Cosmetic Counter

Cosmetic Counter

20" x 20"     oil on linen     2015

Purple together with red and green are an unusual color combination for me in recent years, though I did use that palette more often, along with orange, in the 1980s. These days I tend to favor the three primary colors - red, blue, and yellow - as well as green. 

I've always felt that green is visually and psychologically a primary, but in traditional color theory green is considered a secondary color, along with purple and orange. The distinction is basically due to the fact that the primaries can't be mixed from two other colors, while the secondaries can be; for example, the primaries blue and yellow can be mixed to make green, but there are no two colors that can mixed to produce a blue or yellow, or red.

Harmonies of primary colors tend to be bright and aggressive, while harmonies of secondary colors tend to produce more mysterious and subdued effects ... perhaps a little analogous to the difference in music between harmonies of major notes and those of minor notes. Each has it's own power and beauty. 

After an initial quick sketch, this composition was developed in four drawings, below. 

initial sketch

3 1/8" x 4 3/4"     ink on paper     2015

drawing #1

7" x 7 5/8"     pencil on graph paper     2015

drawing #2

10" x 10"     pencil on graph paper     2015

drawing #3

20" x 21"     pencil on paper     2015

drawing #4, final drawing

20" x 20"     pencil on paper with pastel tone on reverse     2015

I made three significant changes while painting: 1. removed the second large face in the background along the left side, 2. trimmed the right side of the central large face, and 3. raised the woman's arm so her hand is touching the cosmetic case on the counter. 

Woman with a Cellphone

Woman with a Cellphone

7 1/4" x 7 1/2"     oil on linen     2015

This new painting is a study in blues and greens, enlivened by the warm skin tones and blonde hair. I've also returned to a narrative theme I've used a number of times: people with phones.

The phone first appeared in my work in 1969:

Telephone Call

7" x 9"      oil on linen       1968

Private Collection, Massachusetts

Aside from their narrative interest, objects like phones, cigarettes, playing cards - and newspapers - create interesting hand gestures that can help direct the flow of the viewer's attention through the composition.

Telephone Call

8" x 11 1/2"     oil on linen    1982

Private Collection, New York     

Woman with a Cellphone took three drawings to work out:

drawing #1

5 3/4" x 5 1/4"     pencil on graph paper     2015

drawing #2

7 3/4" x 7"     pencil on graph paper      2015

drawing # 3 

7 1/4" x 6 1/2"     pencil on graph paper w/ pastel tone on reverse     2015

When the painting was on the easel, I decided her legs needed more room and added an inch to the width on the left. In addition to improving the legs, the change allowed me to put a doorway in the background, opening into another room. The dark blue vertical balances the diagonal movement of the chair.

Molly

I've finished another cat painting ... a grey tabby as they usually are.

Molly

7"x 4 1/4"     oil on linen    2015

An outwardly simple composition, but I enjoyed working with the different juxtapositions of dark notes, light notes, and reds.

Game in the Garden

Game in the Garden 

20" x 16"     oil on linen     2015

This composition is a bit unusual for me. I generally prefer working with horizontals and verticals, but here the table and figures form a strong diagonal movement - with smaller diagonals in counterpoint on the card backs. The wall and tree serve to anchor the painting.

To totally contradict that first sentence, two of my last three major paintings - Movie and On the Stairs - were built around diagonals.

Game in the Garden took three drawings to develop; fewer than normal for a painting this size. The original idea came in a doodle a year and a half ago. I returned to the idea in early March of this year. .

initial sketch

7" x 4 1/2"     pencil on paper     January 2014

drawing #2

6 1/2" x 5 3/8"     pencil on graph paper      March 2015

final drawing

20" x 16"     pencil on graph paper w/ pastel tone on reverse     Mach 2015

On a narrative level, the couple was playing a game with round tokens in my drawings. Once I started painting, I decided to go with three cards, partly for abstract reasons, but also because I wanted to reference the con game three-card monte ... a subject I've wanted to use for some time, but whatever the couple is playing is just an invention of mine.

Imp

New painting:

Imp

7" x 4 1/2"     oil on linen     2015

A composition of red and orange warm tones, hopefully enlivened - on both the abstract and the narrative levels -  by the cool notes of the imp. 

The studies and the final drawing for this painting were all made with a single figure, and that was totally my intention when I transferred the image to the canvas. Then, for reasons unexplained, I took a pencil and added the imp.

Imp, final drawing

7" x 4 1/2"   pencil on graph paper with pastel tone on reverse   2015

Diana's Little Venice Party

A new painting: 

Diana's Little Venice Party

9" x 7"     oil on linen     2015

Private Collection, New York

In this painting, I limited my palette to a harmony of red and grey; the tones of red on the left side (and the background) are balanced with the grey tones on the right. The woman's black mask and the man's red mask create a counterpoint. I initially thought to use more colors, but as I went along, the blues and greens and yellows that I tried never seemed right.

This painting began with a quick sketch - a doodle really - of a woman wearing a pair of peacock feathers ... my private homage to a beautiful exhibition at the Hudson River Museum last Fall on the theme of the peacock in art.

initial sketch

6 1/2" x 5"     ballpoint on paper     2014

I developed the idea to include three more figures.

drawing #2

5 3/4" x 6 1/2"     pencil on graph paper      2014

Private Collection, Massachusetts

And seven drawings later - perhaps ironically - the figure that started the process, was no longer in the final composition. I liked the compactness of the trio.

final drawing

9" x 7"      pencil on graph paper with pastel tone on reverse      2015