Urban Posts, 16x12

"Urban Posts" 16x12" Oil

You gotta love it! The dry weather was holding for a beautiful fall and the trees have hinted their annual notes of color.  Since the landscape is not in its full foliage, I've been working the streets again with oils and it's been well, rather interesting. Here is a piece I worked on SE Belmont and SE 34th in Portland along with three other plein air artists. I stood in the nook of Stumptown Roasters and surely enough, an hour into my piece, someone asked if we "were in a painting class."  I didn't think to add this one to my list of top 10 most asked Plein Air questions, but I should have because it's asked a lot. I also had the company of a young man, down on his luck, settle two yards from my easel.  He had a sign that read "I need money for food, fuel and ganja". Now, if you don't know what ganja is, then that's a good thing, but I remember a neighbor in college smoked the stuff, and so that was all I needed to know at that point to stay clear. Anyway, I guess I missed the memo to bring my "starving artist" sign, but I digress...  

The rain has begun here in earnest and it's all downhill for the plein air season, so I will be hunkering down in my studio until the spring warmth brings dry skies.

Oh yes, let me resume back to the topic of this post.  Here is a detail of "Urban Posts".  I was trying to come up with some sort of title that had the flyers and the pole as the subject of this painting. Noting how we communicate on many levels, be it through old fashioned telephone lines carrying conversations across a distance, or colorful flyers stapled on a greasy pole shouting about the local band scene.  I've been taking the liberty of a loose, painterly approach with my oil work and I'm really really enjoying my results.  I wonder how it will influence my pastel work as I jump into it this winter. 

"Urban Posts" detail

If you get SouthwestArt magazine, be sure to check out pages 48 and 49.  There is info on the American Impressionist Society 13th Annual Exhibit coming up this November 8~30th at Eckert and Ross Fine Art. I'm thrilled to have my piece "Curbsides" included in this prestigious national show.  Here is the list of work with images of those pieces invited into this show. Indeed, a stunning gathering of work.

I also have an advertisement in SouthwestArt with my gallery American Art Company, in Tacoma, WA.  Currently AAC has 9 of my large pastels proudly displayed for the next few months.  If you are in the area, please stop by and indulge your senses with color, shape and form.