Post Phippen Show Post - Hey, I won...

Canyon Patterns and me painting a desert scene during the first of two quick draw events.

We had a great time at the Phippen Show a couple of weekends ago and it's taken me some time to decompress, thus this late post about it. It rained like hell the night before the show. We were a little more than concerned about this because we had freezing cold rain at last years show. I woke up several time during the night to look out the window to watch for whales. Luckily the show opening was only damp (really damp, a mushroom showed up in my booth!), and we had no rain all weekend. The ironic part was that despite the rain last year we sold a lot more paintings and this year under sunny skies not so many. Apparently rain = sales. We joked about missing the rain.

The two quick draws went well and were a lot of fun, and on Saturday I was informed that I had won an award in the oil painting category! Michelle and I went to the Denim to Diamonds Awards Ceremony and Gala to find out what place I'd won. We shared a table with several artist friends including fellow award winners Don Rantz of Prescott - 1st in pastels and Sharon Fullingim of New Mexico - 3rd place in sculpture. It turns out I'd won 3rd place in oils for my painting Canyon Patterns.

At the end of the show I was lucky enough to trade two small oils for a fine bronze bust of a pronghorn created by Sharon. I also came home with some excellent drawings by the 1st place winner in watercolor, Teal Blake. And V...., thanks for the wonderful book!

The 2009 Phippen Show ended up being moderately successful, and we were happy for the chance to reconnect with so many of our great artist friends who come here to participate each year.

Phippen Western Art Show & Sale

This Memorial Day Weekend I will be at the 35th annual Phippen Museum Western Art Show and Sale. I really like this show for it's fine location - five minutes from my house in Prescott! But really, it is a great honor to be chosen again to participate in this year's show. From the Phippen Museum website, "The annual event features Art of the American West represented in oil, watercolor, acrylic, mixed media, pastels, sculpture and drawing. The Phippen Museum Western Art Show and Sale has been a tradition of the Memorial Day Weekend in Prescott since 1974. The Phippen Museum believes the true spirit of the American West is preserved in its art. This show brings together artists of the highest caliber, art enthusiasts and collectors from all over the country to celebrate Prescott’s rich western heritage and culture."

Located in Prescott's beautiful downtown courthouse square, the show will be held Sat, Sun and Mon., May 23 - 25, 9 - 5 pm (3 pm on the Monday). I will be in booth # 71 near the corner of Montezuma St. (aka Whiskey Row) and Gurley St.

Also, this year I will participating in both the Saturday and Sunday quick draw events. From the website, "One of the most exciting parts of the Annual Phippen Museum Western Art Show and Sale is the Quick Draw events that are held on Saturday and Sunday beginning at 2 p.m. This fast-paced event is a 45-minute, timed demonstration by 15 to 20 artists creating a piece of art in front of the public starting with a completely blank canvas. The pieces are then auctioned off to the audience. The auction will begin at approximately 3 p.m."

http://www.phippenartmuseum.org/events/westernartshow-schedule.html

The new work shown above will be at the show.

Top: The Ruins at Night 18x24 Bottom: Grand Evening 24x24

I hope to see you there!

Windrush Gallery

I'm happy to announce that I will be represented by the Windrush Gallery in Sedona, Arizona. I always planned to look for representation in the Sedona area, but this came about in an interesting and unexpected way.

A few weeks ago I was bringing home the paintings from the Sedona Art Center members show and ran into pastel/oil painter Michael Johnson. I had recently met and painted with Michael in Sedona, and he mentioned that he had some art in the Windrush. I had never heard of this gallery and only had a little time, so I planned to just run in and out of the gallery to take a look. Owner, John McCullough, was hanging a bunch of really nice works by Adelle Earnshaw and we got to talking.

I told John I was a friend of Michaels, that I was an artist and why I was in Sedona that day, but I said would call him someday and set up an appointment to see if he was interested in adding me to the gallery. I didn't want this to be an annoying cold call, especially when he was busy hanging a show. We traded business cards, and I said I'd contact him soon. As I was pulling out of the parking lot, John came out , flagged me down and said he might as well see what I had since I was there. He liked what he saw and asked me be a part of the gallery!

I had thought that getting involved in the Sedona Art Center would be great way to get involved in the Sedona art scene, but this was an unexpected turn of events. John wants the Windrush Gallery to specialize in plein air landscape painting and I'm excited to be included in the gallery!

Back from the Zion Plein Air Invitational

I arrived in Zion National Park a day early to check out the painting locations for the "In the Footsteps of Thomas Moran" plein air invitational and to just explore the park. During the day I took the time to climb up the popular Angel's Landing trail. I meant to just hike up to the notch at Refrigerator Canyon at the base of the infamous Walter's Wiggles switchbacks. Half way there I realized my sandals weren't up to the task, so I decided to go barefoot. At the notch, I thought I'd hike up some of the wiggles to see what they're like and ended up doing all 21 of them. Once at Scout's Lookout I could see the final summit ridge and couldn't resist going all the way. I got lots of comments about being barefoot, but sandstone is very forgiving and the views of Zion Canyon from the top was well worth the effort.

That evening I left the park to get to the free lodging that was offered at the Ponderosa Resort a few minutes from the park's east entrance. I shared a beautiful resort cabin with fellow artists Brad Holt and Doug Martin. Free digs, but the downside was that we had to commute 30 minutes of winding roads into and out of the park each day. All the artists met at the museum on Monday for a pre-paint out meeting and then we headed out to paint for four days. The painting locations were selected based on Thomas Moran's sketches of Zion, but we had plenty of leeway as to what to paint. Zion is a wonderful place to be and to paint, and except for some cold morning winds, we had near perfect weather all week. We were given a pass to drive up Zion Canyon as far as the lodge, but to go farther up canyon we had to ride the tour buses. Occasionally, a few of us would meet up for lunch or dinner at various local restaurants in Springdale that offered discounted meals for the event artists. All the food was excellent.

This piece sold at auction.

A couple of favorites that are still hanging at the Bingham Gallery

Each artist selected five or so of our best work to be hung for that Friday's wet paint sale at the Maynard Dixon Studio and Gallery in Mt. Carmel Junction just east of the park. This sale was to last through the weekend, but many of us left our paintings there to be shown through May. The paintings we sent ahead of time to the Zion Human History Gallery and the Bingham Gallery will also continue to be shown throughout the month. If you're travelling through southern Utah this month, be sure to stop by the various galleries to see the fine art produced for this show. On Saturday an auction was held at the Zion Lodge. The best part of this was the earrings and necklace I won for my wife Michelle as a gift for making this trip possible. She took time off work to manage the household and kids all by herself while I was gone for the week. Thanks, Michelle!

Maynard Dixon Studio Gallery.

The seven pieces I submitted for the wet paint sale.

The beautiful Bingham Gallery.

The painting I submitted for this is next to the window.

I feel fortunate to have been invited to this show. I made some new friends, learned a lot and did couple of decent Zion paintings. Thanks to Anne Wieler-Brown, Z-arts, Bingham Gallery, Thunderbird Foundation and Zion National Park for putting together a great inaugural Zion Plein Air Invitational. I also came home with a ton of reference photos and sketches of Zion, the Mt. Carmel Jct. area and the Vermilion Cliffs - lots and lots of painting ideas! Now it's time to get ready for the Phippen Western Art Show and Sale....

Going to Zion!

I will be in Zion National Park April 20th to the 25th participating in a plein air invitational. The paintings above, Throne into Shadow, 24x30 and Suncatchers, 16x20, will hang in Bingham Gallery and the Zion Human History Museum Gallery as part of the event. This should be a really great event. Being invited and have some of my paintings hang in Maynard Dixon's Mt. Carmel studio is a true honor. I look forward to being in the park again!

Here are the details from the Z-Arts! website and links about the paint-out.

The 7th Annual Z-Arts! Open Studios and Gallery Tour begins Saturday, April 25th and continues through Sunday, April 26th with the “new 2009” version promising to be better than ever. In conjunction with the Z-Arts! Open Studios and Gallery Tour, Zion National Park will be hosting an "Invitational Paint Out, In the Footsteps of Thomas Moran" to be held during the week of April 20, 2009. Twenty nationally recognized landscape artists have been invited to create in twelve different Zion National Park locations chosen based upon works in the Thomas Moran sketches and watercolors notebook.

The Moran Notebook, created during the summer of 1873, has never been published and was loaned to Zion National Park by Yellowstone National Park as part of Zion’s Centennial Celebration. Artists from Alaska to Texas, such as Kathryn Stats, Russell Case, Kate Starling, Roland Lee, Doug Martin, Susan Gallacher, Mark Bangerter,Jack Bangerter, Arleen Braitwaite and Jill Carver will participate in this outdoor painting event. Some of their previous works will be showcased at the ZNP Human History Museum Gallery and the Bingham Gallery (home and studio of Maynard Dixon) during the month of April preceding the Invitational Paint Out.

On Friday, April 24, 2009, a wet painting sale of the art produced will be held at the Maynard Dixon Living History Museum and Studio in Mt. Carmel. Each artist is also donating a painting to the Z-Arts! Open Studios and Gallery Auction, conducted under the direction of professional auctioneer Stephen Johnson this year, and held at the Zion Park Lodge on the evening of Saturday, April 25, 2009. The public is encouraged to come into the park and observe the artists painting outdoors.

https://kinesava.net/openstudio/OpenStudioTour%201.pdf

http://www.thunderbirdfoundation.com/sitenews.cfm

Paintings and Patterns

I've been putting in a lot of studio time lately and thought I'd post some of the newer pieces, but when I uploaded the images I noticed something interesting. The smallest one was painted first and has the widest view, the second was painted next and has a little tighter view, while the last and largest piece is a relative close-up. As I was going up in size, I was narrowing my view. I doubt I would have noticed the pattern had I not put the three paintings side by side. It's a subtle thing and no big deal, but I wonder if this is something I do subconsciously or if this is a totally random event. What other long and short term patterns are hidden in the process of creating art - or anything?

The top piece is a 6x8 of the desert east of Fountain Hills, the middle is an 11x14 of Canyon de Chelly, and the bottom is a 16x20 of the Betatakin ruins.

A Pleasant Surprise

Last Light on Lomaki, one of my paintings chosen for the Sedona Arts Center Members Exhibition, won first place in the professional oil painters category! It was a nice honor to have three of my works selected for the event, but it was an added surprise to see that I'd won an award at the show's opening reception. The reception was quite crowded and the exhibit looked great. M.L. Coleman juried the event for the Art Center. The family made the trip to Sedona with me and we celebrated by dining out (Italian of course - the kid's favorite). In the photo Sarah and I are enjoying the moment. The winning piece is behind her and behind me is another painting of mine called Canyon Patterns.