Brandywine Road Trip

Yesterday the boys of the Dirty Palette Club and I piled into my Jeep and made a road trip down to the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, PA. It was about a 40 minute road trip from the Academy where I picked everybody up. Besides Will and myself, none of the other guys had been to the museum before, so there was a lot of anticipation and of course rowdy humor on the ride down.I brought along some comics, art magazines and the new Sparrow art book featuring my buddy Bill Wray's work.

I try and go at least once a year, for me it's like traveling to Mecca, going back to the source seeing those paintings by NC Wyeth and Howard Pyle. This is where everything comes from in American Illustration. The best of the best and I get such a charge looking at those painting, and now being in school and learning about painting, and painting more and more myself, I see and learn more on each successive trip. The whole trip was almost worth it just to hear David say "Holy fuck!" under his breath when he walked into the room with NC Wyeth's paintings the first time.


Another thing is that every trip they have something new hanging and this time there were several new paintings from NC and an awesome Dean Cornwell and one by Harvey Dunn.
They also had a few nice plien air paintings by Frank Schoonover, a very nice Daniel Garber, even a Thomas Anshutz, so plenty of painting by former Academy students like ourselves.

After we hit the first two galleries we ate lunch at the museum cafe, then we saw the NC gallery and then the Andrew Wyeth gallery where his granddaughter was giving a little tour. We listened from the side as we looked at his amazing tempera and watercolor paintings. there is no way to really be able to appreciate the amazing subtlety of his work even from the best reproduction. When he passed recently, we really lost a giant in the world of art.

I have often had debates with some fellow students at school who knock his work, say his work is lesser or without merit because there can be a narrative or that it has a sentimentality to it, a melancholy. Once in class we were comparing art by Andrew Wyeth and Antonio Lopez Garcia, and people were all over Wyeth, basically calling him something akin to a Hallmark card artist. I was aghast and told them i thought that was bullshit! I think both artist's work is actually very similar, their love for where they live, the amazing technical ability , the dreamlike quality and the ability to make a moment of time beautiful. I find both artists highly poetic, the main difference I see is that the sunny climate of Spain is very different that the hills of Chadds Ford. Their palette and therefore the atmosphere is divergent there,I feel both of the painters are extremely emotionally honest. Wyeth's granddaughter said in her talk that after Andrew's father died in that car accident with the train, it so profoundly changed him, his art changed, and that he would not have been able to paint something like Christina's World if that hadn't happened to him.



The also had a new section with Jamie Wyeth's painting in the museum, some of which I like very much. It must be hard in a family of such giants to find your own way. There was a portrait painted by Jamie when he was 17 that was just stunning, it is really inspirational to stand in front of such true talent and ability--and it makes me want to do nothing but paint!

Brush Seller

This is a drawing I did in my sketchbook based on a pic I snapped of an old guy selling brushes when I was in Kunming, China. I was thinking about maybe doing a print of this in my intaglio class.

March Creepertins

The March Creepertins strip.

Martians, Martians Everywhere

Here are a bunch of sketches from my development art for the adaption of Fredericks Brown's book, Martians Go Home which I'm currently drawing for Sequential Pulp Comics.


I'll be posting art from my progress on the book as I go along.

Intaglio

I really haven't posted or talked about my Intaglio class I'm taking this semester. It's one of the 2 First year classes I have left to take, the other one being Art History II, so I'll be a a full second year student come fall, trying to start my 3rd year come January.

Anyway, we started out in intaglio with doing monotypes, where after your prepare the plate, you cover it with ink and then draw on it, whipe, use stencils, lay things on to make an image and then make single print. Sometimes you are able to strike a second plate, or a ghost print of the same image if there is enough ink on the plate. I really like printmaking and I want to do more monotypes and I am still working on the drypoint above. I will do some more etching on it and more test prints before I do my final edition.

Portrait Progress

Even though my friend Chuck wasn't sitting tonight for me, I went at the background a bit tonight very briefly while cooking dinner. Tomorrow the Dirty Palette Club meets again for another go-round on our portrait of Chuck, so be sure to check the DPC blog in a day or two to see our update.

Week 7

Well week 7 is off and running. I hope artistically the second half of the semester is better as i am pretty dam frustrated with the first part. Missing the bulk of week 6 also has made things pretty tough this week. I did spend a little time adjusting things on the painting for doug's class, I worked on the background and table set-up, even Amy's bathrobe, we have one shot left Friday with the models so I'll spend the bulk trying to nail her face and figure.

Yesterday I blocked in the figure ad background more in Al's morning class, I think we have one more go at this after the spring break which starts next week. I'm trying to be very loose on this one, blocking in with big masses of color and then the idea is to go in and define the changes between the more subtle transitions.
yesterday in Figure comp we had no models, it was the "day without a model" all classes have to have. Why? I heard it was a way yo save some $$. I know schools are all looking now for a way to cut costs, but hey, raise my tuition $20 if you need the model fee that day. But the day wasn't a total loss as Doug took us over to the museum next door and downstairs to look at paintings from the schools collection and the George Tooker show which is currently on in the school right now. That is really one of the fantastic things about PAFA , that we have two great museums at school we have constant access too, we can go, look, study great works from some of the best artists of the past 200 years up till today.

Sick Week

Well this last week was pretty much a wash for me as I got hit hard by that flu that's going around, so I was out for the count until Friday, my first day back in classes. I even had to skip my teaching as I was just too sick to even make it in for that. I still have the nagging cough, which seems to not want to let me sleep very soundly.

But I did finally drag myself back to school Friday afternoon for my uninstructed class in figure composition to once again fight with this wreckage of a painting. Last time i actually sanded it down really well and so i went back in reworking the thing as much as i could, I even stayed late to once again try and get more done. I still need to work on Amy's figure, drop down the background as it's competing too much with the figures and mark's figre, hus legs and torso need more work. But I finally nailed his head and reworked much of the table. the main issues were not planning this thing more, I just winged it and didn't draw any sketches and didn't spend enough time in the initial stage...a mistake I won't repeat on the next painting. What sucks is we have to have a class with no models for one class. Why this wasn't the first class and instead is right in the middle of our pose makes no sense, for cripes sake, raise my tuition the $20 to pay an extra hour to the models.

Oh well, sometimes the painting is a fight.

ACTION PACK 34

In stores this week Action Pack #34 featuring a Secret Saturdays inked by me.

Week 5-wrap--A bloody mess

Here is my bloody mess of a big painting. man, I was just not feeling it this week or feeling very focused on this thing. I should have made the drawing better, so I will sand the crap out of it and blast back on it this week and bust it up.

I have learned that working on a huge painting takes a lot more intense sessions, and they should be closer together, not days apart. I have no momentum on this thing and really hate the set-up and the whole mess. I think having 5 days between work sessions on this thing is contributing to my fractured approach. But I can only solve this problem by being honest and brutal to my efforts and the canvas.

Week 5

I'm off to another rip, roaring week here in the studio and at school. This begins the 5th week and a new pose in Life painting with Al Gury, so we had a new model, Mark, who's also posing in my Figure Comp class, so I was painting him twice today.

As with each new pose in Al's class, we start out with some sketches, then a small study and then we go up to the bigger painting. So I did a few rough sketches and then chose the composition I wanted and did this small oil on paper study using the biggest brush I could use, which was a flat. the study is on a 5 x 7 piece of Strathmore sketchbook paper. Value, shape and temperature is what I am seeking here. The trick is to keep this in the bigger painting.

I'm also knee deep in comics stuff, the Martians book and some Secret Saturdays shorts for DC's Action pack. As a result of such a full schedule I was forced to skip the NYC show this last weekend, and I see that the spring is going to zoom by.

Student Show--Figure Comp

Today in the uninstructed section of my figure Comp class I massed in the colors and tried to establish the mood of the painting. The canvas is big so I used my biggest brushes I spot and went at it.
Today was also the opening the annual student show which is open to all the students in the school, certificate students, MFA, MFA and Post Bac. I submitted my painting of my buddy Scott, and it made it into the show. Lots of people submit and fret over these shows. I guess it's part of the artists life, the stress, rush and worry. I had a painting that was accepted last year, but all of my drawings for the spring show last year were rejected, so that's the way it goes, one day they love you, the next, rejection. That's part of being an artist and entering competitions.

Still Life Study

This is a quick study done for a possible larger painting for the Philly Sketch club's upcoming Flower competition. I did this at last night's meeting of the Dirty Palette Club.

Winter Blast-Figure Comp 2

Yesterday was the first big snow storm in Philly this winter, I snapped a bunch of pics as I walked home after teaching at Uarts. My class was over late and it was a full winter wonderland on my way home. You can see more pics on my Facebook folder.

I also started my second painting in my Figure comp class, the biggest painting I've done to date at 30 x 36. It's a 4 week pose so I hope I can get something decent down on the canvas in that time.

Video Tutorials Coming

One of the things I am pretty excited about is the series of video tutorials I have started on and plan to bring on-line this year.

I get a lot of people asking me for help, tips, tricks and how-to info on a lot of art related things, from drawing and inking to coloring and even painting. I do already have an entire magazine, DRAW! which is all about comics and animation how-to, plus a DVD and book on the subject as well. But things are changing and I think everybody is going to the YOUTUBE route.

And face it, reading and demo is never as good as watching a demo. I learned a lot by watching my teacher Scott Noel work is amazing pastel drawings live in class. There are even guys like Stephen Silver doing on-line courses now.

So with all of this in mind I plan on starting to make some video-demos covering a lot of my working practices. I'm also throwing the ball out to you guys and gals to ask you what you'd like to see a demo on. I have already shot the first demo with my buddy Jamar Nicholas and I'm in the editing process now. I hope to have the first part up in the next week or so.

Week 4--The Plastic Club Small Worlds Show

Your's truly with one of the two paintings I had in the Plastic Club's Small Worlds show which held it's awards reception this past Sunday.
The Plastic Club is hop. skip or jump down Camac Street from the Philly Sketch Club and was a female only club until about 30 years ago. Violet Oakley,Cecilia Beaux, and Jessie Willcox Smith were but a few of it's famous members.
My good buddy Dave Gloas took First Place in the show for his self portrait.

Here Dave poses with all of the other winners from this year's competition.


Wow, the semester is fly'n bye, so, so fast. This week being week 4 means the spring semester is 1/4 done as of this week. I sort of hate to see it go so fast but I will not shed a tear to see the winter go and spring come. I am tired of Old Man Winter this year and can't wait for his bone chilling old ass to vacate the city.

The painting above I finished this morning in Al Gury's Life painting class. It's a study really, as we only had two session with this model so it wasn't going to be a nit-picky type painting. I tried to keep it pretty bold and go for the bigger changes. I'm about 40% happy with this, I wish I was just a bit more focused on it, but the class running at 8:30 in the am on Mondays means my brain just isn't that fresh and I just never feel I am grooving till the end of class. Al was very complimentary about what I did, so that's cool.

Februray Creepertins

The Dirty Palette Club Rides Again

This weeks work is on the blog

End of Week 3

So this is where the session ended and it was teh end of the pose and the end of our 3rd week of the semester. next week we will be 1/4 the way through--and I can see that time is going to fly by fast. I will go back in a few days and touch up a few spots on this but basically she is done and we'll be moving on to the next pose on Monday, this time with two figures. I have been loving the liquin Detail medium and I have to say it really comes in handy at school in the battle ground of the classroom.

Week 3--Paint as fast as you can!

Today started the 3rd week of the semester at the Academy, and it was my second pass at painting with the model in this pose, we have one more pose Friday and then we start another pose, next time with two models. Doug also reviewed the paintings for the bad composition exercise and basically said I failed to make a bad composition with the painting of the peppers. maybe I'll do another one for next week and see it i can take the bad composition prize.

In Al's class we were right off into the deep end when the model(who was late) showed up. This is what I blocked in today with the model, I will have I think one more session next Monday and then we are done. So the basic drill is we have to move pretty fast and try and block in as much as possible in each class, in fcat I usually stay longer to try and block in the backgrounds/set-ups when I can.

here are a couple of shots of Al giving us our end of class crit where we push all of the paintings together to check out what everybody's done.

Bad Peppers Composition

This painting I did this evening while watching the Simpsons, Family Guy, et. I hate the Family Guy by the way. Its for my figure comp class with Dough Martenson and the homework was to make a bad composition and paint it. So I plopped two peppers I bought at the store today down on the dinning room table and went at it. It's oil on MDF, about 9 x 12 I guess, it was on an odd sized small panel I had laying around. I used Liquin Detail as the medium so it would start tacking up right away.

The end of Week 2

This is the painting I'm working on in figure comp this week, I took the block in a little further than before, but this thing is still a work in progress....

Week 2

Though today was MLK day classes went on as scheduled at PAFA and that means it was painting with Al day, my Monday painting class with Al Gury. We officially started our first pose today, and that meant a sketch, then a small study. After this we can go next week to the bigger painting. the study was done in charcoal and the Oil Study was done on Strathmore sketch paper. I just taped the oil study up next to my first sketch and went at it. So next week I'll start the larger painting and the pose should run 2 more weeks.

After we all did our sketches and started the oil studies Al gave us a crit at the end of the class.

Manley Goes to the Martians

This is the promo art for a post card to promote the new comic series I'm doing for Sequential Pulp Comics, an adaption of Fredric Brown's Classic Sci-Fi book, Martians Go Home. The first issue will be out in late spring or early summer an will be published through Dark Horse. I'll be penciling, inking and coloring the series myself and my best buddy Bret Blevins will be painting the covers. This will be the first comic series I have done in years and I'm looking forward to doing this series because it combines two things I love, Sci-Fi and Humor.

Figure Comp Week-1

This is the first painting done in my Figure Comp class taught by Doug Martenson. This was a two session pose, the last session being today during the uninstructed portion of the class which happens every Friday. So it's the first official painting of the semester.

As always you are fighting the changing light this time of the year as the sun sets early so values change pretty darn quick about an hour into class which starts at 1pm. This causes you to rework things, constantly revisit the entire painting. I tried using a new medium today, Detail Liquin, which is thinner than the standard Liquin and dries fast like the thicker medium but allows you to work thinner. Alex Kanevsky uses this medium I am told. This helped tack the painting up quite a bit as I worked, racing the clock. In the end I am happy with parts and in others I wish I had more time as the values were pretty narrow on a lot of the figure. I never got to address the head as much or the hair, but them's the breaks in a class painting.

Lots of things are different this year for me personally and career wise and I am really knuckling down even harder in school. I have big goals and big dreams and I know I'll never get anywhere near them unless I up my game even more. That doesn't mean that I won't have fun, but last year at times I feel I wasn't as focused as I could have been, 2008 was a Fucking Shitty Year, but 2009 seems to be doing much better and I feel more balanced and more focused, my goals are clear, now I have to work hard to get there.

In the Studio

Here is s shot of the studio today, and the finished 8 page job I just inked for DC's Action Pack #36 featuring the Secret Saturdays's, who's show was just given a green light for the 3rd season.

I scanned and loaded the job on the DC server and now off to work full time on my next comic project that I will announce here in a few days.

Back to School--Spring 2009

Today was the first day of the Spring 2009 semester and the kick-off to the school year for me as a student. next week i start back as a teacher at Uarts, teaching storyboarding once again.

As a student I have two painting classes, one printmaking class and Art History II and now I am officially into my second year as a student in the certificate program. Today was the first class for both Life Painting 2 and Figure Comp. I'm the class monitor for the Figure Comp class as well. The painting above was done in the Figure Comp Class which is taught by Doug Martenson who I had the first semester in year one for painting. I started this oil sketch 3 times, wiping out what I did until I came up with this composition, I'll have one more class with this pose on Friday.

I think this pic sums it all up, Art and Hope might be the themes for me this year, and lots and lots of Hope!
The Still Life room lay quite awaiting the earnest brushes of the my fellow student.

Iron Giant Still Life

This is the still life I did today in our meeting of the Dirty Palette Club Head on over to see my process and the work by the other members.

The Big Commute

Here is my initial rough in of a bigger painting I'm working on in my commuting series. As I make each big step I'll post it up and talk about what I'm doing. One of the tings I need to do is get a bigger easel, which I hope to get in the next week or so. I roughed in with a medium charcoal pencil and the canvas is a Dick Blick canvas 24 x 30.

The next step will to be define the drawing more and work out details, better then fix it and start painting.

I'll have some smaller paintings underway as well.

The New Year Brings New Experiences

I have started another blog The Dirty Palette Club with a bunch of friends and fellow students mostly from PAFA. But we also have cartoonists, and animators as members as well. We decided as a group to get together outside of the classroom environment to paint, draw and create en mass to enjoy the experience and frustrations as artists together and to learn from each other. Also to just have fun painting together in a looser atmosphere.

So stop by from time to time to see what we are up to. I am upping my game this year as an artist. Oh, I'll still have plenty of commercial work, the usual mix of comics, animation and Draw! magazine, plus my teaching and being a student myself, but i want to focus on working on a series of paintings and themes as an artist and start entering juried competitions and events. One might ask how I can possibly up my game with all I have on my plate? Well I just have to be more organized and be willing to suffer a bit more. The spring semester will go fast, and soon the year will be half over and summer will be here. So the paintings I have been posting while on break are just me sort of limbering up for this year's harder push.