New Painting in Progress: Conewago Creek I

I am posting a new work in progress! Spring has inspired me to return to the easel! I actually like this painting so far, so I am going to post it before I kill it.

I decided to go back to basics and paint small. This is a 16x20 pre-stretched canvas that I picked up on sale. I like to keep a bunch of these around so I always have something to paint. I tinted this canvas with some of the new Golden acrylic paint. I used Vat Orange. I did not paint on location. Due to some personal safety issues, I drove around a took photos of the creek . (There are some "interesting" people that live near the creek) I had these photos around for a while and finally decided to try to paint one.

This is the result of one evening's work. I worked a couple of hours on Wednesday night. I like the freshness of this painting. I have some "finishing" work to do, but I don't want to do too much. I think I tickled the death out of that last painting I posted.

As always, your thoughts and criticisms are appreciated. Don't take too long. Get out and enjoy the spring weather!

Chalk it Up! YorkArts High School Chalk Mural Competition

Hello good blog friends. I hope none of you feel insulted that Neetzy hasn't visited your blogs lately. I've just been busy with my kids. My own and my students. Yesterday, my high school art club participated in "Chalk it Up". This is an annual public art event which is held at a local shopping mall. My students are wearing their awesome blue smocks. In this photo, two of my students are "pouncing" (transferring an enlarged drawing onto our huge canvas 108 x 80). You will see this drawing eventually. If I uploaded my photos in a logical order, the pounced transfer would have been next. Since I do not have the capacity to function logically, you will see it at the end! Sorry. My bad.

In this photo, two of my students were adding a very interesting border. I noticed that my Art One student, "Peighton" has an excellent talent for design. I asked her to make an excellent border. You must admit, this is pretty cool. The dirty cushions I provided for the students to work on the cold, tile floor. (These were my old porch furniture cushions) I would have thrown them out, but they came in handy yesterday.

This is Beth's transferred creature. Pouncing is a transfer method which was used by Italian Renaissance artists. We punched pinholes in the drawing and placed it over our amazing black primed canvas. We rubbed the drawing with a pouch filled with baby powder. The image was transferred onto the canvas. Now Beth will do her magic with chalk and pastels.

Stay tuned. My camera's battery died. One of my students had a better camera. I am hoping she has photos of the finished product. We didn't win anything, but I think we should have. We had a fun time. The mural will be on display for a year. My students had the experience of making public art!

Gotta Love Picasso

You've gotta love Picasso!

Shazza, M, Semiconductor and I visited the Cezanne and Beyond exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art Friday. This was a wonderful exhibit, not just of Cezanne's work, but of many of the artists who were influenced by him. In one gallery, there was a wonderful painting of Madame Cezanne in her red armchair. There were also three or four paintings done by other artists (Matisse, Picasso, Beckmann) of their significant women, muses, mistresses et al in red armchairs.

This particular Picasso painting was of his mistress at the time. I enjoyed the painting. I thought it was quite beautiful. I picked up on the exposed breast and felt that Picasso must have felt that this woman was quite sexually attractive.

Afterwards, M asked Shazza and me if we noticed this painting. We did. It was quite remarkable. This spurred a bit of interesting conversation! I will not drop the ball. I want to know YOUR thoughts!

I have just completed teaching a unit on art criticism. Art criticism consists of the following four elements: Description, (what, who, where & how?), Analysis (what formal elements did the artist use?), Interpretation (What was the artist trying to say) and Judgment (Was the artist successful? What do you like and/or dislike about the painting?)

I thought it would be fun to ask fellow bloggers to criticize this painting. I will not forget M's interpretation. I just want to know if anyone else had a similar reaction. Steve Wynn, the owner of the painting and Las Vegas casinos felt the same as M. ( This is a bit of a psychological experiment. Please post your responses!

After you have commented, click on the post title find the link to Nora Ephron's blog. http://www.theunderserved.com/arts/the-100m-klutz.html You will discover some other interesting history/trivia about this painting. Does your interpretation match Mr. Wynn's? What does that say about Picasso? What does that say about you? Something to contemplate on this Easter evening. Love and Peace to you all.

Darwin Does Dover

Darwin Does Dover. Hee Hee. Do you remember the Intelligent Design Debate? Of course you do. Well folks, I live in the land of Intelligent Design, Dover, Pennsylvania, US of A. Back in February I drove to the end of my road to find this sign. Darwin in Dover. Ha Ha, HeeHee. I wanted to take a photo, but missed the opportunity. I found this on Flicker. Yay Flicker!

I lived through this. The right-wing, uber-conservative Christians tried to take over the school district and enforce the teaching of creationism. We went to the school board meetings and tried to convince these eejits that they were eejits but they would not listen to us. They would not let us speak.

I know you think we Dover-ites are a bunch of po-dunk rednecks but there are some of us that are a bit more educated. We did defeat these bastards. They lost their court case and they all lost their school board positions.

We chose to live here because of the natural beauty of the area (you have seen the photos) and the proximity to major metropolitan areas such as DC, Philadelphia, Baltimore and New York. We love this area. Do not let these people take over your school board. It was an organized effort during the Bush administration. I think they are still around. Whoever posted the sign, "Thank you!" I laughed every morning on my way to work.