Brittney

Oil, 12 x 16 inches

Artist's Magazine Honorable Mention

I know I've already been talking about this painting a lot recently since it received the Best of Show award in the NOAPS annual exhibition. Well, the December issue of the Artist's Magazine has been released and I can now tell you that the same painting has received an Honorable Mention in the Magazine's 30th Annual Art Competition in the figure and portrait category! I'm honored once again to be in the company of so many great artists including fellow Illuxcon exhibitor, John Jude Palencar, who took first place in the same category. Below is the cover and my own section of the magazine, but go check out all the other great art in this issue on the news stands or order your own copy right here.

Artists' Magazine

Ukulele, Oil, 18 x 24 inches

Here again on the left is a large image of the painting for you to see. Just click it to zoom.

And again, because I don't like to post here without showing new work, below is another alla prima painting from the portrait night that I attend. This model was dressed so nicely and sat in such a nice pose that I had to do more than just her portrait.

Kelly with a Carnation, Oil, 12 x 16 inches

Kevin and a Nude

A couple of alla prima pieces from a little while back.

Nude, Oil, 12 x 16 inches

Kevin, Oil, 14 x 18 inches

Best of Show!

I'm so honored to report that my painting in the National Oil & Acrylic Painters' Society's Annual Best of America exhibition has received the Best of Show award. Some pictures of the exhibit can be seen on the NOAPS facebook page. Many thanks to the organization and to the galleries hosting the show!

Ukulele Daydream, Oil, 18 x 24 inches

...and because I don't like to make a post without showing new artwork, here is a little moon.

Moon, Oil, 8 x 8 inches

Mini Mermaids

Two little mermaid paintings that I brought to IlluXcon VI earlier this month. Each is just 8 x 10 inches. Both of these paintings, and several others, sold at the event which was a really excellent display of incredible fantasy artwork at the Allentown Art Museum in Pennsylvania.

Oil, 8 x 10 inches

Oil, 8 x 10 inches

A Bargain Kept

Another new painting that I'll be bringing with me to IlluXcon next week. This will be my second year exhibiting in the main show there and a very exciting year for the event as it moves to the Allentown Art Museum. An unprecedented event displaying (and selling) current fantasy artwork in a fine art museum.

I wanted to create a story with this image. I'm drawing on many stories and fairy tales from The Frog Prince to Ulysses' encounter with Circe in The Odyssey to clue the viewer into what might be going on here. A shadowy sorceress is seen here with a few of her accoutrements. It's not a large leap to guess that this frog of unusual size may have not always been a frog. But who's that in the mist beyond? Is it someone spying upon her activities or an unfortunate soul forced to come and keep their end of a bargain?

Oil, 18 x 24 inches (Click to Zoom)

Detail image (Click to Zoom)

Detail image 2 (Click to Zoom)

Ukulele Singer, Oil, 18 x 24 inches

I've also been notified that Ukulele Singer has been accepted to the National Oil and Acrylic Painters Society (NOAPS) Annual "Best of America" Exhibit! The show will take place in Bolivar, MO, at the Dunnegan Gallery October 13-27th 2013, and The Vine Gallery, Osage Beach, MO, November 2-20th 2013.

Falling Fire (Shooting Star)

In this new figure painting with the Milky Way I'm hoping to express my appreciation for the natural world. I'm also hoping to express my interest in thinking about how earlier cultures saw and understood the world. For one thing, I like to remember that before electricity and light pollution, the Milky Way was visible from everywhere, and visible every night that the moon wasn't too exceedingly bright. The best starry night sky you've ever seen was the regular nightly show. Now, I'm not disappointed that we have electricity, but what a different experience our ancestors had!

I also like to think about what people would have thought of all those lights up in the sky. We tend to take for granted our knowledge that stars are burning balls of gas, and that we know what space is. But, before science told us these things, people could only guess at what all those lights were based on what they saw from hill tops such as this. The astronomer, Carl Sagan, proposed that a star looks not unlike a campfire from a great distance and people may have seen stars as distant campfires of the gods. This thought is one of my main inspirations for this piece. This is the reason I included distant campfires dotting the landscape below as well as the reason for the title "Falling Fire."

Oil, 18 x 24 inches
(Click to Zoom)

In more good news, my two entries to the Jack Richeson 75 Figure/Portrait contest were accepted! Michael (below right) received meritorious status, while Mark Taber (below left) is a finalist and will be included in the exhibition at Richeson Gallery in Kimberly WI, from Sept 16th - Oct 25th 2013.

Joe

Oil, 11 x 14 inches

Last weekend, at a fantastically mythic juried show at Hope Gallery, title Heroes & Villains, my painting, "Last Stand" received second place!

Jenn

Oil, 12 x 16 inches

Amanda with a Sunburn

She was just back from a beach vacation.

Oil, 11 x 14 inches

Nick

Oil, 11 x 14 inches

Nude with News

I can now post a small nude that I painted for the Portrait Society of America's Mystery Sale: Limited Size, Unlimited Talent. For this sale, artists are chosen and given a 6 x 9 inch panel to paint on and are asked not to sign their works. At the event which takes place at the organization's annual conference, buyers bid on the paintings without knowing who the artist of each painting is. It's great fun and it was an honor to participate along side some of the most well known artists working today (secretly.) Below was my contribution.

Oil, 6x9 inches

I've been pretty busy lately and while I haven't been able to post here much I've accumulated several bits of news to share:

My piece, Fairy and Her Steed was a finalist in this year's Art Renewal Center Salon. I'm excited to be including in their new Imaginative Realism category. Congratulations to all the winners and finalists!

Looking Back has been accepted to the Oil Painters of America's First Annual Salon Show in Petoskey, MI. Taking place between June 21st and August 31st, 2013.

Crater Lake received second place in a juried show at Hope Gallery in Bristol, RI.

I'm honored and grateful to be included in all these events!

Mark

Oil on Canvas, 12 x 16 inches

Earth, with A Close-Up

A few little recent paintings. Prints available at my Etsy shop.

Home, Oil, 8 x 8 inches

Apple Harvest, Oil, 12 x 16 inches

Zeno

There are several things to think about when painting from a live model. One that I wasn't expecting while painting Zeno was at the end of his last sitting, when after standing up too quickly and stretching, he lost consciousness and fell face first off the model stand. Luckily, he came away with only a bloody nose.

Zeno, Oil, 11 x 14 inches

This second image is taken in raking light to show the relief texture of the brushwork. I didn't make an animated gif this time, but if you click on either image to zoom in with Blogger's image viewer, you should be able to get the same effect by flipping back and forth with the arrow keys on your keyboard.

Portrait Workshop

I taught my first alla prima portrait painting workshop recently in Wakefield, RI at South County Art Supply. Despite losing track of time and rushing the end of the demonstration I gave, it went pretty well and was a lot of fun. I'll probably do it again sometime, so if you would be interested in taking a workshop in Rhode Island, let me know in the comments or in an email so I can gauge the interest level. Below are a few pictures of my demonstration in progress and the end result (with a few touch ups to fix what I rushed.)

Oil, 12 x 16 inches

OPA National Exhibition

This new painting of mine has been accepted to the Oil Painters of America 22nd National Juried Exhibition! This year's the show will be at InSight Gallery in Fredericksburg TX from May18th - June17th.

Young Couple, Oil, 16 x 20 inches

Below is a detail (left) and an animated gif (right) showing both raking light and even light so you can see the relief of the brushwork, and because animated gifs are fun.

Detail

Raking Light

Jillian Looking Back

Pushing the brushwork.

Oil, 8 x 10 inches

Emily in Raking Light

Getting a good digital representation of an oil painting is difficult. I usually scan my paintings, but lately my digital photography skills have been improving. Finally realizing that one of the polarized lighting gels I made six months ago was rotated 90 degrees in the wrong direction was a good step (thereby creating glare rather than removing it.) Being able to remove glare from my photos in this way makes digitization go a lot faster.

Another perk is that I can also get good "raking light" photos like the one below without too much glare on relief brushwork. The term, raking light, means to have one light aimed at an angle very near to the plane of the surface being photographed (the painting.) This causes any bumps on the surface to cast shadows and shows all of the three-dimensional relief of the otherwise two-dimensional surface. This three dimensional quality is a major part of what is lost to a viewer when seeing a painting on a computer screen.

Among other things, the impressive effect of seeing a painting in person has to do with seeing it from multiple angles and being able to change how the light bounces into your eyes by moving around. So while a raking light photo still isn't as good as seeing something in person and doesn't suit every painting, it can add an interesting dimension to an otherwise flat image.

Oil, 14 x 18 inches

Clark

Oil, 11 x 14 inches

Fantasy Portrait and SILA Silver

New fantasy portrait completed at a smokey lava lake, near Mordor.

Oil, 16 x 20 inches

Judging by Society of Illustrators of Los Angeles for the annual Illustration West has been completed and I'm delighted to receive a Sliver Award for my painting Wind Farm! Congratulations to everyone who was accepted. See the award winners here.