MVAL Pastel Painting Demonstration

Saralyn Lowenstein invited me to give a pastel painting demo to the Mid-Valley Art League in Arcadia, (in the Los Angeles area.) It was a simple Christmas theme still life. I started out will a basic charcoal drawing and gradually added in colour, emphasizing tonal value, relative warm and cool colours, then stressed highlights. It was a wickedly wet evening and I appreciated the very warm reception from the members. Mark Wood took the photographs and we raffled off the painting at the end of the demo.

Nutcracker/Degas

I've been interim stage manager for 3 weeks at Redondo Union High School. One of the performances was the "Nutcracker" ballet. Backstage is always interesting. We had dozens of ballerinas waiting, performing, then racing offstage. You can't help but tune into the Degas imagery when they wear traditional white dresses.

"Grain Barge" Liverpool Docks, 1971

"Sou'Westers" 2004

Welcome. 

This is my first posting and I'll be concentrating on paintings and photographs.

 I've made them both for most of my life. These two subjects are of great interest to all, of course. At Liverpool Art School my final history paper was "The Influence of Photography on Painting in the 19th Century". Plenty of fascinating material lies there in the wake of photography's invention, and the later reversal of painting's influence on photography.

The photograph was taken of a bargeman having a mug of tea, while the rare Liverpool sunlight danced through the grain dust behind him.

The painting is a plein air oil of fishing boats in San Pedro Harbour, south of los Angeles.

I try to wear different hats when creating my imagery, and not to wear them back to front, or at the same time, which is pretty common.