Emily

Hey, y'all!

Here we have Emily, who belongs to the daughter of my friend Peggy. Emily runs her house with a strict paw and takes no nonsense from anybody. She was grandly gracious to pose for me in this beam of light so that I might appreciate just how elegant she is. Naturally, a painting followed. Emily eats well, a fact not hidden by her long flowing coat, and I did not choose to make her a bit more svelt. If she had been nicer to me, maybe--.

I really enjoyed doing this. My favorite part is the light glowing through the cat's ear. I did this pretty much entirely at the fall River Art Group show at La Villita, as a demonstration piece. You haven't seen it before because I was tied up with aforementionned surgery recovery and then troubles with the computer AND troubles with getting a photo which was in focus. I hope you like it now.

Jay

Ivanhoe Painting

Dear Folks,

Here is the finished painting of Ivanhoe as promised. I decided that I had to get this on the blog today while I had time to mess with the computer. As you can see, the background has changed quite a bit. The foreground has had heavy impasto added with a palette knife and the background trees on the left have been blued into the distance. The trees on the right have been developed more and the tape and posts in the background have been removed in favor of a more prominent shrub in the foreground. The shrub gives the painting some balance in its composition. I am very pleased with the action in this work. This is the sort of action I really like to portray in horses. Sally and I are discussing the possibility of entering this painting in a competition later in the year. I'll let you know what we decide. Also, I want you to know that for some reason, perhaps the compressing of the file, the color in the background is grayer than the actual painting. The trees on the left are more yellow than in this photo and the trees on the right have much more color to them.

Jay

Dear All,

I am sending along the beginning images of the horse painting I've been talking about lately. The lower image, picture taken in my studio, is the start of the painting. I concentrated at that time on the image of the horse and rider on a toned background. I felt that the horse was the most important part of this painting so turned his head a little from the photo so that he is looking at the viewer and seems to be ready to run right at you. This effect was enhanced by the fact that he has a nice white stripe on his face. This beginning was time consuming as I wanted the drawing to be correct.

The top image is of the painting about half way along. The background lights and darks are laid in and the relationship to the landscape is forming. This is important too, as the background helps focus attention on the horse and rider. At this point the background landscape is thinly painted and awaits a more impasto layering. There was still time to make some decisions on the background as you will plainly see changes in the final image.

This horse is Ivanhoe, who belongs to my friend Sally. He carried her successfully for many years in Eventing competition and is happily retired now, sharing his expertise with young riders. It keeps him busy and happy but does not stress him. His portrait joins that of Spindrift, another of Sally's horses I have portrayed. This painting is done from a very good photo she had of the two of them in competition.

Stay tuned. I'll soon get the finished portrait on the blog. I am anxious for you to see it.

Jay

Rainbow the Bichon

Dear Patient Friends,

This is one of the long ago promised paintings of my aunt's little Bichon, Rainbow. It's one of the many projects I completed while I was away from the blog for so long.

My surgery turned out to be more of a deal to recover from than I had anticipated and while nothing really went amiss, it seems I am slow to get my brain back in real gear after anaesthesia. I sort of knew this before but didn't think this particular surgery would turn into one of those long recoveries. Right about the time I decided I was ready to return to the internet my computer decided to have it's own brain failures and I've been fighting that for a month or more. I finally had to call a computer company and even they had to make extra trips. The end result is that none of my usual settings are where I am used to them and I am still thrashing around trying to get images where they are supposed to go--in focus. Let's hope you all get this.

This was a fun painting to do. I started it while at the fall River Art Group show as a demo piece. I finished it in the studio and am pleased with how it turned out. This is a cute little dog with a lot of personality and he was easy to paint.

I have finished the horse painting I have been working on for a couple of months and will get that on the blog soon. I took pictures of that as it progressed so you can see it as it went along. I'll keep this short in hopes some of you, at least, are still with me on the blog and would prefer I not talk so much. Let me know if you are still out there in computer land. It's always good to get feedback.

Best wishes,
Jay