Calling All Muses – 16 x 20 Available at Gallery 1261 in Denver, Colorado
When I found my way back to the easel chair in early September I asked the Muses for help and boy did they come running. They are calling me back to the easel as I write…so stay tuned and stay safe !
Last of the Season – 12 x 18 Available at Gallery 1261 in Denver
I have a few NEW PAINTINGS to begin posting…the one above has headed out to Gallery 1261 in Denver.
But it reminded me of today since I spent the morning making an addition to the Ruth Stout bed.
It is mostly Matt’s fault because he keeps texting me about how well his “undercover” veg are doing and because he is my go to garden buddy. It’s so nice to throw ideas and new gurus back and forth and he is a witty soul who takes his garden very seriously.
Here are the rapid fire pics of the process begun early this frosty morning…
A chance to finally use all the cardboard I have been saving for the entire year.
Even threw in the Quarantine Box…awe Finn
Then it was time to haul all the leaves I had corralled into a bin on the other side of the yard.
I filled the spaces in with the stash of Vineyard Gazettes…minus the crossword puzzles.
It was heart wrenching to track the Covid headlines as the island has joined the nation with the out of control surge heading into the winter. These aren’t in order but they give you an idea…
Herself arrived in time to lend a hand and it took two bales of hay to cover the new 11 x 14 foot annex. The Ruth Stout bed now boast 960 sq feet of gardening space.
So, as I feature the “Last of the Season” it feels good to be laying the foundation for the season yet to come. May we all stay safe and healthy to be here to enjoy it.
Mask UP people and I mean it.
Early dark and I’m almost finished here in the studio…
Before I go, on this eve of gratitude, I wanted to thank all our galleries and the hard workers who have managed to keep the doors open during this difficult year allowing we artists to keep working and filling those walls. So…to the folks at Gallery 1261 in Denver, Michael and Christie at Sugarman Peterson Gallery in Santa Fe, and Chris, Shiela and all our dear gallerista friends at The Granary Gallery on Martha’s Vineyard…love and thanks from the bottom of my brushes.
And a special treat…A new video for a very special painting…Arthur’s Light…Available at the Sugarman Peterson Gallery in Santa Fe (website is under construction and at the time of this writing Covid restrictions have closed business – I will update as soon as they are open but inquiries can be made via phone at (505) 820-0010 )
I hope you enjoy…and Happy Thanksgiving !!!
A much needed rainy day here in the studio affords me an equally much needed rest.
The last few days of summer like weather nudged me outside to put the garden to bed and my body is respondingly sore…but my soul…that is very very much alive.
Heavy sweaty work of raking and mulching the mountains of leaves felt as cathartic as counting up all those votes here in the great state of Pennsylvania. I danced some righteously happy jigs while tossing the hay all over the Ruth Stout garden. The crows, bluejays, wrens and one shy bunny all raised their voices in joyous song while I dug up the last of the late season potatoes.
The winds of change have indeed shifted and for me, it happened in a flash. Just like that, ding dong…the weight lifted, the doors flew open wide…and there was spontaneous partying in the streets all across the land. It reminded me of the sublime enthusiasm that Skip had while directing her swan song.
The Muses are vibrating with this newfound energy and I’m listening.
First order of business is to clean up this website. It is almost 20 years old now and since we are on about the business of clearing out cobwebs I’ve signed on to update and upgrade and give it a general overhaul.
We will be working throughout the next couple months with most of the tweaking being done behind the scenes and under the hood…or so Ross tells me. (More on his new company and adventures to come.)
Along with some design changes I will be using this opportunity to reorganize the Print section of my site. The time is upon us to make good on what I had promised to do this time last year…raise the prices on the prints. The material and shipping costs have increased even more so we have settled on $295 as the new charge for the 17 x 22 sized prints.
I’m announcing that now because, like I did last year before the holidays, it will give those who are interested an opportunity to purchase prints at the current $195 until the NEW website goes live early next year. Shipping will continue to be FREE.
A total revamp project like this signals to the Muses that I am ready to rock and roll.
Uncharacteristically…and quite surprisingly…I have absolutely no idea what I will paint next.
Which feels just right.
Herself told me she’s not the least bit worried about that.
So there you go.
I’ll bring you along for the ride…
let’s see where this train takes us !
All Politics is Local – 18 x 24 Available at The Sugarman Peterson Gallery
While this election draws forward…
As dawn broke in the morning studio
in the ballot counting state of Pennsylvania
I was organizing the holiday cookie tins
and saw from my kitchen window,
a lone eagle
flying proudly over the log cabin
and sailing on above the creek
It took my breath away.
The breath that I have been holding
for four years.
I’m once again looking forward
to baking holiday cookies
putting new batteries in the window candles
settling in at the studio easel
for a long winter…
of our peace filled content.
Two messages on the same day.
The first was from my Goddaughter Emily and her Wife Ashley who sent some snaps from Canada of their handsome son Oliver. We love getting to see photos of Ollie who is just the happiest little boy with a clever impish smile…can’t get enough of them. But this one was extra special.
First I have to take you back…way back…over 30 years ago…
I was living with Peter Follansbee in the general store in Muddy Creek Forks, where we were studying our respective crafts. He was the more serious woodworker and I the wannabe painter but we overlapped in the chair and basket department.
Along comes a visit from Emily, a very young version of Herself, and as I had begun making children’s ladderbacks…this one had her name on it…
I just love the confidence and pride in here expression there. Such a love.
So now we fast forward to this …
And now I’m melting into a thousand puddles.
You go Ollie…I hope to show you how to make one of those chairs some day. But that bucket of crayons is also right up my alley and down my street…I can’t wait to see what you do with those !
So I’m all warm and nostalgic thinking of the journey that chair and the chairmaker has made and then I get some pics from Follansbee himself.
Here’s a sketch of my basement woodworking shop in our log cabin which I made for Peter back in ’97
Can you find the pipe ?
The one on the door not on the top of the cabinet.
Yeah so he and I have differing memories, his story will appear later, but I cherished that as being one given to me by Peter and his mother Mary from his dad Mo’s collection. Peter says no, and I usually defer to his stellar skills in the memory department but I’ve held my ground long enough that he has capitulated…almost.
Long after I had made the move to fulfilling the dream of being a full time artist, our log cabin was caught in a massive flood. As we live 15 feet from the edge of a creek, it meant the entire basement was filled with water. Very little survived from that workshop but I took apart the tool chest and saved this door and carved a Mark Twain quote which was eminently applicable to Master Follansbee…
True to both our natures He took it one step further and then some…
He posted a blog that fleshes out the back story so I’ll copy it here and link it back to his website for those who want to read on.
But before I do it feels important to take stock of both of these milestones.
Reminders of that time in my life when my younger stronger body followed the whims of my woodnypmh muses are few and far between now. I made over 500 chairs. From Shaker style rockers, large and small, to dozens of children’s ladderbacks to full dining room sets of chairs complete with child sized highchairs.
It was always meant to be a way of making money so I could follow my true bliss and be an artist. Looking back, it certainly was a magical bridge. And now, I spend my days at the easel…making money so I can justify taking some time off to make spoons.
I’m content with all of it…
because I learned well
from the quote which was most often requested
to be carved in the slats of those chairs…
“The End is Nothing, the Road is All.” Willa Cather
Now here’s Peter’s side of things…(stolen directly from his blog…)
https://pfollansbee.wordpress.com/
A week or two ago I got to a project that has lingered here for ages. The small panel in this door was made by my friend Heather Neill, way back when. The Mark Twain quote she incorporated in this panel is from the Autobiography, “My mother had a great deal of trouble with me, but I think she enjoyed it.” When Heather & I met in 1982, I had just given up the notion of being a painter, and was concentrating on learning woodworking. She took up chairmaking after I showed her some of the steps involved. She probably made more chairs than me before she gave up chairmaking to concentrate on painting! https://heatherneill.com/
Hanging in my shop is a drawing Heather made for me in 1997; showing her chairmaking space when it was active. In this detail, note the cupboard door with the pipe door handle. (my camera was tilted, Heather’s chair is not squished…)
So for a long time, I’ve been thinking of how to incorporate her Twain-quote-panel in a new door. I have two cupboards near the back of the shop – one for axes, and the other for turning tools. I made the axe one first, and it got doors.
When I made the next one across the shop, I had run out of “extra” pine boards. So left it door-less til now. But now that I was going to all the trouble of making the door – I couldn’t leave it plain. In for a penny…
I made it with flush-fitting panels – because the Twain quote had no margin to speak of. Then decorated it.
I haven’t carved pine since I carved the timber frame of the shop. I decided to use something simple & quick. This braid is featured in the book I did with Lost Art Press – this time there’s no V-tool involved, just incised marks with different-sized gouges. The layout is done w two compasses.
In this example, the large circle is 2 1/2? wide, the smaller one 3/4? – I used a 1? wide #5 Swiss-made gouge, and a 3/8? wide #7 Stubai gouge. Then a nearly-flat tool to remove some chips.
This is the dramatic view down the line.
This sort of design is common all over the place. My photos from Sweden a few years ago include a few different versions of it. Notice on this arch the way the effect changes according to the relationship between the large & small circles.
One more – again in an arch, but this time with its columns also.
But in the end, I decided to hollow the circles – the scribed design was as prominent as the carved one – and I didn’t like it. I took a large gouge and worked along each band of the circles. This gives the whole thing more shadow.
The whole interlaced panel (& 2 rails) design is loosely based on one I’ve never seen, except in a photo. This photo below was one of a batch sent to me 10 years ago by Maurice Pommier, author of Grandpa’s Workshop – who is another whole story https://blog.lostartpress.com/2019/10/18/meet-the-author-and-illustrator-maurice-pommier/
My version is simpler, too much blank space between the elements. But it will do, although I can’t wait to try it again.
Oh, I forgot about the pipe – why is that there? Heather swears it was one of my father’s, that my mother & I gave to her, no doubt as painting & drawing props. I swear I don’t recognize it. But my father had lots of pipes…so I might as well believe it.
Here we are…it’s the morning of the Granary Gallery Show Opening
I want to personally thank all of you who have taken the time to read the string of Blog Posts which have lead up to today’s opening. You being with us for this ride and offering kind words of support and encouragement along the way has softened the edges of the rough parts and lightened the air here in the studio.
So…from our studio
To the red barn on Old County Road
on the island of Martha’s Vineyard
And into the homes of all you friends and patrons…
Wish We Were There… a short film from HN Studios
Good Morning Art Fans…
Did you know the Granary Gallery has a Blog ?
It’s called… ArtifactsMV
Click HERE to read the latest post on…me.
The show opens tomorrow…and don’t forget to check in here
at 11am tomorrow morning when I will be featuring a video interview
that Herself and I made so that we could “virtually” be there for it.
Stay safe out there and thanks for tuning in !
And we arrive…
at the beginning…
I began this painting in January of 2020
It was meant to be a talisman…
something I could literally touch to bring me closer to my dream of living on Martha’s Vineyard
And to be a portal…
a window that could transport me to that bluff on that island
And then everything in the world changed…
Except that dream.
Signaling Home – 24 x 36
Standing high on the bluff
rising over Stonewall Beach
on the island of Martha’s Vineyard
where centuries of wind and waves
have been chiseling the shoreline back
further with each blow
after stormy blow
Where generations of Langmuir hands
have moved that dotted line of great white rocks
signaling safety in the moonlight
pulling them back and then
further back again
On that grassy sandy ledge
that has listened to my heart
taken the measure of my Muses
rounded off my edges
and holds all I know of love
Here on this edge
of all that I hold sacred
I plant my soul
holding tightly to my flags
and signaling HOME.
I am home.
Morning again here in the studio.
Before today’s Painter’s Notes I want to give you a heads up…
There are just four more days until the Granary Gallery Show opens…
Though, as you well know by now, there will not be an “Opening Reception”…
the gallery is very much OPEN and the staff are doing an amazing job and going out of their way to make a safe and welcoming environment for people to get in touch with art.
Herself and I have created a video aptly titled…”Wish We Were There” …by way of letting our island community know we are there with them…at least in spirit. The gallery sent me a list of questions and Pat agreed to read them to me on camera and you can expect some frivolity ensued.
I’ll be posting that video here on the blog on Sunday Morning… we hope you’ll pour a cup of tea and join us for that short studio visit.
So…4 days and counting…
That leaves three paintings to go…and today…
we go back to Menemsha.
I’ve spent so many hours on this dock that this painting almost painted itself.
The Morning Bell – 24 x 30
One of my enduring memories of that most special
week we got to spend “living” in Menemsha
up there on Crick Hill
was wakening to the early morning
sounds of the harbor.
When the wind is right
you can hear the bouy bells
playing a rhythmic bass line
and the gulls picking out the melody
Before the charter engines
crank up you can still make out
the water lapping against the bigger boats
some ropes and chains a’ rattlin’
against the mighty masts
and…
If you’re really early enough…
the putt putt putter of Louie’s
trawler making her way out
for the first cast of the day.
So…
even though this particular painting
is righteously full
of the colors
that bring the harbor to life
for most artists
What I hear…
is just as evocative
as what you see.