Harvest Home

Harvest Home

Oil on canvas, 8x24

sold

I taught a palette-knife painting class on Sunday at the Wallkill River School in Montgomery, N.Y. I was a little nervous about it, since I'd never taught one, but it was an absolute delight. 

It was a small class, and everyone had time and space to experiment with the knife, and I had time to make this painting. It's a scene I have painted before, in Harpswell, Maine, and is a scene I am likely to paint again. I love the wheatfield, the brillliant white house nestled in the trees, and the glimpse of lawn you can see right around the house. 

While I was at the school, I met one of the women who bought "Range Rovers," one of the very large cow paintings that sold during my March show there. She was just wonderful, and happy as could be with the painting, and told me the story of how the two big cow paintings sold. 

Gail, who bought "Range Rovers," works at the school on Sundays. From the desk where she sits, she could see the painting, and she really loved it. 

A couple from Manhattan came into the school one Sunday during the show, and Gail, bless her, gave them a tour of the show, which was work by Shawn Dell Joyce and myself. Gail told the woman that she was thinking of buying "Range Rovers." 

The woman, who has a second home in the area and is a big supporter of the school, turned to Gail and said, "If you buy that one, I'll buy the other one." 

And so the deal was struck! Then, just to make things happier for all concerned, the man who was with the woman bought one of my paintings, too. 

Lowe's Wharf Cove

Lowe's Wharf Cove

Oil on canvas, 16x20.
sold

I had a breakthrough yesterday, while painting moving water on Tilghman's Island, here in Maryland. It was a breakthrough in painting and a breakthrough in understanding, as well.

For a few months, I've been fascinated with the marbling effect I can get with the palette knife. I load it up with two or three colors, then move it in a repeating pattern (say, up and down), while also moving it along the canvas, say, right to left.

I've been using this technique whenever I can, I like it so much. Yesterday, I tried using it to paint moving water. Here's a detail shot from the painting: 

The technique gave me water, moving water that I really like!

And if that were not enough, it gave me a new understanding of painting. Here's what I realized: This water that I painted, it doesn't really look like water. But it looks enough like water and feels enough like water that, for me, it works as a sort of shorthand, a personal vocabulary, for water.

I think that one reason that my dog and cat paintings are so attractive to people is that dog owners speak the same language. My paintings clearly don't look like photographs, but the shorthand that is in them, the vocabulary, is understood by others who love dogs.

I got to this idea by thinking of the skies of Samuel Borenstein. In many of the paintings I like the best, he paints his skies with vertical strokes. I have usually painted them with angled stokes, but while I was painting yesterday, I thought I'd try vertical strokes, as an experiment, and as a tribute.

But as I painted, I realized that I was not painting in my voice. And this made me think about Borenstein's skies vs. my skies. Neither of us paints sky that looks like "sky" as you'd see in a photograph. And yet, our skies are understood as skies. We have a shorthand for skies, a consistent shorthand, individual, unique, recognizable.

Then I began thinking about other parts of my paintings. I have known all along that nothing in my painting really looks like the thing it is, and that the more I focus on getting the detail "right" - i.e., attempting photographic representation - the worse my painting gets. And why? Because I am trying to use someone else's vocabulary.

I have developed a shorthand for skies, for houses, for trees, for fields, and even for corn. Yesterday, I found a way to speak about moving water. And I found a way to understand what it is that makes a painter unique.

I don't want to speak with anyone else's voice. I don't want to paint like anyone else. I want to discover my own voice, and speak with it - and continue to have the courage and the energy to experiment.

Marching in Montgomery

Marching in Montgomery

Oil on canvas, 12x24
sold

The Wallkill River School occupies the ground floor of the Patchett House, outside the downtown part of the lovely Village of Montgomery, N.Y.

Originally a tavern, the Patchett house stands on the corner of Factory Street and Route 17K, part of the old Newburgh-Cochecton Turnpike. The Patchett family, which owned the woolen mill at the end of Factory Street, bought the house late in the 19th century, and lived there until the 1970s.

In 1980, the house was added to the National Historic Register. Later, it fell into disrepair. The Devitt family, whose purchases and renovations are part of the fabric of the Village of Montgomery, bought the home late in the 20th century and brought it back to its glory.

It is in this home, with its 14-foot ceilings and hardwood floors, its 10-foot-high windows and spectacular staircase, where I will be showing my art, starting a week from today, with Shawn Dell Joyce.

Shawn has made a series of paintings to celebrate the Village of Montgomery's bicentennial. And I have plans for a couple, myself.

One of them, I finished yesterday. This painting is from the old photograph on the cover of the Village of Montgomery Bicentennial calendar, which is on sale at the gallery and around the village, for $10. The painting shows the Firemen's Parade, as it makes its way down Ward Street at the turn of the 19th century.

I started with the intention of using only sepia tones, but color overtook me - a little! Come to the show - or come to the reception, Saturday, March 13, from 5-7 p.m. You won't be disappointed.

Range Rovers

Range Rovers

Oil on canvas, 36x60
sold

It was more than two years ago, in July, and I'd put myself on parole only weeks before.

I was driving home from Wisdom, Montana. I was as free as any human could be, alone in a car, with time and paint and canvases, and money in my pocket. The sky was huge and blue and endless, the prairie green and gold in the afternoon heat, and I felt like an explorer.

In Wyoming, I got off the highway at every exit, just to see what was there. And why not? Never had I had such freedom in a place that drew me so strongly.

On one exit, I turned up a dirt road and had to stop while this group of cows and steers crossed. Clearly, the road belonged to them. 

They were pretty mean-looking, so I did not get out, but took photographs through the windshield. I've painted them already, on a teeny canvas that sold way back. They continue to intrigue me, and so I've painted them again - and there are more paintings of these creatures coming.

Thanks for reading!

The Ancient Voice

The Dying of the Light
Oil on canvas, 8x24
sold

It's November, and I am hungry all the time. I'm dieting, but that's not the reason. This hunger is something more primal, something ancient and deep and unconnected to today or tomorrow or what I had for lunch.

This hunger is about caves, and the thick skins of animals. It's about nestling, curled with my brothers and sisters in the curve of our mother's belly. It's about hot breath catching in clouds in the frigid night, and about the whipcrack of trees as the frozen sap breaks in the winter wind.

This hunger feeds on fear and darkness and the sense that nothing will ever grow again. This hunger knows no satiety. It grows from the gnawing knowledge that snow will cover the plains and keep the herds from roaming, and unless this hunger is met now, it will consume us all in the deep of winter.

It's November and I am hungry all the time. I listen in the night as the coyotes howl and I know they are hungry, too.

Sunset in Maine

Sunset on the Ridge 
Oil on canvas, 24x24
sold

Today, some odds and ends. First, this painting. I made it from a photograph I took while I was in Maine this summer. It's a field on Hio Ridge Road, where my aunt and uncle live. The sunset was so amazing, I nearly drove off the road. In real life, it was even more dramatic than this painting - which is more dramatic in real life than on the screen. Maybe I do need a better camera.

My friend Lori Rembetski, a wonderful sculptor and delightful person, is having a show in November at the Lighthouse Gallery on Long Hill Road in Groton, Conn. Lori makes charming and character-filled sculptures of dogs. They're small, from a few inches high to perhaps 10 inches, and they are gestural and full of life and fun. The opening reception is Friday, Nov. 6, from 5-7 p.m., at the gallery. If you're in the area, come!

My friend Judy Beisler, a wonderful photographer and delightful person, tells me that on that same night, at the Unitarian Universalist Church in New London, the folk group The Work of the Weavers will perform. I don't remember just when the show starts, but Judy told me it would be possible to go from the Lighthouse Gallery opening to the show, and make it in plenty of time.

I probably won't be able to do that, though, since I'll be teaching a workshop at the Wallkill River School on Saturday, Nov. 7, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., on painting pets. If you're anywhere near Montgomery, N.Y., there's plenty of space in the workshop. Call the school and sign up!

Peter found out that those ladybugs I wrote about the other day were imported by New Jersey as a way to rid the state of a particular insect that eats and kills hemlock trees. The ladybugs are otherwise harmless, but wherever they come from, they spend the winters in white cliffs. So when they're swarming over our light-gray house and white doors and windows, they're just a little confused about their winter homes.

I've spent a fair amount of time this past week working on my portfolio, in preparation for approaching galleries near and far. If anyone reading has any suggestions of active galleries where my work would fit, please let me know!

And thank you for reading.

It's Raining Dogs?

Rain, Route 2
Oil on canvas, 11x14
sold

I really like this painting. I like it alot. I like it better in person than on the computer, too.

I like it because it's expressionistic and emotional and evocative. My favorite paintings, I'm realizing, are ones that have these qualities.

I have some more rainy-day ideas - and some plans for snow, too. And that's not so far away.

Here's a note for anyone who'll be around the Hartford area on Saturday: I'll be painting, tentatively from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., on the sidewalk in front of Central Framing & Art, 56 LaSalle Road in West Hartford Center. So come out, see my fun dog paintings and say hi!

Meantime, we've been taking Jojo and Smokey to the Central Bark, the dog park in Groton. I've never been to a dog park, and I must say, it's great fun. This is a huge place, well fenced, and extremely well attended. Today, there must have been 30 dogs there, running, barking, racing around.

We were greeted by a whole pack of dogs when we came in, and as soon as Smokey and Joey were off the leash, a conga line of butt-sniffing started. Eight or nine dogs in a row, nose to butt, it was a riot. Then they were off, racing after balls and frisbees, tugging on ropes, rolling on the ground - it's barely contained canine chaos, and it's absolutely unabashadely fun. I can hardly wait to go back.

Here are some Central Bark shots:

If you enlarge this one, you can see four dogs, one with a Frisbee and three thinking about getting it away from him.

That's Jojo sniffing in the background, while this dog with really spooky eyes tries to stare me down.

That's Jojo in the background again, panting, not taking part in this round of butt-sniffing. The big dog is a great Dane with funny, floppy ears.

Wildness Takes Over

Purple Haze. Oil on canvas, 8x10
sold

I have a thing about abandoned houses, especially ones I drive past or walk past, day after day. I construct lives for them, families and dogs, landscaping, decorations. As vines grow over them, and windows break, as roofs sag and paint chips and thins and fades, wistfulness grows in me, and the buildings seem to take on more life, not less.

This is a house on Route 17K, just outside Montgomery, N.Y. It's more abandoned than it looks in my painting. There's a big hole in the roof, and in front of the house stand the remains of a sign that once offered the house and its land for sale.

Even as the house sinks into its demise, and the yard grows up around it, it's taken on a wild sort of beauty, a harmony of color and chaos and the way of the world.

There's a song by Kate Wolf that I've always liked, "Carolina Pines," and that song ran through my heart as I made this painting.

Here are the lyrics; it's a pretty, pretty song:

Carolina Pines

Just an old house with the roof fallin' in Standin' on the edge of the field Watching the crops grow like its always done before Nobody lives here anymore The sun's going down on the Carolina pines I'm a long way from home I miss that love of mine broken windows empty doors Nobody lives here anymore Old memories come whistling like the wind Through the walls and the cracked window panes And the grass is growing high around the kitchen door Nobody lives here anymore Once there were children and a few hired hands A hard working woman and a bone tired man Now that old sun steals across a dusty floor Nobody lives here anymore

Wading In

Wading In. Oil on canvas, 6x18
sold

I'm feeling at loose ends today. Part of it is the weather, changing and spinning, whisking in on this late September breeze. Part of it is my Wallkill River School show ending, and the inevitable sense of coming down that accompanies the finishing of a show. Part of it is our old dog, Kaja, and her creaky and slow recovery. Part of it is wrapping up the dog project for Center Framing and Art. And part of it, I'm sure, is my constant wondering about the value of what I'm doing.

For now, I am not going to dwell on the questions or the answers. I'm going to do what the young man in this painting is doing. I am going to wade in and keep searching. Sure, the water might be up to my knees, and I might wade in even deeper. But I'm going past the edge, past the lip of the waves, and I'm going to see.

Thanks for coming with me.

Bay with Me

Beagle
Oil on canvas, 12x12

sold

I mean, if you can't paint a picture of a beagle baying, what's the use?

The cool weather has made the dogs unusually joyful. Kaja, who's 12, mostly deaf and painfully arthritic, has been getting up even when she doesn't need to. The other day, she loped across the yard to greet me, and this morning, she came on a long walk with me and the leashed duo. Her eyes are bright, she's vigorous in her soul and she's happy. It makes me glad.

My friend Judy Beisler came over yesterday to visit and see my nascent studio. Always, I'm fearful that the dogs will be too much for visitors, and Judy is small, so I had extra worries. JoJo jumped up on her, repeatedly, and all the dogs begged to be patted and noticed. Even Kaja came out to greet Judy.

We sat on the porch eating lunch and the idiots bayed and howled as though their innermost dogs had been awakened.

So it seems entirely right that I paint this beagle in full bay.

Thanks for reading!

Swell Day

More Big Waves. Oil on canvas, 8x24, sold.

On the day of my show at the Denmark Arts Center, in Denmark, Maine, I spent some hours framing new work for the show (going on now!) at the Wallkill River School Gallery in Montgomery, N.Y.

It was a gorgeous day, and I was framing, and contemplating, and packing. And people kept coming in and, amazingly, buying paintings. One sweet woman bought a painting of Eunice the Cat, a painting I love, and have been showing for years now. A painting I thought wouldn't sell, ever.

Another woman came in, bought a nice, small painting of our yard. I was thrilled. Then her eyes landed on this painting of waves. I had mismeasured it, and so I didn't have a frame for it. It wasn't signed. It wasn't dry. She fell in love with it, and demanded that I charge more than my original asking price.

Those are sales I will remember forever.

Woof

Mini Dachshund. Oil on canvas, 12x12
sold

I've fallen behind in my 12x12 canine project for Sandy at Center Framing and Art in West Hartford. It's a really cool idea, I think - I make 12 12x12 paintings of dogs, as wild and free as I want, and she hangs them in the front window of the gallery. Luscious!

I finished this dachshund today, and I'm pretty happy with it. I love the colors, and the snotty look in this little guy's eye, as though he knows he's the king of the world, and it's about time you knew it, too.

I just spoke with Chris Rose, who runs the Lighthouse Gallery in Groton, and he's invited me to show there in March. Exciting! It's my favorite gallery around here, comfortable and intimate and welcoming. Chris does a great job with it. Right now, he's showing paintings by Sunil Howlader, and they are stunning, a bright mix of abstract backgrounds with realism overlaid. I'm thinking of trying an all-animal show, if Chris would agree.

Thanks for reading!

Experiment

Moon Dance. Oil on canvas panel, 8x10. Sold

One night last winter, when the moon cast amazing blue shadows on the snow, I began to get the idea of trying to paint at night. But how? If there's too much light - like a lamp - I wouldn't be able to see those shadows or the moonlight. Without that lamp, though, how could I see the colors or the canvas, to paint?

I think a miner's headlamp might work, and I'm going to try that - but the other night, my last night at the lake house, I woke at 4 a.m., and found that the moon was full, bright, and about to sink over the edge of the mountain.

I set up my easel behind the van, opened the back door of the van, and painted in the wan light from inside the van. When day broke, I found I had to make some adjustments (for starters, it helps if you put the yellow that you want to use on the palette, instead of the yellow you don't want to use - believe me, they look the same in low light!)

So this is an interesting painting. Successful? Maybe. Maybe not. A first step, for sure.

Where is the Quiet?

Along the Ridge. Oil on canvas, 16x20. Sold.

My friend Joyce White met me at the Denmark Arts Center today, to catch up and see my paintings. It was a joyo to spend time with Joyce. She was a freelancer at the Sun Journal when I was the bureau chief there. She'd retired from a job in Massachusetts somewhere, and was here working on the second part of her life - and she was interested in everything.

She had a keen insight into my paintings. She liked them - liked them a lot - and also noticed that, for the most part, they are not quiet. And they aren't. They are boisterous, energetic, even loud paintings - and that's fine. But I like the idea of making some quiet, serene paintings - and so we shall see. It's hard for me to restrain myself - and mostly, I don't want to. But I'd like to make some quiet paintings to round out my portfolio. And I have some ideas.

Back Roads of Maine

Fryeburg Farm. Oil on canvas, 16x20, sold

Everyone has their favorite roads, and they all ask if I'd like to know. Sure! I'm always looking for a native's favorite views.

My aunt and uncle sent me on Route 113, from Denmark to Fryeburg and beyond. There are some lovely farms and farmhouses along this road, for sure, but they were not as plentiful as I'd hoped. Still, I found this one, and with a good place to pull off. It was great to be in the mountains again, too.

I wonder about what makes someone love a particular road. For me, I know, it is sometimes the road itself - the driving, really. Some roads are just fun to drive, and that's that. But I think that more often, there is one view on a road that makes that road special. I could hunt all day and not see that one sight. Sometimes, I think, you just have to see it with yourown eyes.

In the Thick of It

Two paintings of fog. Top, "Mist," oil on canvas, 9x12, sold. Bottom, "6:15 This Morning," oil on canvas, 8x10, sold

The mornings I've been here, I've awakened to a white world outside the screens of the lake house.

A deep fog has fallen over the mountain across the lake both mornings, blurring the outlines of the trees, and erasing the presence of the mountain behind them.

It's hard to paint fog - or at least, it's hard for me. I'm sure there's some shortcut to painting fog. All I know is that I've been experimenting, finding some stuff that works and some that doesn't. The painting at the top is the one I like better. I made the painting first - and it was a good painting of a deep, shadowed, piney forest. Then I scraped the paint off, and went back over the ghost image with some bluish-white paint.

It's incredibly liberating to scrape off what you've just painted - and know that that's part of the process.

So painters, is there a known way to paint fog in plein air? I'd love to know!

Good to be Back

The Lake House. Oil on canvas, 6x12. Sold

I brought canvases and matching frames with me, so I can make paintings and then hang them in the Denmark Arts Center. I've made a big sign - Fresh Paintings! Get 'em while they're wet! and I told everyone at the opening to come on back - that there would be new paintings to see.

I'm enjoying painting here. Looking at the landscapes, being in the landscapes, brings me back to the years when we lived here. Sure, there were tough times, tough enough so that, in the end, we moved away. But this is a beautiful place, wild and, for the most part, unspoiled. It's wonderful to be back here, and even more wonderful to be painting here.

At the Lake House

View From the Lake House, oil on canvas, 12x16, sold.

I'm in Bridgton, Maine, at the moment, sitting in the laundromat, the one place in town with a wi-fi connection. Actually, a little cafe on Main Street has a connection, but it was closing to cater a dinner, and couldn't help me - but a nice woman in the cafe alerted me to the laundromat, and the women here said no problem - they didn't care that I didn't have dirty clothes!

I'm staying at the lake house owned by my aunt and uncle. Their house, a farmhouse built in 1863, sits in fields at the top of a big hill. The lake house is at the bottom, on Moose Pond. It's a lovely little cabin, with wood floors and wood ceilings, and a giant screened porch that overlooks a ferny slope which runs down to the lake.

At night, it's absolutely quiet there, except for the haunting calls of the loons. There are no traffic noises, no people noises, nothing. There's no television in the cabin, and there's not a phone, though my cell phone works from two places in the house, if there are no clouds.

It's a joy to have such a calm and serene place to stay. It's a little like heaven.

Hmmm... Hmmm... Hummmmmm

Shady Porch. Oil on canvas, 8x10, sold

At our house, we don't have a front porch, but we do have a back deck. If you sit there for long enough, you'll be treated to a hummingbird display.

There's just nothing on earth that approaches the hummers' flying prowess. They zoom across the deck, in arcs that they can change from shallow to tight in a millisecond. They zip past your head, so close that you can feel the air pulsing from the beating of their wings. If you sit still enough, they'll come close and hover, to see who you are and what you're doing. Peter saw one, involved in a hummingbird battle, zoom between the metal arm and the seat of one of our chairs.

We have a feeder that attaches to the window over the kitchen sink, and the hummers use it all the time now. They were a little wary at first, but it didn't take them long to get over it. Now, if the feeders have run out of nectar (and they do, astonishingly quickly, considering the size of the feeders and the size of the birds), the hummers come to the kitchen window and hover there, giving us dirty looks, until we get out and feed them.

This is one of the true delights of summer, in my mind.

Thanks for reading!

Looking Back, Looking Ahead

Edge of the Catskills. Oil on stretched canvas, 11x13, sold

Just out of the frame of this painting stands a snow fence. Hanging from it and propped on it are flowers, stuffed animals, mementos.

On a day close to graduation a few years ago, several teens from Port Jervis, N.Y., died there, in a car wreck.

This crash, and others that happened after and before, set the staff of the Times Herald-Record, the paper where I worked, on a mission to change teens' driving behavior. The project, Not One More, involved most of the staff, and was headed by the newsroom management team, composed of me, Mike Levine, Terry Egan and my immediate supervisor.

Looking for facts on this crash this morning when I posted this painting, I downloaded some pdfs of our work, and I must say I was a little stunned. I knew at the time that it was good. I knew that I was working with a group of people who were changing the way newspapers told stories, presented information, engaged with the community. I knew that we were doing important work.

I just didn't know how good it was. (To judge for yourself, click here. The work we did was before April 2007, in the pdf files in the center of the page. )

Now, that little management team is no more. Mike is dead. My job and Terry's job were eliminated in the first round of staffing cuts, in 2007.

Looking for the facts of the crash made me think this morning of journalism, and my career. Finding those pdfs set off in me a feeling somewhat like longing, or at least nostalgia.

Then, the phone rang. It was Gail Geraghty, one of my reporters in Maine. Now, she's working for the paper in Bridgton, and is writing a piece on me and my art for the paper there. Exciting!

She made a bunch of interesting points, discussing my painting, and I took particular heart in two - one, that in newspapers, I worked in a field that created community. Now, I'm doing the same thing - just in a different way.

The second point she made was this: It's liberating to be free of daily journalism!