Friday, October 28, 2011

Portrait and Figure Paintings

Eric 11x6 oil
This is an early portrait, 1981, when I was
first attempting to learn how to paint portraits.
George Van Hook and I shared a studio in Arcata,
Ca. and we had at least two models coming into 
the studio each day. It was a great time and really
helped me get my chops up. I have posted several
portraits from over the years. There are some gaps
as I don't have digital images of a lot of work.

Helen Botino, oil detail 1989

Bill McBride oil 8x6 1995

  

A Visitor, watercolor 14x11 2002

Self-Portrait, oil 2007 10x10
Self-Portrait, Oil 12x9 2010 


Ken, watercolor 14x11 2008

Edward, oil 54x48 2009

Self-Portrait, oil 68x48 2008 

Mike Galarda, oil 72x48 1996


Self-Portrait, oil 16x12 2011
I have a dual personality when it comes to painting and I often question
my motives for what I paint. Although I consider myself a traditional painter, I respond to
abstract paintings and expressionist paintings, as well as realism. I find much contemporary
realism to entrenched in 19th century painting, and many painters
rather dogmatic in their anti 20th century view of modern and contemporary art.
Every so often I need to step outside my own boundaries and see where
the work goes. I don't make it happen, it just does. Maybe it's because I'm approaching 60 that I have painted
five self-portraits this year. I have posted three recent self-portraits that have been very exciting to paint and come from my other side.


My Father, oil 20x16 2009

Paul Rickard, watercolor 14x11 2010

Profile Self-Portrait, oil 16x12 2011
This started with a lot of palette scrapings and took off from there.
It's hard to show all the texture in a photo.

Self-Portrait, oil 20x18 2011

Detail

Self-Portrait, Outside Noise oil, 2011 16x12

Healing Room, detail 2007
This is a detail of the painting I did of Terry when she was recovering
from the terrible fall she had in 2007.

Terry,  oil 2001 detail

Painting, Terry's Studio 2002 60x54

The Last Song, oil 1993 22x17

The Pirate, oil 1993 54x48
  
  
Jazz, pastel on cement sidewalk 2011
This was drawn on the sidewalk of the Arcata Plaza for
the North Coast Children's Services fundraiser. It from an old
black and white photo of Billie Holiday, Lester Young and
Coleman Hawkins. It was a fun piece to do, but back breaking
and tough to draw on the rough surface of the sidewalk.

6 comments:

  1. Jim,
    Really like the expressionist self-portraits.
    Missy

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  2. A real pleasure to see the early work and also your 'other side' The Jazz pastel on cement is wonderful and I can only imagine the difficulty of such a feat.

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  3. Thank you for the heads up, love seeing your beautiful,and highly sensitive portrait work.

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  4. Thank you for posting these. They are an inspiration. I am impressed by the skill you bring to such a range of styles.

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  5. A lot of these pieces have an almost atmospheric quality to them. I guess it must be from working under natural light. Anyway, I like the effect!

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  6. The head and shoulders self portrait with the caption: Self-Portrait, oil 20x18 2011 Gazes back to you in a similar introspective way to portraits I have seen by Rembrandt.

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