Subtractive Composites

40" x 30", oil on canvas, 2013, private collection

On this day five years ago, I posted my first blog entry here, not knowing if I would enjoy blogging, how long I would continue, or what I would get out of it, if anything. It turns out I kind of do sort of enjoy blogging (kind of) –mostly concentrating on my own artwork, but I also like writing the occasional post about Small Pond Arts (where I gladly invite you to meet me at the silo). Since I have no plans to stop painting, I may as well keep blogging about it.

And what have I gotten out of it? I like sharing my work, my process, my struggles (it might be insightful or educational to someone); I feel I've become better at discussing (though, not necessarily explaining) my work in person after five years and more than 400 posts of trying to be clear and coherent online; and while I don't prefer to dwell on/in the past, I do like to reflect on past work, to reassess and be critical of it so that I may learn and get better...and blogging helps, whether I'm looking back on my first watercolour or my most recent oil painting (this one). So here's to five years!

Carrying on with my Tournament of Shadows series, I've combined here my cleaver-wielding friend Sandra with a sword-wielding statue from the Pallas Athene Fountain in front of the Austrian Parliament Building in Vienna (which I photographed on a trip there with Krista in 2007). The lion tattoo is a larger version of the one Ashley has in The Lady and the Lions from earlier in this series (which also features a statue).

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The Naked Silo

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