Great Landscape Workshop!

Boy, did everyone do a great job on these paintings! This was a really great workshop a couple of weeks ago. These photos were taken on the last day, Critique Day! Everyone made great progress and really produced some great paintings! A round of applause for these beautiful art works!

Finishing a "Finished" Painting

A student recently brought this painting to class (done outside the class) for a critique. First, though, he added two additional elements to it to try to balance the composition - the palette knife on the lower left and the tube of paint on the lower right. This did not really do the trick. The apple, because it contained the strongest light int he painting, is the focal point, located in the left third of the painting, not a good place for a focal point to be. The lighting on the vase is inconsistent with the level of the light on the apple. One brush, which enters the vase at the lower left "corner", would go through the outside of the vase if it followed the path indicated by the top of the brush. The student wanted to just paint over this painting with a new one. Instead, I asked if I could show him how he could improve this painting before he covered it up.

I modeled the apple a little better by adding form shadow to the right dide and bottom of the apple, which not only improved the roundness of the apple, but also decreased the amount of light in the left third of the painting. I added a stem and its shadow. I painted over the palette knife and the tube of paint with the color of the table and increased the light on the table as it approached the vase. My purpose from here on was to change the focal point from the apple to the vase, which would make the focal point more appropriately placed.

I corrected the middle value on the vase as it turned out of the light into the form shadow on the right and I lightened the light value on the left third of the vase. I then added highlights to the main body of the vase and made these, as well as the highlights on the neck of the vase, much lighter and more intense than the highlights on the apple.

I moved (repainted) the errant brush into a position that would allow its handle to stand upright int he vase. I also added slight highlights to the brush handles to add to the effect that the light was hitting this area of the painting strongly. I also added a reflected light on the right edge of the vase.The last thing I did was add another green apple, totally in shadow, to the area behind and to the right of the vase, to balance the composition. This is not a great painting, but it is much improved from its original state. And now it will lie beneath a hopefully successful new painting for many years to come! My thanks to my student for allowing me to demonstrate this.

Portrait in Progress

I am currently working on two portraits, going back and forth as necessary to keep working as paint is drying. I don't usually do this but I really must complete these, so I am putting in every effort to complete them as soon as I can. My clients have been incredibly understanding of the delays and I don't want to keep them waiting any longer than I have to.

The work in progress I am showing on the left (detail above) shows the painting with only the face in a greater state of completion than the initial block-in. The painting on the right is at its current stage which includes a more complete upper half background, the hat and right arm with more work done on them, and new paint applied to part of the shirt. When I view images on the computer I get to see them in a new light, so to speak, and areas that need more work become more apparent to me. For example, I want to lighten the boy's upper lip on his right and darker side. It is a little too dark, I think. If you click on the image of the more complete detail above, you should see what I am referring to.

I will post some new photos as I make more progress.

And Yet Another Huge Flower!

Iris, Standing Tall, 30 x 22, Watercolor, copyright Pat Aube Gray

I am not really sure what is driving my muse these days, but large flowers are uncharacteristic for me. I completed the painting of this huge iris this morning and you may recall that back on July 13, 2008 I posted Brooke's Texas Rose, another full sheet of watercolor paper occupied by a single oversized yellow rose. (It is simply coincidence that I named the painting for my daughter Brooke's love of Texas, the yellow rose tattoo on her leg, and the fact that it was her birthday!) When my other daughter, Kerry, died last year, I was overwhelmed by the beauty of the flowers we brought home, some of which I identified with her natural beauty. In particular, there was a huge, and I do mean huge, white rose, glorious in its fragrance, its size, and the singular beauty of it, and it became a symbol for me of my daughter's natural grace and simple elegance. I vowed then to someday paint that white rose, or one like it, in memory of Kerry. I have not yet done it as I am simply not ready to, I am afraid I could not do it justice, and I have not come across another rose that has the magnificence of that one. Perhaps these other flower paintings are baby steps leading me toward the white rose, or perhaps they are the result of a deeper appreciation for and connection to the simple, yet elegant beauty that we sometimes take for granted. It is interesting to me, too, that I have chosen to paint these flowers in watercolor instead of the oil I have used so much of late. But these subjects beckoned me to watercolor and the attempt to achieve the luminosity inherent in sunlit flower petals. Kerry's favorites were sunflowers, with roses a very close second. Do not be surprised to see more flower paintings...a giant sunflower, perhaps?

Cobalt Mister

Cobalt Mister, Oil on Canvas, 11 x 14, copyright Pat Aube Gray

I found this cobalt blue glass mister at the flea market and couldn't wait to paint it. I chose two other glass pieces for the composition and cut the daisies and rubeckia from my garden. The mister was the last thing I painted and by the time I got to it, the water inside had condensed and form the littel rivulets you see in the painting above the water line. I thought it would be more challenging to pull that off, but I just painted what I saw and it worked! (Click on the image to enlarge it.)

New Beginnings

A New Day, Oil on Canvas, 12 x 24 copyright Pat Aube Gray 2008
Click on Image to enlarge.

I began this painting in my palette knife workshop and finished it afterward. The only part of this painting that was done with a brush is the interesting vent on the roof and my signature! I had been wanting to paint on a 12 x 24 canvas and this barn with the long range mountain view and a sunrise was just the right image for it. The clarity is lost a little in the photo you see here, but if you click to enlarge it you can see more detail. I am particularly pleased with the color harmony in this painting. Hope you like it,too!

Painting with a Palette Knife

Outbuildings, 9 x 12, oil on canvas, copyright Pat Aube Gray 2008

I had a great time these past three days in a palette knife oil workshop I held in the teaching studio at Carriage House Art Center in Blairsville (www.carriagehouseartcenter.com). Had a great group, including several returning students whom I have not seen in a while, so it was a little like old home week. Everyone did a great job on their paintings, some jumping right in with the knife and others, perhaps at first, a little intimidated by the lack of control over a knife versus a brush. But by the second day, the paintings just emerged beautifully under the more confident hands of these good painters. As for me, I painted the small demo seen above, entirely with palette knives, as a demonstration during the workshop. Everyone worked from my photographs and most were summer scenes. As with the painting above, dealing with so much green in hte summer can be a challenge. There are actually many other colors besides green in the grass and foliage than perhaps can be seen here. I did get a decent start on a second larger painting and hope to finish it this week.

Recent Works

I have been spending the last several weeks working on new websites for myself (www.pat-aube-gray.com) and also for our gallery (www.carriagehouseartcenter.com), so I have not had much time to post here. We have hired a former employee, Sarah, to work in the gallery/frame shop and that has relieved me a great deal. So within the next couple of days, I will be painting most of the time and teaching part of the time! With three commissions to complete and a show at Chateau Elan coming up in September, this is a must!

The only paintings I have been able to do recently have been plein air pieces, when I have gone out with my student groups or the Plein Air Painters of the Southern Appalachians (PAPOSA). The two paintings (above and below) at Butternut Creek in Meeks Park in Blairsville are pastels on paper. One was painted in the morning and the other in mid-afternoon. It is amazing how different the same basic subject matter looks at different times of the day and those differences are readily apparent in my two paintings.



The third piece, an oil, was painted at Crane Creek Vineyard on a rainy, cloudy day. Again the effect of weather and a different quality of light is apparent in the painting. Sometimes I will "doctor" a plein air piece up a little back in the studio, as I did with the pastels because my painting time on location was short (one in the morning, one in the afternoon.) But I worked on the same painting all day at Crane Creek under a cloudy sky, so the light did not change very much. Even though I would like to beef this one up a little with more color variation and a few dark accents and light highlights, I decided to leave it as I completed it that day. I think it is truer to the scene and the weather than if I tweak it. All three of these paintings are available at Carriage House Art Center.

Students Learn About Values in Color

Oddball, oil on canvas, 9 x 12, copyright Pat Aube Gray

One morning each week, two lovely ladies come to my studio for semi-private lessons. Beginners in oil painting, the two are eager to paint more exciting things than four colored balls on a table, but I find that the color of all the values found in a colored object is difficult for some students to see. Mention shadow and they reach for greys and browns instinctively, instead of the darker values of any given color. For example, the form shadow on the yellow ball is a dark version of yellow, not just any grey or brown. So for this painting, I set up four different color rubber balls and all three of us painted them, with mine being a demo for them to watch as they painted. It was a good lesson and they each did a very good job!

Note that since the balls are rubber, they do not have really strong highlights, such as pool balls might have, for example. Hard, shiny objects reflect light and have strong highlights. Think of chrome bumpers, automobile finishes, apples, shiny table tops, etc. Soft objects, like rubber balls, peaches, and fabrics absorb light rather than reflect it, so the highlighted areas are softer and not as dramatic.

I decided to include the sku label on the yellow ball in my painting. My students were timid in that regard and left it off. SO both I and the yellow ball are "oddballs," hence the title for the painting.

Click HERE to bid on this painting

At last! Pain-Free Painting!

I am so happy to report, after six months of physical therapy following surgery, that this week I was able to paint at my easel for several hours with no pain in my right arm and shoulder! I didn't have to lower my arm once due to pain! It has been many many years since that was the case. Hooray!
The painting at left is in progress. I hope to finish it within this next week and will post the finished product for you to see. It is from a photo I took while walking this path at the John C. Campbell Folk School in NC when I was teaching there.
I am trying out some new paint and so far I absolutely love it. It is made with walnut oil instead of linseed oil as the medium (binder), which does not yellow like linseed oil does. The paints are pigment rich and soft and creamy in consistency. If I continue to like them, I will order them for our store. Once I decide, I will also share the brand name with you.

A Happy Valentine

Ashley is a beautiful young woman, but in just two and a half hours' painting time, this burnt umber and yellow ochre underpainting was as far as I could get. I really like the method I used of wiping out the lights from the toned canvas. This was a good likeness and the model really liked it. Her boyfriend surprised her with it for Valentine's Day!

I am still having a difficult time painting at the easel, such as I did here, but I am trying. I hope to be getting more art posted in the not too distant future.

11 x 14 oil on canvas

SOLD!

Fantasyland!

copyright 2007 Pat Aube Gray

This is one of the students in my Thursday morning class painting a fantasy image on a pretty large canvas! The dinosaur is hidden by the artist, Sharon Mullings. It was a small class of painters who don't need minute to minute instruction, so I decided to paint along with them, parking myself behind Sharon and painting her without her knowledge at first! When her husband came to pick her up at the end of the class, he said, "Everybody will know who that is! Those are your legs!"

5 x 7 on Ultra Panel



SOLD

Silk Amaryllis - Oil on Sanded Wallis Paper

Copyright Pat Aube Gray

Jessica was painted at a weekly life painting session held at my teaching studio, where several artists come to draw or paint from models. I don't teach at these sessions; I get to paint like everyone else! I loved this set-up with the large silk amaryllis, which adds interest to the composition and inspired the red and green complementary color scheme. I really enjoyed painting this one, which I did on 11 x 14 sanded paper made by Kitty Wallis. Though the paper was developed for pastel work, it is wonderful for oils as well. The paint is absorbed into the paper and dries quickly, but does not sink in as one might expect. The finished painting has a wonderful surface, almost like moleskin. You have to use old brushes, though, because this paper chews them down to nothing in no time!

Click HERE to bid on this painting SOLD

Game Over - Original Oil by Pat Aube Gray

What could be better after a great game of golf than a tall glass of cold beer?

8 x 10 Oil on Canvas
copyright 2007 Pat Aube Gray

SOLD See my other paintings at auction at www.ebay.com

Kissin' Cousins Original Oil on 6 x 6 Canvas

Copyright 2007 Pat Aube Gray

A still life with fruit seems so mundane, but it is not as easy as it looks! And making an interesting composition can be challenging. I broke a "rule" by having two objects "kissing" instead of one being in front of the other. But I decided I liked it this way and went for it! I like this painting not only for its composition but also for the complementary color scheme of yellow and all those violets!


Click HERE to bid on this painting

New Painting For Sale - "Ripe Red Tomato"

Photo: Ripe Red Tomato, Oil on Canvas, 6" x 6"

This is, I hope, the first small painting of many to be sold online as a daily (or almost daily!) painting in an auction environment! SO many artists are producing paintings on a daily basis and selling on ebay and also through their blogs, which is what I certainly hope to be able to do. Tonight I listed this happy little painting on Ebay. SOLD

Today's Happenings

Today I took new photos of two portraits, Corporal William G. Taylor, seen below in my post of March 30th titled "Art From the Heart", and Katie. Both of these photos have been updated here tonight.
I spent a good part of today cleaning up my home studio, having just finished two new commissions, these not exactly fine art, more of a commercial nature. But the one with all those little portraits was quite time consuming! Worked in acrylic on this project. It was fun! The other resulted from a client seeing the sign I painted of our Carriage House logo, a realistic horse and carriage, complete with riders. You can see the nature of the client's business in this oil painting on wood. (Images above.)
I am ready now to do some really small oil paintings with the idea of selling them at auction, perhaps on Ebay. These will be good buys for anyone interested in bidding! I plan to begin tomorrow. See you then!

Freedom of Expression

I had just completed my latest of five portrait commissions last week, feeling relief from the stress of months of painting with the hope of my clients' happiness. It is amazing how the final analysis that there is no more you can do to make the painting better, that it is now time to sign the painting and call it complete, and that all your current deadlines have been met lift a major weight from your shoulders. One would expect that a day or two away from the studio would be welcome, but instead, a couple of lemons on my kitchen counter, brought home by my husband for lemonade, provided the inspiration for a small still life painting. I have been itching to paint some still life paintings for quite some time and I immediately grabbed the two lemons, an orange from the refrigerator, and two over-sized marbles I purchased for just such a purpose. I knew the blue marbles would be a perfect complementary color foil for the orange. I returned to my studio, set up the tablecloth, the subjects and the lighting and painted for hours. I had to make myself stop painting to make dinner, although I'd have kept on painting if not for a hungry husband. (I'm the cook, he's the dishwasher - that's the deal!) Next day I was back at it, just as eager as I had been the day before!
One can love the process of painting regardless of subject, and one can prefer certain subjects to others. But the process of painting to please no one but yourself, to produce an effect you envisioned with no other opinion or outside influence, with no approval necessary save your own, allows for a freedom of expression without equal. It felt great after so many recent commissions, especially knowing there are currently four plus one pending ahead of me.
I have titled this still life painting The Odd Couple, referring to the marbles. I hope you like it as much as I do! And if you don't that is perfectly okay, too!

Learning by Teaching

It is still early in 2007 and already I have taught a six-day workshop in oil portraits in North Carolina, five three-hour sessions of my weekly classes in my teaching studio, and I have attended one four-day workshop! I have six more painting or drawing workshops and those weekly classes scheduled to teach for the remainder of the year.
A schedule like this is very time consuming, not to mention that it seriously cuts into what might otherwise be painting time. So I often question why I keep doing it!
The first answer is, of course, the most obvious. It helps pay the bills. There are times when painting sales and commissions may be slow in coming, and teaching helps fill those gaps. While I keep my class and workshop prices as low as possible, the income is still a necessary addition to the income stream. The other reasons I continue to teach are far less tangible. I have given much thought to this and have found that I have really learned by teaching. I have learned about my own philosophical and analytical thinking every time I have to explain a particular aspect of painting to a student. I must think, question and explore while I am painting and read constantly to stay abreast of other artists, their art, their methods and their styles. I have to understand color and composition well enough that I can explain them to students in ways that will be meaningful to their progress as painters.
I love learning so this is wonderful for me. And I truly love imparting what I know to others hungry to know it! There is nothing as gratifying as seeing a student in an A-Ha! moment only to go on to improve their work with his or her newfound knowledge.
The last, but certainly not least, aspect of teaching is the forging of wonderful friendships with those whose interests are well aligned with mine. There are a good number of students who have taken my classes or workshops for years and my life would not be the same without them. I thank them all.

Also accepted into the PSA Fall 2006 Exhibition is Ben, oil on linen, 24 x 30, shown at right. The third painting, K.J., oil on canvas, is not shown.