Recent content by stlukesguild

I swear by the adage: “Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.”

Over the years rendering the patterns/tessellations has become far easier. The composition remains the most time-intensive part of my work as it develops and evolves throughout the entire process. The gold leaf has become almost as time-intensive as it has become increasingly complex and...

I use primarily 3 brands of soft pastel: Rembrandt are semi-soft and I use them for something like 75% of the painting.I have the largest collection of these. Sennelier are very soft and have the richest or most saturated pigments. These I frequently use for the final layers. Then I use...

This afternoon we went out for a late Lunch/early Dinner. I picked up some pencils and pastels. Now I’m working on my current painting and listening to this:

This morning was drab, gray, rainy, and blah! The wife and I lit some candles and listened to some mellow jazz:

Got a little more done on this painting:

I really wanted together some Tuscan Red pencils but Dick Blick was sold out. I picked up a slew of pencils that were close in color to Tuscan Red as well as some Sennelier pastels. The reds especially are incredibly saturated… like Cadmium Red in oil paints… and oh so soft. I just completed a...

I gravitate towards realistic styles when I go to art galleries, and I lean towards realism in my own art. If I'm honest... I don't entirely "get" abstract art. But that's just me. Most abstract pieces don't really grab my attention, and I never quite understand what the artist is trying to...

Of course I’m being a smart-ass; I spent several years working as an abstract collage artist;

Steely Dan can be found and link to from YouTube: Steely Dan: Do I Again

😜

there were three terms in art school that were intended as insults: “narrative”, “illustrative”, and “decorative”. The Modernist architect, Adolf Loos, penned an essay, Ornament and Crime that became an inspiration for Minimalist architecture… and later Minimalist painting and sculpture which...

Speaking on Abstract Expressionism, the poet Randall Jarrell said, “ Perhaps painting can do without the necessity of imitation, but can it do without the possibility of distortion?” I largely lean toward the aesthetic that Jarrell suggests. I appreciate that abstract art is not unlike the...

Damn! I just discovered I’m almost out of my Tuscan Red colored pencils… which I use extensively in my drawings/paintings. I’ll need to hit Dick Blick’s ASAP.