Almost Blue

So last weekend I had a piece in my very first (real) gallery opening! The show was an open submission at Phone Booth Gallery in downtown Long Beach. The theme was simply blue, you could submit anything as long as it was blue. I had the honor of being accepted into the show along with a lot of talented artists including Robert Pokorny, Mark Michelon, Paul Alvarez, Mariya Suzuki, and Yevgeniya Mikhailik.
My piece is called "The Wanderer" and is based on the poem "The Song of the Wandering Aengus" by W.B. Yeats. It's done in watercolor with some pastel and colored pencil on bristol board.

Quick Paint

This semester I am taking a course called Concentrated Studies in Life Painting. It's a mouthful I know. So far, mainly what we are doing is multiple short poses and do sort of quick sketches in paint. We are focusing on color and composition, working with specific palettes. Here's a sampling of some of the 25 min. poses I've done so far.

Comic

Here's another assignment from my wonderful production class taught by Rick Reese last semester. I learned so much about Ai. It's a one page, 2 color comic about dreams.

Granny

So as I expected I'm swamped with homework as usual this semester. Here's a little something from last semester to keep you entertained.

Sleeping Beauty

I decided to start playing with color. Here are the beginning stages of a painting based on Sleeping Beauty. School has just started, so who knows if I'll get a chance to finish it now, but we can hope for the best can't we?

More Photoshop

So here is another practice portrait, this time of my friend Kelly.I need to not be totally bored by anything other than faces. I'm also adding a colored version of the one from last time of Clarissa. Turns out, overlaying color on a b&w piece is the best thing ever, still trying to get a handle on it though. Enjoy!

Round 2

My second attempt today at painting in photoshop. I still feel like it's looking a little cheesy, and since these are practice I'm maybe not putting as much time in as I should. Next step color.

PS Practice

So I've decided I need to work on my photoshop skills. Today I had some free time, and I thought it might be a good time to sit down and do a little drawing. I've been neglecting working very much over my winter break, it's so nice to actually not have to draw once in a while. Seeing as school starts on Monday however, I thought I should get back into the swing of things. I've never done much painting in photoshop but it seems like a good skill to have. So here's my first attempt at it in a while. It's a somewhat successful and not completely finished self portrait.

Landscapes

And now that I've posted some of the portraits I did, I'll show you guys some of the plein air paintings I did while in France. A few actually include the Mont St. Victoire which is the mountain Cezanne painted about 500 times.

As Promised

Here are some of the portraits that I painted during my time in Aix-en-Provence. They've been a long time coming, I know.

Back to Blogging

So it's been ages since I've posted anything. Got a little lost in traveling this summer and then had the most hectic semester of my life which barely left time to think let alone blog. So, inspired by the lovely Sarah, I've decided to attempt to start blogging again. Hopefully this time I can keep it going for longer. I will soon update with all the art I made in France that I never got around to posting. But first, something completely silly.

It's been ages since I've done any fan art, but I've come to the conclusion that I approve of Tangled and that I like Rapunzel. So for now I leave you with this, and a promise to return soon.

Sculpture

So I've been busy busy here in Aix-en-Provence. Hence the lack of posts recently. The last two weeks have consisted of a combination of a sculpture workshop in the morning (led by Greg Wyatt) and landscape painting in the afternoons, and of course a bit of travel and going out on the weekends and nights thrown in there as well. Greg Wyatt is an accomplished sculptor who lives and works in NYC and we are very lucky to have had him come give us a workshop. As we were working I fell in love with sculpting with wax and hope to continue working with the medium if I can when I get home. The only problem is that since wax melts, it is a semi-permanent method, so Greg somehow found the funding to have one of our small sculptures sent to the Coubertin Foundry where Rodin had his works bronzed. So they will be sending one of my sculptures to me cast in bronze and I will receive it in a few months. Unfortunately, I made about 4 wax sculptures, so I am going to try to see if I can transport them home and eventually get them bronzed as well, but seeing as it is an expensive process we'll see.

Here a few of the sculptures I created, more paintings to come.

Plein Air

Today my class went out and did our first plein air oil paintings. I really don't have much experience with this type of painting (I really don't even like landscape painting much), and painting exposed to the elements, sun, wind, and such, while sounding wonderful in theory, has not been enjoyable for me in the past. Today however, was extremely relaxing. I found a shady spot that looked out onto this beautiful wheat feel full of sunlight and beautiful shadows. I won't say that I've quite mastered the technique yet, but I had a great time and I'm fairly satisfied with the outcome.

So here it is:

Peindre au Parc

So I am living in a little apartment with an older French woman in Aix-en-Provence. Her name is Madame LeRouge, like you could get anymore French. Madame is very nice, and it is absolutely beautiful here. So far I've been here 9 days and I've discovered my favorite thing to do. There is a park right next to my apartment that has a little stream, lots of trees, and lots of children. It is the perfect place to go for a walk, just hang out, or in my case, to paint. I've gone a couple of times and just painted in the shade. Today I took my watercolors down to the park, found a nice spot (which ended up being inhabited by a large group of children from a nearby school). Normally so many children would annoy me, but for some reason today I didn't mind. While I was painting a couple of the kids came up to watch me paint and there was one boy in particular who complimented my work. He was very cute, and as his chaperone said, "très curieux".

Here is the piece that I did today.