Loose Ends

Zippy, Lounging ~ 5 x 7 oil on panel.

I've been spending a lot of time glaring at my easel of late - knowing there is work to be done, but feeling as if I'm just going to make a mess of anything I touch...kind of a reverse-Midas thing, where everything turns to muck.  The oil pastel commission I've been working on is in a good place (by which I mean more than not in my studio, haha), and just getting a rest from my eyes before I put the final touches on it, so I felt I needed to at least be making an attempt with the paints.

My solution has been to finish up some studies that were abandoned somewhere along the road. Some of them were just done during one of my daily painting projects, so they got a day's work but I always wanted to go back to them.  One I actually started from scratch (how brave, haha).  One just involved cutting down and stretching over new stretcher bars.  All I figured I could play with, and if I turned them to muck, nothing much would be lost except a bit more of my self-esteem!  ;-)

At the top is Zippy as a baby - he still has that look of owning the world!  Another study from the same time frame has found a new home, with artist friend Elizabeth McCrindle – it's always an extra honour when another artist likes my work enough to want it!  I have one of Elizabeth's paintings hanging on my studio wall. You can see the paintings in a blog post she wrote when she received them - thanks again, Elizabeth!

Einstein ~ 10 x 8 oil on canvas.

Milwaukee Brew ~ 8 x 10 oil on canvas.

Two of the paintings I was playing with a palette I haven't used much, favoured by artist Anders Zorn.  It's a limited palette of ivory black, cad red, yellow ochre and titanium white.  Admittedly I didn't push it much, but it was interesting just the same.  Both are studies of Thoroughbred stallions – Einstein (BRZ), sire of Sheldon, and Milwaukee Brew.

The last one is the restretch - I did this one as part of my daily painting projects, from a photo taken at Saratoga.  Now, I need to get these up on my website, in hopes that they, too, will find new homes!

Ready ~ 10 x 8 oil on linen.

 Oh, wait - one more!  This is Victor, a little study I started last year and finished up while I still had the Zorn palette open.  Catching a breeze on a warm spring day - which I hope we will see again, eventually!

Victor, Catching a Breeze  ~ 6 x 4 oil on canvas.

Just a PS - it's interesting to note the difference between my usual limited palette, which was used on the racehorse painting, compared with the stallion and Victor studies.  Which do you like better? I'm a time and place kind of person - I have to shake things up now and again, and studies are a great way to try out new things.

You've Come A Long Way, Baby....

They all look so sweet when they're sleeping!  5 x 7 oil on panel, sold.

Maybe it all started the day he was conceived - I took Twine up to be bred to Strut the Stage (standing at Colebrook at the time), baby Gracie at her side.  They didn't heed my warnings that she could be tough, not taking proper precautions, and she double-barreled him in the chest.  Poor Strut! I'm sure that did nothing for his self-esteem!  Anyway...about 338 days later, she had a cute little bay baby boy.  This colt had the slickest coat I've ever seen on a foal - clearly he thought he was landing in Florida, not Southwestern Ontario. He made me drag the vet out to tube him his first meal, because he couldn't figure out how to nurse in an acceptable time frame. And so began our series of adventures, which included a black eye for me.  Well, at least he didn't break my nose, like Hugo!

Lean, mean...well he wasn't mean...and fell a little short of being a racing machine! At Woodbine in 2013.

Close...but not quite (he's the one on the outside).

At the track, Leo started off showing promise...though he turned in to a wildman as a three-year-old.  More exploits were added to his list of accomplishments, like running off with his trainer, who gallops her own (the clockers even got a time on him!  No question he was fast!), escaping from his stall and running off down the shedrow, and antics behind the gate on race day which included dropping his rider and taking off, through the barrier and onto the harness racing track.  His best effort was a second place finish where he just missed winning, but then he hurt himself, and was retired.  And for some crazy reason, I said I'd take him.

That was a year and a half ago.  This is Leo today:



First day jumping from a canter!  Just goes to show you - never say never!

Order from Chaos

A Better Outlook for Polly

The paintings I've been working on lately have been very structured, organized.  My more detailed work usually goes this way.  I start with an accurate drawing; drawing is transferred to painting surface of choice, drawing is fixed with oil paint, tones are indicated, a complete underpainting is used to establish tones before proceeding to colour.  After such discipline, sometimes I throw that out the window and just mess around.  The result is often less than perfect, but somehow it helps balance things in my brain when the screws get too tight.

This little painting isn't complete by any stretch, as there is much more order to be established.  My life has continued to be somewhat chaotic of late, with yet more horse stress (though at least this time the biggest scare didn't end with losing the patient)....so yesterday, I started this, then went and rode my silly chestnut mare for the first time in a week. Funny how nice a ride one can have when one goes with absolutely no expectations.  ;-)

Tune in at a later date for the finished piece.  But don't hold your breath. 

 Experimenting with colour....

....then wimping out!  Will try to get some back.  ;-) As well as fixing the scary legs.

Hard Fought

 Several times along the way I was ready to toss this painting out the window.  The drawing happened easily enough, but after that it was a battle all the way!  This is Freddie, one of the yearlings, and the painting is 8 x 10 oil on masonite.  The palette is more extensive than the last couple of days - I struggled with where I was going, and ultimately settled on the one I brought home from the Val Hinz workshop a few of years ago.

Anyway....it's far from perfect, but here it is just the same!

Paint Now, Think Later!

A little bit of information I didn't disclose yesterday - I got a pretty serious club in the face by one of the foals (the oldest) on Saturday, enough to break my nose.  I don't think my nose really hurts as much as a broken nose should, but my head and neck have been aching rather consistently since.  Yes, I went to the hospital and got checked out, so don't be too worried!  What I have been doing is blaming every little brain blip since then on the incident!  Tonight I was hoping it would help me not overthink this little painting, because I was certainly doing that last night with the one of Brigitte.

Other than the sketch (directly on the panel), which came together quite quickly (10-15 mins) I probably completed this 5 x 7 oil on masonite in just under an hour.  I'm pretty pleased, all things considered.  This is Twine's colt, who is the only one who didn't seem to have a name right from the get-go.  I was calling him "Zip" or "Zippy" for a while, because he has some pretty funky cowlicks on his neck that make it look like you could zip him out of his fuzzy little coat.  But yesterday, he came up to me with his lower lip sticking out, one of his little quirks, and I thought maybe he should be Elvis.  What do you think? 

Again, I used a very simple palette for this one.  Burnt umber, Cadmium red light, ultramarine blue, yellow ochre and titanium white.  This is now the second painting I've done of this little guy.  Below is the first one, about 8 x 10 oil on linen, of one of his leaps in the air!

Paddock School Study #1

With "Hush" on its way to Australia, I managed to get back to the easel today. As previously noted, studio time has been less than productive of late, and this week I've been more or less bumping into myself, trying to get back to things. I tidied up a couple of little foal studies, started a few small pieces, but have mostly felt as if I couldn't get out of my own way. Not a good feeling! Today, I decided I had to stop thinking so much, pulled out an 8 x 10 panel that had been prepped with shellac, and set to work, determined to complete something in a single day - or better yet, a single session.

While as a groom I admit I hated schooling horses in the paddock, I love the imagery of it. When I get there early enough on the card (typically permission to school is given before the first race or two), I always stop and watch, and snap a few pics. This is just another example of the work that goes on behind the scenes to prepare a horse for the races.

I'm actually (gasp!) happy with the result. I'm going to choose not to dwell on what's wrong with it, and instead go off and prep more panels with shellac, because it really lends itself to nice loose studies, and I find I'm craving those right now. Given that I've numbered this study, I'm hoping to produce more!

Keeping It Simple

Life has been less than simple of late, leaving limited time for painting. In a vain attempt to accomplish something at the easel, I did this little oil sketch today. This is 5 x 7 oil on masonite panel, and the horse is Society's Chairman, from a photo I took in the paddock on International Day at Woodbine last October. I had intended it to be a more complete colour piece, but I decided I like it just the way it is. Now if my life would just follow suit.... :-)

It's A Dog Show! I Mean, a Dog Art Show!

I just realized I'd forgotten to announce the Canine Art Guild's latest online show. The CAG is celebrating it's fifth anniversary this year, and I'm proud to be a member. Oops - that reminds me, I also need to send in this year's dues!

All of the paintings are 5 x 5 inches, and there is voting for the People's Choice Award. Have a look through all of the great artwork there, and make sure you pick your favourite! I'm having a hard time deciding, myself - and no, I'm not going to pick my own work!

My contribution to the show is an oil on masonite of my Border Collie, Swish. I adopted Swish through Border Collie Rescue Ontario right about the time Kim Santini and I started throwing around the idea of the CAG. Time sure does fly - I was thinking Swish was five years old, but she was a year and a half when I got her, so she's six! In true Border Collie fashion, however, she doesn't act it! Forever young, it seems - gotta love those BCs.

Don't forget, the April Thirty Horses, Thirty Days is ongoing on its own blog. The first paintings are dry, so I'm going to be adding selling prices to them. Those prices are a limited time sort of thing, because once I start framing them for shows, the price has to go up, no way around that!

Better get going on today's painting!

March pARTy - Bellator #2!

I've been having fun watching the pARTy paintings come in, and decided not to put off any longer posting my own. I did this one on 7 x 5 oil on shellaced masonite - every time I do a painting on that surface I learn how to handle it a little bit better!

Just a short post this AM - I'm off to take my two black and whites to the vet for their vaccinations, then I will see if I do better than yesterday at getting up to ride Miss Monster! I need to remember to take my camera, because I know all the horses will have their blankets off. Of course if they're anything like my horses here, they'll also be covered in mud. There's that trade off again!

You Win Some, You Lose Some...

Some days paintings just seem to fall off the brushes...and others, well, are a hard-fought battle from start to finish (or abandonment, as the case may be!). Today was a bad case of the latter. I've wanted to do this painting for a long time - such a sweet moment between Twine and her first foal, baby Gracie. Gracie got her name because at only two and a half days, she was referred to the Ontario Veterinary College large animal clinic with colitis. She spent five days there, and fortunately recovered, though the reason for her illness was never determined. Out of that experience came her name, Therebutforgrace.

This painting is just a 5 x 7 sketch, oil on masonite, and I think part of the issue was the panel - I just felt as if I was fighting it the whole way. I think this is one I'd like to do larger, and it could be a partner piece to the 11 x 14 I did of Toula and her baby last year.


I could easily do a series of paintings of these mare and foal moments. I have some really cute photos of Clever and Billy. I think Leo and Spider were both tough love babies, though, because I don't remember too many touching moments with those two!

Busy Day!

Some days things just roll. I started painting early today, putting some work in on my next commission. This particular commission will require a number of layers, so I will be letting what I did today dry before continuing. I took a painting break to go out and do stalls and work a bit with Gracie, then threw all the horses hay before getting back to the studio.

I have a few pieces around that are near completion. It's a funny thing, how putting those last touches and calling it 'done' are often the most difficult part of the process. I could have picked up any one of half a dozen or more paintings to conquer today, but I decided it had been a while since I did a dog painting, so I tackled this little 6 x 8 oil on Raymar panel of an Australian Cattle Dog doing agility. I'm going to call it "Tunnel!" for obvious reasons! I might enter this in the FASM From Heart to Hand show in early March, if it's not sold before then. If you're interested, it's available, unframed, for $280.00US including shipping (in North America). Just email me.


Next I put a bit of polish on a painting I did last June. I don't often touch up my daily paintings like this, but I always loved the composition of this and felt a little more work would be worthwhile. This is 8 x 10 oil on masonite panel, and I'm calling it "Contender." It's available, unframed for $450.00US (shipping included in North America). Once I frame both of these paintings, the price, needless to say, will have to go up!

Tomorrow I'll share my Virtual pARTy painting. Participants have until midnight tonight (in their respective time zones) to submit their work, and then I will post all paintings on the blog. Pop over there if you'd like to see the reference photo we're working from.

Days like this, I hate to go to bed, thinking surely I could accomplish more!

When Things Go Right, Don't Question It

I really don't quite believe yet that it's just past 3:00pm and I'm posting today's painting. I expected today would be a bit like yesterday, though when I knew I'd be taking Jubie to King City this morning I lined up help to do some of the stalls. I was actually back by just after 11:00am, which left me in good shape to start painting. I made a few adjustments in the barn, paid some bills, printed out my chosen reference, then got to work.

I've been looking forward to this one since I started doing the Queen's Plate horses. This is one all the 'home team' hopes and dreams are resting on, Stardust Ziggy. I took more pics of Ziggy on Monday, but while he's a very cute colt, I seem to have trouble getting good photos of him! I ended up using this one that I'd posted after his last race. I just loved the lighting, and there's something special about this part of racing, the minutes right after the race when you start the walk back to the barn, slapping your horse on the neck and saying "Good boy!", win or lose. While Ziggy didn't win this particular race, he ran well enough to earn his ticket to the big one. And none of us would have a problem seeing him break his maiden on Sunday. ;-)

This is 8 x 10 oil on shellaced masonite. I know I've struggled with this surface before, so I was taking a bit of a risk using it, but I like the result. By leaving the background as is, it added to the drama of the lighting.

Wow. 3:20pm. I feel like I have the whole day still ahead of me!

Growing Up, Revisited

Really, did I need an excuse to paint another foal? This little guy is the colt I'm calling Spider until I hear differently - Clever's 09 baby. This painting is 5 x 7 oil on masonite, and somehow I was able to achieve that looseness I was looking for! Now if I could just remember how I managed that, so I could recreate it!

Tomorrow I will take a slight tangent from my theme, for the final jewel of the Triple Crown pARTy! This time Kim Santini and I have opened things up and invited others to participate. If you'd like to play along, please do! You can see the image an read the guidelines on The Virtual Party blog. All you need to do is contact one of us with and image of your completed painting to be included! At the very least, be sure to check in and see the results! You'll see my painting here tomorrow. As usual, it will be a challenge to fit it in, with the morning booked for trims for all the horses, afternoon needed to muck stalls of said horses, and a weekend art shot for which to prepare! We'll see how it goes!

Roll Call

I'm taking stock of the WIPs I have in the studio, recalling exactly what is there (yes sometimes I lose track!) and making note of what needs to be done to actually get these pieces to completion. Tonight I worked on another that is in the underpainting stage. This is a 16 x 20 oil on masonite of Sealy Hill, Canada's Horse of the Year in 2007. Hopefully one more session will get this underpainting where it needs to be - then I will give it some more time to dry, before I get to play with colour! I will be back to Bear Now shortly - that one just needs a bit of drying time too!

Just a short check in tonight - time to go clean my brushes. Tomorrow I'll see what other work I can back to the surface!

Thirty Days!

Is it the end of April already? One thing about being busy, time really flies by. What a difference this Thirty Days compared with the first one in November - I felt like things just improved in leaps and bounds. I guess painting 25 new paintings will do that. I'm kind of sad that I can't just carry on - but it does really mean a schedule adjustment for me, and I need to do some catching up on the big paintings. Won't be long until I do it again though - June is the next month that fits the criteria!

This is 5 x 7 oil on masonite panel, limited palette, prepared with the marble dust and gesso. Another sleepy baby, napping in the sun to wrap up a month of growing, and growing up!

Tomorrow I've got a bit of a surprise - or maybe not a surprise, if you follow me on Twitter. There's going to be a bonus horse painting to celebrate Kentucky Derby week. Trust me, you won't want to miss it! It's going to be fun. So I'll see you tomorrow, right?

Somebody's Watching You...

This is the kind of eye painting I like to do - I like a crop with both eyes and ears, because I feel it makes more of a connection. This is Medz, the Thunder Gulch gelding with the mouthful of a name - Medidocihospisurg! I just call him Rupert...but I know his owner doesn't really like that!

I used another one of the 5 x 7 panels that I'd prepared with a mixture of gesso and marble dust, and once again I really liked how it worked. I got a late start today, and this surface just really helped make it easy to do this basically alla prima - more or less in one sitting, save for the time spent stepping back, taking a progress photo, running upstairs for a brownie..that sort of thing! I'm going to prepare some larger panels with this mixture, I like it that much! This time around I didn't stick strictly to the limited palette - I've also used Viridian Green, Naples Yellow, Cadmium Lemon Yellow, Cadmium Yellow Medium and Flake White.

I had a lot of fun with this one, more than just because I love this horse. I guess after yesterday's income tax marathon (yes, I managed to get it done, cheque written and mailed it today) it was good to do something loose where the brushstrokes are actually visible. If I had my way, I'd paint this way all the time. It's rather interesting that I don't - that I can't just say "I'm going to paint this way from now on." For some reason it doesn't work that way!

I've decided to post a little work in progress montage at the bottom. I'm not sure it's big enough to show just how loosely this starts out, and how much correction happens along the way. The first one may look like nothing, but that's just me starting to map out the drawing - I'm eyeballing proportions.

Hard to believe there are only two days to go! Oh, and for those of you that weighed in on Saturday's eye painting, the horse was Clever, so I'll be finding a little something for the ones that guessed right! The other guess I had was Billy, which is a pretty fair choice, as he is Clever's son, and has a very similar expression!



See you tomorrow!

Observation

Okay, so I have to talk about cliché a little bit. Today's painting can be considered exactly that. When everyone out there was painting, drawing and photographing eyes, I told myself there was no way I was going to do the same. I've never wanted to follow along and do what everyone else was doing. In grade school, when everybody had to have a certain brand of boots, I wanted anything but,that sort of thing. So I was strange! But even I came to admit there is something that compels us to study the horse's eye. Every artist will tell you if they don't get the eyes right in a portrait, the whole painting doesn't work. Cliché or not, there is merit in an artist spending time doing eye studies, and I've done a few since that day many years ago I said I never would. I should know better - never say never, right?

This is 5 x 7 oil on masonite, limited palette. Instead of straight gesso, this panel was prepared with a mixture of gesso and marble dust. I'd initially intended to use it for something in oil pastel, but when I realised I'd let myself run out of straight gesso primed panels...I thought this would work just fine!

As expected it was much more absorbent, and had more texture than the gesso panels. I really liked how it worked. Part of my inspiration for doing this eye study tonight was that I had a busy day at the barn, and knew I'd have to pull something together quickly, and I knew I could probably pull it off with this. Early on it looked kind of dead, because the panel was so absorbent, but that let me build up the layers and get where I needed to go much faster than usual.

Any guesses who this horse is? It's one of the horses on the farm...and it's not my own mare, Monster. Leave a comment with your guess, and everyone/anyone who gets it right, will get a yet-to-be-determined prize! No, not the painting! But I'll come up with something. If you want a reminder of the residents on the farm all you have to do is look through my November and April 30 Days projects!

Time For Rolex!

When you drop the name 'Rolex' around most horse people, we don't think watches, we think the top three-day event in North America, held in Lexington, Kentucky at the Kentucky Horse Park this time of year. Thing are getting into gear today, with the jog, and competition starts tomorrow with the dressage portion of the event. When I got the reminder this morning that this was Rolex week, I thought I'd try to do a painting with that theme!

I've only been to Rolex once, and that was ten or eleven years ago - I've lost track! I only took around six rolls of film, so I have one or two photos around. Today's painting is from one of those photos. I decided to go with one I took the day before competition, of one of the Canadian participants schooling her horse in dressage. Of course we all love cross-country, which takes place on Saturday, but dressage is to eventing what tracking is to Schutzhund (that's a dog sport, for those who don't know)...if you only come for the thrills, you're not a true fan!

This is just a small painting, 5 x 7 oil on masonite, with the limited palette, and my goal was to keep it loose, allowing little bit of the burnt sienna toned canvas to peek through. For some reason my brain was taxed after yesterday's painting - maybe that was just Cad Red toxicity! - but today's I found much more relaxing. It might have been I didn't have the same expectation - trying to do a horse and rider in small format like this was a challenge for me, and I was reasonably happy with the level of success.

The best part is, it's only 5pm! Time to go out and feed the ponies, and then entertain the possibility of taking it easy tonight...unless of course I decide the to watch the hockey game, where Les Canadiens face elimination! All right, so I can't have everything...

See you tomorrow!

Learning to Be

I had to laugh at myself yesterday - I had a "day off" of sorts, thanks to my guest blogger, but I was antsy...so I'm going to admit I actually started this painting yesterday. I probably should have worked on one of my non-daily paintings, but as some changes Monday made Tuesday the busier day, I decided to be on the safe side and start drawing out this new one.

This is 9 x 12 (sorry I got it wrong when I posted originally!), oil on masonite, with my usual limited palette. The panel was only very faintly tinted, and I was really surprised how much of a difference that made! As is often the case, this isn't a great photo because the paint is still wet, but even still, I think you'll probably see how strong the colours are. Seems my Cadmium Red decided it wanted a leading role. I actually decided I would post an in-progress photo on Twitter to see what kind of feedback I got and when it was positive, I thought I would just go with it. Of course those helpful commenters aren't seeing the painting first hand....yeah...it's bright! Oh well...nothing wrong with some colour! All I can think is how now I have to clean my brushes, and Cad Red, being a strong colour, is going to be a bit reluctant to come out!

Oh, the "story"....this is Gracie, last summer, with her mom, Twine. I love watching the foals grow up, and it's always cool to see them start the reciprocal grooming. All part of learning to be a horse! And if you've ever spent any time with foals, you'll know that if you scratch them on the withers, they'll try to return the favour!

Day 19: The View From Here

So today's painting is another one that had me laughing much of the time I was working on it. I was looking through a friend's photos on Flickr the other day and came across this one. I'd obviously seen it before, as I'd commented on it! I emailed her and asked if I could paint it. She kindly said yes (though there was some bribery involved) so here's the result! This is Bear, a big, good-looking Thoroughbred gelding who was a decent event horse in his day. I met him when I visited my friend in New Jersey last September, and he is a very handsome boy!

This is 5 x 7 oil on masonite. I did deviate from the limited palette to get the greens, using some Terra Verte straight out of the tube as my starting point, and there's some Naples Yellow in this too, in addition to the usual colours.

Part of why I was laughing as I painted this was that it could very well be my own Monster, with that silly expression. Have I painted a Monster painting yet this month? I don't think I have. Well, I'd better do something about that! Almost two-thirds of the way through!

Tomorrow it's time for another guest blogger, so make sure you check in! Thanks for stopping by.