This is by far the largest sweet potato I have ever seen!
Noble Steed
At the horse rescue shelter, the descnedant of Man O War, no further use for him after a life of racing and then at the stud farm, a beautiful animal.
Horse Rescue
In back of this winery, horses are rescued from slaughter. Thoroughbreds, once prized for their racing value, are abused and eventually sold to Canada or Mexico for dog food at auction. I met the great great great great grandson of Man o 'War a beautiful stallion, who can now live out his days in this beautiful surrounding.
Study in Green
I painted this tonite, from a beautiful photograph of a verdant countryside. I quickly sketched a drawing in burnt umber and rapidly filled in planes of color, almost like a Rothko painting. This was a particularly challenging project, as when I worked with colors more, the difference in color was able to adequately express spatial relationships. Now, I had to rely on subtle shade differences of greens to establish depth. I tried to divide the stage into three major parts - foreground, background and a blue green middle ground. I was careful not to make the greens that were too bright gaudily yellow, or to dull them with whites. I added reds to the sky, to create a rain filled overcast day. Yet the sun does poke through , and I sparingly sprinkled on highlights and dappled the field with brilliant color. In the remote distance, a white steeple church can be seen, reminiscent of the Baptist churches I saw in the North Fork.
Autumn Reflections
This is a painting I did last night at the School of Visual Arts. I chose to copy a photograph of an autumnal scene, showing the refections of trees in a clear blue lake. I began with a quick burnt sienna acrylic underpainting, lightly applied to allow the luminosity of the underlying canvas to show through. I then roughly sketched with brush the outlines of the trees and lake in burnt umber oil, using walnut oil as medium. I forwent the next phase of developing darks and lights in burnt umber, and instead went directly to color. After the first color was applied , I felt I had gone too thick , and I scraped the entire painting down with a palette knife. This created a most beautiful glowing underpainting. I then retouched the sky and lake, painting the sky lighter and the lake a deeper blue. I added in touches of reds and yellows to capture the effects of light. I added light yellows and oranges and reds to the trees, but centrally made them darker to create shadow and depth. Lastly, I added a few semblances of trunks and branches with a fine sable brush. Lucy, our teacher, liked it and said it was complete. She also said that I have my own style, which reflects my personality.
Thank You Rio!
We have a new visitor to the Expedition from Rio de Janeiro. You are the sole representative of your great continent. Please recruit your fellows from the southern hemisphere to join the blog. Welcome!
The Cutting Room with "Henry Butler" and "Mary Lobb"
These pictures were taken at a class New York City Day and Night at the ICP. I did black and white conversion to make more like old 1950's style New York. New Orleans piano legend Henry Butler and singer Mary Lobb performed.
Mary Lobb: click below to hear her music and see her site...
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=47107800
Henry Butler:
http://www.henrybutler.com/
Snowy Landscape at Sunset. "School of Visual Arts"
This is the completion of a painting I copied as part of a course at the "School of Visual Arts". I added bright cadmium yellow to the sky to add brilliance, and i added yellow to the cadmium red to increase the orange tones of sunset. I also smoothed the snow into flat interweaving planes, simplifying the pattern, broken by occasion bushes. I added a few highlights to the diagonally placed stream and I added flake white and yellow with reds to the central snow, showing it as an area on which the last fading rays of light illuminated. I have shown the earlier version of the painting as well, to demonstarte the most recent adaptions.
The teacher is Lucy Gould Reutzfeld, and she is teaching us to create luminous light filled landscapes. Her website is below...
Steven on an ICP Fashion Photoshoot, courtesy of "(c) 2008 Wei Liou - http://www.weiliou.com"
Taken by a Canon pro using a tilt-shift lens TS-E 45mm/2.8. Note how the tilting action of the specialized lens allows the plane of focus to be at an angle, causing the interesting effect of blur in front of and behind the image in focus. This creates the effect of miniaturization.
"(c) 2008 Wei Liou - http://www.weiliou.com."
Special appreciation to Mr. Wei Liou, an immensely talented photographer who was kind enough to take these two photos of me on class assignment using this special lens, which he has complete mastery of. Please check out his website, I assure you that you will be awestruck as I when you view his moving and inspirational views of the city. I will endeavor my utmost to follow his example of sharing and generosity. A truly special individual... Thank you Wei!
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