It has been a very long time since I updated this area of the blog showing you what is in progress on the easel. I have had projects, drawings and paintings on there but did not take the time to write about them. Weren't writing years I guess.
For the past while, I have been focused on storm images. I am very attracted to them for reasons I'll be sorting out over the next few weeks and for the moment I'll say they are an expression of freedom and beauty.
Right after the pandemic settled in I was, like many of us, asked to stay home from my day job at the art gallery and had time and space to work on something new in the studio. It was a complicated time emotionally. I was deeply relieved to suddenly have loads of creative time, which in my regular life is not available in loads, but the cause of the time and space was overwhelming. The storm images and ideas I had been collecting for years had the energy of the moment and so were the first thing I turned my attention to and I began to draw...
These are charcoal and contè on rag and small, about 11 x 14".
In the months since the pandemic I have had to turn my attention to some other projects and return to work at the gallery but this focus on storms is still developing and I have begun some small scale oil paintings on linen. The two shown here are 12 x 24".
Below are some photos of the early stages, drawing with charcoal a simple contour, then the first layer of oil straight from the tube. You can see the grid that helps me organize the composition from my references, which come from old public domain photos from the weather service in the states.
The next stage will be to begin using glazes and painting into layers of medium once this underpainting is dry in a few days.
Thank you for reading and more next week...