Adjusting for Changes

Things change. And art is no different. There have been huge changes in just mediums available. And platforms. When I was majoring in Fine Art at the University of New Mexico watercolors were always done on paper. Canvas was for oil. And we stretched our own as well as learned to prepare the surface with rabbit skin glue and gesso. Acrylics were very new toward the end of my studies.

Little did I imagine I would one day be using intensely colored watercolors on canvas platforms prepared specifically for the medium. I can get the colors once only available in acrylics. And I can float those colors across the canvas. It was an amazing change for me from the pale colors of watercolor carefully applied on hot or cold press paper. And it was a change for the art buyer.

As I educated myself I found myself also having to educate my public. This is especially true on social media like my Facebook page, Binford-Bell Studio.  And as galleries began to fail and fairs no longer attract buyers like they once did, social media became more of the market place for artists and clients to interface. Art buyers want to know the artist. And so I began posting progress photos which ultimately became Creative Process blogs here.

But then things changed again. I blame the iPhone. And the tablet. So quick and easy but if I take a progress photo with my tablet and you see it on your iPhone it is not a true representation of the work. And viewers began to see cats and dragons in the skies. It belittles the work. And it puzzles me because I will look at the painting and not see it. Something fails in the translation. So no more progress photos taken with my tablet. I do after all have a great DSLR camera.

And I will post less progress photos. I will still take them to put into a Creative Process blog, and to judge the status of my own work for me. Some aspects of this new mixed media I work in is very fast because it is poured. But progress slows down as I edit that; refine the accident as it were. And lately I have added another medium to the equation; oil sticks. I joke at exhibits that I will use whatever it takes to achieve what I want.

I just don't want to confuse the viewer with what may be just a transitory dragon created by and iphone and a ipad.

Creative Process - Rain on the Mesa

Rain on the Mesa
20 x 28 Mixed Media on Artists Canvas
$1350

Been a while since I have painted a canyon scene. My first love was canyons. I returned from a trip to Utah and found all my photographs, while good, just missing something. Photography had until recently been a tool to provide inspiration on paintings. Plein Aire was always too much of a slug.

Lately I have been into painting scenes closer to home: snow capped mountains, Aspens in the fall, antelope on the fat grass, etc. I have missed my more colorful palette.

Sky poured on canvas

 I always begin with the sky. Since I generally pour them to avoid all indications of a brush being involved it is easier to mask off the main part of the painting and pour the sky. The colors and mood which results sets the tone for the rest of the painting.

Then I lay in the colors of the foreground

Tackling the middle

Canvas covered/major color blocks laid out

There is a moment after the canvas is all covered when I am not entirely sure what to tackle next. I had begun this painting with an image of the foreground where I was going to use oil stick to provide texture.

Is it done stage

At last happy with the foreground I become critical of the sky again. In this case I did not like the sky around the sun all that much. And having committed to calling it Rain on the Mesa the rain needed to be punched up a bit.  Watercolor is fast and quickly drying. Oil stick takes longer to dry and I end up with more time to fuss with the painting before applying UV varnish. With painting I used qtips to lift some color around the sun and especially the dark at the point of the mesa. As well as detail work with watercolor pens and pencils.

The Recent Views in Black and White

Naked Aspen

 Been a while since I posted on this blog. Sorry. Mind has been elsewhere. I have taken pictures and most began in color but there is something about January, and February, which begs for black and white treatments.

I will not bore you with too many words. I will let the photographs speak for themselves.

Geranium 

Shadows across a snowy drive

Peeling paint 

Buds

Shadows across the snow

Light through delicate flowers

Studio Fence Guardian

Clouds of 2018

Clouds in Shades of Grey

If the monsoon clouds are not colorful then they look best in black and white. It always rather amazes the number of shades of grey in the clouds.

Black Lake Dawn

I bought my house because of the dawns. My windows don't face the setting sun but the east. Dawns do some marvelous things.

Storm Building over Ute Valley

It was a spring with fires all around us. Not always easy to tell which clouds were effected by a fire on the other side of the mountain and which weren't. The Ute Valley clouds above were just clouds I think. But the pink clouds below were at least colored by the Ute Park Fire.

Angel's Fire

And a fire to the west of my house seemed to give the clouds silver linings.

Partly Cloudy

But the last photo is at the least clouds generation by the Ute Park Fire and color intensified by the setting sun.

Clouds and Smoke and Sunset

Trees I Have Known in 2018

Lone tree

This is one of my favorite trees featured in 2018. And as I selected my best trees for the year I noted it is the only single tree all alone in its landscape. And it is the only tree in this blog which is included in its entirety withing the frame.

Some years back before I began focusing on trees as something other than an element of a landscape I read a photography blog about how it was not necessary to include the top and bottom of a tree in a picture. Which then brings up the question of where to cut off the tree. Are tops or bottoms most important.

Skeletons of Trees from Ute Park Fire

This is a photo of just the tops of denuded pine trees in the Ute Park Burn Scar.

Trees in the Snow

And this is a photograph of just the bottom of fir trees after a snow. And, you could argue, a photograph of the light which fills the forest in which the trees stand. I really like this particular photograph of trees because of the light. Which brings us to shadows the trees cast.

Shadows in the snow

 Aspens are a wonderful subject for shadows and especially aspens in the winter with snow at their feet. Even the shadows do not reveal the tops of the trunks.

Trees on the Shore

The shadows of these trees on the edge of a frozen lake is all about the tops of the trees. And like the trees in the snow photograph it is also abut the light in the forest.

Snowy Trees

This photograph also appears in a recap of landscapes for 2018 which raises the question of when is it a landscape and when is it all about the trees in the landscape. That question comes up with photograph number one in this blog. You could argue it is a landscape with a tree.

And you may have noticed that except for the first photograph they are all in black and white. Trees are great without color. It was only after realizing you did not have to have the whole tree in a photograph that I came to the conclusion that trees are not in need to green to be a tree. The first tree will now, in the depths of winter be without leaves. I want to go back and photograph it stark and bare against its landscape. It has nice bones.

Still Life Photographs of 2018

Silk flower in an alley in Trinidad

One of my "tasks" of each year is to review the photographs and pick what I believe are the best in various categories. My father told me my first year of college when he handed me yet another of his old cameras for my Photography 101 class that college was not so much about learning the class content as it was about  learning how to teach yourself for the rest of your life.

As a photographer that is about judging myself and tracking my progress. I give myself homework and tasks and subjects to work on to hone my skills. I confess they are seldom about f-stops. I love best photographing landscapes but I also set myself the task of seeking out still life compositions where I find them. The photograph above also included textures which was another task.

Lake shore in Spring

The still life of the rocks along the shore was definitely about texture. I confess to loving texture in photography. And this was not exactly a "still" life as the lake was moving beneath the slowly melting ice. You could hear it groan and complain. And rocks which had been tossed upon the lake by I assume bored teens were beginning to melt through the ice and now and again one fell through and left a hole.

Crystal Reflections

The still life Crystal Reflections, a crystal bowl on polished granite, essentially has no texture. Just light refractions and reflections.

String of Garlic

The string of garlic hanging on a stucco wall was of course about texture. I could have satisfied my assignment with just one photo but I photographed it for several days in a row at different times of the day because it was also about light and shadow. I printed this one 18 x 24 on canvas. It hangs at Enchanted Circle Brewery with other photographs of mine. 

Tin Heart

Some still life photos are a basis to play with photo editing programs. The tin heart above I used for note cards. I played around not just with the texture but the crop on Crystal Buddha. I wanted to reduce the original photograph to its essence if you will. To me this defines our delicate world in the hands of mighty forces.

Crystal Buddha 

And like the crystal bowl some still life photos are an attempt to capture the light which plays on them. Photography is all about light.

Holders of Light

Birds and Beast of 2018

My number one

I enjoy photographic contests if only with me. What if someone asked you of all the photos you took this year which are your favorite? Or to narrow it down what are your favorite bird photos. Those questions to myself were one of my favorite aspects of the 365 day challenges.

 And I doubt I will abandon that if for no other reason than I belong to the a garden club affiliated with a state and national organization of garden clubs which holds a yearly photography contest. So recently I had to cull through my photographs looking for the best bird photo. And best wildlife. The turkey above could be both or either. But I entered a turkey last year as a bird. And I had a wildlife entry I was more fond of.

Elk at Eagle Nest Lake

And why did I like this one? Because of the landscape. It was only a portion of a huge herd of cow elk. One photo of almost 50 I took. Such a dilemma - wide angle to get most of the herd or telephoto to get a closeup of even less of the herd. Without a super wide angle lens I have no way of getting the whole herd in the frame. There must have been almost 200 elk. I settled for this representative sample in their environment. Like the turkey which could be bird or beast, this photo could be landscape or wildlife. But I had a more loved landscape photo. Well about six best landscapes.

Burn scar of the 1996 Hondo Fire

This landscape of the mountain outside Questa, where I once lived, made a statement I wanted to make. It has been 22 years since that fire which dominated 22 days of my life and became the deciding reason for my divorce, and move to the wet side of the mountain range. Forest fires have consequences. And they don't heal themselves over night.

But back to birds and beasts.

Eye to eye with a Rufus

I had two humming bird photographs, but doesn't everyone. And a goose coming in for a landing on a mirror surfaced pond.

Every spring for several years I have watched the debate over ownership of this particular bit of water. I know these geese well. And better yet they know me and allow me to point cameras at them. But goose pictures are a dime a dozen. And it isn't everyday you can get a photo of a cold junco in a snow storm. They are very nervous birds. Who knew the snow sticks to their beaks.

Junco at the suet feeder

I took this photo and the one I eventually entered for the bird category from inside my studio and ergo through the window with my telephoto lens. I didn't want to get too close to the glass and scare them. It was an experiment the results of which surprised me.

Shelter from the storm

I finally opted for this one because of the sunflower husk. It is after all for the garden club. And this was the remains of a wonderful year of growing sunflowers. I used it as a fall decoration in my house while it dried and when the snow storm came I put it outside on the bird feeder where it was enjoyed for its seeds and for its ability to block the wind.

For me a good photograph is not just about the clarity and focus and composition and what F stop I used. If a photograph is worth a 1000 words there needs to be a story it tells. When I sit down to select my best for the year it has to be first a good photograph and it has to have a good story. The photograph below is a very personal story.

Mare and foal in the wild flowers

I watched that foal from within 10 minutes of her birth as she grew under the watchful eye of her mother. The owners moved them to a field closer to their house but until then they were mine and I came to believe mother was posing for me. But they are neither bird no beast if beast is wildlife. So just one of my all time favorite photographs.