New Drawings

The leaves are falling on my new wildflower garden- a total delight that grows outside  my studio window.One thing about approaching winter, time and light become more precious-  like life.

The first drawing is a study for a new painting called "The Wild Garden". The second is a study for  the painting " Emily Anne". Both are charcoal drawings heightened with pastel. I always start out with the idea of doing a grand renaissance type of drawing all rendered up- almost French Academy- but then I get bored at the tedium of it and reach for a broad fat pastel stick and whack away. I think the charm is in the unsaid. There are Watteau drawings of  women in  grand dresses seated casually on floors that live today- they put to shame the over rendered lifeless literal copies of the human form popular today.  Degas' drawings are still fresh and lively a century later. Another escapee of the academic.

"The Wild Garden" study" 27.5" x 38" on Fabriano Ingres Ash paper spray painted with purple and blue enamel paint

"Emily Anne" 27.5" x 38" on Fabriano Ingres Ash paper spray painted with purple and blue enamel paint

My next project if I survive it will be a multi- character painting. Then I think I will paint some men. Really. I have a few in mind. 

There is no reason or direction behind my work, no ulterior motive, no hidden meaning, nothing. It is just stuff I love to do, find interesting and at times find challenging..

Some gorgeous Watteau drawings. Makes me weep. The freshness, the unpretentiousness.