"Purple" color pencil

I did a few little animal sketch in between working on a lino-cut print. I hope to be able to post the print tomorrow morning if the ink is dry. I will be leaving for a rafting trip tomorrow afternoon. So I will not be making posts for a few days. I plan on taking my sketchbook and a camera, of course. So I should have some things to show (as long as I can stay in the raft).

"Desert landscape" pencil

This afternoon I was looking at landscapes and started to sketch out ideas for a print or even a painting. This is from a photo taken down around Arches National Park.

"Frogger" watercolor

I am still looking at "pond life". This is another watercolor, about the same size as the pelican painting.

"White Pelican" watercolor

This is a watercolor sketch of one of the pelicans that has been hanging around.

"crab apple" linocut print

I went to the Utah Art Festival and checked out allot of amazing art work. The work that impressed me the most were the pieces done in printmaking. There were a couple of artists who did amazing work using screen prints (the same technique that they use for putting images on t-shirts). Also I saw some amazing color woodblock prints. This is just a small print that I did. It only took me a hour or two to carve the block and then ink it and print it. I am just working my way up to something bigger.

"American White Pelican" pen

We live by several ponds which brings the "wild" a little closer too home. Several of the neighbor boys go fishing there almost every day (my son caught a catfish that he was determined to have for dinner). It is also home to geese and a ravenous band of ducks. In the evenings there have been a flock of American Pelicans nesting in one of the ponds. This is a sketch of a small one that didn't mind having a my family standing around it.

"Country Side" color pencil

This is another country side sketch similar to the one I did yesterday.

"French country side" pencil

I have been working on a oil painting of the "Vieux Eglise" in the small French town of Bergerac. This is a sketch of some of the countryside outside of this small town.

"Bella" lino cut

This lino cut was done on a small piece of linoleum. These lino prints are like stamps in some ways. I always print a series, in this case only 10. The ink that I used was actually black Grumbacker max oil paint. I really did not like it at all. The paint took way to long to dry and is not fine enough to pick up on the smaller details of the lino cut.

"pocket lint" relief print

This is a simple method of creating a print. I just rolled ink over some simple objects and pressed the image into rice paper. This is basically the same technique that I am using with the lino cuts I am starting.

Ragnar- Post for 6/18-6/20

What a race. I am posting photos that were taken and edited on my iphone. These images are from the Ragnar Rely that we ran and completed yesterday. In the photos there are my wife and 13 year old daughter who ran as part of our team. Way to go team 308!!!

The start of our groups exchange point in Liberty UT

Lawon at the exchange shoots.

My girl Rebecca at the end of her last leg of the race.

View from the course.

View from the course.

Shoes and shadows.

"Desert Puff" oil paint and pastel

This is a little painting I made with some left over oil paint on my palette. The little clouds are my favorite part of this painting. I was channeling V. Douglas Snow (one of Utah's treasured artist's) with the lofty scumbling.

I will miss making posts for the next 2 days. This will be the first time I miss making a post sense this whole thing started. I am running a race called the Wasatch Back, Friday and Saturday, with a 12 member relay team. The race is a 188 mile relay race from Logan UT to Park City UT. It is a part of the Ragnar race series, which sponsors races through out the US. I am excited to run this, just for the fact that I have been running each day since the fall with this one race in mind. If I can I might be able to make a post from my phone on the race course. I any case I still plan on drawing and taking photo's while I am on the road.

"eagle" gesso and color pencil

I know that most of the things that I post are little doodles and sketches. But I do have "bigger" projects that I do work on. Right now I am working on a large landscape oil painting s well as some lino block prints. It seems that by trying to post each day I end up doing a sketch or doodle because of the time that I have available. The projects that do take more time I try to post when I finish them. That is my excuse anyway for posting such poor work at times.

"Bella" pencil

I did a few sketches of Bella today to use for a lino cut. The cut it self is simpler and done on a small piece of linoleum. I made some prints from the cut, and they will be done tomorrow.

"Green " color pencil and conte

While I was working today I listened to a panel discussing the recent BP oil spill in the gulf. There were some who suggested that this may further the pursuit of alternative energy which are more "green" friendly. The consensus was that it would, of course, encourage alternative energy exploration, but it would take decades. The infrastructure and the technology is not yet in place to make such an immediate transition. We will still be an oil dependent nation for awhile to come, regardless of gas prices and environmental hazards.

This comes as we have had our own little oil spill in Salt Lake City. Where an oil line leak sent crude oil into a local creek and then spread into some other streams and local ponds. It made an immediate impact upon those animals and people who live in and by these creeks and ponds. These issues are more than just about environmental and corporate interests. But also about responsibility and how we respond to these crisis's which don't always happen in our back yards.

Thinking about these things always have an effect the way one expresses things through art. Maybe this is why I choose the color green for today's drawing?

"Sunday Sketch" pen

I sketched this out thinking about a place I would like to visit. I often dream of being able to get out and travel. To visit places that I read about or even imagine about.

"Fishes" scratch lite

No, I don't think that these are rainbow trout.

"Art student- Picasso # 2" scratchboard

Here is a finished composition, done in scratchboard, of another idea in the art student series. The image in the background is Picasso's painting Lady in a Stripped Green Chair. My goal for the next week is to start cutting some lino-blocks to make prints from.

"Klimt study- life and death" pencil

This study is to help me work out some of my themes for the art student series. It is after Gustav Klimt's work "Life and Death". Klimt was an Austrian painter who was controversial in his own life and death. He is considered a Symbolist and a founding member of the Austrian Secession movement. His work is often layered in meanings, usually with the common thread of the female figure. I was drawn to this work because of the organic shapes and patterns found in his work.

"Face study" charcoal

This is a generic face I sketched out using the same technique that I have been using to help to look at shapes and values to create form.

"student M" conte crayon

I have spent most of this morning trying to clean up my studio. I can only go through a little bit at a time each day other wise I spend all of the day doing just that. I have found stuff dating back to High School and even Jr. high. This sketch is another one I am thinking about with my student series. It is done using a conte crayon which is a sepia color and has the appearance of compressed pastels. It is easier to use for sketching out generalities rather than specifics.

"crow sketch" watercolor

Most of the crows that were around through the winter and early spring have moved on. This one, however, decided to stay for the warm weather.

"doodles" pen

It's Sunday, that means doodles from my Sunday sketchbook. I have the bird brothers along with some green men. Why?

"girl" pencil

"Jaden" charcoal

This sketch is another study, Looking at trying to use it as part of the Art Student series.

"Up to Moab" 2 panel oil painting

I always have several pieces of work that are laying around in various stages of completion. I had to finish this one up today as it is a gift for a departing college. It has been on of the paintings that I have worked on off and on science the fall. The part that I liked most about this was playing with complimentary colors.

"crane" pen

I had to go back to the birds today.

"The young Renoir" pencil

Today's sketch is the young Pierre Renoir. The illustrious Impressionist artist.