Painting is a singular pleasure, one of my favorite activities. With a heavy schedule of exhibits and projects I have lined-up for the next few months I am painting a lot, almost 40 hours a week. There are times when I need a break from the long hours of canvas, oils and brushes, but want to continue working in the studio. Fortunanly I have enough space in my studio that I can work on more than one media, or project at a time. I have two plein air painting easels, I have a small one that I use for a drawing/sketching box that doubles as an easel. It works great and holds drawing supplies such as pencils, color pencils, pastels, conte' crayons, watercolors and a great assortment of rendering supplies at my fingertips. I set-up the easel at the back of my studio, in front of a sculpture pedestal and a large shelving unit laden with art books. This provides an opportunity to work on drawing quickly without taking valuable table space that are normally utilized for teaching classes or laying out papers, stretching canvas and other activities. In the above photo you can see a terra cotta bust that I made a couple of years ago on the pedestal. This was a great subject for a quick charcoal sketch. Drawings and sketches in charcoal are a lot of fun and it was good to return to the media with it's lovely chiascuro effects. I think I'll continue working on more charcoals and take a break from painting when my arms and shoulders become tired from many hours at the easel.
Thursday, April 28, 2011
A Break from Painting
Painting is a singular pleasure, one of my favorite activities. With a heavy schedule of exhibits and projects I have lined-up for the next few months I am painting a lot, almost 40 hours a week. There are times when I need a break from the long hours of canvas, oils and brushes, but want to continue working in the studio. Fortunanly I have enough space in my studio that I can work on more than one media, or project at a time. I have two plein air painting easels, I have a small one that I use for a drawing/sketching box that doubles as an easel. It works great and holds drawing supplies such as pencils, color pencils, pastels, conte' crayons, watercolors and a great assortment of rendering supplies at my fingertips. I set-up the easel at the back of my studio, in front of a sculpture pedestal and a large shelving unit laden with art books. This provides an opportunity to work on drawing quickly without taking valuable table space that are normally utilized for teaching classes or laying out papers, stretching canvas and other activities. In the above photo you can see a terra cotta bust that I made a couple of years ago on the pedestal. This was a great subject for a quick charcoal sketch. Drawings and sketches in charcoal are a lot of fun and it was good to return to the media with it's lovely chiascuro effects. I think I'll continue working on more charcoals and take a break from painting when my arms and shoulders become tired from many hours at the easel.
