The Naked Silo

The Red Balloon 28" x 18", oil on wood panel, 2020 This painting is the first of several paintings I have planned that features my friend, Kimberley , doing double duty, representing one's struggle with oneself (since we tend to be our own worst enemy). I shot a lot of reference of her in multiple poses, knowing I'd be able to composite them in Photoshop later. While I had Kimberley wear a different top for each persona in this one, I didn't want to have three legs visible with the same-coloured pants so I painted jeans on the foreground figure. I think the red and blue is a great, rich combination that really pops, leaving the rear "twin" in ghostly pale colours. My original idea for the background was a very dark, mysterious forest, but the more I looked at it while painting the figures against the roughed-in dark-ish background (over which I would have painted the suggestion of a forest), the more I liked the starkness of that, so I made it definitive...

Into the Woods 14" x 17", oil on Bristol board, 2020 One of the main purposes of this "time lapse video" exercise is to keep me painting regularly and, by doing so, I hope to learn a few things and get better at it. So, watching these videos is a fascinating (for me, anyway) look into my development as a painter as I try new techniques. To save space I've begun experimenting with painting on Bristol board and that means the surface needs to be prepped, and this is how I did that: after I pencilled in the subject/s I covered the paper with clear gesso, then taped the sheet to a hard surface (which produced that uneven border), then covered that with orange acrylic (like I usually do), then paint away. Even after these preparatory steps, the surface isn't what I'm used to working on...it seems more porous...but I've managed to adapt and make it work for me. With this painting, I've used my friend, Kimberley , once again from a recent pho...

Restrained Fury 18" x 24", oil on wood panel, 2019 Pencils (with circle). I felt the composition needed something in the upper right, so I drew a circle there, but I don't think I'm going to keep it as a clearly-defined shape. Blocking-in shadows. Along with the shadows, I blocked-in the dark background and softened that circle in the upper right. I'm still not sure what to do with it... Close, but something's off... Blue highlights on right.  The right side of the head and neck weren't looking right until I realized I needed some definite blues (rather than trying to make it work with pale violets) and then it all came together. Now for some blue highlights in the coat... Close-up featuring ear.

Kimberley (with Owl) 36" x 48", oil on canvas, 2019, private collection After months of hemming and hawing, I decided late (almost too late; the deadline was April 26) in 2018 to try to get into the Kingston Prize for portraiture. My previous entries were (in chronological order: my Self Portrait (Shoulders)  in 2011, George Emlaw in 2013, George Meanwell (Concertina) in 2015, and Kelsey with Accordion in 2017. None of them got into the show. Too many Georges? Too many parentheticals? Not good enough work? By the end of January this year I decided to reach out to an old friend and ask her if she'd like to be my subject for what could very well be my last attempt. She happily agreed. I've known Kimberley Tardik (née Black) since high school –right around the time I started painting in watercolours – and I've painted her several times in the 1990s: Mythological , Implies , clear , and in these two paintings featuring the Scarborough Bluffs. Since 2018...

No Swimming 22" x 30", watercolour 1996 One chilly fall day my friend, Kim, and I went to the Scarborough Bluffs to look around and see what we could shoot for possible future paintings, and I shot a couple of rolls of film in a couple of hours or so. Ultimately, I decided I'd do two paintings: a "clean" one and a "dirty" one, both paintings inspired by the beauty of the cliffs as well as the "No Swimming" sign and garbage at the site. Scarborough's beaches have been on-again/off-again clean and filthy and this was during a no-so-nice time. The bottom painting is straight from the photos taken at the Bluffs, but it was way too cold to have Kim in a swimsuit there, so we went back to her warm house and I took some pics for that painting (as well as others; click on her name in the "labels" below to see some of them). Before, Below, Beside 15" x 20", watercolour, Collection of The City of Scarborough The ...

15" x 22", watercolour, 1997, private collection After a 15-painting run of local PEC barns (click on the "barnscapes" tag below to see them), I had a hankering to get back into some figurative work, and my next two big paintings fit the bill (one is half finished at "press time"). Going through much of the photo reference I've shot over the decades (hundreds of pictures!), I came across a few shots that I'd painted in watercolours and now would like to try and reinterpret in oils. The photo the above painting is based on (featuring my friend, Kimberley ) is one of them (mad sketching and Photoshop compositing are underway).

15" x 22", watercolour, 1998 The reference for this came from a photo shoot I did with my friend, Kimberley Black (whom I've known since high school), a year or two beforehand. Yes, she can touch the tip of her nose with her tongue; she wanted to to prove it to me...then I snapped the shot. I find the supercolourful nature and the lighter middle areas of each cell makes the matrix more reminiscent of stained glass here than in other versions –it also makes me think of candy: I can taste that background (and, no, I can't touch the tip of my nose with my tongue). This painting was part of Operation: Waterstorm . For background info on the title, see my post about evade . Sketch, offering further proof.

15" x 22", watercolour, 1998, private collection For this I had a Supergirl costume custom-made for my friend, Kim, and then suspended her in mid-air to simulate flying in front of a giant projection of a jumbo jet. A complicated process for a painting? Worth it!* This painting was in a show I had later that year (on a horribly snowy day) and I invited the late Matt Osborne to be the live entertainment, and he was, as always, truly excellent. When I told him about listening to his CD, Underwater, throughout the painting of this picture, he dedicated a song to it, although I don't remember which. *Not really; she's lying on the floor, I added the costume in the drawing phase, and the jet's from a magazine ad.