Monday, April 11, 2011

Seaside Boathouse
16 x 20
acrylic on stretched canvas
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A place I sketched from a photo I took on Old Cape Cod. It was early in the morning, no one was around but me and my coffee. I wandered down to the boats waiting on the shore, and just soaked in the peace and quite.

Friday, April 8, 2011

Cows in Pasture
16x20
acrylic on stretched canvas
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Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Sunday, April 3, 2011




The Seaside town of
Kennebunkport, Maine
11 x 14
acrylic on panel
Had to do this one. A favorite little port nestled in an inlet on the Maine seacoast. Love this place! I found it challenging, conveying the colorful bustling life onto the surface of my painting. I wanted the salty ambiance of the town to come through. This is the town Popeye would have frequented on one of his shore leaves.
Sometimes I'm glad I paint impressionistically, for it's an asset when trying to capture a multi-eclectic subject matter that won't stand still. ~ Hope you like it!
Country Spring Landscape
11x14
acrylic on gessoed panel
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This painting is from a composition just down the road from me, and I sketched it out rather than taking a picture. I find that sometimes the photo doesn't remind me as much of the subject as does a sketch. Too much information in the photo is more than likely the reason.
This way I handled this painting, is the direction that I am striving for in my work. A free, looser approach, with more emphasis on making a maximum statement, with minimum of complexity in execution. Its not easy, as I am finding out. Saying more with less, is way harder that saying more with more. Simplicity is complex. But thats the mystery and key. It should look like it was done with ease, and yet, the ease is work. The appearance by the viewer should be one of, .. its free, easy going, lively, and they should not be aware of the foundation and work behind the paint. Its kind of like magic. You see it and are engrossed, but not aware of the hand behind the illusion. I hope to maintain this direction as I continue my work.

Friday, April 1, 2011


EXPRESSIONIST PAINTING of sailboats and sunset
16 x 20
acrylic on canvas
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I've been working up enough art courage to get into some different levels of expression with not only my use of color, but subject and composition as well. This is the first of this endeavor I'll be embarking on for a while. I want to explore using color in an uninhibited manner, and let the subject take a secondary seat to the use of shapes, colors and line. Not that I have taken it into the next logical step of abstraction, but it in a close neighbor of it. This being the first, I'm sure I will have a lot to learn as I uncover things that will be revealed to me as I work. Its exciting, and new, and I always feel better about my art, if I haven't been there before. New is good. I'm looking forwards to it. I will include it in my portfolio of art under "it's coming along". But I'm sure I will still adhere to much of my other working procedures and styles that I have come to learn and utilize. ~ Hope you like it.
In case your wondering, .. yes I did some rework on this painting. I decided that it needed a little yellow hue to some of the green as well as a touch of orange. So I did, and now you can see it for yourself. The before and after.

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Storm Along the Coast
16 x 20
acrylic on stretched canvas
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As with a lot of my works, they start out as a sketch, and then translate into a painting. This one was pretty much just a pleasant seascape, when I began thinking about how on a perfectly beautiful nice warm day, a storm can spring up without a moments notice over the water. I love to watch them roll over the horizon knowing that they usually stay out to sea. In the scene are two escaping sailboats caught off guard. I thought, that is how it is. Warm, and sailing along one minute, and making haste to find safe harbor the next.