Medieval Mead

The yearly medieval faire is still on in Ft Tryon Park.
Daya didn't come with me this year, but I met up with Jackie and Doris so we could be Sir Angus's personal cheerleaders.

I drank some mead, great stuff.

Sir Angus.... he did not win the joust this year but he will always be our champion!

The acrobats and the lady who goes inside a bubble performed too. 

Daya would have liked them.

Paint and More Paint

Just as I was getting ready to leave in the morning, Daya woke up.  She woke up happy.
So happy that she was carrying me around the apartment on her back.

And she loves her cat, too.




I went painting.
I have a new friend from the NY@Nite workshop.
Her name is Hua and she is AMAZING.

Hua lives in Shanghai and has 2 daughters.
She also owns an apartment here in NYC and goes back and forth a lot.

We were meant to meet and be friends.
The day together was just perfect.

Here is my painting, 63rd st and Central Park West.
8x10 oil, and this painting kicked my butt.

Hua got there first and chose the location.  I'm so glad because I never would have chosen this spot on my own.
It was great to stretch out artistically and do something new.

Usually an 8x10 takes me 2- 2 1/2 hours, and this painting took 4 hours.
The whole thing was such a learning experience.

Then we went to lunch and that was awesome too.

After lunch we went gallery-hopping in Chelsea, which is also something I don't normally do because I prefer the museums.  I'm not too impressed with the NYC gallery art scene in general, and there was a LOT of junk but also some nice stuff, very interesting, and it was very worthwhile.

It's important to look at new things and expand, even if they are not all to my taste.

I liked these though:




I liked this rubble in the street:

Then we went to Blick and bought Very Fun Stuff, like GRAPHITE PUTTY!!




And I got 2 brushes.

Things that Come Out at NY@Nite

Tonight was the last NY@Nite class.  I don't really have a list of learned-stuff this week, it was practice and putting everything together.

Actually it was stupid-hard and I had help again and it was.... just so hard.
I kept getting lost, couldn't resolve what I was looking at, my head got screwed up.  there was another girl there who put into words perfectly what it was like.... basically I had no idea what I was looking at or how to see it, I couldn't see it, and it was hard.

This is my start, Garin did the foreground.

Garin did a painting too, he was standing in the dark without a light between 2 food trucks painting something dark in food truck fumes and it looked fantastic.   I can't even.  I literally have no words.

Garin came over and looked at my painting.
He pointed to the foreground and said "Hey that's great!"
I said, "YOU painted that!" because he did!!
And I could not stop laughing.

*****
I got to a point of being so screwed up in my head from this painting that I was wondering why I was there, what I was doing, and the meaning of life in general.

*************
We were at Columbus Circle right at the corner of Central Park.
After about 9pm some of the more interesting population comes out.  Here are some bits of humanity we encountered:

A friend's honesty, overheard:
"Frankie you have no game! What the fuck you talkin' about, your shit is garbage!"

(Poor Frankie.)

Bathing Rituals:
There was a water fountain near where I was set up. A drinking water fountain.

Some guy came over and bathed in it.  i'm not kidding.  Face, head, and I think maybe his arms.

For like 5 minutes.

The Glowstick Harness Husky:

A guy was walking his wonderful beautiful Husky.  The harness looked like a big glow stick, it was so freaking cool.

The Governor:

A guy was walking around talking to everyone.  He was friendly enough, said he was the Governor of the area.  He complimented our paintings, and tried to get my co-painter to give him her painting.

He then proceeded to "fire" all of us in individual conversations.  (Garin Baker also got fired.)

**********

The pole and ball head assembly slipped out of my tripod base while I was packing up.

This is not a big deal as tripods are meant to come apart, but I could not get it back in.

Could. Not.  

This tripod cost over $200 (years ago) so it is not a cheap one and it made no sense.

It is an excellent tripod so this was frustrating and baffling.

Garin came over and offered to help which was super-nice of him.

He couldn't get it either.  And he really tried.

Between both of us we must have spent about 15 minutes trying to get the pole back into the base.

We gave up, I packed the parts separately and went home.

When I got home 2 plastic pieces came right out of the base..... they snap around the pole and the whole thing goes right back in.  It took less than 30 seconds.  :/

Jerrys Again!

I got more stuffs again from Jerry's for doing a focus group!

These brushes are surprisingly good!

Changelist

I knew when Daya started high school, it would be a time of great change and transition.

A new chapter in life.

I knew this.

I was ready.

In the last calendar year I have seen a lot of personal change, within a structure of stability.

New Company, we were sold. I work for a new company but I am in the same job, same people (mostly). It is a good situation and I am happy there.

I saw my aunt for the first time in almost 10 years.

Moved off 15th floor at work, where I had been for 10 years. I am now back on 21 where I started in 2006.  It was exactly the refresh I needed and I'm very happy.

New computer. This is also a big change, a Life Upgrade kind of change.  I had been using the same computer since 2011.

New eyesight, it's almost stupid how great a change this routine surgery was for me. My vision is so different now.  It's a dramatic change.

High School, it's a big change.  A culmination of several years' long goal. My child is in high school.

Daya leaves the studio as of today.  I didn't see it coming.  $1,273 says I didn't see it coming.  Now that Daya sent her email out, I'm starting to process this.  I only found out her decision last night. It gave me an actual nightmare and I could not go back to sleep.  I'm caught off-guard, I wasn't mentally or emotionally ready.  The studio has been a centerpiece of our lives since 2011.  I'm sad.  

I'm feeling very sad, actually.

PSA Show & Gapstow Bridge

I went to the PSA show at the National Arts Club as I do every year.
This year I did not get free pastels, so bummer.

The work is, as always, top-notch.

The materials fair was also happening.  Vendors with all the different pastel brands were there with their wares on display for testing and sampling.

It's a good thing I already have that set of Terry Ludwig lights......

Let's take a moment to talk about HENRI ROCHE pastels.
They were there.
They had their pastels set out NEXT TO TESTING PAPER just like everyone else.
I picked one up and made a mark on the paper to feel it.

The lady guarding the Henri Roche pastels yelled at me.
She said to me, "Let me do the swatches.  These are Very Expensive."

Well fuck you Henri Roche.

I might not look like much, I might look too-young, I might not look expensive as I am literally dressed in painting clothes with well-used plein air gear hanging off my body, but I happen to know my way around soft pastels quite well fuckyouverymuch. I should, after having used them for years, spent thousands of dollars on many different brands (so yes I know all about how expensive they are), I literally have many thousands of Very Expensive Pastels in my studio.

I'll say it again:

FUCK YOU HENRI ROCHE. 

YOU SUCCEEDED IN TURNING AWAY A HOPELESS PASTEL JUNKIE. 

I WILL NEVER BUY YOUR PRODUCT.

*********
I met Carol Peebles.
She is one of my heros.
She is also very, very nice and she even recognized my name from Facebook. :)

A lot of Her Stuff is the same as My Stuff!

*********
Since the day was perfect for painting, I went to Central Park.
I went back to Gapstow Bridge and repainted the scene I did a few years ago.

For this painting I needed to really work with that revolutionary takeaway from my plein air workshop-- not paint thinning! None! Solvent for cleaning brushes only!

And you know what it is AMAZING.  I'll never plein air the same again.  It works SO WELL to just use from-the-tube consistency for the entire painting.  I have seriously never done this before.

I did not do an under-drawing, but I massed in all the basic shapes and worked on top of it.
The tree branches might have needed a little paint-slacking but generally that tube consistency is...... amazing.  It is oil paint feeling like oil paint in a whole different way.

When I was setting up there was someone on the bridge with a bunch of balloons, so I added them in.  It gives a nice pop of color.

8x10 oil on panel, 2 hours

I had company at the bridge.  These Guard Geese hung out with me the whole time.
The bridge is definitely theirs.

They like plein air painters though.

More NY@Nite

This painting is absolutely without a doubt the most difficult painting I have ever done.
My head definitely exploded which is a good thing.
11x14 oil 53rd (or 54th??) and Broadway. 2 1/2 hours-ish. I stopped before I ruined it. I am having trouble knowing what to do next, how to take it further.

*******
NOTES
REALLY Dark wash over panel, pull out lights let it sit for a few mins.
Garin DOES NOT thin his paint with solvent!!!!!! Solvent for cleaning brushes only. The paint handles completely differently- much better!! It still layers wet over wet. This is revolutionary for me.

Palette organization- keep darks with darks and lights with lights (where my white and yellows are)
Think about temperature. He was going to say something to me about this but we got sidetracked.
Will ask next week about temp.
My big oily rag is “unruly”!!! Garin tore my rag into smaller pieces. I think he might have walked away with one.

Garin says "Make a mess!" I sure did.
SQUINT. No detail at beginning. Masses. I thought I wasn't being detailed but he thought I was with the tree.

And then he made a total insane mess on my panel and the damn thing came together and totally worked.

He says no one really understands how much he blurs and simplifies. This scene was so crazy that was incredibly hard to do.
Perspective.

Garin seems to have 2 ways he starts paintings- that dark drippy wash where he pulls lights out and pushes darks back and also just scrubbing in masses without that wash.

I kept my colors dark and gray. The lights were easy to put over especially with the paint consistency.

He said I have a knack for doing this, that was really nice to hear from someone like him.
He liked my painting.

******
One of the reasons this is so, so difficult to do is the total crazy chaos of everything.  It's just complete visual insanity.  It's so hard to analyze the scene and build it... without linear drawing!!

Everyone in the class thought it was incredibly difficult but we all had fun.
We all struggled and went crazy, and then Garin would come over and fix it like it was the easiest thing in the world.

I had a lot of help with my composition- seeing it and laying it out.  I was struggling so much and he came over and mapped it out in about 1 minute.

My head was spinning BUT with that much-needed guidance I *think* I might be able to start practicing on my own. I'm going to do one on my own before next Thursday.

He simplifies.  It's all mental.  This is the practice I need.

This workshop is amazing, it will absolutely change the way I paint.

Also I will probably end up in his drawing class on Thursdays.