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Tractor Shed - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Tractor Shed

 
It seems all this week I've been painting water and trees in one form or another. I was ready for a change today. Determined to find some sort of structure to paint today, I went to several different locations searching for a subject that I could paint. At the end of my search was Cedar Hill State Park where I found this building. Actually, I had picked a different building to paint. I even blocked it in before deciding that I wasn't happy with neither the my view of the subject nor my composition, so I wiped it off my canvas. It was then that I noticed this little building right next to me with an old tractor in it. I was drawn to the shadows and the way that just the front of the tractor caught the afternoon light. With a slight turn of my easel and turning my canvas vertically, I was off and painting. My brushed danced across the canvas and mixed colors as if I wasn't even there. I love days like this!

Pappy Elkins Park - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Pappy Elkins Park

 
I just love the name of this park. It's not far from our house, which is good since things got to be pretty crazy today and I only had a few hours of daylight to paint in. I had all of the best intentions to get out first thing this morning and get to painting. My plan was to drive my wife to work since she still has problems driving with her cast and then go paint. As soon as I dropped her off, our daycare called and said our daughter looked like she had pink eye. I turned around to get her and take her to the doctor. Luckily, she doesn't have pink eye, but she did scratch her eye, which is why it was tearing and red. By the time I got her back to day care it was just about time to go pick my wife up from work. After getting her back home, I was able to go paint finally!

 I had ordered these 8x16 inch canvas a few weeks ago and have been dying to do a painting on one of them. I like the proportions. It's a great for landscapes, especially views like this one. There are a few other places I want to paint that I think this size will come in handy. I'm still struggling with my normal computer for color correcting and adjusting the photographs of my paintings, so please bear with me if these photos are a little off right now.

Waiting for a Bite - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Waiting for a Bite

  The first spot I went to today looked good on google maps, with a small river running through it and what looked like a little waterfall. When I got there though, it turned out to be a trash-filled little river with 10 foot tall banks and no way to get down to the water.  Nothing was very inspiring so I thought I would try  Lake Arlington instead.

Lake Arlington has a few piers to fish off of and a pretty amount of shore line that's easy to access.  The water is nice and people speed by on boats and jet skis all day long.  There are a few spots that I think would make good paintings so it was hard to choose what to paint. Then I spotted this fisherman at the end of one of the piers and knew that's what I wanted to paint today. I set up on the shore and got to painting quickly since I didn't know how long he would be there or how much he would move. Luckily, the fishing was slow, so he stayed pretty still for about 20 minutes, which was just enough time to get a good block in before he packed up his stuff and left. After he was gone, I worked on the rest of the painting by finishing off the water and the background. When I stepped back to check my work, I wasn't happy with the head I had painted.  It just didn't look right, so I scraped it off and painted the head of one of the other fisherman still on the pier instead. Between the two of them, it seems to have worked out very well.

Oakland Lake - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Oakland Lake

 
With any luck, this week will be a little less busy and I'll have more time to paint than last week. I mentioned last week that my wife had her hand operated on, and today we saw the doctor, who said it's healing well.
He then put it in a cast, which seems to let her do more things.

 Today's painting was a fast one. I only had about an hour to paint this before I had to rush off to pick up my daughter at day care. This little park is only about 15 minutes from our house, but this was the first time I had gone there. It has a small lake, which is what I painted today, and lots of open ground. I want to go back as the fall color starts to change and maybe try a different view. I'm not sure why, but I had trouble with glare today. I tried painting this while sitting on a park bench, but the reflection on the canvas was terrible. I finally went back to standing. For me, it just works better if I stand. I feel I have more energy in my work when I'm standing and I can step back freely and check my progress. 

 

Whisper of Fall - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Whisper of Fall

 
The last few days have been pretty hectic around here. My wife had surgery on her hand Tuesday. Since then I've been playing Mr. Mom, taking care of my wife and our little girl for the last two days. Today my wife needed to go to work, so I drove her in and then went out painting until her lunch break. I went back and we had hamburgers, then it was off to paint until she needed to be picked up in the afternoon.

Overall, I was able to do two paintings today. This one is from the morning painting session. I went to a little park just down the road from where my wife works with a little lake. It was the first time I had been there, so after scouting out the place for a few minutes, I settled on this view of the lake and the trees. I like how a few of the leaves are starting to change color, just hinting at fall!

 I had some trouble with the computer I usually use to process the images of my images, so hopefully this one looks okay. I had to use a different monitor then I'm use to and different software to color correct it. I hope to can get my other computer running properly before too long.

Eye Candy - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Eye Candy

 
Over the weekend, my wife and I went to the grocery store.  Now I hate the grocery store, except for the produce section where I get to pick out things to paint.  Sometimes I just ask my wife pick out something interesting or ask for certain things, but since I had the time, I went with her. I don't know when peaches and plums became the sizes of baseballs, so I skipped them and went to the organic section.

After picking up and rejecting a few options,  I picked up these carrots to paint since they still had the large leafy part that grows above the ground attached. These seem to be a lot harder to find in the stores these days. Everything is those prepackaged varieties. I like the ones with the stalks on them still since they remind me of Bugs Bunny; however, the leaves wilt pretty quickly so I think this will be the only painting I will do from this bunch. Besides they look pretty tasty so I think I'd rather eat them, "Ah, What's up Doc?".

Wild Hilside - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Wild Hillside

 I love painting this hillside, which we found while vacationing near Medicine Park, Oklahoma. I've painted it a few time over the last year. My only regret is that wish I had the presence of mind to take more photographs of this area.  It's a wonderful area with a huge wildlife refuge with lots of longhorns, buffalo and elk. We actually got stuck in the refuge for about an hour while a herd of longhorn crossed the road. Well, most of them crossed the road. A few of them just stopped to stare at us!

  We had never really explored Oklahoma before.  My wife was skeptical, since she is a native born Texan and somewhat suspicious of places that aren't San Antonio or Austin.  However, she and I were completely charmed by Medicine Park and the wildlife refuge.  The rocks in Oklahoma have some of the most interesting colors in them, ranging from deep blues/purples to rich reds. Some have varied patterns while others are slick.  We saw them on the miles and miles of trials, which is what my wife and I spent most of our time hiking. We were lucky to be there when there were a lot of wildflowers still in bloom and the weather was still cool, so we spent almost all of our time outdoors enjoying the area.

Don't forget to relax!

  There's been a lot of talk lately on the FASO blog about using lists to keep yourself organized to get the day's tasks done. Clint Watson wrote this blog post about it and Lori Woodward posted this one today. Now, I'm a big believer in using lists to keep myself on track with the things I need to do. I have lots of lists, like one for the day's tasks, one for the marketing ideas I want to try, one for the projects around the house my wife and I want to do and so on and so on. I have so many lists that it sometimes drives my wife crazy. But it's my daily list that seems to put the most pressure on me because it's so crammed and hectic.

Typically, my list looks like this:
wake up
feed 11 month old baby breakfast while wife is getting ready for work
shower while wife dresses baby
go work a regular job during the day
get home and play with baby
catch up with wife while bathing baby
get into the studio
paperwork
painting
photograph the painting from the day before
post on blog

Whew! If I'm lucky, I finally get to sit and see my wife again by 11PM - just in time to go to bed. Not surprisingly, there are times when I find this schedule to be very tiring, especially since I've been doing this for the last 8 months or so. Now, I'm not saying I don't want to try and achieve my goal of 200 daily paintings this year, (I know there are more than 200 days in the year) but I didn't start this goal until well into February and I knew when I made it that even if I painted every day, not all of them are going to come out well enough to post. In a given week, there might be 2-3 that I either abandon or wipe off all together. I knew I needed to account for that when setting the number. What I think I've underestimated is the number of times I should have been taking a day or two off to just relax and recharge the batteries. I'm still very dedicated to this task, but this weekend I'm going to take a few days off from all of this. I'll post the painting I painted tonight on Friday, but then I'm putting the computer and my brushes away and I'm going to relax and enjoy my weekend. We have some great family plans lined up that we've been looking forward to for about 2 months. It should be a great time and, I think, well deserved. If your daily list is anything like mine, you should consider doing the same:)

By the way, if your an artist reading this who's trying to figure out how to market your work and you don't subscribe to the FASO newsletter, what's wrong with you?  Go here and subscribe!

Yesterday's Harvest - Daily Painting by Geogre De Chiara

Yesterday's Harvest

 When my wife came in yesterday with the peppers she picked from the garden with some of the leaves still on them, I knew right away they had to be painted before they were eaten. I asked her not to touch them before I had a chance to use them.  She muttered something about pico de gallo and dinner, but without too much fuss agreed to my request. So, I set them up and painted them. The colors in the peppers where so rich that I found it  quite a challenge to try and replicate them with paint. We have a lot of peppers growing in the garden right now so don't be surprised if you see a few more of these before the season is done.

Orange Wedge - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Orange Wedge

  While I was trying to come up with a name for this painting, I started thinking that the orange wedge looked like a little Viking boat docked along the shore line of the blue land.  The white area is the water and the blue cloth is reminiscent of the land. See how it kind of makes a little cove where the blue cloth just barely gets back on the canvas? The problem was I couldn't think of any title that would sum this idea up in a few short words, so I had to go with the slightly pedestrian Orange Wedge. If anyone out there has a better title let me know. I'd be happy to change it.

Hanging With Big Blue - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Hanging with Big Blue

 This is another one for the commission I'm working on (see yesterday's post). I wanted to try to capture a brighter feel, so I placed this whole set up on a white piece of matte board. The matte board reflects light, so I could see many details in the shadows. I always find the reflective quality inspiring and I find painting the details in the shadows very enjoyable because the shadows have surprising, wonderful color when I look and then "Squint and compare", as my instructor Bill Parks use to say. Today's painting rearranges a lot of the same elements I used yesterday, like the tin and coins, but the difference the reflections and shadows makes the effect strikingly different.  For the next one, I will need to gather up some supplies over the weekend, so tomorrow I'll probably paint something else, maybe....



 

Working Lunch - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Working Lunch

 This is part of a commission I'm working on. The only requirement was that I use the two fishing lures; how they are used and in what context is up to me.  This has turned out to be an exciting challenge. I spent a couple of hours thinking about how I wanted to try and set these up and then messing around with different things.  I knew I wanted the lures to look like they where diving through the water and I had this idea that everything else in the painting could be things laying at the bottom of the lake, which is when the idea really came together. I liked the idea that this is a perfectly dry still life done in my studio, but it could almost be a scene found in any lake. When it came time to name this I asked my wife if she had any title ideas (truth be told a lot of the titles come from her) and she said "Working Lunch". I asked what that meant and she explained how the lures were lunch for the fish. I liked that, so Working Lunch it is.

Tea Party - Daily Painting by George De Chiara

Tea Party

 I must admit I've been building up quite a collection of tea cups in the last few weeks. It seems like I've been buying almost every one I've run into at the thrift stores lately. True be told, I'm running out of space in my studio for all of my "things" and need to start looking into some kind of shelves soon. In the meantime, here is one of the tea cups my wife bought at a garage sale a while back.  She says it's apart of someone's divorce china, which is why it is very nice and was priced very cheap. Anyway, it is a very reflective white and has a rather wide mouth, which proved to be a more challenging shape to draw then I thought it would.

 When it came time to name this painting I began to think what could the tea be doing...hmm...maybe it's having a party? And the carnation is coming over to join in while the boxes of tea just hang out. While I do enjoy these little narratives I come up with to name paintings, I admit, sometimes they can be a bit clunky.  I am very tempted to have a naming contest next time I come up a little short.
 

Daily Painting - Plum Stories

Plum Stories

It's funny how these still lifes evolve.  This was originally a painting of carnations! Now, I won't bore you with all the details of how a painting of carnation turns into a plate of plums, but it took a series of eight major changes before settling on this one.  Normally I have a pretty good idea of what it is I want to paint and I may even have some sketches of the idea to help me, but not this time.  I did manage to work in the cookie jar I bought a few weeks ago at a local thrift store. I've also been toying around with this vague idea to somehow use some books in a still life. Books are fun to paint because there is such a variety of size and color so I'm sure I'll use this idea again at some point.