Click on image to go to Plein Air gallery
Click on image to visit gallery
Shocked to have 2 pieces in the 2017 SAAG National Juried Show!
I was honored and totally blown away at being accepted in the Blueridge Mountain Art Association SAAG National Juried Show with not one but TWO pieces of art! There are many fantastic artists who participate, so this is a real honor.
The pieces will hang in Blueridge, Georgia for a month. The little town has become a popular art community, listed in the top 10 in the nation. As well as just being a stinking cute old fashioned town, it offers festivals, galleries and lots of cool shops and restaurants. The biggest draw is a restored train that will haul you around beautiful foothills of the mountains for a few hours, which I got to paint two times for their plein air event in September. (BTW, to ride the train make sure to order those tickets wayy in advance.)
I knew the piece would hang during the fall art festival so I chose a few photos I had taken a few falls ago at my favorite local garden center, Scottsdale Farms, in Milton, Ga. Here are the progress shots of the large piece, produced in my studio in July.
The show opens October 7 and runs through November 11, stop by the art center gallery and visit if you are in town. Thanks for looking and wish me luck!
One of the questions I ask myself with every new painting is, “What is this going to say?” or” What story do I want to visually tell the viewer?” Sometimes it takes careful study to find the truth of a scene, sometimes many sketches, sometimes just sitting and observing. Always lots of thinking about it.
“The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance. ”
From the start it’s a wrestling match to stay on track, because creating is not just copying. It’s the artist’s job to direct the viewer to see the bigger story, through use of light, contrast, shape, texture, color and line.
The struggle is to stay mindful of what is really important, and leave the rest suggested or abstract - or undone. Adding something “wrong” (ie, unnecessary) at any stage will risk missing the story, and for me it still takes amazing concentration and discipline to stop and correct it.
“Every artist dips his brush in his own soul, and paints his own nature into his pictures.”
Each thing added either adds to the spirit of the painting or distracts.
This life-long learning process is a journey made of gathering skills and disciplines and finding a new way of seeing. The prospect could be daunting but for the good company of artists who have created before, or are creating now. Their inspiration makes the journey pure joy.
“Happy are the painters, for they shall not be lonely. Light and colour, peace and hope, will keep them company to the end of the day.”
