Keeping On

I figured you all could use a rest from me yesterday, so I posted my current WIP on Facebook instead. ;-) This is what I've been working on, with a bit more progress. You saw it here first a while ago! This is 14 x 18 oil on linen. Not my usual smooth linen, but a heavier weave which I've painted on a couple of times. I like to change things up from time to time!

This is Clever and her 2008 colt, Billy, who is now in training at Woodbine. Billy had a lot of very original facial expressions as a baby, and always seemed to be nattering at his mom. Here I've started to lay some colour in over the underpainting - just midtones and darks, and scrubbing them and blending them in with a dry brush rather than a true glaze, though the effect is the same.

Her current foal is two weeks old today, and looking very handsome!

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!

Tick Tock!

I suppose that's my theme for the month. It was pouring rain first thing, so the horses stayed in - and I plunked myself in front of the laptop to whittle away at that target wordcount. In a couple of hours the rain stopped, so the horses went out. It took me a bit longer to do stalls because, of course, they'd been in longer! Lunch didn't happen today - I finished the barn around 2:30pm, came in, started my drawing on the canvas, then went back out to bed the stalls and get ready for feeding. Once the ponies were in again, it was back to the painting!

I indulged myself a little today and worked on Artfix portrait linen. Ever since I did my first two paintings on this surface, I've wanted to do something looser. It seems a bit contradictory to want to do something with less fine detail on a surface that lends itself to such fine detail, but that's just what it had "said" to me when I'd worked with it before! As I have a lot of it now - I took the plunge and bought a roll of it this summer - I figure I have no excuses! And going how things went today, I'm guessing I'll try it again.

This is 10 x 12 oil, and I used the limited palette again - burnt umber, ultramarine blue, yellow ochre, cadmium red medium, titanium white - with a bit of cadmium lemon, unbleached titanium and terra verte. I worked from one of the photos I took this summer at Saratoga of a horse behind the starting gate.

Now, I've got another 1500 words to take care of if I'm going to make that 20,000 target before bed! Better go!

Brought to You by the Colour Green

Apparently I’m on a green kick this week. Could my purple avoidance get any worse?

Look what I finally dusted off today! The painting formerly known as ‘Backstretch’ and later renamed “First Time Past” (current working title). Lots of different greens in this one, and like the Mike Fox painting, I’ve been blocking in colour over the underpainting. recently, having worked on paintings with a detailed underpainting as well as one without (Eccentric), I’m reminded just how much simpler it makes things to have that tonal roadmap. I was able to make a lot of progress, quickly.

I’m also enjoying the Artfix linen with this piece. When I started this one, I didn’t think we were going to be friends! I really did contemplate locking it in the closet on several occasions. It was worth those early “fights” I’ve decided. Guess I’m going to have to buy more!

Saratoga Dreaming, January Edition

I put my "First Time Past" painting aside today for a rest (for both of us!) and started work on a new one. This will be my second on Artfix linen, so we'll see if I learned anything from my struggles. It's an 8 x 10 oil, so less surface area to cover!

I took the reference for this painting on my first trip to Saratoga, in 2003. As someone who has spent a lot of time on the backstretch, this is a familiar scene. It was summer, of course, and after training each day, a horse is bathed (say it "bath'd" with the 'a' short...we don't "bathe" or "wash" racehorses!), and then walked. Naturally their feet get dirty again as they walk, so before going back in the stall, the groom will wash the horse's feet and dry the legs with a towel. It's all part of the routine...one that starts around 5AM, or did for me, way back when it was what I did for a living!

I've had this photo set aside for a long time. It's always appealed to me, but I wasn't sure I liked the composition as shot. With the painting, I've actually added the right foreleg as it wasn't visible in the photo, and it just didnt' look correct without it. You can kind of see me starting to work out how it should look as I go. I'm not done yet - I'm really only blocking in an underpainting of Burnt Sienna, Ultramarine Blue and Titanium white so far, though I'm taking a few liberties and using the colour as colour. Just couldn't help it! The surface was toned with a light wash of Raw Sienna before I started. I'm really happy with how it came along today.

Spending some time on this little breather should let me get back to the larger, more complicated racing painting with some added inspiration. Right now, it's looking like time for bed!

Seriously...Where's the Chocolate?

It's perhaps a sad thing that one of my greatest motivators to get to the grocery store is needing to replenish my supply of chocolate. Yes, even out here in Boonieville we have a couple of corner stores of a fashion (all gas stations seem to have convenience stores now) but when I talk about chocolate, what I'm usually looking for is "real" chocolate, the higher the cocoa percent, the better! When I go away (in a geographical sense) I look for new chocolate. Have you read my profile? That degree and minor I have? I figure that gives me the authority to remind everyone that chocolate is GOOD for you! Has to be the high cocoa content stuff though. More antioxidants than that red wine everyone goes on about. And you don't get drunk on it!

Okay...painting, right? My next task is to finish the other piece that was abandoned mid-underpainting last October. When I originally edited the photo for this, I flipped it, and I was going to call it "Backstretch Banter" because the riders were making me laugh. When it came down to it, though, I decided to leave the orientation as it was - the field in a route race going past the grandstand for the first time. The race in question was actually the '06 Canadian Oaks. Maybe my reasons for not changing the photo too much were directly related to that!

This is one of those "count the legs" paintings. I'm still doing that. I'm also testing my memory, painting those legs. My photo ref doesn't show as much as the painting does. I still have some work to do there. Too bad this race was over the old dirt surface at Woodbine, or I would just throw in some Polytrack kickback!

As I'm sure no one but me remembers, this is the first painting I've done on Artfix Linen. The surface is so smooth, it's been giving me some real challenges. Just when I think I have the hang of it, I lose it! I've got the sketch for another painting blocked out on another, smaller piece of this. Haven't touched it with paint yet. I think I've come to the conclusion I like a bit of texture!

Where Does the Time Go?

I know, I know...blog neglect! Those kids out in the barn have been keeping me on my toes this last month. We all send belated holiday greetings!

I have managed to get back in the studio to do more than check email this past week. It's coming up to Art Show at the Dog Show time again, and I have two candidates on the easel. Once again, I don't know if it will all come together in time to make the entry deadline. The best laid plans and all that...sometimes circumstances beyond my control get in the way!


Nearing completion is my newest Brittany painting. This is Lara again, who was featured in my two previous Britt paintings. Here she's all grown up, a puppy no more! I'm just working out a few final issues with this one. This is 8 x 10 oil on Fredrix linen panel.

Ambitious though it might be, I started another potential entry this week. This is also 8 x 10, oil on Raphael linen panel, and the subject is Pinkston, a Yellow Lab pup, from a photo taken by his owner, Yvonne. So far all I have is a rough underpainting. White takes notoriously long to dry, and I've had to use a lot of it, so I'm waiting to get back to this.. The clock is ticking!


On that note, back to work! There should be enough chocolate around her to keep me going for hours!

Rain, Rain...

...well, I'm not going to say "go away." We've had such a dry summer things could use a really good soak!



I've been working on a couple of new paintings this week. The one I posted last time of the racehorse standing on the training track is coming along. The next piece I've started is a racing piece. It's my first painting on Artfix Belgian linen. This linen is sooooo smooth it's actually taking some time to learn how to work with it, so I have been struggling a bit! I hope it comes together, because right now it's looking a little troubled! Once the underpainting is done I expect it will get easier, but the underpainting is taking much longer than usual.

Okay....back to work!