Grandmother's Chair - Best in Show

With the announcement and posting of this year's Richeson75 Animals, Birds and Wildlife finalists and competition winners yesterday, I was extremely honored to find "Grandmother's Chair" had taken Best in Show. Two others of my works also were included in the Finalist list along with some fine work by the others who made that final cut.

The Richeson show is an online show, but the work itself can be seen in person, currently, as it is hanging as part of Leaving Our Mark: In Celebration of the Pencil at the D'Amour Museum of Fine Arts, part of the Springfield Museums in Massachusetts. That show hangs through the end of March.

ONE DAY is up and running on my Facebook page now. All work is first come, first purchase. If you would like a small work from the offering, just click the link.

This coming Saturday, November 28th, I'll be offering a group of small works at special reduced prices for one day only. The offering will 'go live' at 11AM Eastern Time and be available through my Facebook art page, The Graphite Art of Terry Miller, linked here as well as in the right hand column on this page. There will be a special album (ONE DAY) set up on the Photos page there which will include all the works available, listing sizes and details and pricing for each. The first person to type SOLD in the comments will be the new owner of the work. This offering will last for twelve hours only on Saturday, from 11 in the morning to 11 that night and all purchasers will be contacted after the sale ends about payment (PayPal preferred) and shipping details. I'll try and post a link here on my blog page, directly to the album containing the offered works on Saturday morning at or shortly after 11AM, but since there may be many waiting for the live upload, it may be better to be on Facebook at that time to have a first chance for any of the offered works. Good luck!

Something's Coming

Having just opened in Great Britain, Drawn, a major showing of works by a number of International artists, includes several of my works. I'm very pleased to have my work hanging alongside that of the other fine artists in the show. If you are within drive distance of Dorchester in the southwest part of Britain, the beautiful grounds of Sculpture by the Lakes is well worth a visit. The Gallery will be showing Drawn through mid December.

This week, Maryland's Waterfowl Festival will open to the public on Friday morning at 10 AM. I've spent the last weeks preparing new works for this year's show, and have tapped into my experiences and memories of seven trips to Africa by completing  the most African themed works I have had at the Festival in years. It's been fun to revisit my memories of times on the African continent and reflect those in new works. Come see all of my new work in beautiful, historic Easton, Maryland at the Waterfowl Festival!

My copy of the new edition in the series, Strokes of Genius: The Best of Drawing arrived yesterday. I've just had a chance to quickly flip through it and see that there are loads of wonderful works represented in this volume focused on Depth, Dimension and Space, including one by yours truly. It is available now through North Light Books or your favorite on-line or down-the-street local shop.

The Big sign has gone up on Maryland's Route 50 just north of Easton on the eastern shore advertising this year's Waterfowl Festival. It's just a couple weeks away now and the studio is humming with the final few new pieces that will be included in the event. Plan you trip now . . . you'll have a great time and see some fabulous art, sculpture, carving and more.

Another new work destined for this year's Waterfowl Festival which opens a month from yesterday. Plenty of time for you to get your tickets and plan your visit!

 

In just a bit over a month, this year's edition of the long-running Waterfowl Festival which is held every November on Maryland's beautiful eastern shore in the historic town of Easton, will open for business. I believe this is my 24th or 25th year of doing this large, group show which has its public opening on November 13th. Easton is filled with fine art, sculpture, decoy carvings and lots of other interesting crafts for the weekend, almost all within a few blocks in downtown and the remaining an easy, free bus ride away. Well worth a visit, The Contenders (a just completed drawing above), will be one of my newest works available during the weekend. Come to the eastern shore of Maryland and enjoy the fine fall weather and lots and lots of great art.

Captured off the computer screen this morning, the home page of the Springfield Museum, Springfield, Massachusetts, where a most wonderful exhibition - "Leaving Our Mark: In Celebration of the Pencil" - will open in November and run through the winter months. I am most honored to have five of my works included in the exhibition along with outstanding examples from the other featured artists - Lesley Cohen, Lisa Henry, Ryan Jacque, Christina Mastrangelo, Scott Tulay, and Steve Wilda (Massachusetts), and Paul Batch, Doug Gillette, Luciana Heineman, Bill Simpson, and Alan Spellman (Connecticut). The exhibit will also feature works by Jennifer Maestre and Dalton Ghetti, who both use pencils to create imaginative and intricate contemporary sculptures. The museum has spotlighted my work, "A Race to the Finish" on their banner intro to the exhibition and I was quite surprised to find it so. Thanks to Steve Wilda, who organized this endeavor with the museum, and asked me to be a part of it.

In just shy of two months, this year's edition of the long-running Waterfowl Festival on Maryland's beautiful eastern shore, will open. I believe this will be my 25th year of doing the large, group show and the next few weeks are going to be busy ones in the studio as I prepare new work. This is one of the recently completed works that will head to Easton, MD in mid November. It's always a beautiful, fall weekend in Easton with lots of great art and sculpture and carvings and much more to see and enjoy. Well worth a trip across the Chesapeake Bay. The show opens to the public on November 13th, with a benefactor gala on the evening of November 12th. Check out their web site to find out more.

The Delightful Dozen x's 2

With an ever so slight nod toward 1967's The Dirty Dozen, today, a week after my departure to this year's edition of The Woodson Art Museum's annual much anticiapted event that is Birds in Art, I'll spend a bit of time spotlighting two dozen of my favorite works from this year's exhibition in The Delightful Dozen x's 2.

As those of you who have looked in on this pretty annual posting know, I could easily post and spotlight and speak to each and every one of the works included in the exhibition, but alas, time will not allow that and so I have skimmed the cream off and picked these two dozen works to feature, while in no way diminishing the beauty, appeal and mastery of those works not mentioned here. If you really want to see what Birds in Art is all about, you can order a catalog here or better yet, plan a visit to The Woodson Art Museum to see the exhibition in person - a far, far better viewing!

So then, in no particular order, here follows two dozen inspiring works of art that captured my eye as I saw the exhibition for the first time last Thursday evening.

Having drawn them myself, many times in the last few years, I am rather drawn to chickens when I spot them and was amused and delighted to see many works included in this year's Birds in Art which spotlighted the jocular bird. Two portrayals that really stopped me were a painting by Virginia's Ed Hatch (No Chicks Allowed), a first timer in the exhibition this year, and a most smile-producing bronze (The Barnyard Brigade) by California's Burt Brent. What a great pair of works these made in one corner of one of the galleries, nice planning on the part of the exhibition team at the museum. Hatch's work really brought me into the interesting composition, placing the major features and subjects off center (as I do many times in my drawings) while maintaining an appropriate balance across the entire canvas between strong light and deep shadow. The cluster of chickens all tangled up in Hatch's work was quite nicely duplicated and echoed in Brent's fine, humorous bronze sculpture almost as if both artists had planned out corresponding strategies of what to do and how they might relate.

I generally approach my own work in a somewhat graphic manner, looking at qualities of shape and texture, value contrasts and abstracted forms, and trying to develop interesting figurative compositions within those parameters so I'm naturally drawn to works that embody similar attributes. In the next three works, spotlighted below, three very diverse artists in three very diverse mediums have developed very graphic works with high appeal, interest, and stories to tell. 

Beginning on the left, Sherri York's Cruisin', a reduction linocut, displays her mastery of the medium to its best. I love the way she has positioned the pelican way off center and yet by putting so much emphasis on the swirling patterns of reflection in the water, she has kept a balance across the composition which contrasts the movement of the pelican away from the center. Deftly handled, it is a compositional framework not for the weak at heart; confidence in yourself and your abilities is surely needed and York has it in spades. 

In the center is Mark Eberhard's Man Loved the Birds, a striking oil. Mark's very graphic portrayals always inspire me and make me pause to both understand the story being told as well as to relish his beautiful renderings of the natural world and how he manages to illicit an emotional connection in this viewer, and I am sure in all others who stand before his canvases.

The final work in this trio (Romance in the Hood) by last year's honored Master Wildlife Artist, Barry Van Dusen, embodies some of the same qualities that both previously discussed works do, but in a beautifully rendered watercolor. Though a completely different medium to York's, there surely is a similar character to Van Dusen's brush work and strong color separations that give it a sharp graphic reading, which is closer also to the more defined details in Eberhard's oil. Three very distinct works of art, each holding their own as far as design and execution, yet embodying similar characteristics that make them almost appear as if having come from the same hand.

Playing Hide and Seek is what comes to my mind when viewing the three works, above, that make up the next trio. Once again, the 'hide and then seek' idea of composition is one that I often make use of, either by intentionally burying the main subject or a surprise second or third subject, which when 'discovered' will bring a smile, or simply making the animal subject fit into its habitat as it would in nature; a part of the overall scene and one often overlooked or missed in a hurried passing. 

These three artists have played the 'game' well and brushed very appealing, smile provoking works. First, on the left, Jim Bortz's Twilight Watch shows us a glorious landscape in which his great horned owl resides. His depiction of light and color and atmosphere just after the sun has dropped is a marvelous rendering that immediately brought to my mind, many personal experiences and made an immediate emotional connection. The position of the distant owl, though relatively insignificant in the broader landscape, is the key that moved my eye right into the painting and completely documented that sort of surprise moment in nature when such an observation might naturally occur.

In the upper work of the three, English artist Robert Cook deftly hides his ringed plovers Amongst the Pebbles just as they would in nature - camouflaged and still, blending in with their beautifully rendered surroundings in oil. A perfect example of hiding and seeking which obviously appealed to the museum's acquisition committee as this work will be added to their permanent collection.

Jhenna Quinn Lewis, in her second inclusion in Birds in Art, brushed a beautiful oil in The Ornithologist's Library. Her red breasted nuthatch is not completely hidden, but still makes for a very appealing, surprising addition to the book shelf. The spare coloring and composition emphasize the details of books and bird that need emphasizing while leaving out any fussiness that would detract from what is important in the overall design.

Straight forward portraits, to my eye, can sometimes be rather boring and devoid of interest or, when handled with more finesse, starkly appealing and captivating as in the three works seen above. In the upper left, Australia's Tony Pridham has painted a beautiful trio of corellas, a kind of cockatoo. They perch upon a twisty branch, illuminated with sharp light and shadow and against a softly developed sky that glows blue and pink. It is the deft rendering of the birds and branches and the color values in the birds that made this a show stopper for me. The compositional elements are few and rather simple in shape, but what set this painting apart from many others, to my eye, was the mastery involved in making those spare elements burst off the canvas. It is no doubt why this painting captivated the jury to such an extent as to have been included in this year's exhibition.

Below Tony's work is another beautiful portrait of a Tricolored Heron in pastel by Texan, James Offeman. I was drawn into that work because of the stark value shifts in the bird and the dark, negative space of the background. The highlights on the bird were deftly handled and gave the work a very strong depth and spatial atmosphere in which to 'live'. One of the more simpler works included in the exhibition, it held its own amid all the more complex compositions in my estimation.

The final work of this trio by Brian Jarvi (Silent Song: The Birds), was actually a large color study for one panel, according to the artist, of a larger, more complex work of African subjects that he has embarked upon and will consume his work time over the next year. The rendering of all the specific birds not only was spot on, but his interesting arrangement of all is what really sparked my intense study of the oil.

Though a rather monochromatic guy myself, I tend to be drawn toward the luminous in color work; those works that radiate sparkle and spotlight strong value shifts. Luminosity - the quality of being intellectually brilliant, enlightened or inspired - could also be applied to the three works I've spotlighted below. To the left, first timer Jeffrey Larson, a 'local boy' being from Wisconsin, knocked my socks off, and those of many other of the attending artists with his Rooster Pheasant in most glorious and lush tones of oil. Reproduction color here and in the catalog just could not capture the true intensity and luminous quality to the sharp turquoise tones of the door and the contrasting warm feathering of the bird. The dimensional quality of his depiction was also outstanding and from across the gallery appeared to have a third dimension. How wonderful to have found such a marvelous painting included in the exhibition as a first time inclusion.

The upper work to the right, depicting crimson-fronted parakeets in Shadowplay by Debby Kaspari, also embodied some of that luminous quality with striking sunlight and sharp contrasting shadow. I also enjoyed the very angular composition. 

The third work below, a marvelous wood carving by another Wisconsin resident, Todd Wohlt of Blue-breasted Bee-eaters, certainly fit my understanding of the definition of luminosity as being brilliant, enlightened or inspired in the way that Wohlt's birds emerge from the wood as if by magic; their coloration developing as they take form and shape and moving across from block to branch. His depiction of the bee-eaters very high contrast color was also spot on. Having observed these little flitters in person on my many trips to Africa, I certainly was able to make a very strong emotional connection with the work.

It is hard for me, as noted above being a rather monochromatic guy myself, to not be drawn toward the more monochromatic works included in the exhibition each year and this year there were several marvelous examples of the mastery of black, white and tones of grey to be viewed. I've spotlighted just two of those above. On the left is a fine charcoal work by Ray Brown, Huginn and Muninn (as Ray noted in his text accompanying the work in the catalog, the title derives from the names of the two supposed raven pets or servants to Odin in Norse mythology, their names meaning thought and memory and their task to fly the earth gathering information so Odin could be all knowing). Over and above the uniqueness of the title (something which I often try to succeed in when naming my work) the rendering of the ravens was quite natural and appeared almost as if dashed off in a moment of creative explosion; the movement and poise of each bird so natural in feel. Each of the other simple elements of the composition were placed in perfect harmony with the bold forms of the birds, enhancing and supporting the design yet offering minimal distraction from the importance of the two main subjects.

John Felsing, known for his soft, emotive, ethereal landscape paintings, contributed a beautiful graphite work, Blue Acrobats, in his typical hand. A wonderful melding of light and shadow, soft tones and feathery hatching and line work all came together in a very emotion-packed little 15" square package.

The next pairing of works, one by 2005's honored Master Wildlife Artist, Nancy Howe and the other by Wyoming's Kathryn Mapes Turner (in her fourth appearance in Birds in Art), bring into focus the 'out-of-focus' quality of their two very distinct styles of painting, which knowing a larger body of work of each of these masterful artists, establishes those approaches to their work as very well known and consistent.

In Nancy's work, In Transition on the left, her depiction of the important aspects of the composition, namely the goldfinches, brought just enough resolution and detail to give the birds the importance they required within the bounds of her ethereal and subdued landscape while letting them blend in and meld into the overall soft quality of the color, light and design of the work. In her accompanying text to the painting, she talked about the intentional compositional structure of the work, relating it to the overall design and title and that struck a close chord within me as a fellow creative soul.

Mapes Turner's Favored, depicting a sandhill crane, embodied many aspects of Howe's approach to painting but in a more spare, concentrated overall design while duplicating a similar, minimal color variation and muted tonal approach to the other oil.

Unique in structure and medium, the next three works, spotlighted above, represent those pieces that always catch my eye when wondering into the galleries for the first time each year I have attended the opening of Birds in Art. Feathers, cut paper and burned wood, are not usually mediums that one thinks of when thinking about works of fine art, but the three noted here certainly do embody those attributes that make a work a fine piece of art. 

To the left, Chris Maynard from Washington state, once again proves that he knows how to deftly manipulate such a delicate support medium as an actual feather in his magnificently presented Eat. The tiny, perfectly defined insects emanate from the feather as if by magic, yet through Maynard's precision appear almost as a naturally occurring event. This is the second time I have marveled at his mastery and noted his work in my post-exhibition sum up the last time as well in 2012.

The cut paper bird of paradise (perotia sefilata) by Canadian, Calvin Nicholls in his Body Language, was another of those special works that popped off the wall, though comparatively one of the smaller works in the exhibition at just 15" tall. Nicholls' ability to capture movement and depth and body structure with nothing but pieces of white paper, cut and carefully molded and folded, and how light and shadow are employed to also enhance dimension, was mesmerizing to say the least.

The final work of this trio by Nabuko Kumasaka from Japan, See You Tomorrow, placed her crow in a most unusual position in the composition, almost falling off the lower right corner, but it worked; the bird's pose and angle mirroring the angle of the fence line and countering the movement and direction of the horse. On top of all that interesting compositional design was the fact that it was all accomplished by burning into a hunk of wood!

Last, but certainly by no means least, a trio of three dimensional works close out this year's 'arm chair' tour of Birds in Art. Being a 'flat artist', I do not usually have reason to interact with sculptors, though I count sculptors among my circle of artist friends and have learned a lot over the last few years as I interact with and talk to more three dimensional purveyors of creative output. I tend to look at three dimensional works in the same way I look at paintings and other flat works of art - first and foremost drawn into the compositional aspect of the work and its overall design, then to the quality of the handling of the medium. 

In this final trio of works, I've spotlighted three pieces of dimensional work that rose to the top of my 'likes' in the exhibition. The first work, upper left below, by Washington state resident, Ross Matteson, a bronze and marble meadowlark (Whit's Salt Licks), appealed to me because of the combination of the two materials in the beautifully stylized work. I tend to be drawn toward the more abstract in three dimensional works and Matteson's work had the qualities of both an abstracted vision and a figurative representation of its main subject.

Don Rambadt's welded bronze piece, Wings When You Fall, depicting barn swallows swooping away from the rectangle (representing a barn door or window?) surprised me upon entering its gallery as it was hung against the wall; his works usually occupying a pedestal and able to be walked around. Of course, I recognized his unique style but beyond that, was easily pulled into its movement and whimsy.

The final three dimensional work by yet another first timer, Ohio's Barry Gunderson (Four and Twenty) made me chuckle as I descended the stairs into the lower gallery space. His polyurethane, painted wood and metal assemblage of red-winged black birds was one of those surprise works that just stop me in my tracks and demand a bit more attention and study. I really enjoyed all the shapes and poses the birds reflected and could almost hear their group chirps and chatters.

And so another ramble through some of my favorite works from the event that IS Birds in Art comes to its conclusion. There is a lot of fine, fine work to be seen at The Woodson Art Museum during the course of the next two months before the exhibition will close and about half of the works will then go on tour. That tour will hit the following venues -The Fullerton Arboretum, Fullerton, CA from December 28 through February 22, 2016; The Art Museum of Southeast Texas in Beaumont from March 12 through June 5 of next year; The Museum of the Red River in Idabel, OK from June 24 through August 21; The Newington Cropsey Foundation, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY from September 12 through November 4; and finally to the Dane G. Hansen Memorial Museum in Logan, KS from December 9 through February 5, 2017. It's a long tour this time and sure worth a visit should you be within an easy distance of any of these fine venues over the next 16 months.

Recently announced by North Light Books, the 7th volume of their ongoing series, Strokes of Genius: The Best of Drawing, will be available in mid November for purchase. One of my drawings is included in this volume, which focuses on Depth, Dimension and Space. It is my 6th time for having work included in this series.

As noted in the last entry here, this past weekend saw the opening of the 55th Annual Members' exhibition, Art and the Animal, of the Society of Animal Artists at the Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History in Jamestown, New York. It was a wonderful event at that most elegantly rustic venue with over 200 in attendance at the reception on Friday evening. Art and the Animal will hang in Jamestown through October 25th before half of the exhibition will go on tour to several other venues across the country, perhaps one near you.

Opening this coming weekend, the 55th Art and the Animal exhibition of the Society of Animal Artists. If you happen to be in upstate New York taking advantage of the early fall color, a trip to the Institute will be an enjoyable experience. Over 125 works of art and sculpture will adorn the gallery spaces, including one of yours truly. I'll be there along with about five dozen of the other exhibiting artists for the opening festivities at the Institute on Friday, August 28th. The public is invited to visit beginning on Saturday.

The latest work off the drawing board. This one will fly across the Atlantic for a show in Great Britain later into the fall. "When the Sun Comes Out . . ." is 10 1/4" X 7".

Done. Image size is 10" square. Being held for something special this fall.

Getting close to completion on this one - maybe another day's work?

Studio time is about to begin for today. Here's the update on this one before pencil is placed on Bristol board today.

Staying in the current bovine mode . . here are the beginnings of the next piece on the drawing board.

The Long and the Short of It - Finale

As yet title-less, this one is ready for a frame. Image size is 5.25" x 13.25" and it will be set aside for something special coming later this fall.

The Long and the Short of It Part 4

Finally able to post the work that has taken place over the last few days. I've been preoccupied otherwise so have not been at the drawing board as much as I needed to be. Anyway, here is where things are as of this afternoon. I need this one finished up within the next day or two as I am a bit behind schedule and have many other works to complete before the end of August.

The Long and the Short of It Part 3

I little bit of studio time yesterday has brought this one to this point.

The Long and the Short of It - Part 2

So, yesterday's work time was pretty much occupied with filling in that right hand side with a soft tone and trying to get some variation in it as I worked. Might be hard to distinguish from the photo, shot on the drawing board this morning before I sit down to work today, but I wanted there to be a slight gradation from top to bottom, with some stronger dark on the top gradually softening up as it moved 'south'. At first, in my original sketch out of the piece, I had thought it would have a fully delineated background, though rather dark and nondescript so as not to detract from the focus on the cattle, but in the process of beginning work yesterday, I decided I would much rather see a very 'negative' background giving the complete focus on the cattle and so that is what I did.

In this next shot, you can see the three main pencils that I used to establish that varying grey tonality, on the left a rounded point H wood encased pencil, in the center a lead holder with a 2H very sharp point tip to it and on the right a blunt tipped 4H. Basically, these three grades of graphite made up the majority of that overall tone through a series of hatching - both horizontal and vertical as well as angular in both directions - overlayered with lots of circular movement of the pencils to soften and blend the tone. I've mentioned before that I work on a slightly textured Bristol board, so I am basically just brushing the upper surfaces of the texture with the pencils, constantly building up the tone till I get it to where I want it; this accomplished by mixing the grades over one another in no particular order, but usually starting out with the blunted side of the 4H lead as a base to work from. The reason for the blunt tip on the 4H is so I can use either 'side' of it, either the blunted side or turning the pencil slightly while I am running the point across the surface of the Bristol to expose the sharper tip which gives a narrower, darker stroke. By working with the 4H in that manner, rotating the tip as I work, I can vary the tonal intensity of the strokes with that one grade of graphite. The sharp point on the 2H really acts as a strong blending agent and is what usually is the last layer that is drawn in to combine all the other hatches, squiggles and circles into one, soft, even tone. Sounds like a lot of work . . . well, it is! But that is the way I have learned how to use the medium and I like the end result.

In this last shot, I hope you can see some of the beginnings of the hatching and circular strokes as I began to build up that area.

The Long and the Short of It

It's time once again for a work-in-progress set of images. This is about a day's worth of studio time on this new work. 

This Sunday, July 12th, will mark the first day of 

Christmas in July

the next offering of small scale works

at special reduced pricing.

The works will be matted and ready to be framed

by the purchaser. The price will include shipping

to a continental US address and payment

may be made through Pay Pal (preferred) or

a personal check. 

The first posted work will be shown at around

1 PM on Sunday, that's Eastern Time and 

will go to the first person who comments

for purchase at my Facebook art page, 

The Graphite Art of Terry Miller.

I will announce the post time for 

the following day's little work, each day 

and vary it so everywhere

across the country will have an equal shot.

These works will only be offered at

The Graphite Art of Terry Miller on Facebook. 

Pleased to announce my association with Berkley Gallery in Warrenton, Virginia.

Posted on my Facebook page, The Graphite Art of Terry Miller, today . . . this 'heads up' for an upcoming offering of small works again at very special pricing. These works will only be available through posting on my Facebook page which is linked here in the right hand column. I'll give another 'heads up' a day or two before these works will be set to go. They 'go' rather quickly, so I will be posting the approximate times that each work will be offered the day before. I've enjoyed making these offerings of smaller works over the last five or six years and hope you will be able to add one to your collection.

What a difference a week can make. Today's posting, exactly a week after posting the link to the on line view of all the works included in this year's Wildlife Artist of the Year competition of the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation in Britain, word arrived that "Cold Shoulder", one of three pieces of mine (shown hanging during the awards reception last night) received the win for the Monochromatic category. "The Last Day of Summer" was also noted with High Commendation by the jury. The show opened to the public today and runs through July 4th at The Mall Galleries in London. I am thrilled, to say the least. If you can be in London this week, stop in to see some great art.

I'm pleased to have three works included in this year's edition of the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation's Wildlife Artist of the Year exhibition and sale which will take place later this month at The Mall Galleries in London. The show is on line now at the link above, so take a look at some wonderful art. If you happen to live in Britain, plan on visiting the show in person from June 30 through July 4.

It's Never Too Early

As the summer work schedule begins in the studio, I've just completed a trio of little works that won't be heading out till late August for a special September gallery event. "Stellar", a show about sky, will open September 4th at Troika Gallery on Maryland's eastern shore. Billed as a show of 60 works, all priced at under $600 each, these three "Nocturnes" will be my contributions to the event. When asked if I would participate in the show, I had to pause and consider if I could fulfill the 'requirements' of size, price and subject. I figured why not, but had no clue six weeks ago when I agreed to do some work for it. Then, I was sitting in the studio one afternoon, listening to some CD's and . . . bingo, there was the idea! Listening to some Chopin nocturnes opened my eyes, shall we say? So, these three little works resulted from that inspiration. I believe, now, they might be just the first three of what may be a larger series of works with the same theme yet to come. Each image is just 4" square in large, imposing yet subtle frames that measure about 12" square.

I am quite thrilled to announce that I have been accepted into membership in the American Society of Marine Artists as a Signature member. It will be an honor to have my work included in future exhibitions along with that of a host of wonderful two and three dimensional masters of marine art.

Opening this coming weekend, McBride Gallery's 35th Anniversary Show will include several new works  of mine along with those of a host of other widely respected gallery artists. Two of my latest works are shown above, A Little Visit and The Line Up. A reception will be held Sunday so if you are in the area, stop by to see some fine work.

Completed a short time ago, all that is left is to sign, mat and frame "L'impenetrable". The image size is 8" x 15" and it will be headed to my eastern shore of Maryland gallery - Troika Gallery - for their big July show, Concours d'Troika.

Moving right along - I did manage to get started on the cat yesterday and now, today - well lots more of that darn rug to get done. I see the light . . . the light at the end of this tunnel.

About to sit down to the drawing board for today's studio time. Here is where things were left off yesterday afternoon. I added more pattern but also went back over areas already worked to darken and help to shift things backward and forward to give depth as well as to develop more of the soft texture of the rug which will be very important as the rug takes such prominence in the composition. Since this rug is just steps away from my drawing board, I am constantly getting up and checking out the tonal variations to try and keep things from becoming too 'busy' in black and white and also, have judiciously edited some of the pattern to simplify and key into the more important aspects of the intricate patterns. I want the rug to be important in the finished drawing, but I also want the animal subject to hold its own so have to keep that in consideration as I work. It might actually be time to start work on the cat so as to make sure I have not gone overboard on the rug's patterning. I don't think I have, but that remains to be seen. Of course, I can always go back and tone down the rug by over layering to push it back and add more focus to the cat, if needed.

Yesterday's four and a half hours of work, and again - I ask myself "Why?"

Today's additions.

A New Work Takes Shape

It's about this time in a new work, maybe ten hours into it, and especially one that has a lot of noodling and do-dads and little picky designs and textures like this one, that I scratch my head and wonder out loud, "What were you thinking?" I know, well I . . . hope . . . this one will be a winner when done, but might be questioning myself on the background as I work on it over the course of this week (my dinning room rug kindly offered me the reference while one of the roaming neighborhood felines did the rest).

Opening tomorrow, May 17th and running through mid July, this year's edition of the annual spring show, Modern Marine Masters will take place at The Maritime Gallery at Connecticut's Mystic Seaport. One of my works is included in this fine assemblage of works by some of the worlds most esteemed marine artists. A great place to visit on any occasion, doubly so during one of the gallery's major annual art events.

HORSE

A very special show, Horse, will take place this summer, from June 13 through July 11 at The Gallery at Sculpture by the Lakes in Dorset along Britain's southern coast. I am pleased to have several of my drawings included in the show, along with fine works by other internationally recognized artists and sculptors. If your plans call for you to be in England this summer, or you are a native, why not visit this marvelous venue to see some very fine art.

A new work, recently off the drawing board, Shell Game will be one of four new works being delivered to McBride Gallery later this month for the opening on June 7th of their 35th Anniversary Show celebrating over three decades in Annapolis.