I've been teaching a landscape class in San Francisco and its been a challenge but a fun experience.  With the constantly changing light and unpredictable weather conditions, painting in plein-air is always a challenge.  Fortunately, the weather has been unusually mild in San Francisco and so the following painting was completed over two days with fairly consistent weather.  The light pattern was changing as it fell across the dome but in general not too difficult conditions.  Both days I painted in the afternoon from around 1:30pm to 4::30pm. 
Degas described painting in plein-air as the "tyranny of nature" and in some ways I can see what he means.  Its difficult trying to capture something in a more unique way than what we are all used to seeing.

Day Two: Palace of Fine Arts, 12" x 16" oil on linen panel "Not quite finished but I think I'll leave it this way."

The following painting was completed in teaching a figurative painting class at the Academy of Art in San Francisco.  It was completed in three sessions and I photographed the painting  at the end of each session to record the progress.  I feel it is important for the student to learn to paint from "life" and so I do not allow photographs taken of the model for them to work from later.  Norman Rockwell once said, "I don't suppose anyone will follow my advice, but it is better not to use photographs until you have proved your ability to get along whollly without them." and I agree.
Our model is well known Bay area model Otienno.  He brought in what I believe is a traditional African costume.  I asked him whether he would normally wear this and he emphatically replied that "He would never bring anything he does not wear normally."  Good enough for me.  I want the pose to be "real", a real person in contemporary life.

Day One: Graseille: Started with vine charcoal to place in the figure in the composition.  Really just a gesture that took a few minutes.  I then established a mid-tone color for the general local color of the skin tones and costume.  From this stage, drawing with the brush, I use primarily raw umber to draw the figure and tone the entire canvas to establish a darker canvas for this picture.

Day Two: This next stage resumed a week later, so the painting was completely dry allowing me to establish a darker deeper dark for the background.  The head and hands along with parts of the drapery are resolved more fully.  The folds continued to change every time our model resumed the pose which was a challenge but I mostly stuck with the original drawing from day one.

Day Three:  This is the completed painting after the third session.  We resumed the pose a week after Day two, so the painting was completely dry, allowing me to oil down the painting with linseed oil prior to resuming painting.  I was able to achieve an even darker and richer black for the background due to three layers of glazing.

Recently I wrote an article (actually written more than 4 years ago) published in International Artist Magazine discussing the advantages to utilizing photography in painting.  Although I put on a brave face, I must admit that there is some amount of guilt I feel about the use of photography.  Nothing feels so honest and pure as painting direct from nature.  So in this blog I wanted to show a recent step by step self portrait I completed from "life" using a mirror. 
In a way, this is revisiting a self portrait I completed (pictured left) from a mirror back in 2000, when I was 42 and living in Brooklyn, New York.  In this new self portrait as in the old, I set up one source of strong light sitting over my left shoulder and eliminating all other light sources.  I worked primarily at night to achieve this.  The 2000 version was completed in two 3 hour sittings while this newer 2008 version was completed over the course of a week.  Each stage below represents what was accomplished each evening.  I would photograph the results the following morning outside.  Its interesting for me to see the changes after almost nine years in myself.  Aside from my now grey hair, glasses and 10 plus pounds I'm pretty much the same.

Day 1: I started with vine charcoal to block in the basic placement of the figure and composition. Size of head, placement of hands were determined at this stage.  I spent around 5-10 minutes on this rough gestural stage.		Day 2: I then used a thin wash of flesh tone to establish a mid-tone for the face and arm before starting to draw with the paint using mostly raw umber.  At this stage I also added the artist's smock.  I felt the t-shirt alone was too bland and the smock added a bit of costume interest.
Day 3: I spent another couple of hours working out the drawing continuing to use raw umber.  The face in particular was reworked.  The maul stick was added at this stage.  I discovered myself holding it and decided it was an effective element.		Day 4: I started in earnest with the face and head as well as part of the background to relate to the head in terms of color, value and edge relationship.
Day 5: Completion of the upper background and t-shirt.		Step 6: Completion of book shelf, suggestion of books and artist's smock.
Day 7: This is the finished painting. It measures 29" x 19" and is on oil primed linen canvas.  Although in reality I am a rather neat painter, I decided to add the paint stains on the smock for effect.		"Self Portrait at 51 (2008)" Detail

Just finished "Harvesters Resting", 31" x 48" oil on linen canvas.  The idea for this painting was inspired by the great painting of the same name by Francois Millet (pictured left). I had been thinking about this painting for a few years but was stumped as to how I could accomplish it.  I thought of perhaps hiring an entire group of farmworkers in the fields for a photo shoot, almost like making a mini-movie but instead I stumbled upon a scene of fieldworkers resting by the side of the road on my way down to Pasadena for the Gold Medal Exhibition reception last April.  I pulled over the side of the road and started taking pictures.  From these pictures along with the painting by Millet, I was able to draw the rough thumbnail sketch (below left) which was the basis of this painting.  I later hired models, both professional and non-professional (including my student and the janitor!) to help pose for this painting.  The thumbnail was invaluable and allowed me to clearly direct the models and lighting as well as aided the models in how to pose and to see what exactly I was trying to achieve.  Armed with these photographs I was able to complete the more finished sketch (below right).

Thumbnail Sketch: ink pen on 5" x 7" sketch pad.

Sketch: graphite pencil on 11" x 17" bond paper.

Next, I completed a color study of the painting (below left) along with a plein air study of the background scene which was completed on site off Davis Road in Salinas, California.  In most all my more ambitious paintings, I complete an underpainting (below right) in a transparent oil wash in usually raw umber. This allows me to work out all drawing, composition and value issues as well as aid in the overall color harmony of the finished painting.

Color Study: 8" x 12" on linen panel.

Underpainting: 31" x 48" oil on linen panel

The completion of the painting took most of the summer (off and on) to complete.  It measures 31" x 48" and it marks the first time I had the canvas professionally stretched.  A local frame shop built the custom stretchers and stretched the linen canvas that I provided.  I must admit, that having completed the color study, the "pay off" of the final was a little anti-climatic.  The excitement of the finished piece was already achieved in doing the color study so completing the larger version was less inspired and more workman like, although I think that this is the best way to insure successful larger works.  I've also included a couple of details from the final painting.

Final Painting: Harvesters Resting, 31" x 48" oil on linen canvas

Detail: Left		Detail: Middle Right

Just finished a series of private painting lessons with a nice lady
named Pauline from Fresno.  A challenging experience to work one on one
in the studio.  We decided it would be best to stay working in oil wash.  It worked out well as it was a good transition stage from drawing to painting.
One of the perks of teaching is being able to paint from the model myself.  The following are a few of the oil wash demonstrations I completed during this series of 5 lessons.  Those of you from the Monterey area may recognize well known models Victoria B. and Brenda.

Model: Victoria B.                              Model: Brenda

The following pictures are from my workshop at the Andreeva Portrait Academy in Sante Fe last month.  The first day our model was Raven, a well known model in Sante Fe and I completed a oil wash demonstration in a couple of hours.
On our second day, I completed a limited palette demonstration of our model Bill Cowdy using cremnitz white, yellow ocre, cadmium red and ivory black.  The last three days were devoted to painting our model Graciela in a extended palette.


Raven: 2 hour oil wash demonstration.


Bill Cowdy: 3 hour portrait demonstration in a limited palette of cremnitz white, yellow ocre, cadmium red and ivory black.

Various pictures from the last three days of the 5 day workshop using an extended limited palette.  Our model, Graciela.