Merry Christmas from Airdrie, Alberta

Snow on French Lilac

Check out the Alberta/Texas phone interview for a pull-out feature in today’s Denton Record Chronicle.

In honor of my French Canadian mother-in-law who used to bake the best pies every year at Christmas time, and who is now in the advanced stage of Alzheimer’s, I decided to bake Tourtiere. I only tried making crust once before, but it was more like an edible jigsaw puzzle.  TV ads for brand-name shortening imply that flaky crust is a good thing, but it should probably stay on your fork long enough to reach your mouth. Making pie crust is not for sissies! Well, don’t despair my fellow bakers…as long as it ends up tasting good (using a tablespoon to get the job done) it’s the thought that truly counts.

Norway Maple, work in progress: 36H x 48W x 2D inches acrylics, will sculpt edges of leaves with modeling paste medium on canvas. Gallery wrapped sides painted. The watercolor classes really helped with awareness of color choices, keeping those colors pure and marks fresh, and also a desire to leave more abstract elements alone; less realism and more expressionism. All of those things will be magnified in this painting.

After today, blogging and Artwork will be infrequent until mid-January. Driving up to western Canada, there will be plenty of snow-covered trees and winter photo opportunities along the way to Alberta, B.C. and back. Working up until the last possible moment, I started this painting of purple Maple leaves that were seen in Madison, WI during late August. Modeling/Molding paste will be applied, then painted with acrylics when dry, this will be a 3 dimensional-ish painting.

Happy Holidays everyone!

Creating Art and talking about are truly two different ways of seeing; the theory of right and left-brain thinking is matter of fact. As an Artist it takes some effort to “switch brains” and reflect on the processes and progress of work in order to accompany my Art with writing on this blog, so I’m really impressed with the mature quality of the critiques given by students at Olive Stevens Elementary School of paintings on their school Art blog every month.

In collaboration with Oxide Gallery, the Denton school has started a blog where students – or anyone else actually – can give a critique of a different work of Art each month. This month the comments regard the recently finished Sounds of Silence, which is also at the gallery.

The Tree of Life, 29H x 29W x 29D inches mixed media; refurbished vintage plastic lawn chair, woven canvas strips and white glue, thin layers of drywall compound: cured, sanded, carved, acrylics paint, varnish. Durable, completely functional.

There was an interesting buildup of colors after a lot of changing colors and repainting the design many times, so the impressions of this chair are created like the other chairs in this series; ancient artifact replicas. The other chairs are listed here.

Chapala Wind, 11H x 11W x 3D inches acrylics on canvas, wrapped sides painted

Upcoming exhibition: monthly featured artist at Oxide Gallery in Denton, TX. Among the items on exhibit: most of the Magic Square series, Dawn at Bell Rock, Sounds of Silence, Polypore Fungi, Shadows of Summer, Eastern White Pine, and three of the vintage chairs. Opening Reception Tuesday, December 1st, 6:00 p.m. – 8 p.m., and the show runs until December 31st.

Dawn at Bell Rock, Arizona – 24H x 18W x 2D inches acrylics on canvas, wrapped sides painted, trim frame. Below: phases 01, 02 and 07

Orange Milkweed, Kentucky 15 x 22 inches watercolors on paper, sold

Driving from Texas to Ontario one summer I had to pull over to take photos and a closer study of the vivid orange bouquets growing beside the highway in southern Kentucky. The colors are irresistible, and this is not the first or last time I’ll portray this subject. All plants and trees contain medicinal and useful chemical properties in their leaves, stems, roots and flowers.

I looked up Orange Milkweed in the most informative books about plants, The Encyclopedia of Herbs and Herbalism edited by Malcom Stuart, which contains details about every plant I have ever sought to find information for.  According to it, Appalachian Indians made a tea from the leaves to use during religious ceremonies. One common name for this plant is “Pleuracy Root”, as it is still useful to treat infections of the respiratory tract including pleurisy It is used as a diaphoretic, antispasmodic, carminative, expectorant. Color also has enchanting, supernatural energizing properties!

Bird Party, watercolors on molded 140 lb watercolor paper, work in progress.

I’m not exactly sure where this is headed, but shapes were cut out of the painting, the paper drenched, folded, stretched and sculpted. Every evening just before sunset in the Dallas-Fort Worth area Grackles, blackbirds, Starlings and pigeons gather on lawns, parking lots, overhead wires and cables, roofs and trees. The event is unique to this area as far as I know, and exciting beyond words to be amongst the thousands and thousands of birds. Here is a previous piece on the subject.

Angel’s Trumpet (Brugmansias) San Antonio Riverwalk, Texas – 14H x 22W inches watercolors on 140 lb. cold pressed premium, white mat