Brain Dump

15 min or 20 oil on gesso paper. From Monday Night Open Studio Drawing /Painting @ The Starline Factory out side my studio

Less than 25 min... some 15 min.  since Im chief bottle washer etc... I dont get the full time for the poses. And it takes me sometime to settle in.  These are from My Mondday night Open Studio drawing/painting in the common area outside my studio at The Starline Factory.

Experimenting: Mix media,  textures using my Black Walnut ink (that I made) pastel and acrylic paint. I did these during our Open studio drawing, I made up the backgrounds then chose them for each pose I thought they might best be suited for.

My Drawing group, Starline Open Studio Drawing/Painting is still meeting outside my studio . I changed the day to Monday evening from 6;30-9:30 pm 400 door on Front Street at the Starline building Ring bell, I will come down 205E Bring your gear, no toxic turp please, Walnut oil is perfect to use as a medium and for cleaning your brushes.  Chistopher Yates work  Suzanne Gleason  Jim Totulis Just a few from a couple of weeks ago.

Learning to play again, using watercolor , pastel, and acrylic paint...., oh my! I painted with my friend Carlolyn , she reintroduced me to acrylic paints. We played , droping paint in blobs spraying water moving it around , more blobs alcohol , crinkled plastic , palette knife . Medium .... This was the result . I had wanted a Chicago sky line for my chickens.... Not sure how this is going to work. Carolyn , " just look at it, let it speak to you, it will tell you what it needs" true enough. That's what all paintings do.  Sandpaper , watercolor , pastel, taped off sections . The beginning of my obsession with chickens.

After my last day with the kids for the year, I drove back to the Kishwaukee Headwaters to fix my paintings . ( I can see a strong influence of Vincent Van Gogh, 4 days with K-3 , I guess I can't help but channel a little, hahahaha) One was unfinished and damaged from a storm that blew up...... Truth be told it was blowing all day , the gust just came at the wrong time. The other had a shadow and a light that needed to be addressed . Had to do it on location. That didn't take long, but I think I over worked the second piece , the one I remembered to take a picture of. I'm really concentrating on seeing the subtle changes in the prairie landscape using values.  I need to replace my red gel , which was tucked in my my leather sketchbook that has gone missing. 

 Illinois State Beach Looking North February 2014 Illinois State Beach Looking South September 2013 I hope to do a series on Illinois State Beach. All of the shores of Lake Michigan intrigue me. I spent a great deal of my youth and young adult years there and brought my children to experience the same delight. There's something about the shores of Lake Michigan. So maybe the series will end up being about the shores of Lake Michigan rather than this specific shore.