Chef Miriam's Outdoor Kitchen

Another wine Saturday, another feast of gourmet food with Chardonnay, and friends to drink with; it almost makes me feel guilty. We were at Casanel Vineyards, a small but impressive winery near Leesburg, VA. Clouds threatened but the rain didn't drop till after we had left. Casanel is run by a family along with helpers. The presiding food expert is "Chef Miriam," a Scottish lady who creates various tasty treats to match with Casanel's wines. Miriam does the cooking under a new wooden trellis canopy just built on the patio of Casanel's tasting lodge. She has a pizza oven which (who?) she has named "Rita." I ate one of Miriam's herb, mushroom, bacon, and goat cheese pizzas. The only difficulty about eating so well is that you get olive oil on your fingers so you can't draw until you've cleaned your hands off.

Original drawing in Pitt black pen on sketchbook page, 8" x 6".

Trans Am

First Friday comes to Falls Church again, and so it's time to trot out the old cars. I enjoyed the sights and sounds of classic, lovingly restored "muscle cars" from the 1970s, including this shiny black 1971 Pontiac Trans Am with its hood raised. I drew the car and some of the people gathered at the event, which also featured barbecue samples, vendors, ice cream, and a fairly competent Southern-rock band. Click on the pic for a bigger view.

Y'know I am supposed to do art from REALITY like plein air, on site, live models, stuff like that but I'm getting so bored, couldn't I just do a lurid fantasy character here and there even if it's bad?

WinePad

This sketch was done on my iPad running the "Art Studio" app, on a wine deck in bright sunlight. This was at "Naked Mountain" winery and vineyard, a place I often go, that combines natural beauty and views with excellent wines. As I poked at the screen, hummingbirds swarmed around a feeder hung from the eaves. I wondered what would happen if they replaced the sugar syrup in the feeder with wine. Would the hummingbirds get drunk and careen around madly? Would they reject it? Or would it be dangerous for them? I love watching them, they are so feisty for something so small.

I am still learning how to sketch with the iPad. One thing I have to watch for is color brightness and saturation, especially if I'm drawing in sunlight. The screen is dark compared to a page of white paper and I am sometimes misled into using brighter colors than are really there in view. In this sketch I imported it into Photoshop and reduced the saturation to make the colors more realistic. Even so, the scene was pretty bright. If I'm going to make "plein iPad" art I will have to take color shift into consideration. Naked Mountain's riesling is a very nice accompaniment to iPad sketching.

Griffin Teaches Me a Lesson

I was very excited to go to my first Boskone in February of 1977. I was even more excited when a friend of one of my new-found fan friends commissioned a nametag miniature from me. His name was "Griffin" and that's what he wanted on his nametag. I was commuting to the convention so I went home that night and in a rush, created this piece for Griffin. I brought it back the next day and presented it to him. He said that the design was not what he was hoping for and that I had tossed it off too quickly. Could I take more time and make him a nametag miniature that would really be impressive?

This was the first attempt, the one Griffin rejected:

And a few weeks later, this is what I sent to Griffin as a final. This second Griffin was derived not from heraldic drawings as the first one was, but from a fantastic engraving by Albrecht Durer. I copied from the best. Mr. Client was very pleased. This is how I learned my lesson early, not to rush things on a job when I didn't have to, and not to present art that was too simple and quickly done.

Both miniatures are the usual size, ink and watercolor on Fabriano paper, February and March 1977.

Elric magical jungle miniature

Andrew Adams Whyte was a science fiction/fantasy critic who wrote reviews and essays for several publications during the heyday of science fiction in the Boston area. I met him via my newfound fan friends in the late '70s. He lived in an apartment in Cambridge that had more books than any other private interior space I have ever seen. He was estimated to have around 10,000 books. (I currently have roughly 2000.) As with many other friends, he commissioned me to do a nametag miniature, again on a theme from the Elric mythos. This one shows Elric pointing his great black-magical sword at a gathering of Chaotic forces. The sword is actually floating; in the books it often moved on its own with Elric merely holding it. The Chaotic forces and creatures don't look very threatening. I was influenced by Maurice Sendak's "Wild Things" as well as Art Nouveau. For instance, you can see a tiny blue rabbit at the lower right corner. Click on the pic for a larger view.

A number of fantasy series from the late '60s and '70s had the theme of Order Vs. Chaos. Chaos turned the world not into evil, necessarily, but into jumbled psychedelic meaninglessness. Later on, Chaos in fantasy acquired a more malevolent aspect. I often wonder whether the social upheavals of that era influenced the "order vs. chaos" themes of contemporary fantasy fiction.

"Elric swordpoint to Chaos" is ink and watercolor on Fabriano paper, 3 1/2" x 2 1/4", Spring 1977.

Elric miniature

In late 1976 I attended a party of Boston science fiction fans which changed my life. At the time I was a miserable graduate student at Harvard, attempting to study Greek and Latin and not enjoying it at all. I used to frequent the "Science Fantasy Book Store" near Harvard Square for escape. I became friends with the proprietor and he introduced me to his fan friends, who invited me to the party and asked me to bring some of my art. I did and immediately sold a piece and got some commissions. Many of the commissions were for nametag miniatures. This piece wasn't commissioned at the party but it came from people contacted at the party. The "John" lettered here was a fan of the "Elric" saga by Michael Moorcock which was very popular at the time. I loved the Elric stories too, of the ill-tempered, cursed albino aristocrat wielding his demonic sword, "Stormbringer." In my opinion no artist has yet gotten Elric right, though some artists like Michael Whelan, Robert Gould, and Barry Windsor-Smith have come close. After the realization that someone would pay me for my art, I never wanted to be an academic again, though it took me two years to get out of graduate school.

John's Elric nametag is ink and watercolor on Fabriano paper, 3 1/2" x 2 1/4", Spring 1977.

July Twilight

I spend a lot of time driving around rural Virginia looking for landscapes. When I find one, I snap a photograph and dash away. Very often, as soon as I stop to photograph, concerned motorists slow down and stop, thinking that I am in some kind of trouble. I just wave my camera and say I am taking pictures. There is no possibility of sitting for any length of time to do a proper "plein air" painting. I take the photos home, download them, do a little Photoshoppery to crop them, and then paint from them. The idea is to make the painting from the photograph LOOK like it might have been painted on site. Lately I have been using the iPad as a reference photo compendium, so that I can move back and forth between images without making a lot of cluttery paper prints. This didn't take very long to do, just a few hours at most.

This image is from my latest expedition, which started at Chateau O'Brien and made a big circle around country roads in Fauquier County. I am also trying out some new watercolors which use fine-ground colored stone pigments the way painters did in the past, rather than the chemical dyes which are often used nowadays. These pigments are much more natural-looking and match the colors of trees, stone, dirt, meadows, and other earthy environmental sights. I plan to do a number of these little watercolors and maybe I can exhibit them at a winery.

"July Twilight" is watercolor on Arches paper, 11" x 8 1/2", July 31, 2011. Click on the pic for a larger view.