Harvest Chair

Harvest Chair   watercolor   20 x 13

combines all of my seemingly necessary elements to portray both the beauty and the mystery of the approach of autumn and, subsequently, winter.  I feel the change of seasons in every bone, the rhythms of which are so necessary to my well-being.  The items:  my antique turquoise green chair, chippy with old paint and covered in decals; a vine wreath formed from our own vines and, of course, pumpkins, whose shape, color and flavor so appeal to me.  The problematic crux in such a work is to suggest the encroaching darkness by eliminating the lighter, fun-filled colors of a summer work.  I was desirous of an entwining dark and light pattern that seems almost unachievable.

I am somewhat satisfied.

Warts and All

Warts and All   Watercolor   4.5 x 6.5

Quite frankly, I think that the title says it all.

Here's to wabi sabi beauty...jolie laide, imperfection, dappled and the good with the bad.

Warts and all!

Stem to Stem...painting a group gesture of pumpkins

Stem to Stem   oil/canvas   20 x 10 x 1.5

is the result of a visit to a local farm....Dussel's...that really does it up for Halloween.  Pumpkins!  I love all-things-pumpkin...bread, cookies, truffles and pie.  Oh, yes, also the ale.  I love their look, their shape and their thick skin.  But I especially love them for their role as a harbinger to my favorite season.

"Stem to Stem" can be seen in person at Hudson Fine Art and Framing in picturesque Hudson, Ohio.

Stem to Stem...a group pumpkin gesture

Stem to Stem   oil/canvas   20 x 10 x 1.5

One year ago mid-morning,  I shot lots of photos at a local farm that puts on fabulous fun Halloween displays to tickle the fancies of children and adults alike.  Until now, I have included pumpkins in many still life paintings, but this time felt drawn to render a row of pumpkins....a row of $5 pumpkins, as they were lined up according to size.  This project became rather tedious as my goal was a vertical wedge of orange, rather than individual pumpkin portraits.  As I worked it became harder and harder to tell them apart, to separate them.  The crevices in-between became more and more important.  The rhythm throughout became a bit of a tangle.  The intense colors urged me on.  The stems (hats?  hair?) with their twisting, turning and varied directionality was the turning point.  I chose to leave the $5 signpost out of the work... that touch of commercial seemed just too vulgar compared to the beauty of the skins, the shells.

The work has been drying for several weeks now.  I am quite pleased.