Progress, As Promised

I should probably put a warning on this post - I'm not quite in foal watch mode, just starting to disrupt my sleep patterns again, so I'm kind of tired, and possibly not making complete sense! If I run off on a tangent, feel free to ignore!

This is where I stopped on the painting on Toula and her baby last night. While I'm happy with the progress, I need to put it aside for a few days now, because the next session should finish it...or could completely ruin it, if I'm not careful! I have to paint in the white markings, of course, but the most important thing will be the final details and highlights. I've noticed an adjustment I need to make as well, which might get some attention during the 'rest' period in order to build up a bit of paint where I make the fix.

I'm not sure what I'll work on tonight - I may bypass work altogether, because I'm going to have the time during the day tomorrow to get some painting done. Maybe this evening I'll just clean up my palette so it's all ready to go tomorrow, so I can't use that excuse to deter me!

Just had to add another photo. This is something you don't see too often - both Monster (on the right) and Gladys down for a nap! Right before I snapped this, Gladys was flat out. Lest I think either of them was sick, about two minutes after this both were up and launched a grand romp, racing through the mud, bucking, rearing...where was I with the camera for that? I know. If I'd had my 40D I would have been snapping away, but the little Nikon D80 can't keep up with these girls in crazy horse mode!

Okay...I mostly stayed on topic! Before I lapse into any ramblings...I'll bring this to a close!

I've Got You To Thank...

Okay, so that's part of another Ben Folds song. Sometimes I think the words 'thank you' are two of the most underused words in the English language. Let's face it, it takes two seconds to say them or type them and express appreciation. When I worked at the track, the trainer I worked for was good at always saying thanks, despite moments that earned him the nickname "Freddy Krueger" behind his back. :-) Because I appreciated that so much, I know I've always felt it important to do the same, if someone helps me out, or does something nice.


Why am I rambling about this? I've been given another blog award, courtesy of April Jarocka - again I'm a bit late in sharing that! As I did one recently, I'm not going to do another 7 favourite things at the moment, though I must applaud the creativity of Sheona Hamilton-Grant for her response to her latest award. She's done a pictoral of her favourite things. Have a look! In the meantime, I still haven't 'shared the love' and notified the recipients of my last award (from Sheona, if you recall) so I really need to do that! Anyway, thank-you, April! Please be sure to visit April's painting blog, as well as Ugly Rabbit, her illustration blog.

Here on the farm, I've just sent off the two chestnut boys - back to work for them. They both have such personality, their absence will be felt! The new colt continues to do well, though he's less than impressed with that chilly day out there today. The snow was interesting for him - rare that a February foal is born when there is none of the white stuff on the ground, but that's the way it was.

All right. Now that the somewhat insane horsey part of my day is taken care of, time to make a cappuccino and think about this work in progress so maybe I'll have a painting to talk about next time!

Taking Care of Business

I'm hoping I can be forgiven for being a bit distracted of late, but I have a bit of catching up to do. Yesterday friend and fellow blogger/artist Sheona Hamilton-Grant deemed me fit to receive a blog award. She also selected many of my own favourite blogs to receive the award, so I'm going to encourage you to check out her list and visit those blogs, and then come up with the suggested seven more here!

There are a lot of blogs I could name as favourites to which I'd like to pass along this award, so exclusion in no way means those not mentioned are any less appreciated! I also realize when I visit the blogs of others that I have a rather underwhelming blog roll on the right. Anyway, maybe one of these days I'll fix that!

So...my job here today is to name seven blogs that I admire, and pass on this award to those bloggers. Then I'm supposed to list seven of my favourite things.

Some deserving blogs I think you should check out, in no particular order:

1. Margaret Dent's Life in a Fishbowl
2. Kim Ratigan's Paintings and Portraits
3. April Jaroka's Ugly Rabbit
4. Carrie Lewis Horse Painter
5. Michelle Grant, Unbridled Imagery
6. Judy Wood Art/Photography
7. Art With A Bark, a collective of several canine artists!

Now, seven of my favourite things...hmmm...

1. Horses, though there are days I question my sanity for that.
2. My dogs, for reminding me some things are still black and white.
3. Chocolate. Good, quality chocolate!
4. Painting on linen.
5. Water - the lake, oceans, rivers...though the torrent running past my barn today is less than welcome.
6. Music with great lyrics.
7. A good book...which I seem to have a hard time finding these days, let alone finding the time to read when I do!

Well, that was kind of fun. Now I have to figure out how to pass the 'good news' on to those bloggers I've named! Like I said, the tip of the iceburg, but I'm guessing this process is kind of viral (my apologies to those dealing with cold and flu this winter!) in that this list expands as new recipients are named!

Off to the barn now to deal with that...temp is dropping, wind warning is in effect, so I have a bunch of cooped up horses today!

Still There, But Showing Potential

I'm hoping to distract you from the less-than-stellar progress on this painting by posting some shots of the two boys in question. They're such a couple of goofs, they always make me laugh. I'm going to miss them both when they go back to work!


I spent today working on more blocking in of colour, and just a bit of working up the detail. The funniest thing about this painting is that I'm really not enjoying the surface. A couple of years ago, this was my new best favourite ground for oil painting. Now that I've "moved up" and am working with the more recently discovered Raphael panels and luxurious Artfix linen, these Fredrix panels aren't quite so special anymore! I only have a couple left, and I think the others will be reserved for studies.


Anyway, I'm going to cut this short because Swish is suggesting she'd like to go out, and I've learned to believe Swishy when she makes such requests! So off I go, and I expect I'll be back with more on this painting soon in my drive to push it past this prolonged ugly stage!

Making the Best of It

No snow today, just more cold. It's getting kind of repetitious, I know. My days are an ongoing cycle of go out to the barn, freeze, come in, thaw, go out to the barn...and so on. I noted begrudgingly today that it seems as soon as my hands warm up enough that I can actually use them, my feet freeze and I need to come in again!

I started this new painting in one of the "thaw" phases of my day. This is the one I meant to start last Saturday. I had a title for this one before I even took the photo, though I'm not going to reveal it yet. The boys had me laughing and I was glad I caught them with the camera – unlike today, when a very bold/friendly/stupid(?) bird was keeping Gracie and Jubie company. First I saw Gracie following it as it hopped around on the ground, then a bit later it was perched on Jubie's back! By the time I grabbed the camera, of course it had disappeared!


This painting is 11 x 14 oil on Fredrix linen panel. Step one was just starting to work out the drawing with Burnt Umber. Tonight I worked on it some more, still just with Burnt Umber. There are still things that need to be resolved, but I've got the most important stuff worked out. Burnt Umber dries quickly, so I should be able to continue working on it tomorrow.

Now I'm trying to convince myself to take advantage of a bit of an early night! It's only quarter to twelve...that's early for me!

Waxing Artistic

Rubytuzday

It was rather on a whim I decided to take the most recent FASM workshop offering. Encaustics are a medium I knew little about but found intriguing. After seeing some originals in person at the FASM general meeting where the teacher for the workshop, Cora Brittan, gave us a presentation, I thought if I could manage to attend and cover my usual barn work, I would! I even had everything on the materials list, so I didn't have to buy anything.

Simply speaking, encaustic painting is a process that uses wax. Techically what Cora taught us was mixed media, involving everything from drawing, ink, linocut printmaking and collage. I decided to keep it as simple as possible - I'm a painter, so I felt a bit out in left field! Like a good workshop participant, I did a couple of drawings the night before, so I wouldn't spend half the day working on my drawing and not get a chance to actually play with the wax. It's something I always encourage my own workshop participants to do, with varying degrees of success!

Poseidon

I found out, very quickly, that it would take a bit of trial and error to come up with work I was actually happy with, though I will show you what I did anyway. I used a combination of technical pen, coloured pencil and oil pastel for my drawing. The first one, which I've posted at the top, I went back over a second time with the wax - once I had a better idea of how it worked! The photo doesn't show it, but I used some of my very cool Sennelier iridescent oil pastels over top of the wax as well.


At the very least, I had some fun with colour today. The last one I didn't finish, only putting the wax over the drawing I did with the tech pen. You can see I used the same drawing again - all of the colour is from the waxes. Certainly nothing resembling the intricate designs our instructor produces! I believe I will be sticking to oils for the time being, but every now and then it's nice to just play! I kind of felt like I was back in grade school!