Now that life has slowed back down to a normal pace, I think I’m going to try to be consistent with this blog again. I made a few attempts earlier this year but was already too overloaded with obligations for it to stick. Now that October is over, things are slowing down and I feel…
Category: Oil Painting
Building a Daily Painting Habit
Building a daily painting habit or rebuilding a daily painting habit, in my case, is no easy task. I used to be very good at maintaining a habit of painting every day, but have struggled considerably since the pandemic started. While some people found the extra time on their hands a boon to their art,…
2021 Art Goals
Goals are important when doing any activity. They’re especially important if you intend on accomplishing anything substantial. The hard part is planning out these goals. For me especially, I’ve been struggling with the long term direction I want to ultimately go with my art. I recently met an artist and thought: “That! That is what…
To what end?
Sometimes you have to ask yourself the question “to what end?” To some extent this most recent hiatus from painting has been a crisis. It has also just been a break, a time to focus on other creative outlets. I’ve driven myself really hard the last few years to improve as an artist. I’ve had…
Painting: Use it or Lose it
Unfortunately, painting is a use it or lose it skill. After a pretty long hiatus, I’m trying to paint again and finding out that I’ve lost a lot of what I had gained over the last few years of consistent painting. All of the effortless color mixing I was doing this time last year is…
2020 Year in Review
It has been a bizarre year. All I wanted after the nightmare that was 2019 was an entirely uneventful year. Nothing like the whole world sinking into pandemic chaos to make your problems feel small. I don’t have very high hopes for next year since we’re still in the full swing of the pandemic right…
September 2020 Strada Easel Challenge Days 25-30
I made it! The final six paintings of the challenge are finished. For day 25, I came across these shells and thought they were perfect for the prompt. My other idea was to paint another feather. It was nice to do something I’ve never done before though. I seriously lacked energy on day 26. I…
September 2020 STRADA Easel Challenge Days 18-24
I’ve been wanting to paint a raw egg for a really long time. I can’t think of a good reason why I haven’t either. Especially now that I’ve discovered how fun they are to paint. The egg is from my chickens so it’s almost half the size of a normal egg and the yolk is…
September 2020 Strada Easel Challenge Days 4-10
Here we are, more than a week into the challenge! This first day was probably a stretch of the prompt, but aside from sitting outside and painting a literal structural, I tried to think of things that were structural. To me, origami always has a very structured quality about it. So I made some buffalo…
September 2020 Strada Easel Challenge Days 1-3
I’m off to an interesting start with this gory skull painting. This painting kicked my butt! I’ve been painting with gouache for most of the year so switching back to oils was definitely a challenge. Note – no skulls where harmed in the making of this painting. I put Saran Wrap down before pouring red…
Framing Some Old Work
After buying a Logan mat cutter at the end of last week, I finally got around to cutting some mats. Last year when I started painting with gouache, I painted on some randomly sized tiny pieces of paper that didn’t fit in any normal frame sizes. I think I painted so small because I wasn’t…
Painting for an Art Show
This painting may seem familiar to those of you following along with my Utrecht Color Theory Challenge from March 2019. I wanted to repaint this larger for the Canyon River Runners Art Show next month along with another painting that I haven’t done yet. I plan on painting the next one this next week and…