64 posts tagged “fine art”

Quail Diaries: learning to skate

Nov 8, 2009
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This is another commission I am working on for a local park. Eventually it will consist of a mated pair of Gambel's Quail on skates with a tower of acrobatic chicks balanced on their backs. Silly? Yes. But it should be pretty keen. There will be another male quail with one or two chicks skating at the opposite end of the park.
This quail may undergo a gender change (involving the removal of the topknot feather). I'm still considering...

Bonneville Cutthroat II: finished!

Aug 3, 2009
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Bonneville Cutthroat II

The fish are schooling in the median of 2100S / 1300 East on the eastern border of Sugar House in Salt Lake City. The prior school of fish swim toward this group three blocks to the West. I resolved issues of manipulating the mold with the foundry, and this group is more dynamic than the first- which is good since they are smack in the middle of traffic and swimming toward the pond in Sugar House park. They are placed at car window height, and the L turn lane gets a nice slow drive past them- the City is already getting positive feedback.

Bonneville Cutthroat II: front view

Bonneville Cutthroat II: with semi

Bonneville Cutthroat: in-progress

May 13, 2009
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Bonneville II: in-progress, side

Bonneville II: in-progress- front

Bonneville II: in-progress, rear

Bonneville II: in-progress, detail

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Foundry day. All the fish cast out clean and were reassembled nicely. Today's job was to position them to school through the hoops. Each fish needs at least two points of contact, either with the hoop or with another fish. After a few hours of tack-welding, snapping the weld and adjusting, re welding, and fussing about- they came together into two nice groupings. A group of three swimming tightly together through a descending rapid, and a group of two swimming level and further apart. The lead fish is slightly buoyant- as if rising toward the surface, to contrast with the prior commission further down the road where the lead fish is diving toward a "splash" on the ground alluding to river diverted underground.

Entropy Bale III: finished

Apr 22, 2009
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Entropy Bale III: finished

I may be done. Hard to say. Just because there are some areas that I'm unsure of doesn't mean that I should work them more.

Entropy Bale I: finished

This one was worked more while working on Bale II. The digital process has really gutted them both of life and color (Bale II below is closer than the two above)- On that note, I submitted Entropy Bale II & Elizabeth with Heavy Ball to a state show- the museum curator was excited to see E w/ Ball and hoped it would get in. Neither piece was accepted, so I'll drive down tomorrow and pick them up.

Entropy Bale: day 5

Entropy Bale III: next carcinoma

Apr 16, 2009
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The background has taken most of my attention so far. Today moved from the foreground into the bale. I started with too small of a brush and lost my sense of mass, then backed up with a larger brush and started pushing around with the shadow areas- getting just far enough to leave a nice mess.

Entropy Bale III: back to bale

Entropy Bale III: background

Entropy Bale III: blocked in

Lake Effect: in-progress

Mar 30, 2009
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Lake Effect Storm

Another snowy weekend here in SLC, and E & I spent Sunday afternoon going back into this collage. This piece was begun last fall. It is massive in comparison to even the largest prior collage works of this type. The size difference opens the time commitment from an evening or two, to a whole different idea of process.

Entropy Bale II: nearly finished

Mar 27, 2009
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Entropy Bale: day 5

Some day a painting will look on the post as it does in the studio- lemon yellows disappear, as well all the complex layering. The day needed to be much brighter, and the shorn hayfield seem nearly too bright to look at. This helps emphasize the swirling depths of hay.
I didn't work on this yesterday, or the day before really- as my sister flew in from Sacramento to pick up my Dad's truck. It is the lovely Ford F-250 V-10 that effortlessly hauled the old Mustang down from Montana. Now it is off to it's new life as a California truck- it snowed yesterday and the day before; the last snow the truck will ever see. A bit too much truck for hauling groceries though- it will resume it's life as a working truck on my sister's little sheep ranch.

Entropy Bale II: continue

Mar 24, 2009
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Entropy Bale II: day 3

Entropy Bale II: day 2

Once again, color is horribly compromised- and since that is where these works really live, the gutted versions appearing here only approximate...and deaden it down. that's all right, as it still has a ways to go. I'll take picts outside when it is finished in different locations and see if that helps. til then, it is all in-progress anyway.

Entropy Bale: second bale, second hour in

Mar 20, 2009
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Entropy Bale II

The first bail is nearly done, but I'll wait til this new painting is further along before I post the first one again. On the first/prior bail painting, I'm having a painter's gap over a portion of the mid-ground, and so far it is one forced looking attempt after another. I may have gotten it resolved today: mid way through this latest one I mixed what seemed a tone that called to the problem area and wandered over and diddled about. I'll let is set for a bit and see. Meanwhile, this one has a fairly promising start- it is missing some of the essential volume and gesture as yet, but things are well enough mapped in to give an idea of where to go next.