Sometimes thing just work.
At the same time I delivered my two new pieces (Tri-square and the Modigliani) I dropped off a piece that ALOC wanted for a 6 moths display at the Ocean City Convention Center. Not a sho, rather a way of decorating the center for free, but the pieces are all marked for sale. Good exposure I thought.

This is the piece I dropped off, "Winter's Breath"

As soon as I got home from dropping it off, my phone rang and it was Ocean City: somebody bought the piece ten minutes after I left. They asked if I could supply a replacement; sure, I said.

Unfortunately the only requirement was that it should represent Ocean City. I didn't have any pieces that represent Ocean City on hand. Butr, I diod have many photos from the area so I set to work on the chance I could get one done by the end of the week and bring it to the reception on Friday night 4/6/18.

Two pictures.......

Wham bam, thank you ma'am, two pieces delivered Friday:

Working under pressure breeds economies of technique and even style. No doubt, these would have been different if I had taken my time like I usually do but I'm not sure they would have been better. In some ways they might not even have been as good. Tired right now, more later when I have time.

A new thought, one involving Amedeo Modigliani

Saturday March 10, 2018 in the morning.

In the Italian, it is probably pronounced

ama DAY o - mo DIL yani

Not at issue here.
What is at issue is a kernel of a thought from a participant in my "Art for Artists" Facebook page, a retired art professor, Paul D. Hayes, for which I thank him here, a lot.

Paul had the thought that wood might translate the Modigliani nudes well. A bell happened, a rather loud bell. My mind's eye jumped to a huge collection of Myrtle "burl" I have which is best labeled Myrtle muscle figure. Even that name is not my coinage. The folks at Berkshire Veneer used the term casually while pointing out a flitch of veneer with great cross grain fire. I never thought of my flitch of Myrtle as "muscle" until they said that. So, I present to you my first effort of Modigliani nudes, by way of a thought from Paul D Hayes, a casual remark from Berkshire Veneers and Amedeo himself:

here then is my version of A. Modigliani's "Nude resting on right arm."

In the raw, veneer only and just assembled a few minutes ago:

And, the print of the original:

It is extraordinary the amount of detail your mind can place into this raw effort. At a glance you could consider it finished. I know I'm not capable of leaving it that way though. Indeed minor shading is what I'm hoping to contain myself to including. Time will tell. If you haven't guessed, I'm pleased with this start. Thank You - Amedeo/Paul/Berkshire for this beginning.

We shall see where this all goes.

Late Saturday........

Studying this piece has me mesmerized. I'm no longer sure I will do anything at all to the figure itself. Something about what the wood is bringing to the image is quite powerful. My next contribution to this piece will be a designed background and foreground. Modigliani was spare in his surround. He was right. She doesn't float however, she rests. On what does she rest in my piece, will be the solution. Strong contrast is Modigliani's device. I'm not sure because wood with strong color usually adds figure and might get busy. The process. Always the process. Time.

As I said to Suzanne this evening, continuing will just happen - when it happens. These solutions just arrive after ignoring and then being reacquainted with the piece in a new frame of mind. Time.

Friday, March 16th Evening.

After some false starts I'm almost ready to put Modigliani in the press. She will sit for a while until I'm sure I like it.

The background is slip matched random Cherry. Her pillow is Birdseye Maple, and her "resting place" is a single leaf of cherry with a live edge which has been false mitered to indicate her support. I like that she appears to float. The background has been self matted including contrary ends. (BTW: "live edge" means the lighter sap edges are exactly the way they came off the log, as in the shape of the tree.)

Wednesday March 21st (The day Toby the 'noreaster' arrived)

We decided the above background distracted from the planned nude focal. The temporary solution was to cut out everything but the matte surround and the purfling. The field is now pieced birds eye Maple, meaning it is made from scraps to add directional flow toward the focal nude. This is what it looks like now.

It is extraordinary how much pressure one feels when working with someone else's subject matter. It feels like it is somehow more important to get it right. This doesn't make much sense but it does seem to happen.

A word on copyright: Some art is in the public domain, which means you can do what you want with the graphic or design. There are exceptions however. Picasso is one of those. Apparently all of Picasso's images are FIERCELY protected by his surviving family. There are "agencies" in all civilized countries keeping watch for any use of Picasso's images in the whole or even in part. I am told they are quite serious about chasing down all transgressors.

I did a Google search on Modigliani and found no such organization in defense of using his images for whatever purpose. With the few exceptions, such as Picasso, most art has copyright covering the use of the original image for profit. That is to say making a copy and selling it or using it in advertising. It is rare however that uses such as this use of figure are going to run into objection even if the copyrights still exist.

As I understand it, copyright can flow from a maker to a descendant for up to 70 years after the maker's death. After that, it is in the public domain. As example, Picasso died in 1973 so his descendants can protect his works until 2043. Modigliani died in 1920 so his copyrights ran out in 1990.

All the more reason to do justice to this master. As I worked with his form the true quality of his art got clearer. Certainly the single most important part of working with anyone's form that is not your own creation. No more astute learning can be had than the actual touching of their forms, the looking deeply enough to see what these masters accomplished. Indeed, Modigliani's nudes are the most sensitive portrayals of their kind I have seen.

Although not named as yet, this piece's name will acknowledge A. Modigliani's genius in one way or another.

Saturday, March 31, noonish.

The saga winds down, and here she is:

"A Celebration of Modigliani in Myrtle"

The frame is a story in itself.

While prepping the piece for framing I discovered a simple error. It appears that I didn't square-up the core piece prior to applying the original cherry matte surround (see previous photo above.)

After calming down I simply reduced the size of the core image and planned a wider frame. My new intent was to make a mock-museum-style frame by using mosaic-like pieces stitched together. As that veneer structure evolved I realized I also like the idea of not mitering the corners but rather using an end matched pair at left and right and using cross grained assembly in the top and bottom. Hope you all like it because I love it. (BTW: an aside: the first try was using the sap/heart flitch of Brazilian Rosewood you can see in the sides, but having sapwood all the way around. Ouch! It dominated the art instead of enhancing it. So, I removed all of the sap wood in the top and bottom runs of the frame and replaced it with mottled Sapele for it's contrasting pattern but similar color structure which toned down the frame while still highlighting the art.)

With this new idea in mind I needed a wider than usual frame to carry the detail. My usual narrower frames are mitered at the corners and have a simple 1/4" dado to capture the edges of the 1/4" MDF panels that are my usual substrate. That prompted me to switch to slip jointed corners for strength at this wider than normal dimension.

Finally, in order to be sure that the veneer hit the frame just right and wouldn't shift in the press I made a center core piece 3/16" narrower and shorter than the interior dimensions of the frame and taped it temporarily to the frame veneer holding it at just exactly the right dimensions. It worked. It came out of the press just 3/32 overlap all the way around. Easy shaving with a sharp chisel.

As I have a small stock of 5/4 Wenge I ripped some 3/16 strips, trimmed them up a bit and made interior and exterior beads.

Monday April 2nd, 2018, evening.

Best laid plans is how the adage goes.

As good as my Modigliani is I delivered it today to Art League of Ocean City together with a piece I did a while ago called Tri-square for want of a better name.

This is "Tri-square" as it hangs at ALOC because I never took a picture of it before I delivered it.

This piece was an effort to make a piece without throwing away any veneer scraps. Indeed, each half is the waste or scrap from the other half. They were then attached by 7 pieces of Sapele plus a maple hanging bar viewable in the middle near the top. Three veneers only in "Tri-square."
A 6 piece slip/book match of Japanese Yew (the lightest color)
a 4 piece book match of Zebrano (the striped veneer)
and a single large leaf of rotary cut Mottled Sapele (the darker red areas.)

You may notice that "Tri-square" took an honorable mention at this show. As an aside, I was told by staff at ALOC that the juror indicated she wished she could have awarded ribbons to both pieces. In my opinion she chose Tri-square because it is original and Modigliani is derivative (of course.)

As you can guess, I am very pleased.

"NOTE Worthy" at ALOC

Thursday, March 1, 2018.

Got a call from ALOC. Wouldn't you know it, "Canvas can do miracles" got an Honorable Mention ribbon. I'll post the juror's statement once I have a hard copy of it.




Monday, February 19, 2018.

ALOC "Note Worthy" exhibit coming soon.

The premise of this exhibit is art that was created by inspiration from music. They requested a specific piece of music to be noted: Tune, artist and performance. Their intent is to have a link to Youtube during the show so that you can use your phone to listen to the music that stimulated the art.

I have done two pieces. I almost always design with music on and frequently annotate the music at hand. Because of that I remembered that I had been listening to a very particular solo performance of Camille Saint-Saens' Danse Macabre by Vladimir Horowitz while designing and fabricating a piece I call "Hyperspace Dance."

So here it is, my first submission to "Note Worthy" - "Hyperspace Dance."

This piece is a single leaf of Myrtle 'Muscle Figure' inlayed into some bias cut "Fumed Larch." To achieve the 'macabre' dance I inlayed a strand of Kevazingo (the squiggly line) which I extracted from some scrap by finding the shape I wanted and following the grain so that it would look natural. (Kevazingo is the trade name for plain sliced Bubinga.)

(BTW: Fuming is the process of subjecting wood to the fumes from some sort of acidic mixture. In this case the fuming was industrial strength ammonia. NO, I didn't do the fuming, I bought the veneer already fumed.)

As a second submission I settled on Christopher Cross's performance of his huge hit tune "Sailing" because the tune always moved me. Just the lyrics (at the end of this narrative) are enough, even without the music, because they feel to me like great prose even leaning toward poetry.

I felt I needed to do a new piece mainly because the challenge was do a piece specifically for the show from a specific piece of music. I have sailing themed pieces on hand but wanted the challenge of doing as they asked. It's just who I am I guess; my own kind of adrenalin junky - pressure makes my blood rise.

I listened to Chris's tune several times, printed the lyrics and hung them in my studio/shop. Then I listened some more while reading the lyrics. Eventually I knew what I wanted.  

The feeling I got more strongly than any was from the phrase "The Canvas can do miracles, just you wait and see, believe me."

So, I first wanted the canvas to be dominant. To do that I found the movement I needed to accentuate the shape of the sails (one spinnaker, and one main sail) in some Japanese Elm I have several flitches of. I immediately loved the free form shape of the sails the Elm yielded and started toying with the size and shape of the hull they would predict. After a single false start (I put the sails above a hull of Brazilian Rosewood, maroon in color) and almost immediately was hugely disappointed because it looked, well crafty, and definitely not artistic. Worse, the sails (or canvas) weren't the focal point and this was about 'canvas doing miracles.'

After two days of getting frustrated and thinking about giving up the idea I woke up one morning (this past Sunday in fact) and knew what had to happen: A sky with ghostly suggested clouds would be behind the sails in a Birdseye Maple sky and the hull of the sailboat would be a dreamily 'almost there' ghostly image of a hull. This would make the sails focal.

Indeed, my hope for this piece will be viewers will look at it from a distance and question the sanity of the artist and then come closer out of curiosity for their personal aha! moment when they see what it is and identify with the tune that inspired it. Will it work? How should I know. All art is a gamble isn't it? I especially think the biggest gamble is hoping for a specific response to the idea that made the artist put the first pencil mark of that idea onto paper. It is so much safer to make art look like something or, even to make it look like nothing (such as an abstract) as long as it has a good design foundation. Well enough word-smithing (I can be verbose a bright and good friend recently told me) here then is "Canvas can do miracles."

My miracle (which I'm confidant no one will 'get' is that the spinnaker is fully inflated while the main sail is luff (limp or fluttering.) I hope I've achieved both the serenity and the graceful movement involved in sailing also.

Both the hull and the clouds are suggested by micro carved outlines into the Maple sky and the Chestnut sea. Hopefully these close-ups will help that come clearer.

This piece is just now out of the press and sanded. The micro carving has been better defined and it is ready for any shading I might decide to do. It will be interesting to see what happens with this piece. Interestingly I switch back and forth with it.

Love and worry. (I worry I will embarrass myself with this piece.)

Well, that's why I do this. 

"Sailing" (words by Christopher Cross)

Well, it's not far down to paradise, at least it's not for me

And if the wind is right you can sail away and find tranquility
Oh, the canvas can do miracles, just you wait and see.
Believe me.

It's not far to never-never land, no reason to pretend
And if the wind is right you can find the joy of innocence again
Oh, the canvas can do miracles, just you wait and see.
Believe me.

Sailing takes me away to where I've always heard it could be
Just a dream and the wind to carry me
And soon I will be free

Fantasy, it gets the best of me
When I'm sailing
All caught up in the reverie, every word is a symphony
Won't you believe me?

Sailing takes me away to where I've always heard it could be
Just a dream and the wind to carry me
And soon I will be free

Well it's not far back to sanity, at least it's not for me
And if the wind is right you can sail away and find serenity
Oh, the canvas can do miracles, just you wait and see.
Believe me.

Sailing takes me away to where I've always heard it could be
Just a dream and the wind to carry me
And soon I will be free

Today, March 7th:
Wouldn't you know it, "Canvas can do miracles" took an honorable mention at the Note Worthy exhibit. 90 artists, 6 awards and we took one of them. I guess risks ARE why we do this.

Well I haven't been  hanging around actually, I made a new discovery. My pieces look dramatically better if I put appropriate hardwood frames on them. As I get around to photographing them I will post the before and after pictures here.

This all started because my wife and partner thought I should frame some of my SoDel series if I planned to take them to Yellow Springs. So I did. I think you'll agree that they all look better than they did without the frames. I've done 5 of the 11 remaining so far and have materials cut and/or ideas for the remaining 6.

The Penna Series - Historic Yellow Springs.

The "Penna Series" is a a group I started for exhibit at the the 2018 Yellow Springs Art Show and Sale. It happens at Yellow Springs in Chester Springs, PA and runs from April 28 through May 13th.

This first piece is the required catalog piece and it is called:
"1668 Art School Road" which is the address of the studio depicted in this piece.
21"h  x  31"w with a three level hardwood frame.

Following this will be a triptych piece of the Washington and Lincoln buildings at Historic Yellow Springs. It is underway at this writing and not yet finalized, nor is it titled. (?Georg and Abe?)

The mock-up:

The current plan is that these pieces will have an integral frame, probably perforated and more floating than attached. Looking closely it can be seen that the bias cut Wormy Chestnut matte these three images have in common bring the eye up and to the center. Part of the current issue is that the upper center has nothing to support that directional device once your eyes follow the directional device. One attempt has a suggestion of a significant tree on the property. I'm also considering the hospital ruins as a focal point.

I am now open for suggestions for PA #3 as I like the idea of the Penna Series. I'm hoping for landmarks and well known scenes.

Saturday, Feb 10th.
Decided that the excessive negative space of the upper central piece was the problem blocking the finish of this piece. Have now cut down the width of the central piece and am mocking up cloud structures for the distant sky behind the buildings. In truth, there is a thin forest back there. However, every effort to suggest a forest stole thunder from the buildings.

Now current mock-up:

Once these cloud structures are ready, the next step is to decide on the layup: ie, will it be a triptych or will it be a single panel with some sort of design device separating the three panels. We'll see.

Thursday, Feb 15th.

Decisions have happened. The piece will be a single large panel, roughly (at the moment) 26"h  x  40"w. Two 'design devices' have been inserted between the three panels, the clouds have been finalized and the whole has been matted with Brazilian Rosewood.

Now current mock-up:

There is a mild feeling of negative space in the upper central panel. I am experimenting with a large gnarled tree to give 'enough' focus to that area. Don't want it dominant though.

Getting close to laying up the panel. At the moment I am planning a light colored fairly thin hardwood frame surrounding the Rosewood matte. It should complete the integration of image to matte/frame.

Friday, February 16th.

First, a close-up of the detail I call a design device which separates the three panels. It is essentially a miniature raised panel with the center being Mappa Burl and the chamfer being Sapele. The rails and stiles are Sycamore strips. Note also the cutoff portico from when I made the center narrower runs through and is part of the device also.

The detail:

Finally, pre-layup fascia skin as I call them, here is the final face of the piece prior to re-taping. The new gnarled tree is now inlayed. Some shading and fine tree branching will be added with a hot knife following layup and pre-sanding. Re-taping is the only thing remaining prior to laying up the 3 part sandwich of Veneer face/MDF core/Kraft paper compensator backing.

RE-taping: It can be seen I hope, that this is the finished face. On the back are many layers of blue painter's tape holding this assembly together. While doing the inlay in many steps, the tape build-up on the back (which will become the glue-down surface) can be as many as 4 (or more) layers thick. Here is the back of this piece prior to re-taping:

There are 2 reasons that I work with the front untaped until just before layup:
>First is I'm not clever enough to work an image in reverse - no kidding here, way too easy to get lost as to what goes where working in mirror image.
>Second: I discovered many years ago that the press-down in veneering can be irregular if there are an irregular number of tape thicknesses on the face when it is pressed. Any place where there are the fewest number or even no tape can fail to be fully pressed down causing pockets of glue and therefore a disaster called alligatoring = a sort of washboard irregularity in the surface which literally causes you to sand right through the high spots during the initial sanding.

So, the process goes like this from here: I first put new tape on the face, as much as possible only one layer thick. After every seam is taped on the front I turn it over and start removing all those layers of tape on the back or glue surface. This couldn't be more precarious of a procedure as it is very common for tiny pieces of veneer at seam intersections to come away with the tape. Tedious is an understatement for this part of the work. No miracles to the process other than I use the very sharp corner of a chisel to start each piece of tape and then slowly watch the tape come free. If a piece of veneer appears to be releasing with the tape I use that same chisel to separate the tape and veneer piece which I finally press down into the new front tape. Clear as mud? read it slower and it might come clear.

Wish me luck: more after the piece comes out of the press.

Saturday, February 17th.

Successful press, all seems good.

Right out of the press, this is what it looks like. face tape still on.

The process from here amounts to carefully removing the tape. If the blue painters tape is removed in the first two hours after coming out of the press, generally it comes off cleanly. There are some woods that have what I call fragile grain. What I mean by that is the fibers are not well connected and because of that some fibers will tend to pull right out of the wood during tape removal. In this piece the vulnerable woods are the Holly (very light beige color) and the Lacewood (a peach/brown color.)
On occasion the perfling (narrow strips that separate the borders) can be fragile also. We'll see.

My method for pulling the tape is actually incorporated with careful placement of the final taping done yesterday on the face. Given the vulnerabilities of various woods, the tape is applied across the grain as much as possible rather than with the grain. This is done so during removal I am never pulling the tape continuously along a piece of veneer. Continuous pulling is the greatest way to ruin all of the previous work.

Here is the piece with the tape removed, not yet sanded or trimmed to size.

It shows some minor fiber lifting but no real damage from tape removal. Next is level sanding (120 grit power oscillating disc sander) to simply get all veneers to be absolutely flat and level with each other and expose anything that might need touch-up or even serious repair. Remember, veneer is not equal thickness. The various veneers can be from 0.3mm thick all the way to 0.7mm thick. This first sanding levels them. After trimming to size I will then sand the face again with 180 grit. After all other pre-finishing work is done and prior to sealing it will be finIsh sanded with 320 grit to finally remove all scratches and prepare the wood for a seal coat of lacquer.

Sanded 120 grit to level, edges trimmed. Ready for detailing and touch up.

There are a few flaws, but all and all it is quite clean. The detailing will be interesting. When doing pieces like this the important decision is when to stop. Some detailing will be pyrographed (wood burning knife) some will be ink, or oil pastel, mostly shading on this piece to give it depth. I'm expecting to add some finer branches to the center tree and also to the large dark tree in front of the Washington Building (left.)

Never sure how long it will take to do this, partially because I am prepping for a new exhibit at the Art League of Ocean City. It will start with a reception on March 2nd from 5 PM to 7 PM. The subject is "Note" Worthy - art inspired by music, a specific tune or even a specific performance. I will be posting my two submissions to this exhibit soon.

Friday, February 23.

Finally got back to this piece. If you look closely you can see the changes. Many new branches in all three panels have been pyrographed (wood burning) into the piece. The roofing details were finished by simply adding little horizontal burns in rows. The windows now have tiny indications that there moldings are actually there and the larger tree trunks have been given shape with oil pastels. Finally, the fountain in the middle now has a little shape, also via pyrography.

This piece will now sit for some days while I decide if it is ready for seal coating. Seal coating allows for some subsequent steps in detailing but it also prevents the use of pyrography and oil pastels. Therefore, a wait and debate. I am also going to work on the frame for a while. At the same time I will be planning the framing of a few of my SoDel series pieces so that they will be ready for Yellow Springs also.

Once I decide on which to take (and then frame) I will mention that here.

BTW: I will also be taking one of my more stunning pieces to Yellow Springs:
"Composition #18 - Order"

This piece is about to be framed also. We are speculating on a semi attached frame weighted at the ends more than continuous around in equal widths. The piece is convex in that it is higher in the middle than it is at both ends. A happy accident due to an unfortunate (fortunate?) hanging problem at a previous exhibit. I tried to straighten it and it sudden;y dawned that we like it this way so why not enhance the curve with a frame that compliments that issue. Errors, damage and problems are almost alway opportunities. Lemons into lemonade.

That is the plan currently. This piece got a lot of attention the last time it was shown.

The SoDel Series. In search of.......

Wow. It's been quite a while without a post.

Progress? I guess so.
I've been exhibiting and finding some minimal success. Some awards, some sales, but nothing like my dreamed of heights.

If work is progress, here is my work since I've been gone:

The SoDel Series:
A series on Delaware scenes; 13 different ones here in Sussex County, DE to be precise.
All measure 17" h x 28"w and all are from photos I've taken around Sussex County, DE.

This is "DE #1 The Point" at Cape Henlopen State Park.

This is "DE #2 Big Sky DE farm" Off Cedar Creek Rd in Milton, DE.

This is "DE #3 Night view from Paradise Grill" (self explanatory.)

"DE #4 Safe Harbor" Cape Henlopen State Park

They are well received where ever I show them and do sell. I am proud of them for sure but not real happy that the serious creative work is done after I've taken the pictures. It always seems that I'm cheating somehow. More pieces:

"DE #5 Composing Geese" Early morning on Broadkill Beach.

"DE #6 Watchtowers from Lewes" From Freeman Highway Bridge in Lewes toward the beach.

"DE #7 North of Broadkill Beach" AKA 'The Green House' (self explanatory)

"DE #8 Prime Hook Ice" Prime Hook Game Preserve.

"DE #9 Ground Fog Sunrise" Same tree as #2, different angle and time of day.

"DE #10 Winter's Breath" Rehoboth Beach Boardwalk

"DE #11 Dawn off Broadkill Road" In Milton, self explanatory.

"DE #13 House Martin Hotel" Foggy morning in Henlopen Acres near the marina.

Where is #12 you ask? Well, it is still working. My wife would say I got distracted. Number 12 is a curious piece. I liked (not loved) the photo I took, but still thought it was a good idea. The problem is I'm having trouble bringing it "up" to the level of the others.

Here is the original photo. Hard to tell, but the Indian River Inlet Bridge is barely noticeable behind the distant island. The shot was taken from Angola Point.

This is the mid point mock-up prior to layup. It can be seen that the foreground stumps are taped on as a test.

This is the piece as it stands today. My next step (which I'm debating for 2 months now) is to detail the chop in the Rehoboth Bay waters. Note this shot was taken with a flash and although the veneer is mounted to backer it has no finish coats or sealer on it. This causes the flat and dull appearance. The bridge is a tad bigger than in the photo which may cause a change in title from "A view from Angola Point" to "Indian River Bridge from Angola Point."

Part of my distraction was the imminent need to tender a photo for this year's Yellow Springs Art Show and Sale in Chester Springs, PA. I will be posting in progress shots etc from that work.