Frank Gregory's Studio Wall

Updated website

2012-01-15T19:04:00.005-05:00

I have finally updated my portfolio website: www.frankgregory.com

While it is still not perfect, it's not too bad for a free google site.

Check it out, and like it on facebook!

"Mind & Matter" @ Grappone Hall, NHTI Concord NH

2011-07-01T11:55:00.007-05:00

The installation of Mind & Matter at Grappone Hall, NHTI Concord NH went smooth as could be. I am very pleased with how it all turned out. I was a unsure and a little apprehensive about installing into the curved the wall, but other than some small undulations to the wall, the system worked perfectly. I now hope the students will choose to meet "at the big brain."

Taking it to the Street

2011-01-22T08:54:00.005-05:00

Mackenzie Issler of the Greenfield Recorder wrote a fine article about me and my current exhibit at the Geissler Gallery at Stoneleigh-Burnham. Here is the front section and the back section as PDF files. You may have to zoom in to read the text.

Mind & Matter

2010-11-27T09:15:00.018-05:00

I recently received a percent-for-art commission from the State of New Hampshire to create a piece of public art for a new building at the New Hampshire Technical Institute. The image above is a digital sketch of my proposal photo-shopped into a photograph of the actual room. Below is most of the proposal statement explaining what I intend to make.

Mind & Matter

A Public Art Proposal for the second floor study lounge area of The Beverly D. Grappone Hall at the New Hampshire Technical Institute

Statement

Mind & Matter will consist of 299 separate 7” square unique abstract paintings, that form an image when assembled into a grid. This grid is meant to be a visual echo to the glass block wall adjacent to the location at the 2nd floor study lounge. The paintings will be oil on ¼ inch birch veneer plywood with black edges. These will be mounted to 5” square ½ inch plywood on the reverse, creating a floating effect when these are mounted to the wall. The space between the paintings is equal to the width of the mortar joints in the block wall, and will fall completely into shadow.

There are two major images in the painting. On the right is an illustration of a brain in profile that I created for a medical textbook I illustrated several years ago. On the left is an image of an iron bridge. The images are simple and accurate line drawings which are contrast-reversed through an overall checkerboard pattern. The individual pieces will be painted in a lively, colorful and painterly manner in oils, with a variety of application techniques and exciting brushwork. Each piece will be painted as if it were to exist on it's own as an abstract painting.

The medical illustration is obviously a reference to the nursing training at the college, but in this context it also brings up the dichotomy of mind and thought versus the physical gray matter of medicine. The steel bridge image references human creativity, engineering, and great physical acts of imagination, but it also symbolizes the path to making these imaginings real, the synaptic bridge over the void from mind to matter.

These are some oil studies I have been making in preparation... this is going to be a blast to make. My work is usually observed realism, or based upon observation. Typically any invention is secondary to the depiction of observed ( or at least believable ) space and light. It's satisfying, but can get a bit boring after a while. The night series I just completed kind of drained the realist well, at least for the time being.

That said, this project has two very realist elements in it, although it is less about the depiction of space and more about the symbolism and graphic drawing of the images. The actual physical act of painting is completely freeing. I can use any application method, any color, texture, whatever works to embody the emotion rather than depict it.

Just an update...

2010-10-25T06:06:00.007-05:00

Again it's been a while since my last post here, and since this site is still generating a decent daily traffic it's probably time for an update...

I'm still working for The Clark Art Institute helping with the Masterpieces Tour. The first exhibit, Pasion por Renoir at The Prado in Madrid has opened to great acclaim.

Also I am getting ready to have an exhibit of my night series of paintings, monotypes, and photographs this coming January at The Stoneleigh-Burnham School.

I did work on an interesting little project for el Museo del Barrio exhibit, Nueva York. As a subcontractor to The Small Corp, I was asked to make a scale model of Frederic Church's Heart of the Andes in the original walnut tabernacle frame. The original frame was destroyed or lost long ago and the only documentation that exists are a few old grainy black and white photos.

The model is made of walnut and is 1" = 1' scale. We decided not to include the presidential portraits in the model. As much as I would have loved to paint the image, I had to be competitive and make some money on the project, so I used a high resolution digital print. The figure is in historically accurate dress and is for scale.

Inky Fingers and Busy Busy

2010-07-14T20:13:00.007-05:00

Walk This Way

etching ink monotype

on Rives BFK

8 1/2" x 16"

Walk That Way

etching ink monotype

on Rives BFK

8 1/2" x 16"

Intersection

etching ink monotype

on Rives BFK

8 1/2" x 8 /2"

Coffee at Night

etching ink monotype

on Rives BFK

8 1/2" x 8 1/2"

Has it really been since May that I posted something on here? Here are some of the monotypes I've been working on for my upcoming exhibit of the Greenfield At Night series. This will be at the Geissler Gallery at the Stoneleigh Burnham School in January of 2011.... seems a long way away, but it's really just around the corner. This will be a benefit exhibit, where 50% of the sale price of any piece will go directly to the Greenfield Public Library. If you would like to be put on my mailing list, please email me your information and I will be glad to send you postcards of my upcoming exhibits: frankgregorystudios@gmail.com ...please put mailing list as the subject line.

I have been a busy guy lately, working on a long term project for the Clark Art Institute preparing frames and paintings for an upcoming traveling exhibit. I'm the guy that puts that annoying glass between you and your favorite 19th Century Masterpiece. I apologize, but it really is necessary when paintings go on tour as everyone wants to touch, and those that don't touch, sneeze. It's quite the process as the heavy gold leafed period frames are often very uneven on the back, and are parallelograms, trapezoids, arced and bowed, twisted, or otherwise beat up. I am making a build-out frame that is often carved and screwed to the back of the original frames to provide the added depth necessary for the glazing, custom wood spacers, felt lining and the paintings themselves. As a painter, it is a real privilege to see and handle the Monet's, Degas', Cezannes, etc. up close and personal.

Walk This Way

2010-05-16T12:12:00.004-05:00

Walk This Way

20" x 20"

oil on canvas

I've never fully trusted observational painting. I have a love-hate relationship with it and really struggle most of the time with it's relevance in today's world. Images are just everywhere and really quite sophisticated, just look at this NyQuil ad shot by photographer Tony Dorio . The attention to lighting and qualities of reflected light under his nose are really quite painterly. I am immediately reminded of Carravagio and Lucian Freud.

Sometimes it's enough to paint for my own agenda of improving my observational ability and expressing my own vision... other times it's not. I do seem to get through those dry days and pick up the brushes again eventually. These silly little purple paintings will lead somewhere... I hope.

Only Just Dark

2010-02-16T15:50:00.003-05:00

Only Just Dark

oil on canvas

25" x 25"

I haven't quite finished with Main Street yet. Here is the latest oil on canvas. Ever earlier, I guess it will be daytime soon enough.

East Main @ Dusk

2010-01-10T08:12:00.003-05:00

East Main @ Dusk
pastel, gouache, acrylic
17" x 16"

Yes, another Main Street picture. Now that I know the image so well, I can concentrate on my mark making more. This is mostly pastel, with touches of gouache, and acrylic in the spots of light.

Fro and To

2010-01-05T17:28:00.002-05:00

Fro & To
Etching ink on Stonehenge
image: 8 3/4" x 8 3/4"

This second version is the right way around for Greenfield. The first image in the previous post looks like we live in England and drive on the other side of the road. I think I'm getting a better feel for these monotypes, coming up with some improvements in my methods. A few more prints and I'll be making a "how to" post on The Art Dept.

Messin' with Monotypes

2010-01-03T17:44:00.006-05:00

To & Fro
Etching Ink on Stonehenge Paper
image: 8 3/4" x 8 3/4"

Bart's Cafe
etching ink on Stonehenge Paper
image: 8 3/4" x 8 3/4"

New Work on the way...

2009-12-28T08:21:00.003-05:00

got my paper
got my ink
got my brushes
gotta think

got an image
got a press
gonna print
and make a mess.

stay tuned.

Only Only ( Finally)

2009-12-09T13:40:00.002-05:00

"Only Only"
25" x 25" oil on canvas

I know, it looks a lot like the other ones. This is the final painting though and is sort of a "best of" version of the others... a car from this painting, a window from that, etc. These are exceedingly hard to photograph, this is fairly accurate though... I spent some time in Photoshop making it look like the painting. The next painting will not be a night scene... I promise.

Maybe Next Time

2009-11-23T07:42:00.005-05:00

Broken Pots
2009 oil on canvas 10" x 20"

I am re-visiting a subject I haven't painted in 29 years. When I started at MassArt in 1980 I thought I was going to be a graphic designer, but I quickly got bit by the painting bug. My first series of paintings were of broken terracotta flower pots my mother had lying around. This is the subject where I learned the basics of oil paint. Although those paintings are definitely student work, I can look at them now (still hanging on my mother's wall) and also feel the excitement I felt at having made them, and the possibility of the next paintings being better. Little did I know then that the better paintings are always the next ones.

Only Evening

2009-11-20T22:26:00.006-05:00

"Only Evening"
pastel and acrylic on matboard
25" x 25"

Yes, another view of the intersection, although this time it's evening and the world is still barely lit by the sky. Also, this is a pastel on dark blue matboard. I don't make a lot of pastels, although I have a complete set of expensive french pastels I salvaged from a trashed display case several years ago. The retail display had an actual piece of each pastel hot glued into a plastic covered recessed well under each color's bin. The art supply store I worked in was throwing it away... I took it home and spent an hour or so removing each piece of pastel. Well worth the effort as I now have one of every color. I've messed around with them over the years, but never produced anything I really liked... also the feel of the pastel, the dryness, the way each color breaks so easily never really appealed to me. l aways came covered in dust. That said, I had a good time making this one.

(update for those who were here before: this is a new photo, the previous one was not accurate. )

OK, OK I said I was done before... really this time...

2009-11-16T10:28:00.002-05:00

Only Raining (Again)

oil on canvas 25" x 25"

Same Old Haircut

2009-11-14T16:51:00.003-05:00

Same Old Haircut oil on canvas 4 3/4" x 6 1/4"

I've been told this one looks more like me. There's quite a lot of paint on this little canvas. I was looking at Wayne Thiebaud recently, specifically his use of white for backgrounds and the thickness of his paint. What a great painter!

Two Little Paintings

2009-11-08T16:15:00.010-05:00

East Main Street, 01301- 3:00 to 4:00 pm November 7, 2009
10" x 10" oil on 8 ply ragboard

This was a fun little painting to make. Again, this was done from the top floor, north-east corner window of the newly christened Arts Block in Greenfield, MA. This is that really fleeting time of day when the sun is low in the sky, raking across the landscape and intensifying all the colors. The window of opportunity to paint this is very short, as the shadows are moving faster than mid-day and have a very profound effect on the image. Consequently, even with the way I paint, this is heavier and thicker than usual. Color, value and mark-making decisions are made very quickly and corrected faster and usually right into paint already applied, as opposed to removing paint with a pallet knife or rag... Detail is sacrificed to the gods of color.

Multi-tasking Self Portrait
4 3/4" x 6 1/4" oil on canvas on gatorboard

I was working in the shop all day Friday and at about 4pm I had enough and went upstairs to the studio. I have several small panel pieces that I had cut off of a larger one used for the Coffee at Night painting, and decided to do a self portrait. Not long into it, the phone rang and and I had some business to do, but kept right on painting. Later on the phone rang again and scared the life out of me.

Only Raining... again

2009-11-05T21:48:00.003-05:00

Only Raining 25" x 25" oil on canvas

Well, I wasn't happy with the painting and went back into it.... hard. You'll also notice that I did'nt crop it like I was going to.

Only Rain

2009-11-02T23:35:00.006-05:00

Only Rain
22" x 22" oil on canvas

I made this painting as a combination, sketched on site but painted in the studio from photographs and the other paintings done on location... larger, looser and more hard fought, I'm not sure what to think of it yet other than I can't wait to make another.

Only Only

2009-10-09T09:21:00.002-05:00

Only Only
18" x 18"
oil on canvas

Stayed late last night and finished the painting. These things are always a surprise. I have an image in my mind, but they never turn out the way I expect. Most of the time it's a good thing. The only thing in my control really is the composition. The first mark of opaque color points in a certain direction, then I'm along for the ride not really knowing where we'll end up.

Dark & Light & Grisaille

2009-10-08T06:09:00.008-05:00

This is the grisaille oil sketch of the next night painting from the Arts Block, looking east into the intersection of Main and Federal. Not much to look at yet, but I always like the paintings at this stage, when the composition is defined and the lights and darks are suggested. I have painted this intersection at night before, though not from life, nor from above. The constant flow of cars changes the light of everything, especially the painted lines and directions in the road. Tentatively called Only Lonely, I still haven't decided what to do about the traffic and may make the painting void of cars.

This is the intersection looking back towards the Arts Block building glowing in the morning light. I am painting from the top floor corner window. The top two floors are empty and open with no interior partitions, and have never been occupied by more than storage.

Greenfield at Night

2009-09-29T19:32:00.003-05:00

This is the first painting of Greenfield at night from the window of the newly christened Arts Block. It is 18 x 18 oil on canvas on gator board. Those who know Greenfield will remember the building as the Clark's Sport Store building. Originally the Arm's Block built in the mid 1800's, the top two floors have never been occupied by more than dry storage. This is looking north across Main Street towards Bart's Cafe.

Light at Night: Photography & Painting

2009-09-24T07:13:00.008-05:00

When the sun goes down, the world truly becomes a place of our own making. Objects that don't emit light are defined solely by reflective quality. A bright red box that is not reflective is nearly black, whereas a black box that is highly reflective will bounce a nearby red light all over it's surface. Light sources are random in color, size and intensity; and when they are in motion anything reflecting their light appears alive and moving.

I am making a series of paintings and photographs at night from the upper windows of a building in downtown Greenfield. Painting night images from life is a luxury. There just aren't that many places with the proper light to paint by combined with an interesting subject to paint. Here are some photographs I shot from these windows, and the beginnings of a painting. Ultimately I will be making a larger painting in the studio (from these smaller ones and the photographs) that will go to the town of Greenfield. I received a grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council to produce this painting.

Todays Painting & The Easel

2009-08-18T17:00:00.011-05:00

I thought it was hot yesterday. Today was hotter and for some reason I pulled off the road at the trailhead for South Sugarloaf in Deerfield, grabbed the paint kit and headed off up the trail. By the time I reached the top I was soaked. So here is the little painting I did up there. For those of you Google Earthlings out there: Latitude 42°28'46.89"N Longitude 72°35'30.62"W is the top of the cliff.

Here are some pictures of the easel box I recently made. This is similar to a box I made way back in 1985 to take on the Appalachian Trail. That box held 3 wet 8" x 10" paintings on 4 ply matboard, (although I painted oils on watercolor paper taped to the matboard). This version is much improved. It is made for 10" x 12" and will accept 8 ply matboard, or 3mm Dibond. The original box had plexiglas as the pallete surface and a hinged wooden upright to hold the panel in place. This box is constructed from 1/2 birch plywood with Dibond surfaces on both sides. It can hold either 4 panels or 3 panels and the upright board, which is also Dibond. This upright slides into place over two 1/2" brass mending plates that also hold the painting in place. The solvent cup is held in a brass ring that screws into an insert in the door.

This unit fits nicely in my old Jansport Rucksack. I carry my paint in a small plastic storage box from the Dollar Store, and my Mineral Spirit in an old squirt bottle. I also bring another small bottle to carry out the used mineral spirits. Rags, an old tube filled with brushes, a waterbottle, my camera and Kerodex 51 complete the kit.

Frameshop Painting

2009-08-17T17:38:00.003-05:00

Man, it was hot today... I had some time to do a painting and wanted to paint Greenfield from Poet's Seat Tower. I've lived here since the late 80's and have yet to paint from the ridge... Anyway, I went up there to scope it out and just about cooked in no time flat. So, a day off and back to the air-conditioned shop. I used to paint interiors a lot and forgot how interesting they are. This was a quick two hour painting to christen my new easel / wet painting box I made a while back. I'll post some pics of the easel soon. Some may recognize the Delta drill press in silhouette, but only a framer will recognize the Jyden Chopper in the lower left. Tomorrow I will paint outside ... but early...

Slave Cabin

2009-06-23T19:13:00.010-05:00

I have finally finished the slave cabin model for the Sumter County Museum in Sumter South Carolina. The real cabin exists on their property, but is in the middle of a hunting preserve and is fairly rundown, not to mention the presence of snakes and wild boars.

The model is in 1:24 scale, where a 1/2 inch equals a foot. The building is 16' wide x 16+ ' high x 48' long, so the model is 8" x 8" x 24".

It is made so the roof can come off to show the interior, which includes beadboard and random width boards, and a double fireplace as this is a duplex.

I also made little hinges of metal and fishing line, that has been rusted with a patina chemical. All the doors and shutters open and close.

Wood Thrush

2009-04-27T10:45:00.004-05:00

I've been working on a couple of models for a nature center. Here is the woodthrush. Next will be a New England Cottontail Rabbit.

Sugarloaf & Sunderland from Mount Toby Tower

2009-02-10T07:55:00.003-05:00

Not much to look at yet, but here is the beginning of the next 60" x 20" panorama painting. This one probably won't include any birds, but who knows for sure at this point.

The Heart's on Fire auction last night went fairly well. Lots of bargains were had. My little painting, "5&10&2A" went for the full value.... thanks to all the bidders, especially JD. My paintings are in especially fine company with your collection.

Artspace Greenfield Hearts on Fire Auction

2009-02-05T16:12:00.005-05:00

I am donating this oil on birch called 5 & 10 & 2A to the Artspace Greenfield Hearts on Fire Auction this coming Monday February 9 at the Hope & Olive Restaurant. It depicts the intersections of these routes (Main & Federal Streets) in Greenfield, MA

I made this painting last year as part of a continuing series of night images of Greenfield and surrounding towns. The outside of the frame is 14 3/4" x 17" and the painting is 8 1/4" x 10 1/4". It's a bit retro with it's painterly realism, but I've always enjoyed making these. and I think this is a particularly nice little study.

This is a detail of the street lights. The value will be placed at $300. About $100 of that is the custom designed and unique frame I built for it. Anyway, bid high and bid often, email one to Mary Kay Hoffman if you'd like. Thanks, they are a very worthwhile organization.

Woodpeckers Over Graves Street

2009-02-03T10:24:00.003-05:00

oil on canvas 60" x 20"

next is Robin over Greenfield

nearly there... nearly there....

2009-01-31T18:00:00.010-05:00

I finally found some time to work on this painting. I had to stop in early December as I became very busy in the shop and out. Christmas framing was fairly steady. The crunch came with a large order from the Clark for 25 frames for the Toulous Lautrec exhibit, which we just finished hanging last Thursday, and the book mounts for Holy Cross, which I installed the second week in January. So I am back in the studio. It didn't take long to get some wind behind me. Yesterday and today I made some real miles. I can't wait to be done with this thing.... what was I thinking?

update 6 and tempus fugit

2008-12-03T06:24:00.017-05:00

Yes, I've been slowly plugging away at the painting, although reality caught up and I became very busy in the shop and out. I am working on an exhibit of Transcendentalist Books for the Cantor Gallery at Holy Cross College in Worcester, MA. The collection has come from the Sant Bani School in Sanbornton, NH. Here is a PDF from their site discussing some of the books and the thinking of the transcendentalists. The exhibit follows an interesting meandering brook that leads from Thoreau's dictionary to Elvis Presley's copy of Kahil Gibran's The Prophet. I went out there to measure and handle the books for custom Plexiglas mounts fabricated to hold them safely open to specific pages.

I've also been working a piece for Jane Lund's annual invitational exhibit at the Northampton Center for the Arts. This years theme is Let's Play, Artist's Look at Toys. I went through three iterations before settling into re-working a clock from the past I was never too satisfied with.

The yellow feather is the second hand and as such moves fairly quickly. The minute hand is the maple seed and the hour hand is a sable paint brush. The airplane is made of old barn board. When I was a kid, we used to take apart the old buildings of an abandoned farm behind my neighborhood. We'd spend all day straightening bent nails with a rock and then build things with the wood. Besides building forts, we made a few fairly large airplanes, some with 10 foot wingspans that we would then throw off a 3o foot cliff in the woods..... great fun.

Behind the second hand it says Tempus Fugit (written backwards of course) and behind the shell is a penny.

Update 5.3 More Bird

2008-11-06T21:57:00.003-05:00

OK, I got a little ahead of myself and had to leave the little houses behind for a bit. I feel pretty good about the little pecker...

Update 5.2 Plein Air Wisdom

2008-11-06T06:23:00.012-05:00

Color and drawing decisions made painting outside need to be quick, but not rash; accurate, but not obsessive and confident but not insistent. The trick to then working indoors from photographs is to use all this information in an honest, not artificial way. It's all about the painting after all.

I am re-posting a previous essay I wrote on plein air painting:

True Magicians

Contemporary Plein-air painting and contemporary Blues music have a lot in common. Both have a wide appeal to a large and diverse audience. Both also have identifiable formats and loose sets of boundaries that are deceptively simple and direct. Yet despite that simplicity, both are extremely difficult to master, and not many do. Like the Blues, plein-air painting is a very democratic art form. It is not pompous or pretentious, it does not exclude anyone with its form or vocabulary, and there is little if anything preachy about it. And also like a good blues song, when it all comes together a great plein-air painting is nothing short of magic.

A plein-air painting is a conversation of sorts; it is a sharing of an experience in as direct a way as possible. The scene goes in the eye of the artist, rolls around in the head a bit and then goes right out the hand onto the canvas. The magic occurs when the sum of the experience results in a painting that equals more than its parts, and includes a universal truth, an understanding, or genuine emotion.

We've all seen them, those magical paintings. What is it that makes these paintings work? Whether plein air landscapes or huge abstract pourings, they all have one thing in common. They have a quality that we recognize, but can't adequately describe in words. They do more than transport us into the head of the artist. These paintings validate our consciousness; they verify our experiences and emotions. For those that are open to the experience, seeing their own personal emotions, or observations on display can sometimes be very unsettling, and even cause some to deny the artwork its magic and the artist his skill. Although truly poignant plein-air paintings will more often than not bring a whispered, "YES" than a disturbed denial, they are no less powerful because of it. Sober cityscapes or desolate industrial views are not often "pretty", but their honesty can still affirm an experience and elicit a profound response.

Although a certain level of realist skill is often admired, it isn't solely the representational qualities that make a painting magical, otherwise only tightly rendered and highly detailed pictures would have it. In fact it can sometimes be as simple as a relationship of colors or values that will move the viewer. The experience can be like catching an elusive and reminiscent scent in the air. Before you know what has happened, you're transported somewhere else. When this happens it is sometimes unnerving, but it's always interesting.

Can there be a formula to create such artwork? There may be, but if so it is not something that can be taught directly or copied honestly, because any formula is the result of the individual artist's hand, an awful lot of paint, canvas, time and very hard work. To make such paintings it is important to be honest with yourself, absolutely fearless, ruthless with your intent, and equally open to both utter joy and intense pain. However hard we try, these are not things anyone is capable of feeling all the time. Still, when it all comes together, it is truly magic, and worth all the effort.

copyright 2008 Frank Gregory.

Update 5: Better Bird & Another 'hood

2008-11-05T21:13:00.009-05:00

There's no question painting like this is work. Very satisfying, but work none the less.

Those of you with kids of a certain age will be familiar with the character Dory from the movie Finding Nemo. The voice over was done by Ellen Degeneres. Dory is an ocean fish with short term memory loss who befriends the lead character, a clownfish named Marlin on his quest to find his missing son. Anyway, Dory's sage advice to a disheartened and frightened Marlin is to just-keep-swimming... just-keep-swimming .

just-keep-painting... just-keep-painting...just-keep-painting...

Tom Waits is a true American genius. Lately I start my day with Get Behind the Mule. If that's a little harsh I also really like John Hammond's version.

Pin your ear to the wisdom post
Pin your eye to the line
Never let the weeds get higher
Than the garden
Always keep a sapphire in your mind
Always keep a diamond in your mind

Got to get behind the Mule
In the morning and plow
Got to get behind the Mule
In the morning and plow
Got to get behind the Mule
In the morning and plow

Update 4: Bird Blocked

2008-11-01T07:06:00.004-05:00

Yesterday I was able to finish the foremost field and row of trees. I also started blocking in the Hairy Woodpecker a little more. I made a small shelf for the mount to sit next to the painting and put an old paint rag behind him for a similar color field.

I also stopped using my laptop and setup my old computer and monitor. The laptop monitor has a real color and value shift depending upon where you look at it from, also I got tired of cleaning paint from my keys and touchpad.

Update 3: Down on Graves Street

2008-10-30T22:22:00.012-05:00

Again, not much time to paint today, even still I got a good piece of this neighborhood finished, or nearly so. I believe this is Graves Street. I've been working on this in a certain way, pretty much moving right to left through this mid-ground, and drawing as I go along, with the paint. I think for the remainder I am going to define the rest of the drawing more tightly. I almost jumped to the left side to work my way back, but realized, thankfully, that the middle then might not match up. Once the drawing is fully defined, I can then paint anywhere with abandon. Drawing and Painting 101. It's scary how easily we can forget information we don't use very often.

Update 2: Little Houses, Big Bird

2008-10-28T23:24:00.015-05:00

The male Hairy Woodpecker is just sketched in at this point. I really want to bring him up to full realization, but there are many little houses to paint between now and then. Again I found only about an hour yesterday to paint. This neighborhood is coming together well though.

Here I have begun sketching them in with a pencil just to locate them in space. keeping track of where I am on the canvas is a real challenge. There is nothing worse than finding the puzzle piece doesn't fit after you spent an hour putting it in place.

As soon as I started this piece I got very busy in the shop. In addition to several other pieces, I am currently framing a Gideon Bok print. He has a wonderfully loose and easy way with paint. He also uses an interesting multiple vantage point perspective. These two visual devices combine, with a little suspension of disbelief, to portray the passage of time in a very convincing way. The print was produced at Wingate Studio, a print workshop just north of here that specializes in traditional intaglio printing techniques. They consistently produce amazing things for amazing artists.

Deerfield Woodpeckers Update

2008-10-28T07:41:00.009-05:00

I was able to find about an hour and a half yesterday to make a few miles on this painting. I reworked the industrial building right of center, which is actually one of the many buildings owned by Yankee Candle. At one point in time it was a car museum housing the collection of Mike Kittredge, the founder of Yankee Candle.

Several years ago I worked on his swimming pool in his home in Leverett, MA. It is in half of a Butler building with a domed ceiling painted as a sky. We fabricated a fake mountain out of concrete, complete with caves, passageways and a water slide that went through a waterfall before emptying into his pool.

My job was to climb all over this mountain and paint it to look like granite. It was a surreal experience. Outside the pool is a fake Italian Villa that you walk through to get to the professional stage area, bowling alley, arcade and basketball court complete with the old Boston Garden's parquet floor. Whatever you think of Mike Kittredge, you have to admire him for building an empire out of an ancient technology in today's high tech world.

South Deerfield is to the left here. Often when I drive down Route 116, I stop here for cider donuts and bread at Elm Farm Bakery. Across the street is the Hot L Warren, a local hangout, and down the street is Sienna restaurant, Wolfies restaurant and the GoNomad Cafe.

Please be sure to click an ad or two in the right pane. I put them there and will eventually get a check for $100 from Google if enough of you use them. I'm at about $46 after a couple of years. I'll be sure to toast you all with a drink when I take the family out for dinner with the windfall.

Painting in Progress

2008-10-26T16:53:00.013-05:00

I have begun what is hopefully going to be a series of oil paintings around a similar theme. The detail above is about 12" x 9" of a 60" x 20" panorama painting that I will be chronicling here as it is completed. This past summer I rediscovered my fascination with climbing and hiking to high places. Achieving altitude on foot and taking in vista views earned through sweat and toil is an experience that, when I was younger, had a profound influence on my work. This first painting is the view from the cliffs of North Sugarloaf in Deerfield, MA. Although not particularly high, the view is dramatic for it's proximity to the farms, village homes and industrial park areas in the Deerfield Valley.

Rather than stretch a canvas on bars, I stapled this piece to the wall similar to the way I make my murals, leaving enough room to stretch it later. Initially I make a thin wash drawing to layout the composition. I am working from both digital photographs and paintings made on location. It is a new experience to work from a computer screen rather than a printed photo, and one that I am going to repeat.

Here you can see that I have worked the sky and background hills up to a certain level of detail. You probably also see the silhouettes of two birds at either end. The Roaring Brook Nature Center in Canton CT has been kind enough to let me borrow some taxidermy mounts to work from. These are two Hairy Woodpeckers that were pretty dirty and faded when I first got them. I cleaned them up a bit and dyed the feathers back to the original black and red with a mild fabric dye.

It is always preferable to work from life and these two will be painted that way. Be sure to check back for updates, I am working consistently on this first piece and should be updating the blog soon.

Work for Hire

2008-10-07T09:10:00.007-05:00

The Art of Action finalists have been chosen, and congratulations to all of them. Now that I am free from the heartache of trying to get on the list I would like to address the Work for Hire clause in the application. During this process, late at night, when I was imagining that I had become a finalist, I was planning my strategy to challenge this during the contract phase. The goals of this project, as stated by Lyman Orton are high minded, community oriented and visionary, but for all that, the proposed terms reveal this as not a purely altruistic endeavor. I can understand the sponsor wanting to retain the copyrights for the work commissioned, but copyright comes in many flavors and Work for Hire is the most bitter. It is probably more than they need, or even want. Bear in mind I am no copyright attorney, but I have researched the subject extensively over the years and all the information is readily available to anyone with an internet connection. As creators, this is important information to at least familiarize yourself with. We have a poor track record of watching out for our own best interest.

With the purchase of a piece of art, when no discussion of copyright even comes up, the artist retains full copyright, as do their heirs for fifty years after their death. That means if someone buys a painting for their wall, they cannot make prints of it and sell them. They have bought the object, not the concept. In some states, if they re-sell the object for a profit, the artist is even entitled to a percentage of that money. In certain circumstances, like commercial illustration where the artist is the hand creating another's concept or when the work is made specifically for reproduction, the artist is compelled to sell certain rights, and can decide which to sell. These can be as restrictive as one time reproduction use for a specific publication, or as encompassing as world-wide use forever. As you can imagine, the more rights granted, the higher the value the artwork has. The creation and sale of fine art is usually immune to these concerns, except when it is going to be reproduced.

Work for hire typically affects employees. If you have a regular job as an employee, not as an independent contractor, and you produce artwork for your employer during your employment, then you are producing work for hire. The owner of artwork produced under Work for Hire can legally take all credit as the creator of the artwork. With work for hire you have sold your authorship and have no legal right to even have your name on the piece. As if that is not enough, it gets even better for the owner. The owner can lay claim to the style and any subsequent artwork made in a similar manner. That's right... your artistic style becomes theirs. This is what I meant when I said it is more than they need or want. There are numerous descriptions of the intricacies of this on line.

By my figuring, Mr. Orton and the VAC have ponied up a generous $300,000 for this project. In all likelihood it is not going to turn a profit and they are just looking to recoup as much as possible, although one never knows . That said, Work for Hire is an unnecessary clause for their stated goals. I'm not sure what I would do had I been chosen and if they insisted upon the clause. Personally, I would have no problem selling all reproduction rights for the money offered. I'd like to think I'd press the point on work for hire at $1000 - $4000 each for 10 pieces of artwork and the required time spent promoting the project. You don't get what you don't ask for, and contracts are contracts. I would hope Mr. Orton and the VAC will either remove this unnecessary clause, or negotiate separate rights into the contract protecting the selected artists from the excesses of work for hire.

Art of Action & Drawn to Drama

2008-10-06T05:33:00.005-05:00

Apparently the jury choosing the twenty finalists for the Art of Action project in Vermont are having some trouble agreeing upon the final finalists. The original deadline for notification given was last Friday at 6:30 pm and like many of you, I too was checking my messages and email throughout the day. The Art of Action page now states that the decisions will be made by Wednesday the 7th, so all of you who came to peace with your rejections are now in the running again. I know one artist who is a finalist and he heard last Wednesday via email... so keep checking that inbox.

In other news, I just got back from a week of working at the Clark Art Institute helping to put together the Drawn to Drama exhibit that is up now in Gallery E. It is an exhibit of Italian Works on Paper from 1500–1800. An absolutely wonderful collection that is truly worth a trip.

Vermont's Art of Action

2008-09-17T07:51:00.019-05:00

Lyman Orton is an interesting man. As the heir to The Vermont Country Store he grew the retail and catalog business started by his father Vrest in 1946, into the 60 million dollar a year success that it is today. In addition to employing about 350 people in Vermont, he also started The Orton Family Foundation as a resource for small cities and towns “...to build vibrant and enduring communities.” A current project of the foundation, together with The Vermont Arts Council and the Vermont Council on Rural Development is called The Art of Action: Shaping Vermont’s Future Through Art.

(From the RFQ) The goals for the project are to:

1. Help Vermonters comprehend what the future may bring given current forces and trajectories, and to articulate a desired vision.
2. Demonstrate how art is able to frame societal issues and engage people in dialogue and action.
3. Cause more art of this type to be created as a result of this project.
4. Create a national market for Vermont art and position the State as 'the place to be' for creative and entrepreneurial leaders.

This project is imaginative and ambitious. As an artist I find the effort to harness artistic idealism for a greater good to be refreshing and empowering. It is not all that common for artwork and artists to be taken seriously by serious people for an earnest and worthwhile cause. Referring to oneself as an artist is sometimes a risky thing to do. If someone says they are a real estate agent, or a chemical engineer people have a good idea of what they do. The title artist means different things to different people. A majority still conjure the image of the tortured soul covered in paint in the garret trying not to self mutilate their ears. For some people every artist is like their Aunt Millie making paintings of Emmett Kelly. Others only think of artists in the news that try to be as provocative as possible. Do I sound bitter? I hope not. Art is by definition all inclusive. Even so, artists can't even agree what an artist is. Some painters think all conceptual art is hooey. Some conceptual artists think painting is an anachronistic craft like a millinery or a purely decorative endeavor like flower arranging. Serious practical endeavors that purposefully reach into this thick soup of ideas don't come along all the time.

The economic, social, and environmental challenges facing Vermont today are similar to those that trouble our entire nation. These issues are magnified and more significant in Vermont due to it's rural character, rich history of independence, fierce sense of identity, and close proximity to the growing Eastern Megalopolis. Maybe because of these attributes, there are critical differences in how these challenges are being addressed nationwide and in Vermont. Vermonters are leading the way by actively working the problems with genuine Yankee innovation to forge creative practical and long lasting solutions. This project is a positive step in that direction and I would love to be a part of it. Time will tell whether the jury thinks I should be too. You can view all the entries here.

Birds & Bees Puzzle

2008-09-15T14:06:00.005-05:00

I've had this concept for a while and recently made a proposal for a few large puzzles like this. I thought it was time to attempt it. The idea is to make puzzles from not only paintngs, but from different objects and finishes. Here is the first attempt. Birds & Bees

Harvey's Lake

2008-08-07T17:43:00.009-05:00

There is no such thing as a paid vacation when you are self employed, so it's a rare occurrence for me to go along with the family for a whole week. That said, we just spent a great week in a cottage on Harvey's Lake in West Barnet, VT. Other than reading, relaxing, swimming and kayaking, I found the time to make these two paintings from the yard of the cottage.

The skies were very dramatic most of the week with afternoon thunderstorms rolling through. Be sure to click on the images for a larger view.

My youngest and I also drove to Franconia Notch in the White Mountains in New Hampshire for a great hike one day. I am posting some photos of that hike here.

Finished!

2008-05-30T07:50:00.005-05:00

There are many more pictures on my portfolio site www.frankgregory.com

The mural is painted in artist's acrylic on a non-woven Tyvek material made for murals and backdrops. It was painted in the studio then wallpapered into place. The diorama is made of wood, concrete, Plexiglas, epoxy, acrylic paint and natural materials.

Almost There

2008-05-20T06:54:00.005-05:00

This shows some of the concrete rocks and plexi/epoxy water surfaces.

Here is the diorama and mural seam drawn in red.

More Mural

2008-04-23T17:30:00.007-05:00

The mural has been installed and is now in progress at the nature center, hence all the blue tape. These photos show the door painted on site to blend this image with the mural I completed last year. It's kind of a Twilight Zone door merging two different centuries and seasons. More to come as the diorama is completed and blended into the mural. Be sure to visit my photoblog and click on some ads in both places....

More Mural Update

2008-04-15T05:05:00.007-05:00

Here are some new images of the progress of the Native American village mural for the Roaring Brook Nature Center in Canton, CT. I plan to install it this week and finish it on site. This is all artists acrylic on a Tyvek non-woven material similar to the housewrap, but sturdier and made for murals and backdrops. If anyone is interested in purchasing some to try, I bought a fairly large quantity for this and have plenty to spare.

The Art Department is Now My Photoblog

2008-04-11T05:44:00.008-05:00

Instead of having this hub turn into a photoblog I am now posting my digpics on the art dept, my other art blog. If you haven't done so already, please be sure to also visit Frank Gregory Studios to see my public art portfolio. Also, if you have tried to email me from this page, you will have been sorely disappointed, apparently I hadn't updated the listing in a long time... it is now accurate so fire one off, I may reply.

While you are here click on a few of the Google Ads to the right. Eventually, if enough of you do that they will send me a check for $100 and I will then raise a glass of a good single malt in your honor, and probably with more than one of you there to enjoy it.

....and more pics

2008-04-06T11:52:00.007-05:00

These were all shot this morning on a hike down to the Connecticut River below Poet's Seat Ridge in Greenfield, MA. I shot these RAW and messed around with them in Photoshop.

Some New Pics

2008-04-06T08:31:00.004-05:00

New Camera

2008-03-29T06:42:00.009-05:00

Those of you familiar with my paintings on this site will recognize this view. I bought a new digital camera last week. A Sony A100 that was being sold as an open box from Best Buy, even though it had zero clicks on it. It's not the best of the best, but it's still a remarkable picture making tool, and a steal for a 10 mp DSLR for $320. Anyway, I've been having a ball shooting with it. Shooting RAW files, manipulating them in the provided program, then finishing them in Photoshop is a surprisingly similar thought process to painting a picture. I don't do drastic things with the programs. My intent is to make the image look more like what I saw than the camera produced alone. These are some recent pics

We had a few inches of snow yesterday and it clung to everything. This is not a black and white photograph and only required a light unsharp mask in Photoshop.

These sumac seed heads are right outside my shop window. I've wanted to shoot this picture for years.

Mural In Progress

2008-03-28T06:33:00.005-05:00

and only 12120 hours later

2008-03-18T05:49:00.017-05:00

Put that way it really doesn't sound that long.... but it still is a year and a half. 505 days also sounds long. 727200 minutes, not so much and 43632000 seconds, shorter still. Regardless of how it all appears this is how long it has been since my last post on this blog according to this calculator.

I am amazed by the number of daily hits on this stale blog. It's not a huge amount. but it's consistent and so are the keywords. Other than people searching my name, it's always the same thing: Dibond dibond dibond....

Yes, new things have been in the works.... but this little public diary has had to take a backseat to daily life.

Since my last post I've made another large mural, several new paintings, and started another large mural and diorama. The murals and diorama are for the Roaring Brook Nature Center in Canton, CT. Ted Essystyn of Appleloosa Artworks and his talented pool of artist friends created this amazing place... the man is a Wacky Wood magician. The co-conspirators are Randy Gilman, a man who consistently designs the unexpected and can sculpt anything; Mike DiGiorgio, an amazing bird illustrator, created a wonderful winter exhibit and David Gloman, an artist I have admired for a long time, painted the vista view you first see when entering the building.

My contribution during the last phase was a compound mural that includes a barn door that, when open covers the middle third of the painting. The trick was to create an image that worked with the door open and with the door closed, kind of like the old MAD magazine fold-outs on the back cover. The subject was 19th century farming in Connecticut.

Right now I am working on a companion piece to this one. It starts on the wall perpendicular to this on the right. It also includes a small diorama and climbs the angled ceiling to the peak of the roofline. Pics will appear when its ready....

New Things are in the works....

2006-10-30T09:29:00.001-05:00

I am in the midst of re-arranging my internet activity. I have created a new online Public Art portfolio here. In short order the old website will be replaced with a new hub leading to all these various places. This site will continue as is.

A Long & Busy Summer

2006-09-02T19:23:00.000-05:00

May 7th was so long ago. An awful lot has happened this past summer, but alas not much art making. I have sent out proposal packages for several projects around the country, and have only received two rejections so far... fingers are crossed as the remaining projects are the most exciting ones. The most interesting one is probably the least likely for me to get as the budget is enormous and the locations appear to be mostly exterior. Every public artist worth their salt will want a piece of this one, and although I have some substantial projects under my belt I don’t have the portfolio depth that some of the great artists out there do.

Nevertheless, answering the RFP was a worthwhile exercise. As the project is for a new Courthouse, part of the application process was to answer this question in 75 words or less:

How might the theme of “justice” be incorporated in your work on the public art for this complex?

Answering this in 75 words or less is no easy task, but I feel good about my response:

Samuel Butler said, “Justice is my being allowed to do whatever I like. Injustice is whatever prevents my doing so.” If this is so, then civic justice is only as fair as the individuals it includes. Inclusivity and access lead to selflessness, impartiality, and ultimately justice. My artwork, being made of separate distinct pieces, illustrates the sum as being greater than its parts; that quite literally, the big picture is made of individuals working together.

Exactly 75 words.

I also have an exhibit of my plein air paintings at the Hosmer Gallery at the Forbes Library in Northampton MA for the month of September with another artist, Cynthia Thomas. The Forbes Library happens to also be the Calvin Coolidge Presidential Library. In their Presidential collection is a mechanical "horse" that Silent Cal would ride twice a day for exercise. Imagine a black Victorian inspired mechanical bull, or supermarket ride with an English saddle on it. The highlight of the collection is a full length Eagle feather Sioux Indian headdress. Several years ago, when this library was being renovated, part of the collection went to the Flynt Center at Historic Deerfield. They called me to create several object mounts for the exhibit, including this headress. It is a very impressive object.

Installed!

2006-05-07T08:11:00.000-05:00

I finished installing the piece for the New Hampshire Youth Development Center. The install went smoothly, very few surprises. I spent three days in Manchester, NH and got to see a little more of the town. They have a bustling downtown absolutely full of small ethnic restaraunts and Irish Pubs. I will have to visit again when I have a little more time to spend. Anyway, If you would like to see more installation pictures be sure to visit The Art Department.

The Art Department

2006-04-29T06:42:00.000-05:00

I have started posting the other Art related things I do on a new blog: The Art Department. I have completed Now & Then & Now & When, although it is not installed yet. Visit the site above to see images of it done.

Dibond Panels & a Sneek Peek

2006-04-27T21:08:00.000-05:00

Here is a sneek peek of the Now & Then & Now & When puzzle I am finishing up for the State of New Hampshire. The first shot is the cardboard template. The second picture is cutting the dibond, the third is my studio, and the fourth is an almost finished detail. I will be finishing this soon as I need to install it next week.

Apparantly if you google dibond panels this site is the first listing. As such, I feel I should provide a more thorough explanation of the proper preperation of dibond for painting in either oils or acrylics. Since it is so expensive you'll want to do it right, about $150 - $200 per 4' x 8' sheet of 3mm if you shop around. There is a best method beyond simply scuff sanding the surface and / or applying a coat or two of gesso. The surface of dibond is a slick polyurethane paint. Before priming the first step should be to wash it down with a solvent. Don't use a solvent that contains VOC's (Volital Organic Compounds such as hydrocarbons) as most acrylic primers including gesso are corrupted by these. Clean-Air Solvents , by definition, ahve very low VOC's. Acetone is a strong Clean- Air Solvent, but since acetone is the prefered solvent for polyurethanes, it should not be used on dibond. Isopropyl alcohol ( rubbing alcohol) is ideal. After washing down the panels they should be scuff sanded using a stiff (red) Scotch bright pad or an extra fine 200 grit or above sandpaper. They should be gone over with a tack cloth to remove all dust. Now they can be primed. The best primer for these panels is a product made by Sherwin-Williams called DTM bonding primer. This primer is designed for factory painted aluminum, such as aluminum siding. It's composition is very similar to gesso, with the addition of zinc and silica ( quartz and mica). It's really pricey, over $80 per gallon retail ( if you get in their system as a business you get the contractors rate, about $45 / gallon) I like to apply one good coat with a roller, and then after it dries, a top coat of acrylic gesso. That's it.... go forth and make art.

Salt Marsh Spring

2006-04-23T20:55:00.000-05:00

My kids April Vacation this year began last Monday, Patriots Day here in Massachusetts, otherwise known as Marathon Day in the Boston area. March and the first half of April have been a very busy time for me with a large public art commission form the State of New Hampshire, lots of picture framing and working at the Clark Art Institute once a week. For their vacation week, I took my kids to visit their Grandparents (my Mom and Dad) in Sandwich, on Cape Cod. My wife is finishing the Equine Studies program at the Stockbridge School at UMASS and needed to stay home to go to school.

I made two paintings while on the Cape, and shot many photos for reference paintings. The one above was made at Scorton Creek, a large saltmarsh creek that crosses route 6A. The tide was coming in as I started this and was fully in as I finished it. Even though Cape Cod has a rich artistic history and many galleries, the site of someone painting outside is still an oddity. The photo to the right was taken by Kevin Mingora and appeared in the Cape Cod Times on Wednesday. He saw me painting and came over to shoot some pics and ask a few questions. Granted, it was cloudy, cold and windy, but it makes me wonder whether there are as many plein air artists on the cape as I thought. A guy fishing came over and critiqued the piece... told me I forgot the dock barely visible about 3/4 of a mile away. This is about 12" x 24" oil on primed dibond.

I made this painting later in the week at the Murkwood Conservation Area in Sandwich. The Saltmarsh creek here is bordered and punctuated by large groves of Cedar, Pitch Pine and Scrub Oak and Tupelo trees. As with many saltmarshes in the United States, there are also a large amount of Phragmites, a tall pervasive grass that seems to be everywhere now, from highway medians to open fields. These crowd out native grasses and do harm to any species of insect, bird or animal that rely on the native plants. I was a little concerned about ticks standing out there in these tall grasses. The Cape is a prime breeding ground for deer ticks that carry Lyme disease and other just as nasty little demons. No red rings yet. At 18" x 22" this painting is fairly large for a plein air piece. I like the size and have prepared several more panels.

3's the Charm

2006-03-05T16:25:00.000-05:00

This is the view out of a northeast window in my studio, looking towards Power Square and Eastern Textile. The top image is a thinned oil wash underpainting. Lately these have been very vague sketches, if I have bothered to do one at all. With this painting, it was necessary to understand the space a little more thoroughly before applying opaque paint. I include it here because I really like it, and it is now buried forever under the final painting.

I have attempted this painting three times. The first was exactly one year ago this month, at the start of my re-introduction to oils. Parts of the painting turned out pretty good, but overall I felt as if I had bit off more than I could chew for an onsite painting. The second attempt was during the height of summer. Nothing at all came from it except a wasted canvas. With the river and woods paintings I can be free with the drawing to a certain degree as there is no likenesss to a tree. There is a side of me that really falls for the complexity of portaying complicated spaces, and another side that needs to be expressive and loose. The trick is to successfully walk the fence between draftsmanship and the Hail Mary pass. This is about 12 x 24 oil on dibond.

Morning Glare

2006-02-27T19:08:00.000-05:00

This morning I came to the shop earlier than usual and marveled at the orange light pouring in sideways directly through my windows. After working on a framing order for a while I became restless and went upstairs to the studio. Looking southeast at my well worn view placed the sun right in my eyes. I made this painting in about an hour squinting through the dusty old window glass. It is a very difficult painting to get a good photo of. I spent more time tweaking the image in photoshop to get it to look like the painting than I did painting it in the first place. It is 11 x 14 oil on matboard on 1/2 inch paper honeycomb.

Cold Farm Redux

2006-02-27T11:55:00.000-05:00

This is shaping up to be possibly the busiest February and March I have had in many years. The government contract maze has been successfully negotiated and I am in the midst of creating Now & Then & Now & When. New Hampshire wants the project completed by March 29, but as there was a delay on their end in signing the contract, (and I wasn't going to work without one) it is not likely that this date will hold. That said, I still want to get it done as soon as possible. At this point I am still going to shoot for March 29, but in all likelihood we are looking at the beginning to middle of April. On top of this, David Brewster has brought me a pile of new paintings to frame. The art moving company will be picking them up on the 19th of March.

Finding time to paint this month has been difficult to say the least. Fortunately I had a part of the day yesterday to make this little painting. The usual procedure is to make larger studio work from smaller onsite paintings. This is an exercise in subversive artistic behavior. I made this little 8" x 12" oil on Dibond directly from the larger 14" x 28" oil on canvas "Cold Farm" painted last winter. This is an experiment in painting directly on Dibond, prepared only by scuff sanding the factory applied polyester paint surface of the aluminum.

It felt and looked a lot like a monoprint, showing the white surface through all the unloaded brush strokes. If the paint adheres sufficiently well, I will be painting on this more often.

I made another painting looking south out my window this morning, directly into the sun. It needs a little fine tuning and will be up here later today.

Mixing Colors

2006-01-28T10:14:00.000-05:00

A week or so ago, I stopped on my way home from Williamstown to maybe make a painting. I went up the road off of route 2 towards Zoar gap and pulled off the road at an interesting bend in the river. Looking up a hillside, across the curve in the road and under the bridge at the river, the composition had a particular geometry and set up a visual tension that I really liked. I had brought along one of the panels I have been making, this time a mat board surfaced ½ inch honeycomb paper core about 20 x 24. This is large for onsite painting. The last one posted here was larger, but was done out the studio window, a very different experience than standing out in the snow with the wind and the logging trucks barreling by. Anyway, I worked for about an hour and ended up scraping it all off and going home feeling like I should get a real job.

Later that day I had a thought. When I paint outside, I spend so much time with certain housekeeping tasks that the time actually spent putting brush to canvas is not that long. Painting outside is a very different thing than working from a photo, or from a still life in the controlled environment in the studio. The light and weather can change so fast that a certain amount of haste is necessary. I am now trying a few ideas, one being to pre-mix all my colors down to a thinner consistency, and keeping them in small squirt bottles. Also, I made a palette carrier so I can pre-load my palette with straight tube paint and have both thinned and un-thinned available immediately, and be able to carry my loaded palette back to the studio for later touch ups and corrections. My palette is a fairly large piece of Plexiglas, about 20 x 30 with a few holes cut into the edge to hold plastic yogurt containers as turp pots.

It’s taken me a while with all the other things going on, but I finished pre-mixing and bottling the paint. I used a small amount of stand oil and thinner to achieve the right viscosity. Flipping the top and squirting a small amount of color on the palette as needed is so uncomplicated compared to grabbing stiff cold paste with the brush and mixing it down, only to find I didn’t mix down enough and have to do it again. Also the colors mix together much more readily and there is a lot less waste of paint. Mixing stiff paint can actually be enjoyable and meditative when working in the studio, with all the time in the world, but outside, I find it distracting and frustrating. As a test of sorts I did this painting of the (now very familiar) view from my window, using only the premixed colors. It is about 12” x 12” and really was a joy to paint.

Left Pine Right

2005-12-30T18:04:00.000-05:00

I can't remember the actual size, but this is near 24" x 34" oil on stretched canvas, and is the largest plein-air painting I've done yet. I have tried to make these larger onsite paintings before and always feel I am sacrificing the element of immediacy and intimacy that occur naturally with the smaller work. Those of you you have read the archives also know of my struggle to make larger studio work directly from the smaller paintings. There is a breakthrough of sorts with this one. Although there certainly are elements that trouble me, on the whole I believe I am heading in a good direction. I had the sash out of the studio window and the space heater cooking away at my feet, although it was only about 30 degrees out. This took about three hours. The first hour the sky was completely overcast. The second hour the sun broke through and was directly in my eyes, at which point I closed the window and worked from memory until the sun set enough to fall behind the trees on the right hand side. The last hour was spent again looking out the open window. The sky in this painting is somewhat more active than I was able to capture on my digital camera.

I hope to get outside next week sometime. Early last spring I went to a large beaver pond near the Millers River in Erving, MA and started a large painting on panel that I never finished. Back in the studio, I sanded it down with a random orbit sander after it dried. It must be a spectacular place under a blanket of snow. Its a short hike in, but shoudn't be too bad as the snow is not deep yet. It's about the same size as this one and I now feel ready to try it again.

Happy Holidays to the Frequents

2005-12-20T10:57:00.000-05:00

I don't want to scare anyone away from visiting, but I am curious about a few of you. Sitemeter is a free hit counter I use that also provides a small amount of information about each hit to a website. It's all very interesting, but far from George Bush nosing around. The free version I have provides the location of the ISP of the visitor, the ISP itself, the time and length of the visit, and the referring URL if any. I filter my own hits so they don't count as I check my site a few times a day, but if I didn't it would tell me I'm from Quincy MA even though I live 90 miles away as that is the location of my ISP, that my ISP is Verizon.net, that I visited for x number of minutes at x o'clock, and if I came to the site from, for example, a Google search, the referring URL would be the Google search page the visitor hit from. It's probably some cardinal sin of the blogging world, but I'm reaching out to you frequent visitors to drop me a line and say hi and maybe why your interested enough in my site that you visit at least once a day and sometimes several times a day. I appreciate your visits and it certainly keeps the pressure up to update this thing fairly regularly... and please don't be scared away, if you choose not to identify yourselves, that's ok to. I hope you all have a happy holiday season, especially you two in Hartlepool and Rochester.

Selected!

2005-12-16T12:54:00.000-05:00

Now & Then & Now & When has been selected! There is still a bureaucratic maze to negotiate before a contract is signed, but this is par for the course with any government contract. This will now be redesigned to include images from their collection of historic photos. I have seen several that are on display, and there really are some intriguing images.

They have also reissued the RFP for another site in the building that I was hoping to make a proposal for last time around, but ran out of time. This other site would be a stretch for me, as they are looking for a hanging kinetic sculpture, and I do not have any large scale pieces in my portfolio. I have made several small to medium scale, and simply for my own curiosity and enjoyment. I have also made proposals in other states and venues for such things but so far have not been selected for any 3d work. Look for my proposal soon.

Studio Tour and Elf Time

2005-12-06T08:46:00.000-05:00

The Mill Street Artworks studio tour held this past weekend was a resounding success. There was a consistant stream of people milling through my studio, which depending upon your route was the last stop on the tour. The group of us have yet to meet to discuss the results, but from a sheer numbers standpoint, there were many more people than I had expected. In fact I was ill prepared for the turnout. I sold four paintings, two wrapped and gone, one future sale because I did not want to let it go yet, and one time payment (yes I have a payment plan, I will encourage anyone who wants to buy artwork.) I know Greg Aubin did well with his pinch pots as his studio is right next to mine. I am sure we will do this again.

With Christmas coming it's time to wear the elf hat again. Green River Frameworks has become a fairly busy shop these days, so I probably will not be posting any new paintings until the new year. I am going to be taking in framing orders for Christmas right up until December 23 this year. It can be an awful lot of work, but sorely needed as business has been down significantly from last year. Many people are more concerned with heating their homes now than decorating them. I stock a lot of matboards and moldings making this possible. It can actually be fun too, as long as the work flows efficiently through the shop.

Whoa, did you see that?

2005-11-24T08:26:00.000-05:00

I think our eyes are connected to our brains along different neural pathways at different times. How and when our brains decide when to take the scenic route versus the express are probably determined by too many factors to even consider. We see something one moment, make an unconscious judgment about it and catalogue the experience in the brain, only to look at it again another day and see it again for the first time. It's like the opposite of Deja Vu. I am sure most of us experience this sometimes, but I suspect the practice of observational painting intensifies the phenomena and encourages it to happen more frequently. The experience can range from amusing to really unnerving sometimes. When confronted head-on it can make you question every assumption you've made about every aspect of your conscious reality. Many people avoid this discomfort at all costs and rely on their judgments, solidifying them in concrete and not budging in their opinions until forced from them. Some even go further and rely on others to tell them what they are seeing in the first place, avoiding the responsibility altogether.

I think most visual artists thrive on the experience. Some have been so awed by one single experience that they spend their entire careers dealing with it or forcing it to happen again and again. Others seek out the experience like shapeshifting experience junkies.

The reason I bring this up is that, in some sort of weird visual feedback loop, I have yet again discovered not one, but two paintings I made a while back and hated, only to see them now for the first time. I think what happened is the paintings didn't adequately represent the initial experience that inspired them, but somehow tapped into something that I didn't know was there in the first place. This has happened so frequently with this recent body of work that I am not going to destroy anymore paintings I don't like. River Blues, above was painted onsite last February and is 15" x 14" oil on ragboard on masonite. The one to the right is about 12" x 14" oil on birch and was completely invented over a period of several months.

...a few more things.

2005-11-19T16:54:00.000-05:00

I have donated the original painting of this illustration done for the Raid on Deerfield website to the annual Franklin County United Way Arts & Leisure Auction held each year at Eaglebrook School in Deerfield, MA. The auction is tonight and I am looking foreward to the event. The food is really wonderful, as is the collection of donated artwork. The original is about 22" x 30" acrylic on watercolor paper. Hopefully someone will bid on it for the Pocumtuc Valley Memorial Association to own it themselves.

The other news is our neighborhood art open studio event that is comeing up this December 3 and 4. We have begun calling the neighborhood Mill Street Art Works. There are quite a few art studios spread around Greenfield, but there is a growing concentration of them in this area, so with the ArtSpace Community Art Center we are trying this to see what happens. We could get 5 people, we could get 50. who knows? The neighboring town of Turners Falls is also hosting an art event that Saturday, December3, their Arts & Icicles studio tour event. Having done the murals at the Great Falls Discovery Center, I am an honorary Turners Falls artist, although I work in Greenfield. Consequently I am going to be at the museum Saturday from 10:00 - 1:30 to answer any questions regarding my work there. Our event in Greenfield starts at 1:00 so I will be a little late, although Karen Gaudette, a really wonderful artist has graciously volunteered to sit in my studio and frameshop for the first bit until I arrive. She will have some of her work there too.

The other information is that Greg Aubin of the Greenfield Optimist website has linked to this blog and I wouldf just like to say thank you. Greg is a potter who makes pinch pots in our studio building and will also be taking part in the open studio event.

Now & Then & Now & When

2005-11-19T14:34:00.000-05:00

Now that the deadline for submissions has ended, I think it's probably ok to post my proposal. It's a little risky emotionally as I could very well be turned down and this blog will make the rejection a very public one. Regardless, I feel good about this proposal and would very much like to see this made at full scale. As I said in the previous post, this will be for a youth detention facility in New Hampshire, specifically the Dining Hall. Here is the text of my proposal statement:

Statement

The artwork I am proposing for the Dining Hall, Now & Then & Now & When will be a painted mural on Dibond aluminum panels that are cut into silhouettes of recognizable shapes and assembled jigsaw fashion on the wall. The open edged, unfinished jigsaw puzzle is a visual metaphor designed for the youth residents to symbolically connect to their present through it’s past, so they can move towards a positive future. In the submitted proposal painting the images drawn by the puzzle edges are taken from a variety of sources. If accepted, the piece will be redesigned to include silhouette images from historic photograph collection of the Youth Development Center itself, as well as some of the images already included. The interest in the history of the YDC by the youth residents speaks to a desire to connect to a lineage that, on a basic level, has experienced what they are going through. Simply recognizing that their troubles are not unique, that people have gone through similar experiences before and that time moves on regardless of their choices, is powerful stuff indeed, and provides ample fodder for reflection on positive growth.

On a purely formal level the jigsaw puzzle theme lends itself well to the dining hall space. The large simple line drawings are understandable and compelling when seen from a distance, yet the painting offers the viewer a cohesive image behind the puzzle edges. This unifying image, an infinite late day sky, is striking from a distance, emphasizes the passage of time, and again gives pause for reflection. This whole image, being made up of separate but vitally important parts, symbolizes team work and a balancing of independence with interdependence.

4mm Dibond is an extremely durable archival, exterior grade panel consisting of two thin sheets of aluminum with a polyethylene core. The surface will be abraded and primed with three coats of acrylic gesso and painted with artist’s grade acrylics. The painting will then be varnished with a satin MSA (mineral spirit acrylic) varnish. The MSA varnish provides an opposing solvent layer that can be removed and reapplied if damaged without affecting the paint surface underneath. The installation of the artwork will be permanent and will require two steps. First an interim layer of plywood will be cut into the shapes of the individual pieces with edges beveled towards the back. These interim panels will then be screwed to the cinderblock wall using adequately sized molly screws. The Dibond panels will then be attached to the surface of the interim panels using construction grade contact cement or a two part epoxy adhesive.

Now & Then & Now & When is tranquil yet engaging, emphasizes growth, change and possibility and will also be a lot of fun to look at again and again. This piece will not only be decoration, but can exist as a learning tool and as a symbol to help define a rehabilitative culture that can achieve the combined hopes and dreams of the residents and the YDC.

So there you have it. Its a total crapshoot, but this is what I do. I'll keep you posted as to the outcome.

Yes, its been a while.

2005-11-03T07:20:00.000-05:00

Yes, its been a while. Life marches on and sometimes the best of intentions fall by the wayside, like the daily or even weekly making of art. My recent downturn in artmaking began with a flood at my studios building in mid October. No, my studio was not underwater, thank God, but the Green River was flowing through the basement space below me, completely submerging the oil burner. The river crested its banks and was flowing a few feet deep against the building. It's been cold, but this week hasn't been too bad. Supposedly there will be a new oil burner installed next week. I hope so, I am a little concerned about all the space heaters plugged in around the building. There was an upholsterer in the basement who moved out two weeks before the flood... one lucky man. I was about to take over the space to expand my frameshop. I had hoped to make it my woodshop and move all my moulding and woodworking tools down there... Another lucky man. Needless to say, I am now making new plans.

I have also been putting together proposals for a few Public Art Projects that have appeared. Several states have Percent-For-Art laws, where a small percentage of the total construction costs of any publicly funded construction project has to go to the purchase of art. Not only do public spaces benefit by getting artwork, but these projects generate an income stream that spreads from the artist to every supplier and subcontractor it takes to build and install the piece. There are typically two ways that states put projects out to bid, RFP (Request for Proposals) and RFQ (Requests for Qualifications). In an RFQ the organization reviews an artists previous work and selects finalists to come up with genuine proposals. This is good because it can be a significant amount of work to design a site specific piece of art, and if you have a one in three
chance, it becomes worthwhile. I told myself earlier this year that I was not going to enter any more competitions that require design up front, the RFP, because spending hours and hours of work to prepare a design that will be one in fifty or one in a hundred, just isn't worth it. These are two paintings from RFP proposals that were rejected The top one was a proposal for a mural in a school in Fairbanks, Alaska of the confluence of the Chena and Tanana Rivers. This painting is about 5" x 12" acrylic on paper. The mural would have been 5' x 12' had it been chosen. The second one is a painting of a Robin on plexilgas actual size and cut out. This was also for a school in Alaska, where I had proposed making an atrium sculpture of all of the migratory birds in the area hung in the space as a flock. Both of these RFPs requested a subject that would refer to summer and daylight, as the winters are so long and dark. Anyway, I have quite a collection of polite rejection letters, but it is all a numbers game. The more you send out the better chance of being chosen for one or two.

So, I am again not taking my own advice and I am busily creating yet another proposal, this time for a New Hampshire youth detention facility. We shall see.

Grace

2005-10-12T22:10:00.000-05:00

I made this drawing of my 12 year old daughter Grace this evening. This is in China marker (grease pencil) on Canson 14" x 17" drawing paper and took about a half hour. I have not made many drawings of my kids simply because they have not been able to hold still long enough for anything beyond simple sketches. Now that Grace is a little older she can concentrate long enough for an extended drawing, at least while watching a movie. You'd never know she is watching Shrek 2 for the umpteenth time by the look on her face. I worked on her hair, clothes and darkening certain areas when she laughed out loud, which was often. Grace is an artist herself and is quite good at drawing horses. She has also really taken to her digital camera and has produced some really wonderful photographs. We have talked about putting up a photoblog of her work, and probably will soon. I am going to try to draw our other daughter tomorrow night.... at ten years old it might be more of a challenge to hold still...

Early October

2005-10-04T15:57:00.000-05:00

September went by so fast that I missed painting my monthly River View. October 4 will have to be close enough. There is a freedom that comes with familiarity. I know this scene so intimately now that I can paint it without any fear or much forethought. It is more of a conversation with a friend than an introduction and exploration. There is just a hint of color on some of the leaves. The sumacs are the first to turn and several are very red already, while most of the grasses are now bleached and dry, mixed with some leathery greens. Everything that will seed has done so and has a woody fibrous look to it, while the air is clearer yet still quite warm, at least for the past few days. This painting took a little over an hour this afternoon and is 15" x 13" oil on canvas on gatorboard.

...and now for something completely different:

2005-09-30T16:30:00.000-05:00

Memorial Hall Museum in Deerfield, Massachusetts distributed old school chairs to over forty local artists to decorate as they see fit. These chairs are going to be auctioned October 23, 2005 to benefit the museum. I took two chairs and made this hybrid that I call School's Out. The springs are fairly strong. I weigh 175 lbs and I just compress the chair to the bottom, but my kids float a few inches off the stops. The lower seat was sanded and dyed a deep blue, while the back is dyed a deep green and both are lacquered. The frame is steel sprayed with a black enamel. The springs are new and are very securely attached. The balls on the feet are real, and yes, it is a lot of fun to sit on. If you are at all interested in leaving a bid I am sure you could email them about it from their site.

Male & Female & Winslow & Neil

2005-09-26T21:29:00.000-05:00

Tonight we had a male model at the open figure session. I hadn't realized how trained I had become at drawing the female nude. Specifically how I looked for spatial clues based upon anatomy, and relied upon visual devices that just were not happening with a man, like the importance of the curve of a woman's breasts to guide my drawing of the rest of the figure. It showed me I am as guilty as anyone of the visual assumptions I spoke of in the last post.

He was a decent enough model, although he did noticeably drift in the long poses... The corner of an arm that wasn't visible is there the next time you look, that sort of thing.

Lately this blog has become more of a figure drawing studio than a plein-air place as it started. More than likely I will be posting some more plein air work soon, who knows, maybe with a figure or two. One of the many things I do to carve out a living is to occasionally work as a freelance museum preparator. Tomorrow I am going to work at the Clark Art Institute helping to hang an exhibit of their Winslow Homer collection. Homer typically painted the landscape with the figure, and knowing myself, I will probably drive home full of ideas. Although this is a very nineteenth century thing to do, it is not unheard of in contemporary art. One of my favorite contemporary painters is Neil Welliver, who not only painted the landscape, but early on at least included the nude. Neil Welliver died this past April, and was a major influence on my becoming a landscape painter. Another great collection of his work on the web is here. Be sure to scroll through all three painting galleries.

A Leap of Faith.

2005-09-19T22:44:00.000-05:00

Drawing from life is an under-valued mental excersise. There was a time in this country when everyone who went to secondary school received training in the act of drawing, and could draw well.... yes... everyone. I don't bring this up to rant about the state of education in America today. I have carefully avoided the political in this blog as there are plenty of people covering those bases already, half of which I agree with. My point is that the act of drawing can be taught and more importantly it has real life value. What is the value? Drawing is a way to excersize visual acuity, visual memory and a practical lesson in not taking anything for granted. It teaches how to see what is really there, not what you think or wish were there. In other words, it teaches how to see, not just how to look. What is the difference? To See is to Look on purpose. Most people have no idea what they are seeing at any given moment. We live in a world of our own making, and don't even know that it is a fabrication. We are now taught at an early age that all tree trunks are brown and roads are black. It takes a genuine leap of faith to trust your eyes over your brain, so look again.

I did these drawings tonight at the figure drawing session. They are in bistre and sepia conte, and black compressed charcoal on Strathmore 18" x 24" drawing paper. This model was young and had an air of vulnerability about her, despite the tattoos I chose not to draw. She held three two minute poses, three five minute poses, three ten minute poses, two twenty and one fifty minute pose. She was very good and did not strike any awkward or contrived poses. The first one is a twenty minute and the second is the fifty.

...go figure

2005-09-13T07:58:00.000-05:00

If you visit my old website linked at the right, you'll see that in the recent past much of my work has tended toward fine detail, especially in the murals. I can easily get lost in it and, satisfying as the experience can be, my connection to the end product is ultimately about "skill" and patience, not raw experience and emotion. Recently, I have been working very hard at loosening up a bit, giving the medium itself a longer leash and letting it romp in the grass, so to speak. There is an element of surprise every time: sometimes good, sometimes not so good; sometimes edifying, sometimes disturbing. It's an overly used sentiment, but works created this way are more like "children" in that they come from the parent, but have their own personalities which sometimes make us proud, and at other times make us cringe. I made this painting last night at the open figure session. I find myself cringing, but unable to stop looking at it either... any thoughts out there?

Studio Painting

2005-09-07T08:37:00.000-05:00

I made this painting, Main & Federal, last night. It is about 8" x 24"oil on birch veneer plywood. Creating a realist painting from a photograph shouldn't be a compromise. The artist has two choices, make a painting of the photograph, or use it as just another tool. Photographs do a fine job of providing certain visual information, particularly detail and texture. Color is more problematic as is value, the range of lights to darks. The real test for the artist who wants to use a photo rather than copy it is to be able to ignore the photograph while looking at it.

Photography as an art form can manipulate the viewer in ways that painting cannot. A photograph, as a mechanically produced image, has a detached quality that we rightly or wrongly trust more than images that have been filtered through the head of a fallible human. Most people will judge a realist drawing or painting by how much it looks like a photograph. Of course all artists, including photographers bring the full weight of their raw emotions, prejudices, and personal history to the images they make, whether they know it or not. We certainly can admire and enjoy artful nude photography, but the experience is very different than viewing a well made figure drawing or painting. The photo has a certain kind of immediacy because we trust it to be honest, even though we know it could be manipulated. More to the point though, and probably to the chagrin of most photographers, most photographs can be admired on one level without too much effort from the viewer. What then do we get from a drawing of a photograph? An admiration of the artists skill? An admiration of the photographers skill? Should a realist drawing or painting really judged by how much it looks like a photograph?

A painting is a very different thing than a photograph, and ultimately a picture that is painted conscious of this fact is always going to take more effort on the part of the viewer. A painting from a photograph is also a very different thing than a painting from life. When I work from photographs, which is only when necessary, I tend to paint more loosely and with bigger gestural strokes than when I am painting from life. This may be an over reaction to being disconnected from the place depicted, but I don't think so. I want to use photos as just another tool to pull all my human fallibility, raw emotions, prejudices, and personal history out of my head and pour them onto the canvas.

Life Drawing

2005-08-29T22:32:00.000-05:00

This coming October I am teaching a four session life drawing class at the Artspace Community Arts Center here in Greenfield, MA. Like I said in a previous post, I used to draw all the time but have let the practice lapse some. Seeing as I am going to be teaching it soon, I felt it was a good idea to do some life drawing again, so this evening I took part in the walk-in sessions at my old place place of employment, The Guild Art Centre in Northampton, and here are the results:

This model was very good. It is a very difficult thing to hold still for any length of time, and surprisingly draining physically . She started with several five minute poses and worked up to a few twenty minute and a fifty minute pose. These drawings are all about 20" x 30" charcoal, sepia and white conte crayon, and graphite on blue paper.

I haven't taken part in a life drawing group in many years. I have made many life drawings of my wife, last when she was pregnant with our first daughter twelve years ago. I drew her when she was nine months pregnant as she sat in the tub to get some relief. I dug out all the old drawings and was pleasantly surprised at the quality. Unfortunately for you, I was told in no uncertain terms that these drawings are not for public consumption. Most are pretty tame, although there are some she would rather see destroyed. Anyway, I am going to take part in this open session group until my class starts in October, so you should see more weekly.

Hot Summer Night

2005-08-24T10:48:00.000-05:00

I sat in my open garage door for few hours last night working on this painting. I sat low to the ground in a small folding chair to get a child's eye view. I set up the Coleman Lantern behind me and off to one side so it wouldn't light the house. I also had a small LED flashlight to check certain colors with. Our cats thought I was nuts, as I am sure the neighbors did too. While I was working a small skunk rustled out of the privet hedge and ambled towards Gabriella, our fat female cat. She looked up and resumed washing her paw, not even giving him a second thought. I stamped my feet and he waddled away. A few days earlier, Cosmo, the big male, walked right up to a skunk in the driveway and rolled on his back purring at it.... he's led a pretty sheltered life. I grabbed the hose and blasted the skunk, who stood there taking it for a moment before giving up and going away. Anyway, this painting is 16" x 15" oil on ragboard mounted to plywood.

Back From Maine

2005-08-16T09:18:00.000-05:00

Although the whole area is magnificent, there are two places I enjoy most near Pemaquid Point. One is Rachel Carson Salt Pond, a fairly large tide pool managed and protected by the Nature Conservancy, and the other is a small area known as Back Cove, a rocky coastal cove that is a hidden gem of a place. Back Cove is a working commercial fishing and lobstering dock, with shanty’s built on pilings off of the rocky shore, which is easier to find by boat than by car. The end of Back Cove is small tidal pond that was a holding area years ago for lobsters after they were caught. Today lobstering is regulated to a degree that the amount harvested and steady demand rule out the holding of any lobsters. There is a small footbridge between the cove itself and the tidal pond, where my daughters joined local kids fishing for crabs and other sea creatures, pulling in some fairly large ones using chicken as bait. Emi even pointed out a baby lobster to us that was no more than four inches long, crawling across the bottom. Nearly every square inch of these waters here and at Salt Pond are alive with something: seaweeds, algae, crabs, lobster, starfish, snails, and fish. It’s amazing how abundant it all is. The water here also contains phosphorescent algae that, when disturbed at night, glow an eerie green, something that has to be seen to be believed. Andrew Wyeth made a painting of lobsterman pulling in traps at night that featured these algae, a highly illegal activity even then. (I have looked high and wide for an image of this painting online, if anyone else can find it please let me know.)

I made this painting just outside of the Salt Pond looking north. It is 12 ½” x 14“ oil on canvas mounted to Gator Board and took about an hour. I would have worked on it a little longer, but the tide came in very fast and covered all the ochre colored seaweed covered rocks.

New Harbor, Maine

2005-08-12T08:07:00.000-05:00

We are off to New Harbor Maine today for an extra long weekend. We have visited my wife's Uncle Ron a few times in the past, driving the five hours in a car with my wife, my two young daughters, my mother-in-law, and me. (Insert sympathy here).

The drive can be a little edgy at times, but the visit has always been great. Ron Fletcher is an artist and framer also, so we always have plenty to talk about. New Harbor is in a very scenic part of Maine, with classic coastal views, lobster boats, and a fantastic tide pool where we always spend time looking at all sorts of creatures. I will write more about it when I get back.
The pictures are of my travel paint setup. I made the easel/palette box in my shop, and modified a lightweight tripod to hold the weight. I plan on doing a painting or two, so I should have something new to post by Tuesday.

Sunday Morning 8 am

2005-08-08T08:47:00.000-05:00

I used to draw all the time. It has been a very long time since I drew in pencil, and even longer since I have done a portrait. Yesterday morning I came downstairs and Emi was on the computer, Grace had slept at a friends house and wasn't home, and my wife was reading a book. We stopped getting the Sunday paper delivered a while ago, and I did not feel like starting a book. I got my coffee and tried to interrupt Terry's reading for a conversation....no good. I drank my coffee and waited for the computer.... and waited... and waited. Emi was doing a math fraction/decimal game on the National Geographic website, so I couldn't very well ask her to stop. I mean, if she were still playing the Captain Underpants game where skateboarders shoot spitballs at the elderly on the sidewalk, I would have no problem insisting upon my turn at the computer. Grace had left her sketchbook in my truck for a few days, so I went and got it and did this drawing of Terry reading. I forgot how much fun drawing can be.

Ruth Bernard

2005-08-05T11:18:00.000-05:00

There is another artist friend that I forgot to mention in the last post. Ruth Bernard is the reason Dik and I are back in touch with each other. She was also a MassArt classmate and is a wonderful painter. She's having a show in Northampton, MA at the Oxbow Gallery. I hadn’t seen her in about twenty years, and I went to the opening. Really great paintings, very thick and rich, imagine Soutine with strong drawing. We spent the next day together here at my studio in Greenfield.

Summer Window South: Hazy, Hot & Humid

2005-08-04T13:57:00.000-05:00

I painted this just a few hours ago. It took most of the morning, although I went back for about ten minutes or so after lunch to touch up a few areas. I almost went outside to paint this morning, but I figured I should be here in my shop just in case any framing customers came in or called. A good customer (and great painter) did call about framing some work he sold, so besides making another window painting, it was worthwhile to stay here. David Brewster began bringing me his work to frame two years ago, and I have to say he was a force in my return to easel painting. His paintings are so lush, fluid and intuitive that it is hard to be a painter and not want to paint when you see them. I am also back in touch with Dik Liu, another friend and incredible painter who's skill and focus has always been an inspiration. This painting is slightly more literal and more accurately drawn than the last window piece.

I have been asked about my surfaces, so I have included this detail. The painting is 15 1/2" x 20" and has as small a stroke as I generally get these days, in fact maybe smaller.

Slides...are so.... 20th century.

2005-08-01T07:41:00.000-05:00

I hate taking slides of my artwork. I never liked it even when there were no other options. Most places that I send my work to for proposals, grants, galleries, etc. will accept digital images on a CD, but not all. My guess is that this number is determined by the cost of digital projectors, and as they come down in price, slides will disappear into being an ART medium only. I needed fifteen slides of my recent work, the paintings I have been posting here. Yes, I could have hired a pro, and in hind-sight, I should have. I went through three rolls and 150 miles on my truck driving back and forth to the developer, before I got adequate images. For years I shot tungsten film to great results, this time, something must have gone wrong with my bulbs- every image was PURPLE. Deadline looming, I shot daylight ektachrome.... In the shade ( bad mistake) every slide was BLUE. Deadline for the US mail passed, I shot daylight again.. In the sun. Adequate images, but now I have to drive 300 miles today to deliver the package by hand. Oh well, I am bringing my easel and paint and just may stop somewhere to salvage some of the trip...

Distant Hills

2005-07-24T07:11:00.000-05:00

I did not paint yesterday. I worked on rebuilding my back porch, did some yard work, and then went to a cook-out at a friends house.

I did find this painting I made a couple of weeks ago and forgot to post in my earlier updates, which apparantly are now archived. I was looking at real estate listings online and found this property about a half hour from my home. It has five acres, a genuine antique cape, and an enormous barn already decked out as an artists studio. Unfortunately it is out of our price range, but it was interesting enough to check out, (with easel of course).

Makin' the Bacon...

2005-07-21T15:50:00.000-05:00

As much as I would like to have been painting these past couple of days, duty calls. This is the slow time of year for my frameshop, but alas, slow doesn't mean stopped and a backlog has built up behind the gate. Also, I have been finishing an illustration job I took on a while ago. I created three illustrations and I am finishing a fourth for the Raid on Deerfield web museum.
The bulk of the illustrations were done by the unbelievably talented illustrator Francis Back. My four contributions are in the Founding New Communities section where I am doing all but the Montreal image. It really is a marvelous website and has recently won two web museum awards. I encourage all of you to visit. Anyway, back to the drawing board for now, but back to the easel this weekend.... Thanks again for looking.

Frank

Muggy & Muddy

2005-07-19T19:40:00.000-05:00

The past several days have been incredibly muggy, with pockets of torrential rains. It was pouring at the barn where my wife and kids were, but not a drop here, and then vice-versa. So much rain fell yesterday that the Green River was as high as spring snow melt, but brown. In the time that I was looking at it I saw many large branches, two volleyballs, several coffee cups, and a Styrofoam cooler go by. Today the humidity was unbearable and the river had mellowed to greenish ochre. I did this painting in two hours this afternoon. It is about 18" x 24" oil on canvas on birch.

True Magicians

2005-07-14T21:52:00.000-05:00

Contemporary Plein-air painting and contemporary Blues music have a lot in common. Both have a wide appeal to a large and diverse audience. Both also have identifiable formats and loose sets of boundaries that are deceptively simple and direct. Yet despite that simplicity, both are extremely difficult to master, and not many do. Like the Blues, Plein-air painting is a very democratic art form. It is not pompous or pretentious, it does not exclude anyone with its form or vocabulary, and there is little if anything preachy about it. And also like a good blues song, when it all comes together a great plein-air painting is nothing short of magic.

A plein-air painting is a conversation of sorts; it is a sharing of an experience in as direct a way as possible. The scene goes in the eye of the artist, rolls around in the head a bit and then goes right out the hand onto the canvas. The magic occurs when the sum of the experience results in a painting that equals more than its parts, and includes a universal truth, an understanding, or genuine emotion.

We've all seen them, those magical paintings. What is it that makes these paintings work? Whether Plein Air landscapes or huge abstract pourings, they all have one thing in common. They have a quality that we recognize, but can't adequately describe in words. They do more than transport us into the head of the artist. These paintings validate our consciousness; they verify our experiences and emotions. For those that are open to the experience, seeing their own personal emotions, or observations on display can sometimes be very unsettling, and even cause some to deny the artwork its magic and the artist his skill. Although truly poignant plein-air paintings will more often than not bring a whispered, "YES" than a disturbed denial, they are no less powerful because of it. Sober cityscapes or desolate industrial views are not often "pretty", but their honesty can still affirm an experience and elicit a profound response.

Although a certain level of realist skill is often admired, it isn't solely the representational qualities that make a painting magical, otherwise only tightly rendered and highly detailed pictures would have it. In fact it can sometimes be as simple as a relationship of colors or values that will move the viewer. The experience can be like catching an elusive and reminiscent scent in the air. Before you know what has happened, you're transported somewhere else. When this happens it is sometimes unnerving, but it's always interesting.

Can there be a formula to create such artwork? There may be, but if so it is not something that can be taught directly or copied honestly, because any formula is the result of the individual artist's hand, an awful lot of paint, canvas, time and very hard work. To make such paintings it is important to be honest with yourself, absolutely fearless, ruthless with your intent, and equally open to both utter joy and intense pain. However hard we try, these are not things anyone is capable of feeling all the time. Still, when it all comes together, it is truly magic, and worth all the effort.

copyright 2005 Frank Gregory. All images and text on this blog are copyright protected. Just ask first , I 'm easy...

...one more thing...

2005-07-13T19:07:00.000-05:00

... sitemeter tells me that people are logging on here, some for a significant amount of time, yet to date I have one reply. Please let me know what you are thinking... thanks in advance.

Frank

LOOK OUT!

2005-07-13T18:54:00.000-05:00

Here is the updated painting, for the record. OK maybe I was a little harsh this morning, but I slept pretty badly last night. This painting and the subsequent thoughts kept me tossing and turning.

This afternoon I dug out this painting I did over the winter. Although it's done inside I consider it a plein-air painting. Again, there is much I don't like about it, but I found the concept interesting enough to do another...

... there is much I do like about this one... maybe a concept for larger studio work...

Response Ability

2005-07-13T08:47:00.000-05:00

That damn studio painting has been irritating me since I painted it. I worked on it some more yesterday, simplified a few passages, reworked the water, and still I feel like it's just too much of a lie. I don't know what I was expecting, like I said, this is the first studio painting I've done in a long while. Responding to the world around me is one thing, then to go ahead and copy to the response just seems dishonest.

Of course, I can always impose myself on the work and make detailed and accurate paintings in the vein of my mural work at the Great Falls Discovery Center. I have done a few since completeing the project. Those are not that difficult because I have developed a formula for making the work, and I know just what the paintings will look like before I even begin them. If painting still has any meaning as ART then it has to happen honestly and without pretense, doesn't it? Otherwise it becomes just another learned craft, like picture framing or upholstery.

It's the height of summer, I've got a good 3 to 4 months left of great plein-air weather, after which it will be a real chore to perform. For the time being I am going to work directly from nature, and then reintroduce myself to the studio easel when it gets too cold. At least I now know that the studio work, if I am truly a passenger along for the ride, has to be something other than copying.

Studio Painting

2005-07-11T20:10:00.000-05:00

Today I finished this studio version of the River painting I did onsite last week. This is 28" x 42 ". It is fairly loose, with big brush strokes.

Studio

2005-07-11T07:37:00.000-05:00

This is the view I have been painting from the studio window.

That window is the one on the left. The River's Hillside series is from the window on the right.

I have been working on the two studio paintings you see started here. It has been a very long time since I have done larger studio paintings in oils. The mural work I had been working on for the US Fish & Wildlife Service was all done in acrylic. I worked very hard to make the acrylics look like oils. It has been harder to switch back to oils than I thought it would be. There is an immediacy to oils that just isn't there in acrylic. That immediacy is what makes the medium so intuitive and insistant. You need to respect the paint and give it it's due. Only then will it allow you along for the ride and take you somewhere you want to go.

OK, now I am up to date....

2005-07-09T07:26:00.000-05:00

This is the view from another studio window, lest you think my studio is in a completely bucolic setting... 12" x 16" oil on ragboard on dibond.

I painted this on a Saturday on the Connecticut River, just north of the French King Bridge in Gill, Massachusetts. It was 95 degrees out, 100 % humidity and buggy. I left there with my head spinning from the heat, sweat pouring into my eyes, a nasty bug bite on my wrist, and potential poison ivy on my ankles from a pit stop in the woods. I had such a good time I went back on the equally oppresive Sunday to finish it. 14" x 28" oil on stretched canvas.

OK now I am up to date. Nothing new to post yet, although I have two larger studio pieces I am working on, one based loosely on this painting. Check back often for updates, or if you would like to be notified of a new post just drop me an email and I'll be glad to put you on the list. Thanks for looking.

A short Bio...

2005-07-08T21:56:00.000-05:00

After graduating from college in 1985 with a degree in painting, Frank spent several years painting houses and working as a picture framer, making paintings at nights and on weekends. A native of New England and an avid outdoorsman, Frank spent those years painting outside in all seasons working from the coast to the mountains. For two months in 1986, he backpacked 350 miles of the Appalachian Trail through the mountains of New Hampshire and Vermont. Carrying his oil painting equipment and the bare necessities in a fifty pound backpack, he created fifteen paintings en route. A small home-made easel/box that could also store three wet paintings enabled Frank to continue on his way and mail the work home as it dried.

Years later his interest shifted to creating small abstract paintings, which he would work on several at one time. After painting literally hundreds of these small pieces, the work ultimately evolved into being night images of cities and county fairs, depicting artificial light and mysterious silhouettes. These paintings sharpened his sensitivity for color and light and pushed further his ability to portray subtle emotion and atmosphere within the landscape format.

From 2000 through 2003 Frank used all the skills and vision he developed through plein-air landscape painting in combination with the shear scale and physical demands of house painting to create the murals for the Great Falls Discovery Center, a US Fish & Wildlife Nature Center in Turners Falls, Massachusetts. Eleven murals totaling 2000 square feet depicting various habitats along the Connecticut River Watershed from the Canadian border to Long Island Sound were created for the space.

In 2002, Frank received a percent-for-art commission from the state of Florida to create a piece of public art for the Palm Beach County Health Department 's new building in West Palm Beach.

There he created two large "puzzle" paintings depicting the city of West Palm Beach and a quiet nearly empty beach, cut into silhouettes of recognizable shapes, surrounded by other paintings shaped like the continents.

Currently, Frank is again focusing on his first love, plein-air painting of the New England landscape. The experience of painting 2000 square feet of highly accurate habitat murals taught him many things about painting the landscape that he is now using in his on site landscape paintings.

Frank lives in Greenfield, Massachusetts with his wife and their two daughters. Frank Gregory Studios occupies two floors of an old mill building on the Green River where he also operates Green River Frameworks, a fully equipped custom frame and woodworking shop. When he is not outside painting the landscape or framing someone elses artwork he is working on his old house, playing guitar, helping with homework or listening to his family's horse riding stories.