Kill Me Tomorrow

In the play Othello, Desdemona desperately tries to talk the insanely jealous Moor out of smothering her by pleading “Kill me tomorrow, let me live tonight." That would have worked on me, but Othello is obviously a moron who thinks the source of his infidelity information (his BFF, Iago) is a truthful and honorable man. Really? Everyone in the audience knows Iago is evil. 

Oh well, at least Othello realizes, just before killing himself, that he “loved not wisely but too well.” Loving “too well” seems to be a nasty condition that many men in the Shakespeare canon suffer from. 

If I were a woman I’d prefer a “loving-pretty-well” kind of relationship. Anything a little less “Shakespearean," thank you.

Kill Me Tomorrow, Let Me Live Tonight
Digital print on canvas
16 x 20

Detail

Nawlins

Last week I had a three-day rendezvous in New Orleans with high school friends. Our official high school reunion had been a couple of weeks earlier, which we couldn't make for various reasons, so we convened in New Orleans for a smaller reunion with world-class debauchery.

Just kidding. About the debauchery. Even with the fact that our hotel was at the corner of Bourbon Street & Royal.

Some locals call it Nawlins. Growing up in South Louisiana I called it Norluns. No one in Louisiana knew it was called The Big Easy until Dennis Quaid starred in a movie with that name in 1986. I saw that movie in Shreveport, Louisiana in 1986 with a friend who, like me, had grown up in Louisiana. We thought “Hmmm, I wonder what the name of that movie refers to?” Now there are signs all around Norluns referring to itself as The Big Easy.

When I returned home I painted a digital portrait of my high school pal in The Don't Hurry cafe.
He now lives in Germany, sort of the opposite of Big Easy.

To make sure we were doing the Big Easy thing, we visited The Don’t Hurry cafe, in the Garden District.

If you run out of money while on Bourbon Street you can usually find a part-time job. 
I happen to have advertising experience, so getting a job was not a problem for me.

2 to 30

Drawings from Tuesday night’s drawing group. For three hours poses ranged from two to 30 minutes. The quality of drawings ranged from “toss it” to “keep it,” with most of the “keep its” coming from the two-minute category.

I’m pretty sure there’s a lesson there, but I’m not so sure I want to know what it is.

Two minute pose. 

Twenty minute pose. 

Two minute pose.

Two minute pose.

Pink Nude

Another digital print version of an original sketch from the weekly Tuesday night drawing group.

Pink Nude
18 x 24

Muscular Model

Tuesday night’s drawing group was packed with 14 artists and one pretty darn muscular model. The group has had such good attendance in the past six months that we decided to have an exhibition of life drawings by artists in the group, drawn specifically during a Tuesday night session. We hope to have the exhibit in February or March. Details later.

Digital print from original charcoal drawing.

Two-Minute Pose

Digital print created from a charcoal sketch of last Tuesday night’s model.

Jesse’s Pose
30 x 40

Jesse & Rose

Some sketches from September’s Tuesday night life drawing sessions, featuring Jesse & Rose, two great models.

Jesse in Charcoal

Two-minute sketch

Rose on Newsprint

High-energy Hair

Bob Told Me To Use Red

Friend and mentor Bob told me to use red if I want a painting to sell.

OK, got it.

Note: The term “mentor” comes from the name Mentor, the advisor of the young Telemachus in Homer’s Odyssey. At least that’s what I recall from my extensive Greek studies in years past (muffled laugh).

This unfinished painting started as an oil-on-canvas painting. While waiting for the oils to dry a bit I   photographed the painting, imported the photo into the computer, then added some digital brush strokes as a study for later when I continue working on the original with oils.

Almost Ripe
Oil on canvas
30 x 20

Rush Hour

A landscape, in progress, based on a photo I took several years ago of the road between Chimayo and Nambe, two villages north of Santa Fe. Traffic hasn't changed much. Still as busy as ever.

Rush Hour
Oil on canvas

Phantom Painters of the Opera

Went to the Santa Fe parking lot this morning with 5 other TPAPs (Thursday Plein Air Painters). Not one of us actually painted the opera house (The Crosby Theater). Instead we all opted to paint the mountain view looking east from the parking lot.

View from the Opera
Oil on canvas
Digital print 36" x 28"

Variation 1

Winter Morning Stroll

Mysterious woman on a winter morning stroll in Brompton Cemetery, London.

Brompton Cemetery is one of seven huge cemeteries that Parliament established around London in the mid-1800s to cope with a shortage of adequate burial grounds. It contains over 35,000 monuments and covers over 40 acres. 

Winter Morning Stroll

Detail

Yon High Hill

A re-worked watercolor sketch using digital brushes. 

When I saw the morning dew on this hill I thought to myself “But look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, walks o’re the dew of yon high eastward hill.”

Or maybe that was Horatio in Hamlet, Act I, Scene I. 

I sometimes get the two of us confused.

Yon High Hill
30" x 24"

Detail

Great Skellig

Robin and friend Carla contemplate the mystical island of Great Skellig (barely visible on the horizon) in the Atlantic, just off the southwestern shore of Ireland.

A monastery was founded on the barren rock island between the 6th and 8th century. It was continuously occupied until it was abandoned in the late 12th century.

I’ve heard of monastic solitude but, come on!

Digital print
22" x 18"

Robin, detail.

Botanical Garden

The Thursday Plein Air Painters met at the recently opened Santa Fe Botanical Garden for a morning of location painting. I'm getting used to the idea that I don't need to leave the painting location with a finished painting. That's probably a bad attitude, traditionally speaking, but I’m breaking lots of other rules too, so there.

A section of Phase One of the brand new Santa Fe Botanical Garden. Painters are setting up under a portal.

Color sketch of garden rock sculptures, painted on location with acrylic on watercolor pad. 

Later, in the studio, I added a little more detail. 

After reworking more, I took an iPhone photo of the painting, imported it into the computer, repainted the imported version using Corel Painter software, then enlarged the digital painting to 30 x 40 inches (below). 

The final digital version.

Detail.

   

Mermaid Tavern Plaza

Digital watercolor of the Mermaid Tavern Plaza, also known as the front yard.

G’s Studio

Last week, Bob (from my Tuesday night drawing group) and I visited G (also a regular at the drawing group) at her studio in Santa Fe.

Cookies, sparkling water, and freaky massive drawings exploding onto canvases. Experience some of them at her web site.

I shot a few iPhone photos in the studio, including one of Bob that I later used for a digital painting.

Visit to G’s Studio
Digital print
30" x 24"

Detail

I also grabbed a photo of the mysterious G and used it to create another digital painting.

G in Her Studio
Digital print
36" x 32"

Plein Air Chimayo

Three plein air artists and I drove to Chimayo, a cool little village about 45 minutes northeast of Santa Fe and set up our easels outside the humble and historic Catholic church, El Santuario de Chimayo (built in 1816).

Using acrylics on watercolor paper, I decided to paint in a low-stress, enjoy-the-morning, primitive style, also referred to as “crappy drawing” by some more accomplished artists. Later in the studio, I finished the painting, photographed it, then digitally resized it to 40x30 inches for digital output on paper or canvas.

El Santuario de Chimayo
Acrylic on watercolor paper
Print size: 40 x 30 inches

Digital paint version
32 x 24 inches

Poster version
32 x 26 inches

Waterfall 2

Another view of one of the waterfalls at the entrance to Bishop’s Lodge, just north of Santa Fe.

Waterfall 2
Acrylic on watercolor paper

Painting at Valle Caldera

Six of us from the Thursday Santa Fe Plein Air group drove to Valle Caldera, formerly known to most of us as Baca Ranch or Valle Grande. The caldera is a huge valley created by a volcano that collapsed upon itself millions of years ago, located in the mountains just above Los Alamos, New Mexico.

Road & creek in Valle Caldera
Acrylic on watercolor paper

Joe and White Place

I recently spent a day in Abiquiu with artist pal Joe Hall. The village of Abiquiu, 45 minutes northwest of Santa Fe, is best known as the home of artist Georgia O’Keeffe.

We hiked through the White Place, a unique canyon of white rock formations. It also is the location used for the scene of the final battle with aliens in the supremely weird but entertaining movie Cowboys and Aliens. It is best known as the subject of one (or more?) of Georgia O’Keeffe paintings.

After lunch (green chile cheeseburger) at Bode’s General Store we drove to the top of a mesa for another view of the White Place, where I shot an iPhone photo of Joe. Later I used the photo as reference for a charcoal sketch on gray Canson paper. A bit later I scanned the drawing, colorized and antiqued it in Photoshop.

Joe and the White Place
28" x 36"