New work, more birds (of course)

Red-Winged Blackbird (male) at dusk

Watercolor on paper

So finally, I've been able to take some decent photos of my new work that I have been working on and off with since the end of school. These two pieces represent to me the struggles of working two jobs, searching for a better job, and applying to shows post-graduation. It was more difficult than I had expected to keep up with my art-making in reference to the pace I kept while I was a student. I really miss having the excuse to work on a painting for more than four hours because it was my "schoolwork." Now, it's just the thing I do on the side before and after my "real" job. Luckily, I have been accepted to at least three shows since graduating (waiting on the fourth), have sold two paintings, and will have the opportunity to discuss my work with an audience in August. Overall, the art world is being generous to me as an emerging artist, but the pace is unsatisfying.  

I've started a total of five paintings since finishing these two. I'm trying to get two done quickly; the others have no deadline as of yet. No surprise, the upcoming two are of birds: one a Ring-Billed Gull the other of Carolina Parakeets, and extinct species. As you can see from these two paintings, I am looking forward to painting a bird that is not primarily black (or dark brown in reference to the Ivory-Billed).

More information on the presentation and upcoming shows will be updated soon. I'll be leaving for Antigua next week, and before then you can expect to see those two paintings added to the blog and/or website. Wish me luck!

Animal Wisdom, Animal Soul at the Life Force Arts Center

If you are in the area this Thursday, be sure to check out the Life Force Arts Center from 6:30 to 10:00pm. One of my paintings, Two Sides (Moho nobilis, extinct 1934), will be on display along with other great animal art in the exhibit, Animal Wisdom, Animal Soul: Lessons of the Wild Things. The Show will be up until September 9th and the center has a lot of cool presentations to coincide with this show's theme. I will be having my own presentation on August 9th from 7-9pm about animal extinction. More details to follow, but save the date! 

image: Cheetah (c) Sharon Bechtold

The Sparrow Project

Too much non-art work, not enough painting. I would be lying if I didn't admit work is slowing me down, but at least the ball has been rolling. The female Rose-Breasted Grosbeak is finally done and I have two other paintings on the edge of completion (...still not enough). I have a total of three pieces in two shows right now and more to be on display soon. Most recently, I was proud to include my work in The Sparrow Project, a fundraising event to help raise money for Heather and Caleb King's medical bills. More info on their project and how you can donate is below:

http://thekingtwins.tumblr.com/

http://sparrowproject.tumblr.com/

This is the finished painting, Rose-Breasted Grosbeak (female) on Purple Leaf Plum, my smallest yet at 5 x 7 inches. It sold for $90.00 at auction for The Sparrow Project, to a worthy owner. It was actually really refreshing to work on something this small and I plan on creating more small works for the future. 

Lexington Art Article

I just found out that one of my images was featured in an article about Lexington's art scene! I'm very honored that my painting made such a good impression in their city. Unfortunately, this Tuesday they will be taken back home with me to Illinois. Still, it was wonderful to have the opportunity to show my work there and I hope I will be able to again in the near future!

Here's the article if you are interested:

http://www.theurbn.com/2012/06/lexingtons-sensational-public-square/ 

Emily sketch

This Sunday, I found the perfect excuse to utilize my new sketchbook. My family was over and while my cousins were playing dominos, I realized that their still, concentrating faces were ideal for drawing. This is a quick, five-to-ten-minute sketch I did of my cousin, Emily. I've been so involved in studying birds and animals that it was a nice refresher to study the human face again. I think I'm going to keep up this habit for future family gatherings and such.

Field Museum Painting Day: May 8, 2012

Before my graduation rehearsal on Tuesday, I took advantage of being early in downtown Chicago and scheduled an appointment to visit the Field Museum's Birds Collection again. I still needed more references of the Carolina Parakeet to gain more familiarity before I began my next two paintings. Unfortunately, I only had an hour to paint, but the advantages of this short time frame forces me to work quickly and record the bare essentials of my subject. Plus, I like the unfinished quality of my studies in my sketchbook.

Before the end of the month I plan to finish either a large painting of the Carolina Parakeet interacting with the unicorn, or a smaller painting that focuses more on the parakeets. 

The Sketchbook Project 2012

It's finally finished! At the beginning of the year, I took part in the Sketchbook Project, a publication and exhibition opportunity where participants receive a small sketchbook as a manner in which to show their artistic process to the general public. Each year, new themes are introduced to see what new and returning artists come up with. I choose the theme "the last word ever spoken," knowing immediately that it was a great excuse to draw some extinct birds.

At first, I thought my project would be very straightforward: just quick drawings of some interesting extinct species to aid in my future studies. I had wanted to add some color, which meant as a watercolorist I needed to remove the original pages of the sketchbook and rebind them with watercolor paper. I wanted to keep in touch with my current working process by adhering the watercolor paper using gesso. So, page by page I gessoed and adhered the new paper. This was going well, until the cheap paper couldn't handle the water absorption and started to fall apart. I couldn't rebind the book and it was starting to get too thick for the project's requirements. By this time, I had spent so much effort preparing the paper that I was itching to just start drawing, and I had successfully destroyed my book. Needless to say, I wasn't happy. So, I  unwillingly ditched my oh-so-beautiful-watercolor-paper and rebound the book with regular copy paper. I started drawing with the intention of just getting it done but quickly realized that my book was not as creative and interesting as I had imagined it to be. During the last few days of the project, I started to worry about my drawings. I needed something to imply the somber mood and express the birds' fateful nonexistence. Out of desperation, I began experimenting with different mediums and stumbled across something very cool.

Here's the result...

 



 

 



 

 



All of the pages were first drawn with graphite and ink, which I had already done prior. Then, I painted with black acrylic a dark "cloud" to represent the thoughts or "last words" of the bird(s). After that, I added thin layers of white gesso over both the images of the bird and the black, creating beautiful grays and off-whites on the already white paper. While the gesso was still wet, I carved into the white to expose the black paint underneath, adding my interpretation to my sketchbook's theme.

Overall, this project was not what I expected it to be. It turned out to be a great learning experience about my personal aesthetics and process. I would love to continue to painting like this as a side theme to my larger works.