… I thought I saw the tree smiling back at me.

But sometimes paintings just happen. Ajax on the Kitchen Floor (24 X 48 inches).

Think you have a tough job? Join the military. Here is my new desktop, made from a photo of a jet engine at the March Reserve Air Force Base, Airfest 2088. The Airfest is a type-o-rama of warnings and designations. This one seemed like just what I needed during the last days of the CaliforniaAuthors […]

Damnit! It turns out that I can’t do a major website relaunch and keep my whole house out of whack with my do-it-yourself realist painting workshop. Too much chaos! Website work wants order! Okay, break down the still life, resked the whole thing after the launch and visit of M&M next weekend.
On the M&M visit […]

I’ve seen lots of paintings in the last few weeks: three juried group shows and an exhibition at the Long Beach Museum of Art. It’s been good; it sent me off on my current realist exercise and it’s been sort of encouraging. I feel a happy understanding of the language of paint. It is good […]

Sigh. Spent the whole morning resetting my still life. That’s right. The still life lesson of the day: still lifes must be absolutely still. It seems that over the week since I set up the still life the first time, things have moved around just enough to make my original drawing seem off. Now, this […]

I spent the afternoon mixing medium into color — sitting on the back porch, listening to Miles Davis and thinking, “this is the best goddamned job I’ve ever had.”

I know I said the curation of the recent portrait exhibit at the Long Beach Museum of Art fell flat, but the paintings themselves left an impression on me. I found myself thinking a lot about the high level of technical performance required to create the hyper-real portraits in the the show. So when — […]

We just saw a piece on the news about Jeff Deck, a guy who’s traveling around the country correcting misspellings, including misplaced apostrophes, in storefront signs. His route is plotted on the Typo Eradication Action League site.
Here’s his post from New Orleans; he’s in LA right now!
I’m glad someone took up the challenge to […]

Wow, things are suddenly so busy here — only time to bang out a roundup.
Doing: With Val’s hot, under-the-hood stylings, I’m redesigning a new and streamlined CaliforniaAuthors [sketch], with a simultaneous rework of thenightnote [sketch]. Also: I’m still on board with Claudio, helping him with the lightning-fast launch of his dream practice. While he works […]

Duane Kaiser, the talented creator of the now-famous Painting A Day blog/movement, has a series of nice time-lapse movies of his beautiful still life technique. Enjoy the one below and check them all out here.

Another still day with the still life. A good day. No full-blown vertigo spells, a little general dizziness. Thanks for all the love! Now some drying time for the little painting.

Thanks to all for the good wishes. My vertigo gets less and less every day. Today I set up a little still life with the honey pot and stayed still all day. I didn’t have any of the bad vertigo spells, just a little general disequilibrium. I’m done for the day, but I’ll put some […]

Finally getting there, just a few more sessions to go. I took Ilana’s great suggestion for an Iron Oxide glaze. Thanks! Now some drying time before the next round.

Had to do a little something or go loco from flu-based cabin fever.

At the nexus of history geeks, graphics geeks and politico-geeks there are things like these HistoryShots’ posters, “History of the [American] Political Parties I and II”. Fascinating. Whiggy. See them at historyshots.com.

Deadlines, budgets, style conflicts, all kinds of little and big things, can lay a pretty rigid track for creative thought. We use a direct approach and our well-vetted set of strategies to get it done and move on to the next thing. We are especially apt to take our first idea and go with it […]

… and madass mountain biking coach Andrew Lucas has been keeping an eye on The Night Note from Denver. This weekend he e-mailed to wish me Happy Festivus and was generous enough to tip me to his very cool Photoshop “woodcut” technique. (He’d seen the sketches I’d done for Mike’s solar co.) He writes: […]

Last night Val and I had a little Shrimp Remoulade and settled in to watch Helvetica, a stylish documentary about typography, culture and the influence of — and controversy surrounding — the Helvetica typeface, which turned 50 in 2007.
Yes, controversy. You see, in the world of graphic design, the ubiquitous typeface is a divider, […]