After my conversation with customer Mr. J about all the special things on his former house, I did a new sketch, this time a bit more careful with all the details. Usually a loose sketch works for oil paintings, but this job requires more. Mr. J requested that I send him the two sketches when […]
Long Distance Commission
The wonder of the interwebs has brought me a customer that I most likely will never have the pleasure of meeting in person. Let’s call the customer Mr. J. Mr. J and I have gotten acquainted in the comment section of The Frugal Girl blog, and he asked me to paint the home he used […]
New Oil Commission, Chapter 6
We last saw this oil painting commission looking like this. I actually wrote a long list of parts that need work, but it was really unnecessary because I can see what to do. We refer to this section of trail as the Green Tunnel in the summer months and the Yellow Tunnel in the fall. […]
New Oil Commission, Chapter 5
Before I finished layering the background things, I blew off any discipline about painting, ignored conventional wisdom about The Way You Are Supposed to Paint, and I launched into detailing. When I draw, I work from top to bottom, left to right. This way I don’t rest my hand on finished parts, thus not smearing […]
New Oil Commission, Chapter 4
About the mural The threat of rain prevented me from beginning on Friday. More relevant:the powers that be did not offer me a key to their building, which means I can only paint on Fridays. This coming Friday I will be setting up for the Holiday Bazaar, and the following Friday is part of Thanksgiving […]
New Oil Commission, Chapter 3
On Monday, you saw this version of the custom oil painting of a Mineral King scene. Next, I put more paint on the sky and worked more carefully on West Florence. (The humanoid is still a mess.) Time to rescue the humanoid from embarrassing me. Wait, time to rescue me from the embarrassment of the […]
New Oil Commission, Chapter 2
Here is my usual collection of thoughts about custom art: This is too hard, I’m a washed-up has-been, why does anyone think I am qualified? And: These people are counting on me and I’d better get started because it is going to be hard and take a very long time. Finally: Just paint, you Goober! […]
New Oil Painting Commission
“Commission” means someone is paying me to paint custom art for him. Them. Her. Shhhh, I think it will be a Christmas present. Let’s call the customer Mister. You can decide if it is a man, a woman, or several humans. Mister decided on 20×20”, a square format. The canvas arrived, and I put a […]
Drawing with Pencils
I guess you could draw with chalk or a paintbrush or your finger on a fogged up window, but drawing with pencils is what I do. Student work It’s also what I teach. A returning drawing student had one month free for lessons before embarking on a new chapter of life. We dove right in, […]
Sold in Summer—Pencil Drawings
Five of these pencil drawings sold at my solo show in Tulare, “Around Here (and Sometimes a Little Farther)”. The others were pencil commissions, which I showed you with all the slow developments in painstaking detail. I love pencil. Did you know that? Thus we conclude another post about the business of art, because. . […]