Thursday, December 29, 2016

New Work: Winters Morning II, oil on canvas 60 x 60 inches

Winters Morning II, oil on canvas 60 x 60 inches
Private collection

This was a very enjoyable endeavor. This oil is very freshly done, starting with two sessions of turped-thinnned paint. 5 feet square is a lot of area to cover, so using the thinned oils in the first two painting sessions allowed me to completely fill in the canvas and put the composition in a good place for a finish. 

In this version I've added more light, greener foliage and detail.

This canvas is extrapolated from a previous one, Winters Morning 36 x 48, that just sold last week. As it turns out, the 3 x 4 foot canvas was something of a sketch for this larger one.

I did a video of that oil explaining how I painted over an older canvas with a newer idea. You can view the earlier blog about the oil and video here.

Being an artist is a real privilege and the joy flowed into these works.

Winters Morning I, oil on canvas 36 x 48 inches
sold, private collection

Tuesday, December 27, 2016

Grateful Notices: Haze in the Distance, oil on canvas, 36 x 36 inches

Haze in the Distance, oil on canvas, 36 x 36 inches


My sincerest thanks to the collector that took this home.

This is the first of a series of paintings using this scene.
In this painting the sun is apparent but it is not having a big effect on the light and color in the scene.

All of the colors are in a natural palette with the exception of the purple foothills and some of the low foliage in the background. I set out to do something peaceful, with a limited amount of color and each color in it's own distinct place. 

It was a purposeful exercise, much like keeping your peas and carrots from touching on the dinner plate.  In the end, each separate element is comfortable in the scene with the others. Interesting how the greens made it all come together... those were the last colors applied.

You can view more versions of this oil and all of my works on my website.
Ken

Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Grateful Notices: Lake Palette, oil on canvas, 36 x 48 inches


Lake Palette, oil on canvas, 36 x 48 inches


A special thanks to the Dallas collector that had this delivered in time for Christmas!
Exhibited at the Arden's Gallery, Houston


Here's a bit about the painting from my earlier blog post:

I am always drawn to the calming interaction of land and water at the lake. This oil was made from a photo and it contained considerably more detail - nice to have it, but the point of the oil is simplicity.

Rather than use the colors of the photo, I opted for a tranquil, blue effect. There are a lot of blues here and they are limited to certain parts of the painting in order to preserve their power and unique effect.

It took a lot of tweaking to bring it all together. The pinks at the foreground went in first, an off-balance move to set things in motion, a small risk.

Once the oil began to take shape, lights and darks were increased for depth and interest. Just a touch of green and the red/darks provided a sense of realism to the right land form, setting it apart from the etheric left side. From there it was a matter of setting up the various blues, some receding, others glowing to bring the oil to life.

In the end, the aquas slightly glimmering in the water and the yellow / purple sky in the far distance lift the somber blue mood and allow the eye to move through the scene.

Sunday, December 18, 2016

Exhibition: Saks Galleries December 18, 2016



Opening Night Exhibit at the Saks Galleries, Denver
Friday, December 18, 2017
Opening night exhibits are always a lot of fun! Here are some photos from the opening night. It was a great success with my largest oil, Forest with Yellows and Reds, sold days in advance. It's not on the wall for the opening but hanging in the home of the new owners (thank you VERY much!) 

You can view Forest with Yellows and Reds, 48 x 60 inches from this earlier blog post
Although it was a cold night, a big crowd arrived and they were welcomed by the gracious owners Mikkel and Catherine Saks with Becka and Leanna... a great evening!
After the exhibit it was a thrill to walk out into the falling snow with the Christmas lights everywhere.






Wednesday, December 14, 2016

Grateful Notices: Forest with Yellows and Reds, oil on canvas, 48 x 60 inches


Forest with Yellows and Reds    Oil on canvas, 48 x 60 inches    Private collection

Thanks to everyone at Saks Galleries for placing this painting.

You are invited to my upcoming group show, The Greatest Gift A Celebration of the Holiday Season.

Friday, December 16
Opening reception, 5-8pm
Through December 31

3019 E. 2nd. Ave, Denver, CO  80206   303-333-4144   map







Sunday, December 11, 2016

New Work: Winters Morning, oil on canvas, 36 x 48 inches


Winters Morning, oil on canvas, 36 x 48 inches
Sold, private collection


Here is a video about how I decided to use an older oil, Bright Progressions on Yellow (bottom of the page) and overpaint it, creating Winters Morning above.

This is all about moving forward as an artist and taking risks. 



Bright Progression on Yellow, oil on canvas, 36 x 48 inches

The oil started as Bright Progressions above and then became the new oil below. My only plan was to add complexity and to use a grayed down palette. You can see that some of the original oil has been preserved and reimagined.

Tuesday, December 6, 2016

In the Studio: December 6, 2016

In the Studio December 6, 2016

Here are 4 canvases currently progressing in the studio. I had no idea that I have five more canvases currently working. That will certainly keep me busy when the snows come.

For years I have recommended having a lot of works in progress, a tip I learned from Wolf Kahn. When he summered in Vermont, Wolf would often make over 100 starts and ship them back to his NY studio for completion.

The 4 x 5 canvas in the upper left has been in the works for most of this year and is almost completed. The 36 square on the far right was started last February and I'm still working on bringing it to a compelling conclusion. Do they always take that long? No, but sometimes it takes a number of studio sessions before the true nature of the canvas reveals itself. 

The oils at the lower left and center easel were started this week and I am enjoying the challenge of taking on these subjects in a more abstracted way.


Happy Holidays!
Ken

Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Article: Good Rothko article


An informative Rothko article - Ken

Mark Rothko’s Dark Palette Illuminated

by HILARIE M. SHEETS
NewYorkTimes, Nov 2, 2016
An untitled Mark Rothko oil on canvas from 1962.Credit1998 Kate Rothko Prizel & Christopher Rothko/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Photo, via the Mark Rothko Foundation, New York







One evening in 1968, Mark Rothko regaled the art dealer Arne Glimcher, who had dropped by his studio on his way home from Pace Gallery in New York, with the story of a visit from a collector that day.

Pointing to an enormous painting of dark blue and black rectangles floating on a deep burgundy field, Rothko, the Abstract Expressionist painter, described offering his work to the woman, who had been pestering him for a canvas. “Mr. Rothko,” she had said with disappointment, “I want a happy painting, a red and yellow and orange painting, not a sad painting.” Amused, Rothko had responded: “Red, yellow, orange — aren’t those the colors of an inferno?” The woman left empty-handed.

The memory of this exchange now has inspired an exhibition that Mr. Glimcher hopes will “disprove the prevalent interpretation” by many critics, collectors and viewers that Rothko’s brilliantly colored paintings of the 1950s were sunny and joyous, while his darker-palette works in the 1960s reflected his progressing depression and foreshadowed his suicide in 1970.
“There wasn’t a dichotomy,” Mr. Glimcher said. “Mark said many times he felt that tragedy was the only theme noble enough for art.”

“Rothko: Dark Palette,” opening Friday at Pace Gallery on West 25th Street, is the first large-scale exhibition to trace this artist’s experimentation with darker values of rust, burgundy, charcoal, blue, gray and black, beginning in 1955. “These paintings are as spectacular as rare night-blooming flowers, and they don’t come just at the end of his life,” Mr. Glimcher said.



Arne Glimcher, left, and Christopher Rothko with an untitled Mark Rothko painting at Pace Gallery.CreditRebecca Smeyne for The New York Times

In fact, Rothko’s last complete series, in 1969, featured pastels — pink and beige, baby blue and white and gray — and the unfinished painting at the time of his suicide was shades of dazzling red.

According to Mr. Glimcher, Rothko was striving to communicate something universal about the human condition rather than about himself, and he didn’t paint when he was depressed. “Painting was a positive, exulting experience for him,” Mr. Glimcher said.

Yet the perception that Rothko’s somber palette reflected personal angst is entrenched. In her book “Mark Rothko: Subjects in Abstraction” (1989), Anna C. Chave wrote: “His friends and acquaintances have recalled that by the late 1950s, Rothko was increasingly depressed. They have speculated, too, that his beclouded emotional state was instrumental in the darkening of his palette.” A review last month in Time Out of “Abstract Expressionism,” on view at the Royal Academy in London, referred to “a ridiculously depressing late Rothko.”

Alison de Lima Greene, the curator who oversaw the Rothko retrospective at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston last fall, said the dark paintings “are in for a reappraisal.” She was surprised when a friend recently suggested that the 14 black murals at the Rothko Chapel in Houston were “all about his death,” because these works were begun in 1964, years before his suicide at the age of 66. Dark doesn’t equal melancholy, she said, “or if it’s melancholy, it’s closer to the melancholia of Albrecht Durer, which is a contemplative state rather than a nihilistic one.”

Scholars including David Anfam have written about how tragic subject matter was something Rothko felt compelled to address in the wake of constant war and the destruction of every Jewish household in his native Latvia. He was haunted by depression. As early as 1949, the year he found his signature format of painting bands of radiant color in dynamic tension, Rothko wrote to the painter Clyfford Still: “This has been the darkest winter of my life — why and what I hardly know myself. … Ironically enough my pictures have never been more ecstatic. People will say what a cheerful guy I must be.”



One of Mark Rothko’s so-called Seagram murals from 1959.Credit1998 Kate Rothko Prizel & Christopher Rothko/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York Photo, via the Mark Rothko Foundation, New York

His mental strife became more acute after his collapse in April 1968 from an aneurysm caused in part by hypertension. His health suffered as well from chain-smoking, heavy drinking, marital strife and years of working with the toxicity of turpentine, the fluid he used to thin the oil paint that stained his canvases in diaphanous layers of color.

On medical advice, Rothko shifted to working with acrylic on paper, in deep browns and grays, burgundies and greens. “He was at this tumultuous stage in life, and yet he was doing the most incredibly disciplined work possible,” Ms. Greene said, noting that people had trouble wrapping their heads around the change. “There was just a cloud of misunderstanding around the work. They were meant to be eternal. They were meant to push boundaries of perception.”

Mr. Glimcher was 25 when the sculptor Louise Nevelson took him to a Chinese restaurant to meet Rothko in 1963. “He knew I was frightened,” Mr. Glimcher said, recalling how the illustrious painter kept putting food on his plate and encouraging him to eat. “When we left, he said, ‘You don’t have to call Louise to visit my studio, just come by.’” Mr. Glimcher did just that, and when he opened his New York gallery that year, he dreamed of showing Rothko’s work.

Rothko was under contract with Marlborough Gallery in his lifetime. After his death, his daughter, Kate, successfully sued to have the paintings returned to her and her brother, Christopher. Marlborough, during lengthy court proceedings in the 1970s, was found to have underpaid Rothko for his work. At the trial, Mr. Glimcher testified that he had agreed to pay Rothko $35,000 per work in 1968 for a proposed exhibition — one that Rothko then backed out of under pressure from Marlborough, according to Mr. Glimcher. He later learned that price was almost three times more than what Marlborough had been paying Rothko for paintings.

In 2012, Christie’s New York set an auction high for Rothko of nearly $87 million for his 1961 canvas “Orange, Red, Yellow.” “That was your quintessential very bright, beautiful Rothko, which brought to the table this feeding frenzy of top collectors from different countries,” said Brett Gorvy, chairman of postwar and contemporary art at Christie’s. He said there is a “huge difference in the number of people” who go for vibrant Rothkos versus dark Rothkos, which he called “a much more limited market.”



Credit Kate Rothko Prizel & Christopher Rothko/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Yet two aggressive bidders last year at Christie’s New York ran up the price on a dark Rothko, two luminous rust-colored clouds titled “No. 10” (1958), achieving almost $82 million and surprising many who had questioned its commercial potential, according to Mr. Gorvy. He said that the specter of Rothko’s depression can both hurt the salability of the dark pictures and add to their romantic lure but that their marketability ultimately comes down whether there is “an inner light to its darkness.” He added, “That’s what a great Rothko has.”


Mark Rothko’s “Orange, Red, Yellow” (1961).CreditStan Honda/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Given the occasion of the Pace exhibition, the Sotheby’s head of contemporary art, Grégoire Billault, said the timing was good to bring back a dark green and gray oil on paper by Rothko from 1969 that failed to sell three years ago there with an estimate of $6 million to $8 million. It will now be offered at the contemporary evening sale on Nov.17 for $3.5 million to $4.5 million. “I’m sure this show will have an impact,” Mr. Billault said. (Mr. Glimcher said he does not have a financial arrangement with Sotheby’s for this work.)

Mr. Glimcher has worked closely on the new exhibition with Rothko’s children. They have lent multiple works, including a 6-by-15-foot mural from 1959 in rust and brown that was part of his canceled commission for the Four Seasons restaurant. Only a couple of smaller works on paper will be offered for sale. (The gallery declined to give prices.)

Christopher Rothko, who manages his father’s legacy, believes his father began darkening his palette in part as a “corrective.” “When the public really started to embrace those brightly colored works,” he began to worry that they were “too easy and people weren’t understanding the more serious emotional push-pull underneath the color combinations,” Mr. Rothko said.

He also thinks the dark palette was his father’s invitation for viewers to lose themselves in the subtler perceptual effects. The dark paintings offer “a more meditative type of experience,” he said. “First and foremost, we want to make a show that is simply beautiful in a very quiet way.”

Sunday, November 27, 2016

Video: Ken Elliott Forest Light into Shade oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches

Forest Light into Shade oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches

Here is a recently completed oil that evolved in the studio over a period of many months. Find out more about it in the video below.
Ken







Friday, November 25, 2016

New works / Exhibit / New Representation with Saks Gallery, Denver


Forest with Yellows and Reds    Oil on canvas, 48 x 60 inches    sold, private collection



I am pleased to announce that I am now represented by the prestigious Saks Gallery, Denver's premier art gallery for over 50 years.

3019 E. 2nd. Ave, Denver, CO  80206   303-333-4144   map








You are invited to our upcoming group show, The Greatest Gift A Celebration of the Holiday Season.

December 16     Opening reception, 5-8pm     Through December 31

At the Marsh, Light Effect    Oil on canvas, 36 x 36 inches    $5250. framed

Forest Light into Shade    Oil on canvas, 48 x 48 inches    $8950. framed

Lake Palette II    Oil on canvas, 36 x 60 inches    $7500 unframed
Sorelle Gallery, New Canaan, CT

Lake Patterns    Oil on canvas, 36 x 36 inches    $5100. framed

Thursday, November 24, 2016

Interactive art feature: Are You Smarter Than a Billionaire?

Are You Smarter Than a Billionaire?

New York Times  By DANIEL McDERMON Nov. 17, 2016
Fine art auctions are fascinating places. Have fun with this.
Ken

Via Christie’s
A radiant painting by Claude Monet sold for $81.4 million at auction on Wednesday night, just one of hundreds of artworks that have changed hands during this week’s big auctions in New York. But even if you can’t pony up $22 million for a Gerhard Richter work owned by Eric Clapton, you can see how you would match up against art-world insiders below. RELATED ARTICLE

Tuesday, October 25, 2016

Grateful Notices: Light Through the Green Woods oil, 40 x 40

 Light Through the Green Woods oil, 40 x 40
Private collection


This was a simple idea that turned out to be a very big endeavor. Compositionally, the idea is having the light coming through a forest. In the process, I lost track of all the changes I made to the painting. The colors were pulling me as the painting developed, originally as mostly yellow and mauve. Once I added the orange, they took over. Finally, the addition of greens calmed the scene, allowing the yellows to come through in a more discreet way. In the end, the aquas gave the oil a greater vibrancy.

It was quite an effort, much was learned and it slowly evolved over the course of about 8 months. What a puzzle to solve!

Friday, October 14, 2016

New Work: Corals Emerging, pastel on sanded paper, 22 3/4 x 17

Corals Emerging  pastel on sanded paper, 22 3/4 x 17

This is a demonstration pastel that I did during my last Making it Fine Art Workshop for the Pikes Peak Pastel Society, Colorado Springs, CO. View the pastel page

The plan was to make a good start and keep things loose - not go into a pictorial approach. While I was working it, I asked the group to call out colors to use. It worked out to be a nice combination of colors, patterns and interesting edges.

I'm considering doing an oil demo of this same image in this weeks Workshop at my home / studio this weekend.

Monday, October 3, 2016

Grateful Notices: View to the Foothills, Orange Glow

View to the Foothills, Orange Glow oil on canvas 30 x 58 inches

This is the recently finished commission for a delightful Denver couple.
The origin of this image is the view behind my home. It is a long meadow with the foothills in the background. 

It is always an honor to receive a commission and even better when the clients take an interest in the painting as it progresses It challenges me to do my best work.

This oil took on a number of changes along the way, but kept to the theme of high contrast trees against the glowing landscape.



I delivered to their beautiful home last Sunday and installed it over the fireplace.
Thank you!
Ken

Tuesday, September 27, 2016

In the Studio: September 27, 2016


Here are some of the works in progress today.
Top left, 4' x 5'
Bottom left 30" x 60"
Center 48" x 48"
Right 30"x 48"

Some of these oils are further along than others but big changes are still possible. Since this photo was taken, I've added improvements to the center and right oils.

The studio is the place where art is created but also the place and mind set where numerous works that are 'good enough' go through days or weeks of polishing - making the small improvements that can make all the difference.

It's very rare that I have worked an oil straight through and that's why I have so many in progress. I enjoy looking for the large or small things that can really improve the art.

The studio is full of puzzles to solve and blank canvases were anything can happen. There is a real tension in the air from all of the unknowns, but it is never boring!

Sunday, September 25, 2016

Grateful Notices: Descending Tree Line, pastel

Descending Tree Line, pastel on sanded paper, 9 x 18

I just conducted a Making it Fine Art Workshop for the Pikes Peak Pastel Society last weekend.  We had a very successful weekend with a number of breakthroughs, new experiences, great starts and a number of very  good artworks works emerged. 

More workshops are scheduled for October 2016 - 2017 in the Denver Metro and MA  in 2017.  Complete info

Descending Tree Lines is one of the pastel demonstrations I did at the workshop. It is on the theme of taking a common subject and progressing it through a number of different looks but still ending with something that is fresh and interesting.

Many thanks to the person that purchased this pastel their collection that day.


At the Workshop

Here we are on the first day of the workshop. We had a lot of work going on with new ideas and breakthroughs. 

Thank you Bonnie, for the recommendation:
"Thanks for the wonderful workshop! You are a fountain of information and are so giving of your time and knowledge. We all had fun and enjoyed your sense of humor. It's so refreshing to let go of rules and loosen up with color."

Tuesday, September 20, 2016

Just fun: Thousands of Plastic Figures Hold Up the Floor by artist Do Ho Suh Floor, 1997-2000


This is us.
There are a number of ways to consider this allegory but the meanings are brought to our attention through art. Looking at the figures close up, the care and effort is apparent. The figures come to life because we can identify with them tasking together and it doesn't look easy. They have our sympathy.

The installation is meant to walked on, not just observed. I suspect something emotional, perhaps  surprising feelings well up from standing on so many human figures, plastic or not. Just imagine yourself standing there - you may feel something.

The installation photo is compelling and one that stays in the mind. It can take on a number of meanings, but whatever the idea, the visual stays with us.

Great art lasts and that is the high bar for us as artists.
We have the ability to create something that is Forever.


Here is the text from the Lehmann Maupin Gallery website:

Thousands of Plastic Figures Hold Up the Floor






One of the most exciting contemporary artists of our time, Korean Do Ho Suh, created this large sculptural installation that doesn't look like much until you come closer. Glass plates rest on thousands of multicolored miniature plastic figures who are crowded together with their heads and arms turned skyward. Together, they are holding the weight of the individual visitor who steps onto the floor.

Currently showing at Lehmann Maupin's pop-up gallery at the Singapore Tyler Print Institute (STPI), Floor is one of those installations that's wonderfully thought-provoking. The figures represent the diverse and anonymous masses of people who support and/or resist the symbolic floor.

This installation can be seen, alongside works by artists Teresita Fernández, Ashley Bickerton, and Lee Bui, from now till February 11, 2012.

DO HO SUH
Floor, 1997-2000

Installation at Lehmann Maupin Gallery, New York
PVC Figures, Glass Plates, Phenolic Sheets, Polyurethane Resin

40 parts each:
39.37 x 39.37 x 3.15 inches, 100 x 100 x 8 cm

Courtesy the artist and Lehmann Maupin Gallery, New York

Friday, September 2, 2016

Exhibition: The Artful Pour Charity Event, October 20, 2016


Note: This date has been changed form Oct 13 to Oct Thursday, October 20.
All the other information remains the same.
See you there!
Ken


I'll be exhibiting works at this charity benefit in Denver, Oct 13, 2016
I will be there along with the Brushstrokes Gallery Artists:
Kelly Berger, John K. Harrell, Kit Hevron Mahoney, Anita Mosher

The Foundation provides grants to a large number of arts organizations in the Denver metro.

$65 per person
More details to follow

1487 S. Broadway, Denver, CO 80210   map

Don't miss this great event to enjoy local artists & live music
in support of art organizations across Colorado!

Check out our new website:

Monday, August 29, 2016

Just Fun: Amazing Stairwell Illusion - the Escherian Stairwell



Watch this amazing video of people in an apparent closed-loop stairway.

Many people throughout the world are currently being fooled by this tour of the Escherian Stairwell located in the Frank B. Gannett building at the Rochester Institute of Technology. The tour is an elaborate hoax created by RIT film/animation graduate student Michael Lacanilao and features people experiencing the stairwell illusion for the first time.  YouTube video link

M. C. Escher Ascending and Descending  woodcut print, 1960



Some background on the artist M.C. Escher:

Maurits Cornelis Escher (17 June 1898 – 27 March 1972) was a Dutch graphic artist who made mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints.

Early in his career he drew inspiration from nature, making studies of insects, landscapes, and plants such as lichens, all of which he reused as details in his artworks. He travelled in Italy and Spain, sketching buildings, townscapes, architecture and the tilings of the Alhambra and La Mezquita, Cordoba, and became steadily more interested in their mathematical structure.

His work features mathematical objects and operations including impossible objects, explorations of infinity, reflection, symmetry, perspective, truncated and stellated polyhedra, hyperbolic geometry, and tessellations.


M. C. Escher Relativity  woodcut print, 1953


Oh yes, here is the solution to the illusion.

From Yahoo Answers:
The secret is that it's a film maker's illusion, in reality it's impossible in 3 dimensions. I was one of the around 30,000 people at the "Imagine RIT" festival on May 4. I had noticed the Escherian stairwell in the list of exhibits and realized that it couldn't be "real" but was interested in seeing what it was all about. There were signs pointing to the Escherian stairwell all over campus but we soon realized that they were pointing in random directions. We finally found the classroom where the film maker played the video seen on the Internet plus a shorter one where he explained that it was his master's project and what he was trying to accomplish. He also gave a short live talk and answered questions. Nobody in the showing that I went to asked about how it was actually accomplished but it was obviously just clever editing.
Gary


I love the stairwell. The stairwell is obviously real. They don't fake people going up and down the stairs. They also do not do a split screen edit. I believe we see exactly what each of the cameras see, at least one camera on the lower floor and at least one camera on the higher floor. The film is nicely edited. 

The illusion, of course, is that we have twins. The host has his twin, so in the one scene, as the first host goes out of view, going up on the left, we suddenly see his twin brother coming up on the right. No editing there. I have seen explanations on the Internet proving that this is one person and how it had to have been done, but Occam s Razor does imply that the simplest explanation should suffice. 

The second illusion is one that I'm sure they repeated multiple times as a practical joke on unsuspecting students, and they picked the best unrehearsed reaction. The host was on one floor, his twin brother on the other floor, and since the camera followed her, it meant that there was no split screening involved, but nice editing between or among the cameras. 

The third illusion, with many students holding hands as the host makes his way back downstairs was accomplished with one more pair of twins, one near the top of the chain of students, the other near the bottom. 

A wonderful illusion filmed on a real set. In the RIT film, there are several floors and twin actors. The action is not broken, but continuous as a person moves from one floor to the other. But BBT stops filming, moves a few things around while the boys move to the opposite end of the stairs, then filming begins again. 
John


Tuesday, August 23, 2016

Grateful Notices: Winter Creek 30 x 40 oil

Winter Creek oil on canvas, 30 x 40 inches
Trees are a favorite theme of mine and in this work I combined then with a cold stream and winter trees in the background. Any foliage in the trees is barely apparent and the grass in the foreground is also understated. The composition is spare but not stark. That was the challenge and the joy of making this painting - just enough complexity to create the illusion of individual winter trees and others massed in a forest.

What little color there is alludes to the first hints of spring, leaving the patterns of winter to frame the cool blues and purples.

My sincere thanks to the buyers of this oil... I miss it already.

Friday, August 19, 2016

Grateful Notices: Gathering Light oil 36 x 36 inches

Gathering Light oil 36 x 36 inches  Private collection

This is an image that I have previously done a couple of versions of. The earlier oils were purple-based and more subdued. I really like this composition and felt compelled to really push the colors in a new version.

I began with the bright oranges and reds in combination, making a bright, new world.  Care was taken to keep the brightest reds and oranges in the background only. Other colors may be similar, but they are not as strong.

The strategy was to create a powerful, high-color scene. The stronger colors are not diluted, but magnified because they were not repeated elsewhere. It is the same with the yellow hues at the tops of the trees - that yellow is not used again. The other yellows are slightly green or red shifted, leaving the tops of the trees brighter than the other yellows.


It all comes together in a bright, luminous landscape where all of the elements accentuate the others, setting up the glowing red-orange background as a focus point.

It was a pleasure to work through this one and I want to thank the new owner for purchasing this for their home!