn't have to cover everything. The main reason for that is that there will be leaves and branches where the bare area is and beyond into the sky. I don't want to detail anything yet, and the sky needs to show through almost throughout, so it needs to dry. Indian Red and black for the tree trunks; the usual Cerulean Blue and white for sky.

Picture
The discipline in executing this painting involved the awareness that one is seeing through the branches to other leaves and branches beyond, and that most of the most distant views are of the sunlit tops. Therefore, working from most distant to closest, the first layers are light and the closer and often more dark branches and leaves are painted over the more distant ones.

Here we are at 5 hours and at the end of the acrylic phase. After this we go to oils because of the nuanced blending abilities it has over acrylics.

Picture
My last Redwood. For now.

0 Comments

Mountain Scenes

9/25/2009

1 Comment

 
Picture
In the next two illustrations, I'm working from photos recently taken on my son's land. The base coat here is divided into the four basic parts and colors that are evident: the sky, the grass in sunlight, the grass in shadow, and trees in the distance. cerulean Blue and white for sky; burnt and raw siena for the grass in sunlight, the same plus violets for grass in shadow, and black and Veridian for trees.

Picture
The completed painting.

1 Comment

To Clarify: First Background Not Always Black

9/25/2009

0 Comments

 
Someone asked me just yesterday, after having read some entries here, whether I always started off with a black background. I answered him short of a full explanation (it was late) by saying, "No". Of the last four Redwood paintings, three did, and one started with white. In this entry and the next few, I'm going to show three examples where I didn't start with black and explain why. The first of these examples is that fourth Redwood.
Picture
In this case I began with white latex acrylic and defined the tree trunks in black acrylic. It was easier in this way because of the geometry of the tree trunks perspective.

0 Comments

On the Eel River

9/21/2009

0 Comments

 
Picture
Some of you may know we recently took a trip to visit my son and granddaughter Luna out in no man's land, CA. Without elaborate explanations, this is a study of them playing in the Eel River. Painting 8" x 10".

0 Comments

Speed Painting.

9/15/2009

0 Comments

 
Since it takes me fifteen to thirty plus hours to complete some paintings, I figured who would be better to choose to lecture on how to get through it quick. Say you have a database that crunches the numbers and now because of having chosen to attempt to give the ultimate visual representation of light filled reality to my spouse because I love her so very much, my average time for a painting has gone up to ... incredible heights. Then it's time for speed painting to bring the average back down to survivable levels.
Picture
I'll call this one Redwoods, again another in this theme series,. This one was again begun on an acrylic (near) black background. This is after three hours of acrylic.

Picture
Just a little more with oils. The finished piece at left doesn't look substantially different, except for the tree trunks, though I suspect the main reason for that is that the initial acrylic developed quickly early on, probably due to a favorable distribution of light and dark.

0 Comments

Fool\'s Art.

9/12/2009

0 Comments

 
If this one doesn't kill me I hear it might make me stronger.

My until recently very beloved wife asked me to paint from a photo she took on our recent trip to Wonderland, CA. Now I know I could have simply said no based on a recent experience, but instead I chose to elucidate to her the multitude of complexities (and lack of compensatory...well, anything positive as far as I could see) inherent in such an endeavor and the multitudinous pitfalls that promise to befall any would be artist foolish enough to undertake what clearly spells out to me to be the most ridiculously  stupid undertaking and possibly the final one for such a fool as myself should I accept the mission. I should have known that "no" might have been more succinct. Let me count the ways I did not want to do this and perhaps revisit the fantasy that this marriage will be my last experiment into that territory. Always cheerfully kidding, of course!
Picture
Again starting with a near black acrylic latex background, just a few acrylics were laid out; white, black, a cadmium like yellow, a cerulean blue and a chromium oxide green. Here it is at three hours. I already know I'm going to go a lot further with the acrylics than I normally do, or have done recently because I can get the most "motion" going on with the colors and specifically the color contrasts. Because oils take so much longer to dry, constant work will tend to muddy the colors. Eventually I will want to move to oils because of what I'm finding to be an apparently impossible to explain quality that oil paint can impart.

Picture
I had no particular plan or target as to how far I'd go with acrylics and it turned out to be eight hours.

It was at a point about seven hours further on but I took no photo (now I regret that) where my wife decides she liked it better seven hours of work earlier. Let me rephrase that. 'S-E-V-E-N'.  Is there any way to describe the angst? What exactly is angst? Is it similar to wanting to put one's head through the drywall? Don't even ask me whose cause I don't want to go there in my mind.

Anyway, after much soul searching and after only very, really very briefly checking out the local personal ads, I begin to rework this painting like I've never reworked any other painting. I can't believe how much more time is going into this 11 x 14. I hallucinate calendar pages flying off the wall, counting unrecoverable epochs of my life going by. Days more into it, afraid to show for fear of further rejection, it becomes my secret project I work all day on, but now no one can see. Until it's done. And when will that be?

I know Leonardo took four years to complete La Giaconda (Mona Lisa), and then made off to France with it. Cause he couldn't part with it, but at the same time I hear he designed a few fortifications for the Duke of Milan and did some other stuff during that time, too, whereas I was not similarly distracted, at least not during the last week anyway. Still, if you think about it that's likely why he never married.

"I like the way it's going, honey".

Or worse: "I liked it better two years ago."

Picture
0 Comments
<<Previous

    Archives

    October 2018
    August 2017
    January 2017
    April 2016
    March 2016
    November 2015
    October 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    January 2015
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    November 2013
    October 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    February 2012
    January 2012
    October 2011
    September 2011
    August 2011
    July 2011
    April 2011
    March 2011
    February 2011
    January 2011
    December 2010
    October 2010
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    June 2010
    May 2010
    April 2010
    March 2010
    January 2010
    December 2009
    November 2009
    October 2009
    September 2009
    August 2009

    RSS Feed

    Categories

    All
    300
    3d
    Abrasion
    Acrylic Underpainting
    Adobe
    After Effects
    Altered Meditation
    Angel
    Angkor Wat
    Antique
    Antiques
    Antiquing
    Archaic
    Articulate
    Articulated
    Articulation
    Aztec
    Baby Eels
    Backlighting
    Baltimore Orioles
    Baltimore Ravens
    Bikini Paisly
    Birds
    Blue Jay Bling
    Blue Painting
    Bronze
    Brother Sun Sister Moon
    Buddha
    Butterfly
    California
    Carving
    Cast Stone
    Cats
    Celtic
    Celtic Design
    Celtic Dragon
    Celtic Fantasy
    Celtic Lions
    Celtic Miniatures
    Celtic Pattern
    Celtic Peacock
    Celtic Tiger
    Chiaroscuro
    Classical
    Colors
    Complex
    Concrete
    Concrete Surface Abrasion
    Concrete Wetting
    Cool Kitty
    Cosmic Turtle
    Creatures
    Crimson Painting
    Cubism
    Cubist Cats
    Dazzling Dragon
    Debonair Dragon
    Deconstructing Dragon
    Devata
    Doberman
    Dogs
    Dragon
    Dragons
    Eclectic Eclipse
    Eclipse
    Egyptian
    Elvers
    Enchanted Eagle
    Etruscan
    Family Scenes
    Fantasy
    Fantasy Creatures
    Felicitous Feline
    Female Torso
    Floral
    Football
    Fractal
    Fractal Valentine
    Freaky Fish
    Frustration
    Game Of Thrones
    Geometry
    Graceful Greyhound
    Greek
    Green Man
    Greyburst
    Greyhound
    Heart
    Hellenistic
    Henna
    Heron Harmony
    Hopi Lizard
    Illustrated
    Illustrated Bee
    Illustrated Cat
    Illustrated Face
    Illustrated Green Man
    Illustrated Sunface
    Illustrated Torso
    Illustrator
    Ink
    Intaglio
    Intricacy
    Intricate
    Irish
    Ivory
    Kissable Kitty
    Kitty Karma
    Leaf Mask
    Lions
    Logarithmic Spiral
    Lorenzo
    Lovebirds
    Lucid Lion
    Luna
    Magenta Painting
    Mandala
    Mandelbrot Heart
    Marine Corp
    Maya
    Maya Calendar
    Mayan
    Mayan Headdress
    Mayan Priest
    Maya Vision Serpent
    Mehndi
    Mesoamerican
    Meso American
    Metallic Finishes
    Mexico
    Miniature
    Miniatures
    Mixed Media
    Modelling
    Moody
    Mountain Scenes
    Mushrooms
    Near East
    Nude
    Old Building Materials
    Ornamental
    Ornamental Birds
    Ornamental Celtic
    Ornamental Love
    Paint
    Painting
    Painting With Few Colors
    Paisley
    Paisley Heart
    Paisley Hearts
    Paisley Love
    Paisleys
    Paisley Sunface
    Paisly
    Paisly Graces
    Paisly Lovebirds
    Paisly Torso
    Parrots
    Pegasus
    Pencil Portrait
    Persnickety
    Pet Caricatures
    Phoenecian
    Phoenix
    Photoshop
    Pigments
    Plaster
    Plaster Carving
    Plaster Model
    Portrait
    Psychedelic
    Psychic Owl
    Puppy Love
    Purple Lady
    Quick Sketch
    Ray Price
    Recessed Tree
    Redwoods
    Reproducible Finishes
    Roman
    Rubber Mold
    Running Wolf
    Seahorse
    Sensual
    Sensuous
    Shamrock
    Snow
    Soldier
    Sophia
    Spartan
    Sports
    Sports Figures
    Standard Finish
    Steampunk
    Still Life
    Summer Daze
    Sunface
    Sunfaces
    Tattooed Torso
    Thread Of Life
    Three Graces
    Three Graces Illustrated
    Torso
    Tree
    Tree Of Life
    Underpainting
    Undersketch
    Unicorn Utopia
    Valentine
    Valentine\\\\
    Veridian Painting
    Violet Painting
    Waif
    Washington Redskins
    Weirwood Tree
    Whimsical Whale
    Wife
    Winged Dragon
    Youtube
    You Tube
    Zodiac

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.