"If I know only one thing, it's that everything that I see
Of the world outside is so inconceivable often I barely can speak"

-Fleet Foxes, "Helplessness Blues"

I haven't posted anything in a while as I've been a little busy working on a couple of studio paintings. I've been wanting for a long time to start working larger, but I haven't known how to connect that to the smaller paintings I've been doing in the field lately.  Ultimately I decided to give the obsessive-neurotic-worry-about-the-direction-of-my-art a rest, and just paint.  So these are my recent attempts at a slightly grander scale, they are 23x40 and 26x32; nothing massive but definitely larger than I'm used to.  I don't think I'm completely done with them yet, but I think I need to let them rest for a while to gain some objectivity and start on something else.

"Push it.  Examine all things intensely and relentlessly.  Probe and search each object in a piece of art; do not leave it, do not course over it, as if it were understood, but instead follow it down until you see it in the mystery of its own specificity and strength."

-Annie Dillard


It's been a really long time since I've posted any drawings, which is ironic given the title of my blog.  I was flipping through an old sketchbook the other day and came across this one.    It's a self portrait I did in ball-point, probably about four years ago.  It's kind of weird looking back.  You see mistakes so much more clearly, but you also see things you like that you didn't appreciate at the time.

"Be careful that you do not write or paint anything that is not your own, that you don't know in your own soul." 

-Emily Carr

 

  

"There is no difficulty in painting detail, the real difficulty lies in getting the general truth of tone and tint." 

- John Collier

These are a few paintings from this week.  I returned to the same spot three days in a row and painted three different compositions.  I was trying to focus more on color, and found plenty of it in the sage and sumac of the local hills.  The paintings  are 10x14 and 10x12 oil on panel.

"A man's work is nothing but this slow trek to rediscover, through the detours of art, those two or three great and simple images in whose presence his heart first opened."

-Albert Camus


It's been absolutely beautiful this week, and being outside painting in the evenings has been great.  I also had the chance on Saturday to visit the studio of local landscape painter Eric Merrell, who was very gracious in sharing his time and the insights he's gained as an artist.  You can see his work on his website ericmerrell.com.

"It's strange that words are so inadequate. Yet, like the asthmatic struggling for breath, so the lover must struggle for words."

-T.S. Elliot

"Great art is the outward expression of an inner life in the artist." 

- Edward Hopper

Here are a couple of paintings from this week.  8x10 and 10x14 oil on panel.

"If one really loves nature, one can find beauty everywhere." 

- Vincent van Gogh


Here are a couple paintings from the last week or so.  I've been spending some time painting along the river just below Los Feliz.  Such a cool area, with lots of stuff to paint.

Well I looked into the sky for my anthem 
And the words and the music came through 
But words and music can never touch the beauty that I've seen 
Looking into you -- and that's true

-Jackson Browne

"If you hear a voice within you saying, "You are not a painter," then by all means paint... and that voice will be silenced, but only by working." 

- Vincent van Gogh

Here are a couple of paintings from this week.  Its been pretty breezy lately which has made conditions beautifully clear.  Driving home each day I've been really drawn to the foothills looming over Pasadena and tried out numerous new locations in hopes of painting them, but I couldn't get anything to compose right.  The clear air got me looking for longer views but that never really panned out either, and working in the wind proved to be quite challenging at times.  A few strong gusts almost had me fishing my tripod out of the L.A. River.  Anyway, painting is difficult and sometimes you wrestle with doubts about what your doing, but I guess you just have to keep going.  These are both 8x10 oil on panel.

"Rembrandt and Shakespeare, Bohr and Gauguin, possessed powerful hearts, not powerful wills. They loved the range of materials they used. The work's possibilities excited them; the field's complexities fired their imaginations. The caring suggested the tasks; the tasks suggested the schedules. They learned their fields and then loved them. They worked, respectfully, out of their love and knowledge, and they produced complex bodies of work that endure."

-Annie Dillard, "Write Till You Drop"


These are a couple of paintings I did this week.  Work has been pretty busy lately, so spending some time after work painting by the water has been really nice.   I actually did a couple more of this  bridge and overpass, but they didn't quite come out.  These are both 8x10 oil on panel.

“We do not want merely to see beauty... we want something else which can hardly be put into words- to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it. That is why we have peopled air and earth and water with gods and goddesses, and nymphs and elves.”

-C. S. Lewis

"We must not be content to memorize the beautiful formulas of our illustrious predecessors. Let us go out and study beautiful nature." 

- Paul Cezanne

These are some more paintings from the last two weeks.  They are all 8 x 10 oil on panel, done in the field.

“It was when I was happiest that I longed most...The sweetest thing in all my life has been the longing...to find the place where all the beauty came from.” 

-C.S. Lewis,  "Till We have Faces"

It's been a while since my last post!  Here are a few recent paintings.  The first was done in the studio, 14 x 18 oil on canvas.  The other four were done in the field and are all 8 x 10 oil on panel.

"The value of a work of art depends simply and solely on the height of inspiration, on the greatness of soul of the man who produced it."

-William Merritt Chase



I came across this quote a couple of days ago, and I find that I keep coming back to it.  I love the idea that the quality of our work doesn't come merely from our ideas, tastes, and abilities, but from an authentic and humble response to the inspiration we are given.

These are a couple of recent paintings, 24x24 and 18x18 oil on canvas.

"The dignity of the artist lies in his duty of keeping awake the sense of wonder in the world.  In this long vigil he often has to vary his methods of stimulation, but in this long vigil he is also striving against a continual desire to sleep."

- Marc Chagall

These are some paintings I did this week.  The middle one, with the view downtown, I did at home based on a photo that I took on a hike with my son last summer.  The other two were done in the field, as most of these small paintings are, awake to the wonder all around. 

It's funny but it seems like every time I'm done painting, and I'm driving home, the hills are lit up so amazingly, bursting with life and color I could never hope to imitate.  And so the pursuit continues!

These are all 8x10 done in oil.

"The painter must enclose himself within his work; he must respond not with words, but with paintings." 

- Paul Cezanne


I've been doing a lot of small oil paintings after work lately (or sometimes before).  These are all 8x10.