Recent Sketch Book Pages

December 10, 2013

December 14, 2013

December 14, 2013

December 14, 2013

December 16, 2013

The sketchbook is a Moleskine 'Watercolour Album', 11.75 x 8.25 inches. The media is Molotow acrylic paint pens. 

Color Panels At Las Manos Gallery

acylic paint pen on panel

Detail

I ended up with twelve 12 x 12 inch panels - we hung them vertically in two rows of six, abutting one another. Impossible to photograph but the detail gives a sense of what the color. 

New Work at Las Manos Gallery - Opening Dec. 14, 2013

Please note the opening reception takes place on a Saturday instead of the usual Friday. I will be there, but on the later side as I have a competing Holiday Party.

I have been working on a series of 12 x 12 inch panels utilizing a straight edge ruler and acrylic paint pens. I'm up to ten in number and each is unique. This work challenges my color skills but I see it as a good exercise and it has been fun. The panels can be displayed separately - but they are modular and mix and match in very interesting ways.

Detail

A Few New Watercolors of Lake Michigan

Recent 'Lake Michigan' Watercolors - 6 x 18 inches

Recent Sketchbook Pages

Moleskine - 30x21cm. (8x11.5) - Watercolor Album

November 9, 2013

November 10, 2013

November 10, 2013

November 11, 2013

November 12, 2013

November 14, 2013

November 16, 2013

New Piece - Homage to Summer

I've been occupied with a lot of busy work this week; inquiries from out of state, shopping for materials, clients in my studio! I had to completely remake a piece that was damaged in transit, thankfully it was a grid piece, easy to recreate but time consuming. By Thursday I had done everything but the making of new work.  Friday and Saturday I did find some time to be in the studio. I had quite a few painted white cardboard triangles leftover from an abstract piece this summer and they were talking to me. I had worked with this motif in my watercolors, but the actual adhering of the cardboard on top of the watercolor was a unusual process for me. The material qualities of the finished piece are not really present in this photo- the whites in the triangles vary and have subtle brush marks. The watercolor background is abstract and physical presences of the cardboard on top of the paper testifies  to its collaged provenance.  

Untitled - Watercolor, recycled cardboard, acrylic paint, watercolor paper - 26 x 40 inches

The precut cardboard triangles

An example of earlier watercolors

Squaring the Square

Process - Photograph something with squarish proportions (window). Down load the image into your photo editing software, (Photoshop). Add 50% white space to all four sides (Image, Canvas Size). Using spherize filter compensate for the barrel distortion of your camera lens (-10). Using skew transformation (edit, transform, skew) bring edges of window back to orthogonal alignment. Using the scale transformation (edit, transform, scale) make width and length of the window equal bring it back to its original square proportions. Crop down but leave the skewed edges.

The now mutated photograph evidences a corrected camera based point of view written into the elegant slopes and overall geometry of the image.

A second example.

41 Train Rides # 26 - October 19, 2013

What's On My Wall - October 27, 2013

A new drawing!

A Few Photos Inside Scout - My Work on the Walls

South Wall of Scout

One of Three Cardboard American Flags

Add caption

Photos From My Opening Reception at Scout

Thanks to everyone that helped make my opening reception at Scout such a success; Larry, Sheryl, Michelle, Christopher, Zach, Kathy, Duey, Leif, Nicholas....  I could not have done it without you. You made the evening at Scout both a tremendous presentation of my work, and an over the top party - fun people,  just the right cocktail (Dark and Stormy), and sensational music. The vibe could not have been better.

Thank You,

Michael

Scout Invite

Scout Teaser - Work on Panel

Untitled - Acrylic Paint on Panel - 12 x 12 inches

Detail

Save The Date - October 11th at Scout

A Large Commission This Week

I am working on a large commission this week that intails what I refer to as my 'City' Drawings. These are made up of drawings of individual buildings that I repeatedly construct, one on top of another, until they aggregate into a 'city'. These drawings are labor intensive, but I have books on CD and public radio to keep me company, and I'm always happily surprised by the end results. The commission thus far includes five panels, each 40 x 32 inches, created with acrylic paint pen on archival mat board. I've been playing with the color a bit, and with the configuration of the urban space in each piece.

Homage to Japanese Screens

Looking again at some of the Black and White Panoramic Photographs I made at the Magic Hedge in years past. The Magic Hedge is a bird sanctuary near Montrose Beach here in Chicago. The city has let the landscape return to a more natural, prairie-like setting to nurture birds as the migrate up and down the coast of Lake Michigan. It is one of my favorite places in Chicago and I have often made photographs there, most in color but a few in black and white. I came across this panoramic photograph as I was perusing old files and was pleasantly surprised to see it. I can see that one idea I was exploring, both as I shot the individual photos, and as I was assembling them, was Asian folding screens. A shared love a nature is one common denominator. The patterned manner in which the foliage moves across the horizontal format, and the way the flash illuminated individual leaves is a direct reference to some vintage Asian screens. And the still visible edges of the source photographs as the overlap one another, are analogous to the panels that make up folding screens.

A few other examples.

What's On My Wall - September 8, 2013

I have spent the last few days making these India Ink grid-like things. I dip cardboard or foam-core into India Ink and then press the edges onto softish paper. The drips occur as I move back and forth between the ink well and the paper. They could almost be considered mono-prints, created one segment at a time. I love the effect - structured yet ghost-like, an x-ray or rubbing of some architectural structure.

Those two small aqua pieces on the table are the kernels of ideas not yet executed. The little watercolor  happened as I was testing a new color recently added to my palette. As the paint dried these shapes appeared.