Art and Photography Blog

Photographs from Bologna Italy: Part One

Here are some photographs from Bologna, a wonderful city within Emilia-Romagna, Italy. They were taken in late October. More to come. 

                          

 

Photos of Traveling in Northern Vermont: Part Four

Here are more Fall photos form northern Vermont. 

                       

Photos of Traveling in Northern Vermont: Part Three

This is the third in a series on photos from travels in northern Vermont. Now we are in the fall. 

                          

 

Photos of Traveling in Northern Vermont Part Two

Here is the second part of my series on traveling in Northern Vermont late in the summer.

                

Photos of Traveling in Northern Vermont: Part One

Here is the first part of a two part series about a late summer trip into Northern Vermont. Many of these pictures were taken in Jeffersonville, Vermont. 

                        


 
 
 
 
 
 
 

My New Art Heroes: Richard Diebenkorn and Emily Eveleth

My friend Liz Sweibel, an excellent artist herself, introduced me to two artists whose work I now greatly admire and find inspirational, Richard Diebenkorn and Emily Eveleth.

 With Richard, I like his work that is more representational such the smaller tomato and knife to the left than his abstract expressionism and the well-known Ocean Park paintings. Here is another example, Cityscape 1963, a larger scale 60 ¼ “ by 50 ½ “ found in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (image form Wikipedia).

With Emily, the painterly realism of common objects and the style of the figures are truly an inspiration. I also like the scale as you can see in the installation view from the home page of her web site showing some giant jelly donuts.

 

I like exploration of the details of figures in a style that reminds me of Sargent, and before him Velazquez.  Here is another image from her web site.  Emily went to the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston, as did my friend Liz. I used to teach education there in the art education department in the late 70s. She now shows at the Howard Yezerski Gallery in Boston. I hope to get there to see some of the paintings and go beyond just seeing images.

 

I do want to paint more textured and closer to the style shown in Emily’s figure above and will someday make the switch to oils primarily for this reason.  I often start out textured and then smooth it out as I try to paint what I see. But I often think maybe I should stop at the more textured stage.  Below is a painting I did that also explores some of the details of a figure in a style inspired by Sargent.

 

 

Photos of the Evolution of Traditional Paella

My friend Eric Wilson and his cousin Arturo Manzano recently made a wonderful looking paella over a wood fire.  You can see photgraphs of the stages below, following by the final presentation and then the cooks. I wish I was there to enjoy it but I may do a painting based on the final version.

I have enjoyed both consuming and creating Spanish cooking since I did some work there in the early 90s. I have made paella numerous ways including grilling the non-rice contents but I always cooked the rice over a gas fire. Now I will have to think about this approach. 

 

 

 

 

 
 

Still Life Painting of Fried Onion Rings

Here is a 24" x 30" acrylic still life of fired onion rings from Captain Al's Tiki Bar. They were delicious. I took a photo before I ate them and did this painting from the photo and my fond memories.  Here the original photos in this post: Photos of Clams Two Ways at Captain Al's Tiki Bar.