Mid-show Night at the Muck

"Scrubber"

"Steel Bundles"

"Colored Tanks"

“Scrubber”
"Steel Bundles"
"Colored Tanks"
watercolor on paper, 2016
6” x 8” (15.24cm x 20.32cm)

Here are my other 3 paintings I have in the NWS Plein Air Exhibition and sale at the Muckenthaler Cultural Center. Today, Thursday March 3rd from 7:30 - 9:00 pm the Muckenthaler is hosting a mid-show gallery tour.
Several artists including myself will be there doing demo's and/or talking about our work. It will be a perfect night to attend if you can make it.

These 3 are the most orderly of my six. Part of that reason is the view I choose and the way I presented them, straight on and compositionally horizontal. Industrial subjects often are chaotic but even when so I can usually find the view that is less chaotic.
When the subject is busy as in "Colored Tanks ", with so much going on in the painted surfaces the straight on view as well as simplification helps make a better painting.

My other 3 in the show are made up of more angles and diagonals compositionally, which I usually favor, but they are simpler to begin with so they needed the perspective views to keep them more interesting.

“Scrubber”
We see these attached to every industrial building. Seen in endless configurations these kinds of machinery are called scrubbers. They clean or scrub the air inside the warehouses, factories and industrial plants. Very similar to my power pole series there is a lot going on with them. With their boxy structures, angles, valves, pipes, wires and ducts it’s their forms that attract me. Sometimes oddly proportioned, gangly in appearance, rusted, worn and weathered they can take on an anthropomorphic character and are irresistible to me so I must paint them.

"Steel Bundles"
Bundles of steel girders, wood haphazardly stacked on top and overlooked by most. I find these kinds of repeating forms a great subject to paint, especially when the stacks are not perfectly arranged. In the simplest form they represent the industrious and hard working as well as both organization and chaos.

“Colored Tanks”

Industrial subjects have more color than most realize. The colorful palette of hues can range from the more earthy to the bright and highly saturated. Then they take on the rich patina of the time worn and sun faded. This one had the two sides of its gates painted at different times and in two different reds. The blues tanks too were faded, its paint water stained in various degrees. I waited for a full sunny day to paint these to accentuate the lively palette.434,435,436

My Work at The Muck

"Storage Yard Sun"

"Railroad Crossing"

"Powder Magazine"

"Storage Yard Sun"
For Sale at DailyPaintWorks, click here

"Railroad Crossing"

"Powder Magazine"
For Sale at DailyPaintWorks, click here
all watercolor on paper, 2016
6" x 8" (15.24cm x 20.32cm)

Here's three of the six paintings I have hanging at the Muckenthaler Cultural Center.
All were painted for the NWS plein air show, an exhibition and sale. The bottom two I painted just prior to the show opening.

Most often I am already familiar with the site and at different times of day. I walk the location, choose a view and proceed to do small, quick but careful studies of complicated subjects, capturing both my perceptions and an honest depiction of any information I see as important. These studies, done in a near journalistic fashion, allow me to get familiar with the subject and later serve to inform my studio work. Through later editing I am able to present my thoughts and views on the subject.

"Storage Yard Sun"
Another of my Storage Yard Series, an all encompassing term for the many industrial sites that I paint that don’t fit any category like refineries or warehouses. This particular day the sun was bright and was bouncing reflected light into the shadows giving the scene an animated quality. I set out to capture that before the light could change and even played it up a bit to give it some life.

"Railroad Crossing"
I often paint railroad locomotives, bridges etc but I also find a certain fascination with the common everyday railroad tracks, crossings and signals. I liked this particular view for the tracks splitting in two directions and had this site in the back of my mind for some time. I knew I wanted to paint it either in the early morning or afternoon to take advantage of the shadows to provide darks for the composition, finally deciding on the afternoon.

"Powder Magazine"
Easily overlooked, what looks like an unassuming little stone and brick building is actually a Civil War era powder magazine built in 1862 for Camp Drum in Wilmington CA. It’s odd to see in the middle of a residential neighborhood down near the LA Harbor since we don’t associate the Civil War with the west coast.
I have driven past it for years and finally needed to get it down in paint. With this study, as well as some others, I plan to develop it into a larger studio painting.431,432,433

Art-A-Fair Storage Yard Nocturne (Stars)

"Storage Yard Nocturne (Stars)"    SOLD

oil on panel, 2015

5" x 7" (12.7cm x 17.78cm)

Happy 4th of July!

I have no paintings of fireworks so the next closest thing was this one with shooting stars. ; )

I like storage yards as a subject and have done several in this series including nocturnes. Although technically some may not be a yard used only for storage, they may be some business, I use it as an all encompassing term for these industrial sites, usually seen from the outside the fence.
I added the shooting stars to offset the stillness of the night.305

Storage Yard Nocturne

"Storage Yard Nocturne (Palms)"
watercolor on paper, 2013
9" x 6" (22.86cm x 15.24cm)
For Sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS, CLICK HERE
Direct link to painting here

The storage yard is inadvertently becoming a series. Something I did not plan but this is the third and I have my mind on a couple others at some point.
Here are the 1st and 2nd.

Industrial settings are odd sometimes. You will see things that you won't find in suburban areas. Here two streetlights, one a warm sodium and the other a cool white light, right next to each other. Even though the orange sodium light is really lighting the storage yard it is still amusing they are side by side. It also made a nice dramatic cast shadow against the gate and driveway.

For me I like the way I was able to play the warms and cools against each other in such a vertical format.
Although this is a real site I made some changes, as I always do, to make a stronger composition. It was fun designing the shapes of the palms. I also added the stack of steel jutting up from the left, the power wire and changed the building.247

* I am still having difficulty with some images uploading in blogger. The image quality if off a little but is the best I could get.
It's random, some days it works fine, other days it's dreadful (and frustrating).

The image on DAILY PAINTWORKS is better.

**I have updated this post with a 'fixed' photo. This is how it should have looked in the first place.

Urban Haze

"Storage Yard Haze"    SOLD
oil on panel, 2013
5" x 7" (12.7cm x 17.78cm)

I see a lot of scenes like this living near the ocean. Bright days tucked under the marine layer.

Colors intensify but are not too glaring, not like a bright clear day. All the moisture in the atmosphere affects colors in a different way, they seem to bleed softly into the air.
Even harsh environments are gently cushioned under this canopy of moist air, not quite blocked and grayed out as on foggy days. The marine layer lets the sun through just enough to let us pause and relook at what we would normally dismiss.

That's what I see and why I choose the often maligned urban setting. It would be too obvious, and easy, to take an already pretty landscape and make it prettier.240

New Gallery

NEW GALLERY-I have two paintings at Horizon Fine Art Gallery in Jackson Hole Wyoming.

"Retired Power Plant" and "Storage Yard Nocturne" Click on titles to see original posts.

For purchase contact Barbara Nowak at horizonfineartgallery.com , email : HORIZONFINEART@WYOMING.COM

Jarring

"Storage Yard Nocturne"   SOLD

oil on panel, 2010

5"x 7" (12.7cm x 17.78cm)

Horizon Fine Art Gallery

Industrial nocturne, just after a rain. Combining four of my favorite image elements or subjects; the nocturne, the industrial, rain, and a simple composition.

Much like I said in my post 'Of the Night' / "Nocturne-Lucy(Cat)", the simple image can be tricky. It needs to have something to hold your attention, some quality that stirs up memories, emotions, some drama... anything to prevent it from being boring.

Here a crisp cool night, a dark blue clearing sky, the scene soaked in the yellow sodium street light, the slick wet textured street, the harder lines of the foreground offset by the lingering fog.

Dangerously close to being too simple, the power pole, dissecting the composition just off center was needed to provide a jarring effect. Without it or the lit up electrical box at the far right the image isn't as compelling to me. Hopefully this painting is provocative to others in some way, so that the industrial motif is secondary.44

Click on image for larger view