Blanks

Blanks

It's true, a blank canvas is a little scary. The truth is I love having a bunch of blanks around to work on, especially with a couple of deadlines looming. Things are moving along for my upcoming show in June. I'm not as far along as I'd like to be, but I always feel like that before big shows.

I've stretched a couple of larger canvases over the past week. I'm figuring out ways to deal with bracing them in the rear and so far, it's working out. I have to improve my measuring so there's less waste and less time spent trimming. I'd rather have to trim the wood than have it be too short. I also found out that if you tighten the screws in the 'T' braces too much, the wood will tend to bow out after stretching. I wound up loosening the screws and left the canvas on the floor overnight. Today, everything was fine. I re-tightened the screws and everything was good to go.

I often don't like the process of prepping canvases, but now that I have a process down and materials at hand, it's not so bad. Next week I'll hate it again...

leaning straight

left: old and busted
right: new and shiny hotness

Really, it's the little things that count. I've used the leaning tower of a cart on the left for more than a year or so. I finally got around to replacing it today. The new one was actually a spontaneous purchase. I happened to be in Loews looking for some hardware when that lightbulb went off over my head (new flourescent one at that). I felt proud of myself because I'm so prone to forgetting that I need to replace certain things because I come from the school of, "eh, it's almost falling apart...BUT it's still standing...".

I'm slowly working my way out of that mindset...

stacks

Hanging Stack
grapihte, oil stick on paper


Floater Stack
grapihte, oil stick on paper

(click images for larger sizes)

These are images of two drawings from a couple of years ago that I mentioned in this post. Rebecca Crowell wondered what they looked like and I finally got around to photographing what I had in the studio.

I did a bunch of these in 2005 and I'm thinking about continuing with the series, called "Stacks". The idea grew out of observing floorboards in my studio. The building is probably nearly a century old and was once a factory of some sort. Consequently, what were once flat, even floorboards are now very worn and irregular in spacing and surface from years of use. The irregularities were what intrigued me the most. I also wanted the 'stacks' to more or less float in space as opposed to being anchored somehow to the edges of the drawing surface.

Commission complete

L: Float On II
R:Float On I
both are 60" x 50", acrylic on canvas
(click photo for larger size)

New paintings completed recently for a commission. Met with the client and Bridgette at the studio on Monday and the client chose the one on the left, Float On II.

Something new

Click To Play

I was done with painting last night and remembered that I have video capacities on my camera. I hadn't forgotten, really, but it's taken me a while to return to experimenting with it. Last October, I had a computer meltdown and had to have my old one replaced. At the same time, I had just barely begun to understand the processes involved with creating and posting videos online.

Last night, after I was done with painting for the day, I decided to turn the video function on and get back into the video habit I began last fall. I'm thinking about doing an ongoing series of video studio journals along with other ideas. As much as I like the creative possibilities, there's the inevitable time-suck that comes along with experimenting with new media (new to me, that is), but I'm looking forward to whatever may come next...