I've moved over to a WordPress blog. You can find it here.   ..read more

 We had a great group last Friday for the Valentine Card Workshop. I'll do it again next February. Here are just a few of the pieces made by participants. All of these are small, greeting card size. It's a great format for exploring contrasts in color, value, and pattern. How do you make an image lively without making it 'too busy'? Where is the line between visual excitement and visual confusion? How simple can you make an image and still maintain a sense of excitement or mystery?  Hope you all had a good Valentine's Day ..read more

 I recently had a bunch of my paintings, drawings, and sketchbook studies printed by a local printer, to generate new collage material. I always scan my smaller work at high resolution, and my larger works I have professionally photographed, so I have high quality digital images of everything. In Adobe PhotoShop I re-sized some of the images, and then ganged them up on 11"x17" files, ready for the printer. You could do this on your own printer if you have plenty of ink. Here are a few of the files I sent to the printer: A few images from my sketchbook More from the sketchb ..read more

 I've been scribbling a lot lately, layering marks in various materials. You can see previous posts about this work here and here.  Like many techniques, scribbling is easy. Making an interesting image with it takes some effort, careful judgement, lots of micro-decisions, and practice. Her is a video showing one way that a particular scribble painting developed. Processes vary quite a lot between individual works, but there is some consistency among those that I do in one "sitting". A sitting doesn't mean all at once, start to finish, but that I work on the group continually until th ..read more

Actually, it is a workshop on elements of abstract visual language, disguised as one on making valentine cards. Get details and sign up here. Friday, February 10, 4:00 pm - 5:30 pm Eastern time. All who sign up will get the recording, so if that time is not convenient, you can still get the workshop.     ..read more

It is a commonly held idea that giving ourselves time to just play, to experiment without a particular goal or expected outcome, is important to making art. [It may be important to living a healthy life, generally, as well]. But many of us, through cultural conditioning, have a hard time with this. If we know it is good for us, then maybe that makes it easier. What are your experiences with play as it pertains to your art practice or to your life? I feel that my art practice is a some kind of pivot point: there is some Old Stuff I am shedding, stuff I no longer feel compelled to work toward ..read more

 Putting together images for my 2023 calendar offers a chance to reflect on the work I've done in the past year. As usual, it is various, and to my eyes all over the map. But it's my map, and I am sticking to it. I've decided not to apologize anymore for being "inconsistent" and trying new things all the time. You can read more of my thoughts on that subject here.  In the 2023 calendar I've tried to choose images that reflect most of the scope of my 2022 explorations. However, I did find myself favoring the most recent work. I wonder if this is a common phenomenon:  is your favo ..read more

 I offer prints and products on Fine Art America / Pixels, which are print-on-demand sites, "FAA" in my shorthand. They are two sites, same  company, practically identical, but Pixels offers a few more products than does Fine Art America. A few products available from FAA: acrylic print, throw pillow, tote bag, and pencil case People often ask me if I like the way FAA sells my work. I read this as emphasis on THEY. Are they (meaning FAA) doing a good job for me? They, in this case, are not doing anything to sell my work other than provide a (fabulous, in my opinion) platfor ..read more

 My residency at Truro Center for the Arts in October resulted in some new directions, and new thoughts about my work and processes. That is exactly what I'd hoped to get out of it.  I developed a practice of making studies, or études, as a kind of warm-up exercise. Read about that in the previous post. Drawing from life and from photographs also crept into my practice, like something basic and essential. I have considered how introducing a recognizable subject into my otherwise abstract paintings might give me a broader capacity for expression. I don't know, but it is something to e ..read more

 I've just created a new Pinterest board on the use of neutrals and bright colors together. Take a look here. I love pushing the ratios of neutrals to brights. How little bright can you get away with and still have it sing? How much bright can you get away with, and not have it "too busy"?  Here are a few examples of my own work in which I'm focusing on this kind of palette: 8"x8" 12"x12" 20"x20" Big 24"x24" 24"x24 ..read more