JULIE JANNEAN IN WHITE 2

18" x 24" oil on canvass  1995

JULIE JANNEAN IN WHITE

16" x 20" oil on canvass 1995

JULIE JANNEAN IN PINK

16" x 20" oil on canvass 1995.

JULIE JANNEAN AND THE BEAUTY SALON

When I painted this portrait of Julie Jannean she had just come back from her first trip to the beauty salon.  It is on a board I cut to 24" x 36" and I used oil paints.  She sat a few times for the painting and as usual never complained. She even put a few brush strokes of her own on there.

MORE JULIE JANNEAN

More of Julie Janean.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JULIE JANNEAN

I painted this portrait of my niece in 1995 when she was seven years old. It was done using acrylic on board. When she would visit us she always wanted to paint and draw.  She even drew a comic called Polliwog (which I still have and cherish). She is now 26 years old and the mother of a wonderful baby boy. Happy birthday Julie and thank you for all the fun times.

WHAT A 60 YEAR OLD THINKS OF TOMMY KANE'S BOOK

Go buy this book.  Buy more than one.  If you are interested in drawing this is what you need to be studying and learning from.  I study and copy his work. A lot.  If you want to draw like a master you must study the masters, and he is a modern master.  I've learned so much about angles, details (oh those bricks!), the way the light hits the side of a building and, most importantly, taking the time in order to really see.  For me his work is right up there with Van Gogh, Hopper and Kirby. He has drawn a lot of the places I am familiar with in and around Brooklyn and Manhattan.  His drawings bring back wonderful memories of places I haunted in the 1970's when I lived there and the world was a much different place.

From the very first he describes how fear drove him to do what he has done so far in life, and how his art has saved him.

 That is real stuff. Motivated by fear and going for it anyway.

When you make art because you have no other choice but to do it you are in a wonderful place.  I like the way he works through adversity.  He goes for it with a Uniball pen, watercolors and prismacolors. Mistakes happen.  But he works it.  Here is a guy willing to produce art without a safety net. He works so hard at it that even if 90% of his art turned out to be mediocre the other 10% would be stone cold masterpieces.  In my opinion his masterpiece percentage is much higher than 10% already.

And anybody who liked Joe Pepitone knows what being a real Yankee fan in the 60's was all about!

One last thing...I noticed on the back of the book it said "to be continued".  I hope there will be a volume 2.
Nice job Tommy. Thanks!

BUDDHA IN OUR BACKYARD

BUDDHA is in our backyard.  He stays calm and peaceful and reminds me that I should too.  We feed the birds here, especially the bluebirds who have a nest in the bushes high up and come back year after year with new babies.  Sometimes I sit outside with BUDDHA and rest.  All part of training the mind and not letting my ego con me.  The drawing was done with Uniball pen and watercolor in a Moleskine.

OUR LIVING ROOM

This is our living room...well, part of it.  There are very high ceilings and I was able to hang several large paintings which is nice.  Since this drawing we have broken down and bought a "smart" TV.  Much larger(42") than the old RCA.  We refuse to subscribe to cable and are able to receive PBS anyway.  We do subscribe to Netflix streaming so we can catch up on the last 20 years of TV shows.  And they do have art documentaries.  My drawing is in a Canson hardcover sketchbook and I used PITT artist pens.

OUR YELLOW HOUSE

Our yellow house.  My nephew calls it the yellow box.  It is nice and peaceful here in Monmouth, Oregon.  It is a college town (Western Oregon University) population about 9,000 until the students leave for summer then it is about 3,000.  The kids are great and I'm confident the future is bright. If you see me drawing outside say hi and get out your sketchbook.

PARIS!

One of my favorite bookstores is in Paris, France.  The last time we visited George Whitman was still running it.  Now that he has passed his daughter is running it the same way George did.  Young writers are allowed to live there in exchange for working an hour or two in the store which allows them to have  the rest of the day to spend on their writing.A good book about the store is Time Was Soft There by Jeremy Mercer.  It is time we head back for a visit to the City of Lights!

BITING ADRIAN TOMINE

Tomine has a fantastic sketchbook published as well as several New Yorker magazine covers and graphic novels.  Really great work.  Clean and deceptively simple.  This is my version of one of his best works.  Done in watercolor in a Moleskine.

BITING STEVEN REDDY

Another artist's work that I study is that of Steven Reddy.  I bought his book Now Where Was I?.  It combines great art and writing.

BITING TOMMY KANE

One of my favorite artists is Tommy Kane.  His style is straightforward and is the closest to the way I draw.  I've noticed that kids respond to Tommy's work as well as the work of van Gogh.  There is something immediate and authentic there.  I am looking forward to attending his lecture at Sketchbook Skool.  

OSCAR AND CAPTAIN AMERICA

Here is Oscar with the Captain America I drew for him.  It's a copy of Kirby 11" x 17" Canson comicbook artboard.  Regular 2B pencil, Speedball superblack ink with crowquill pen, coloring done with PITT artist brush pens.

LEARNING WITH BURNE HOGARTH

One of my favorite teachers is the late Burne Hogarth.  All of his books are fantastic and quite instructive http://burnehogarth.com/blog/.  The writing in the books is easy to comprehend and the illustrations are fun to copy.  This one was done with pencil in a Strathmore 400 series sketch book 9" x 12".
The paper is ok but I learned that I do not like spiral sketchbooks because they can't take the abuse of travel the way hard cover sketchbooks can.

FROM SOCIAL GRACES - SKETCHBOOK PROJECT 2014

This appears in my sketchbook submitted to the Sketchbook Project of 2014 http://www.sketchbookproject.com/  I used PITT artist brush pens which are great!  They hold water proof india ink and most importantly they are odorless.

BITING JACK KIRBY

This is a panel by Jack Kirby that I "bit" using ink on bristol board in the old school style size of 15" x 20". I like to practice by studying and copying the masters.  Although I never went to art school I found out that copying is one of the teaching methods that have been used for centuries. It is a great way to learn how to closely see and observe.  Learning how to draw is really all about learning how to see.  Of course I wouldn't try to pass off another's work as my own or sell a forged work, so I remain on solid moral and ethical ground. Copying or "biting" other artists is viewed as paying a compliment to their work. Jack Kirby was nicknamed "The King" because practically is comic book history. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Kirby
For some strange reason people regard comic art as lesser than so called fine art.  In my opinion Jack Kirby's art has the power of any top fine artist.    

APRIL FOOLS!

This is one of the JOKER I drew for my grandson Oscar in the Netherlands.  He is very much into Batman and all comics (me too).  This is ink on bristol board.  I used a Winsor Newton Series 7 sable brush and also a croquill pen.  I also like just plain synthetic brushes.  This is Speedball super black ink which is nice and dark.  The standard size for comic board is 11" x 17" but I also like to use the old time size from the 1940-50's era of 15" x 22" which I size myself.  For fun I also draw splash pages 24" x 36" poster size.

SUNFLOWER and IRISES FOR TARA

I painted this using acrylic on canvas for our Tara back in 1994 when she was in college.  She is married now with her husband three children living in the Netherlands.  I am holding onto this painting for her. One day I had it hanging in our garage and a man and woman pulled up in their car and asked how much I wanted for it.  I jokingly said $10,000 and they agreed to the price.  Then I had to tell them it wasn't mine to sell.  Perhaps I should have sold it, split the $ with Tara and painted another one.  These great ideas never occur to me at the time they are needed.