St. Francis - In progress - 2

St. Francis. Oil on gold leaf - Work in progress. I continued to work on this painting today concentrating on his left hand. I've left out the stigmata for now but am planning to add it in soon. Enjoy the video and welcome to the studio.

St. Francis - In progress

St. Francis. Oil on gold leaf - Work in progress. I imagine completing 11 more of these and merging them into a large altar piece. I imagine many things.

Walking with my wife downtown, we found this piece of wood lying on the ground. I loved the details in it so I picked it up and started this piece. I've experimented with gold leaf once before but I wanted to get more familiar with it. For this piece the gold leaf was applied using cheap vodka. They say that is what some incredible Russian icon painters used! I was originally going to paint flowers on this panel but I have such a burning desire to paint religious things that I told myself.. why not start now? To be continued..

The Horror.

The Horror. Ink on canvas, self portrait. This portrait was finished in October of this year. A good friend was visiting for a short while and introduced me to the quill. He was very kind to carve me a pen and here is the result after using it. I find this piece very powerful... and hope you do to.

Flowers and weeds.

Flowers and weeds. Acrylic on canvas. My friend was in town some weeks ago and had brought a bouquet of flowers one night when paying us a visit. The bouquet had these wonderful purple 'weeds' amongst the flowers and as the bouquet died these purple weeds didn't show any sign of sickness. So I snatched them up and decided to paint one.

Ever since visiting a Renoir exhibit in Paris my heart has warmed to Impressionism and I have often found the desire to give chase. This is one example. Flowers and weeds.. What a strange distinction.

Attitude.

Attitude. Oil and HB portrait on Cold Pressed 140lb paper. In this photo of a good friend, she's sucking her lips tightly shut, which proved to be a huge challenge. It's hard enough to get to know the valleys and mountains of a face but when there's an earthquake and everything shifts... it proves a greater challenge to create a piece that is readable to the viewer. It almost looks as if she's chewing gum and while staring right at you, asks, what? What do you want? Attitude.

The mall.

I was waiting for family this morning at the mall and so I sat down and quickly sketched people as they went about their activities. Women leaving with shopping bags, men at the bank.. though I think my favorite is the man leaning in, taking out money from the ATM.

Asleep.

Asleep. Portrait study of a friend. Though the original shot was of a very beautiful and feminine woman, this study has developed to appear quite masculine as I used a thick ink pen and stayed very angular. (It almost seems as if you are staring at 1 of the Hardy Boys asleep on the TTC, Elvis?) I'm always amazed how these straight lines add up to give an appearance we can recognize. A face that is having a happy dream. A face that is content.

An old hand and 2 rings.

An old hand and 2 rings.. what a story they tell. Pencil study of my aunts hand holding a wine glass. You can already see I am getting lost in the details and shapes in this sketch when compared with the last portrait study. I love the various shapes and angles of this hand though.. old and wise, it is still a hand full of life.

A man lost. A man not wanting to look.

A man lost. A man not wanting to look. Self portrait. I just finished this piece with an HB. I loved the emotion it evoked at this point so I stopped. It's been far too long since I've let go on a pad of paper. Too long.