Always Drawing

Even when I'm not posting I'm still drawing. At some point soon I'll put some new drawings up for sale on my website (direct link to the drawing section above). New paintings are are their way to the blog too.

Lately I've found myself in a warming pot headed to a boil. The water was just fine when I got in. With just a tiny bit more work I'll swim my way out of it. I just have to will myself to get it done so I can get on to more pleasant stuff.

I call this goofy picture "Meeting God." We're supposed to be in His image so I made Him look like me. The bowler hat was added to Him so we wouldn't be confused with each other. I could easily be mistaken here with this characterization. If I am I will stand corrected -- on all of my six webbed feet.

Four Dimensional Composition

I was looking at a couple of paintings of mine that are hanging in my bedroom and I noticed a compositional similarity. They both have a V-Twist to them. I’m posting them here for you to see: “Theseus” (16X20, 2005) was done for a series of Greek mythology books for Carus Publishing by Geraldine McCaughrean. The next painting “Unicorn and Fairy” (21X27, 1999) was done for Franklin Mint for one of their plates. The plate was never made and I spent some extra time working on this painting and adding to it. That’s why it is no longer in a circular format. I’d planned from the beginning to do this, so I left space to expand.





Looking at them made me think that the way I compose has four dimensions. Of course there’s up, down, right and left, the two dimensions of the physical surface and then there’s the added illusion of three dimensions. So what’s the fourth dimension? It is movement. Time is thought of as the fourth dimension and without time there’s no movement. Suggested and implied movement is important in a composition. I know all of this, but I sometimes I don’t know I’ve done it till later. Another day I’ll put up some examples of paintings that have different types of visual layers, yet another important part of composition.

New, Old, Sold

I’ve decided to post something as close to once a day as I can. Today I have three pictures that are not on my website. The category today is something new, something old and something sold.



The first I finished just last month. It was done for "1634: The Baltic War" by Eric Flint (16X24) 2006. I tried my best with this painting to be bold. At the very least it is quite thick with paint. The ironclads are the anachronistic element, important in all alternate history.



"Libris Mortis: The Book of the Undead" (16X24) 2004 is the only thing I think I’ve done for Wizards of the Coast. You can see a better copy of it in my book "Kiddography." People seem to be genuinely scared of this painting. To me it’s a bit too much of a caricature to be truly upsetting. The necromancer is a bit on the orgasmic side of happy.



Just today Irene Gallo, art director at Tor Books, asked to put up an illustration on her blog that I did for Realms of Fantasy for "Robin of the Green" (2006) by A. C. Wise. I painted this right after I saw an exhibit at the Dahesh Museum of the Kelley Collection called “Stories to Tell.” This exhibit was of work from the Golden Age of Illustration or of artists from around that time: Wyeth, Pyle, Schoonover, Dunn, Leyendecker, etc. As I worked on this painting I tried to channel those illustrators. I felt I fell a little short of my intentions and, I think, undervalued the painting – literally – selling it for a pittance.

Newer Paintings

I did this painting originally for DAW Books as a cover to Fitzpatrick's War by Theodore Judson. About three weeks ago I put it back on my easel and this is the result. The painting is 32 X 21 and it was done in oils. It's been retitled Abbey Air Race.



Last month I went to the World SF Convention in Anaheim. It was a good show for me. I met a lot of very nice friendly people, very few of whom I remember. These things are just too much for me to process. It's now all hazy. Before the show I promised myself I'd do a number of new watercolors. My plan is to put them in my book Gnemo to augment the oil paintings and drawings in that book or to make a series of 'sketchbooks' that would make up Gnemo's Journal. Here is the only one to come back from that show. The Great Blue Aeros (11X14).