Man, I am learning so much by these lunch sketches. I really was looking for a more interesting composition on this one and I think I got there. The angular path with the shadows and the repetition of line reminds me of a de Chirico landscape, which I am really digging. I need to push these landscapes to get weirder.
de Chirico. I want to get this weird.
Yesterday I went outside to draw over my lunch break as I usually do, and was greeted by over 7,000 flags on the lawn on Art Hill in Forest Park, There was one flag for each service member killed after 9/11.. It was overwhelming. These are tall 3x5 foot flags, not just the little ones. They each had a photo and dog tag of their soldier. When the wind picked up, the clinking of the dog tags makes the saddest music.
Displays like these are always overwhelming. I am keenly aware that my brother's survived their collective 7 tours of duty because of their sacrifice. I am so so so grateful to these men and women.
While I was in Arkansas I wanted to challenge myself to push the limits of medium by taking a plein air painting and making it into a quilt. This is my 7th quilt but my first "landscape quilt". It was such a challenge to convert the light and shadow into flat shapes, but really fun! It still needs a few finishing touches, but I had to snap this picture with my favorite rangers before I left to come home.
From left: Ranger Kevin Peppard, me, Ranger Miguel Marquez in the historic Fordyce Bathhouse Visitor Center at Hot Springs National Park
Well the past two weeks have been a whirlwind. I have only been home one day and I already miss the park 10x more than I missed home. I can truly say I've lived a dream and I am so so lucky.
i couldn't turn off my habit of cranking out work so today I drew this blue heron from Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens in pen and colored pencil.
This toned paper is neat.
I have the opportunity to exhibit some of the paintings I've done tonight at a gallery here in Hot Springs! It's called the Fine Art Center of Hot Springs, right downtown. Come see from from 5-9!
http://m.hotsr.com/news/2016/sep/01/hot-springs-gallery-walk-showcasing-loc/
Never in my wildest dreams would I have imaged I would imagine myself in this role of Artist in Residence at a National Park. My parents began taking my brothers and me to National Parks when I was very young. Their need to see wild places was not extinguished by packing up three arguing children and driving for 12 hours. We’d go on two week long camping trips all over Colorado and South Dakota. We saw Old Faithful and Bison on the Great Plains and then drove straight back to our regular lives in St. Charles, Missouri.
When I was struggling after college, drowning in a desk job, not making art, it was my love for the wilderness that carried me. As a child, it was important for my parents to show us the most dazzling corners of the United States. As an adult, any vacation not spent in a National Park is a waste of PTO. I have urgency in the deepest corners of my soul to see the next great landscape the Park Service has to offer. I’ve never been disappointed by the vastness and diversity of our public spaces.
Eventually, seeing these incredible landscapes inspired me to pick up my paintbrush and start painting. Every time I look at one of these paintings, no matter if it was done last year or 5 years ago, I am immediately transported back to that day. I can feel the sun on my shoulders, see the wind blowing my painting away and remember having to chase it down and brush dirt off of it before starting again. I remember my mood. I can see everything around me. I can feel the mosquitos biting me and my shoulder being sore from carrying so much equipment for a few miles to find a good spot. I notice smaller details than normal, because I was standing in one spot for a few hours really studying everything around me. The details of these Parks are burned into my brain.
The history of American Art has long been intertwined with the National Park Service. In 1871 Thomas Moran explored the Yellowstone area with a group of land surveyors for forty days. Not only was it his paintings that gave Americans their first glimpse of the spectacular sites Yellowstone had to offer, but it was also his art that convinced President Grant and Congress that Yellowstone should be preserved. Although Moran had been a working artist for decades, it was Yellowstone that gave him public recognition and financial success. He gave as much to Yellowstone as Yellowstone gave to him.
Making art drives me to National Parks. National Parks inspire me to make art. My two loves feed each other, and together they feed me. It is a huge honor for my art to be inserted into the 100 year history of the National Park Service. I hope to do it justice, but I know my contributions will pale in comparison to everything The National Park Service has given me.
The fine arts center of Hot Springs is going to display some of my artwork this Friday at a gallery walk! Super excited! I've been busy quilting and I've even made a few sales of paintings today. I'm having such a great time on Arkansas!
Watercolor, 11x14 inches.
Monday at the office.
Today I started a new oil painting and did a art activity for a lot of kids. Loving my time here!
Finally convinced a ranger to let me try on his hat.
Needs work but I should finish it tonight.
Watercolor and pen
All my new buddies celebrating the Nation Park Service's 100 birthday
Oil on board
Today is the centennial of the National Park Service. It's no secret that I love National Parks. They humble me and fulfill a need for wilderness that nothing else touches. As much as I love Parks for their incredible views, I often forget that the NPS serves to protect cultural heritage sites as well. On Wednesday I was honored to visit Central Little Rock High School National Historic Site and visit with Thelma Mothershed-Wair, one of the Little Rock Nine.
Despite the ruling of Brown vs. The Board of Education in 1954, the governor of Arkansas prevented 9 African American students from attending Central Little Rock High School in 1957. Central was a public school with an excellent academic record that would afford these excellent students access to athletic programs, extra curricular activities, and college level classes. The school board had unanimously approved a plan to desegregate schools two years prior, yet in 1957 it took over 1,000 soldiers of the 101 Airborne division sent by President Eisenhower to allow these 9 students access to their constitutional right for a quality education. These teenagers could have taken the easy way out and gone back to their previous high schools at any time, yet they stayed.
I have been been sprayed by Old Faithful in Yellowstone, surveyed the Rio Grand in Big Bend, snorkeled with barracudas in the Dry Tortugas, and gazed upon glaciers in Denali, but I have never been so humbled, proud, or grateful than I was reading the accounts of the perseverance displayed by Thelma and the Little Rock Nine.
From left: the most amazing human I'll ever meet, me, intern Leah who is also great.
Teddy Roosevelt celebrating his greatest achievement, pen and colored pencil on toned paper.
While I'm here I'm trying to do one oil painting and one watercolor painting per day. So far, so good.
Oil on board, 11x14 inches.
I'll let this dry and keep working on it in a few days.
Oil on board, 11x14 inches
Watercolor and pen painting I did at the mountain lookout tower at Hot Springs yesterday.
View from the watch tower, watercolor and ink on paper. 11x14 inches.
I was really enjoying the negative spaces created by the leaves against the cloudy trees. This photo is only about 30 minutes of painting, I'll update it as it progresses!
11x14 inches, oil on board.
And... Done!
I'm all checked into my little cabin at Hot Springs National Park! They gave me a really nice name tag. I don't get cell service and there's no wifi, so updates will be sporadic. Loving it down here though! Gonna start painting today.
Little cabin!
So official!
I left yesterday to travel to Arkansas for my Residency as Artist at Hot Speings National
Park. I left a day early to spend a night in Bentonville, Arkansas to visit the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and the Museum of Native American History. Last night I checked out Crystal Bridges and it was just spectacular. The collection just floored me. I saw so many paintings by artists who have had profound influences on my work; Audubon, Thomas Moran, Diebenkorn, I could go on and on. But the most important work I saw was by Neil Welliver. 11 years ago I was in a beginning painting class at age 19 at University of Missouri. I didn't know anything about art except that I enjoyed painting. My professor told us to write a report on a living artist who's work I admired. I didn't know any living artists, so I googled "living landscape artist" and came across the work of Neil Welliver. He paints the woods. He makes them look loved, careful, organized, inviting. His paintings are huge, you could step right into them. I wrote my report on him, but he actually passed away in the two weeks before it was due. No longer a living artist, I had to choose someone else. He stuck with me though. His work is something I always go back to. He's not a famous artist by any means, and I had never seen any of his work in real life. But last night I came across a huge snowy woodsy landscape at Crystal Bridges. It was emotional to see. I was an American landscape painter on my way to paint some landscapes during the centennial of the National Park Service, standing in front of an unexpected painting by my biggest influencer. It was his work that took me on this journey. I'm incredibly grateful.
Neil G. Welliver. 1929-2005. Snow on Alden Brook, 1983.
Normally when I take a lunch I go into the beautiful Forest Park, which surrounds Saint Louis Art Museum, where I work. But on this day it was raining so I sat in the Ancient American gallery and sketched this guy in pencil for a few minutes, and filled in the color with my watercolors later. I should do more drawings of sculpture! It's always a fun challenge.
I'll never tire of painting you, trees!
What good names for two huge Maine Coon Cats!
I had never done a double portrait before and I was worried I would mess up on one of the cats and have to start over on both. But I just painted them slowly at the same time and I think they turned out pretty great! My client commissioned them as a wedding present, I hope her friend is surprised!
