Sunday, April 22, 2012

Final Semester Week 14

Well we have basically come to the end, we have one week left till the Spring Prizes at school and the next week we hang our ASE wall. I am down to wanting to finish one more painting for the show, I completed this plien air of the Delaware River yesterday. You can read about my exploits painting this with the Dirty Palette Club over on our blog.
I also finally finished my big center piece painting for my wall. I finished it up in a few days of 16+ hours of painting. I'm pretty proud of this one and have another idea for a painting along similar lines I plan to do over the summer.
Last friday Peter Van Dyck did a demo (along with free pizza) in the cast hall at school. I was a busy week which started off with a visit to my studio by Bo Bartlett and his wife on Monday morning. You can read all about that over on my Michael Cole Manley blog.
i finally got to see the Tanner show at PAFA the wek before it closed and I have to say it was the best show I have seen at the school besides the Cecilia Beaux show a few years back. it was really great to see the painting live, he was such a gifted painter and colorist, the surfaces of his paintings are amazing! I have been very effected by seeing his work and of course it's great he went to PAFA.
Though our time at PAFA as a group is coming to a close as none of my buddies are following me into the MFA we are taking the time to enjoy our last few weeks in our studios.I cooked a big pot of vegan curry and we ate some while watching goofy stuff on you-tube and looking at art books. I will cherish this time i know more and more in the coming years.

Judge Parker

What's going on in the barn anyway?

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Sunday, April 15, 2012

Judge Parker

This weeks Judge Parker Sunday--a turn to the domestic...

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Final Semester Week 13

I made better progress in the last two days on my big painting here and once I got everything massed in I could feel the space. Now it's the small moves all over and in some cases I have repainted things more than once to adjust areas to the light-atmosphere I want.
One of the benefits to working on panel is that it dries pretty quick so I haven't even had to use much liquin on this. I can see though I will have to hit this with some retouch varnish because some areas are sinking in pretty good. I hope to be done with this painting this week, just a few more good, long days and I can finish and move on to my last two paintings for the show. We have three weeks left till we have to hang our work.

Sunday, April 08, 2012

Saturday, April 07, 2012

Final Semester Week 12

I am now into the last month of school, and the last month of my undergrad at PAFA, so I will be spending as much time in the studio painting as possible. My solo show at Rodger LaPelle cam down last weekend and I am happy with the good sales that happened, especially in this bad economy.

So now its the last sprint till the finish line and the ASE. Like a runner running through that pain or stitch in my side, I have to keep the pace. In my portrait class with Scott Noel I got to put in a bit more time on the big paintingScott set up and is himself the central figure in. Now its all the changes one deals with from week to week, class to class as the set-up and the lighting conditions can alter in small and in big ways. but eventually you have to nail down things and move on.

I will have one large painting for my Wall at the ASR, this painting of the crowd of riders inside the train I take to school. I saw this cool scene before me while riding in so I took my Iphone and snapped a dozen or so of pics in a panorama, covertly snapping in an arc across the car. I stitched the patchwork pics together in photoshop and they didn't of course match up perfect, but it gave me a layout which I could do the drawing from. I made a support of luan, whichis very light and has a great surface and which I cradled on the back, primed it with 4 coats of acrylic gesso and then 2 coats of Windsor Newton oil primer.

Then looking at the layout I gridded off the panel and the layout and drew in the painting directly on the panel with Van Dyke Brown in a terps wash.

This is where all the comics drawing and animation background and layout drawing skills server me so well. Once I found the vanishing point it went pretty quick and 90 minutes or so this picture was laid out. I kept it loose and of course made so many adjustments and changes sine working from the pictures created all kinds of "holes and tangents" that I had to fix. I moved heads and hands, all kinds of things as I wasn't trying to exactly trace what I saw in the pictures but to essentially create a space with figures in a specific atmosphere of light. The painting is 3 x 5 feet and so I have to move back and forth a lot to see the whole thing.

This is a picture of what I did in my second session I started working in very broadly and directly using the biggest brush and a Speedball litho/printing roller to mass in things.
This is the painting after my work on it last night, my third session and a detail of a few of the faces below. I aim to keep this one juicy and very "Sargent" in my touch and approach
I can't wait to get back to the studio and paint on it today!

Thursday, April 05, 2012

Draw! Magazine Nominated for an Eisner Award!

Draw! along with our sister publications has been nominated for an Eisner Award under the best comcs journalism catagory: TwoMorrows Publications: Alter Ego edited by Roy Thomas, Back Issue edited by Michael Eury, Draw edited by Mike Manley, and Jack Kirby Collector edited by John Morrow

Monday, April 02, 2012

Susan McDowell Eakins Painting Competition

This weekend at school was the annual Susan McDowell Eakins painting competition at school, its a two day event painting from the live model, 9-4. It's open to 2nd to 4th year BFA and Certificate students and was started by Al Gury the chairman of the painting dept. at PAFA. There were roughly 30 students on hand this time, including my studio mate lexi and Alina, who won second place last year. Here is my effort from this year, 24 x 30 in oil, I didn't win anything this year--last year I won first place and Alina won second place--but this year she won first place, and I'm really happy for her, she did a handsome little painting. It's rough standing mostly on your feet for two days painting and I was running on little sleep, but during the judging, this time by Peter Van Dyck we all feasted on Pizza. That's it for me as next year I'll be an MFA and unable to participate, but it was a challenge for the few years I was able to compete.

Sunday, April 01, 2012

Judge Parker

This week's Judge Parker Sunday wrapping up this storyline...