Oils

"Holiday Road" by Lesley Spanos. Oil painting on Ampersand Gessobord, 5" x 7". Copyright ©2011 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

Funny how some paintings grow on you. When I finished this one a few weeks ago, I didn’t think it was up to my standards. I was going to wipe it off and start over. But it had so freaking much paint on it. Wiping it would have created a toxic mess. So I put it aside, thinking it would be easier to deal with when dry.

Over the weeks, my revulsion mellowed. I started thinking maybe it wasn’t so bad. Maybe even I liked it a little bit. The warmth of the colors made me feel good, and the texture was pleasing. The day it was dry enough to test in a gold frame, I fell in love. Not the first time that’s happened to me…

"Chocolate Eclair" by Lesley Spanos. Oil painting on acrylic-toned canvas panel, 5" x 5". Copyright ©2009 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

How many starving children can be fed with one chocolate eclair? I’m listing this little painting on The Daily Paintworks Help the Children of Africa Challenge. Proceeds from the sale will be donated to World Vision to help feed drought-stricken children in Africa.

Here’s how it works:
The painting is up for auction on the Daily Paintworks site. When the seven day auction is over, the winning bidder pays me via the DPW auction website. Then I send 100% of the donation to World Vision, and a receipt as proof of donation to the buyer. Buyer gets the painting, and I get the tax deduction. I’m throwing in free shipping anywhere in the United States.

I want to make sure this painting sells because any amount is helpful, so I’m starting the auction at a low, low price of only $30!

"Me, 2011" by Lesley Spanos. Oil painting on Multimedia Artboard, 6" x 8". Copyright ©2011 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

Other than my hair being a mess, today seemed like a good day for a self portrait. My new Alzo Digital color corrected studio bulbs arrived, and I was eager to  try them on painting from life. I haven’t been using daylight bulbs, and I really should, especially when I’m color correcting images for print work. The light from the bulbs looked too blue in the room at first, but once I started painting, I loved them. Mixing color was effortless when I wasn’t fighting the light.

I loved them even more when I discovered that all I had to do to get a perfect photo indoors was match the color temp on my camera with color temp of the bulbs. Perfect shot the first time, with no color correction needed in Photoshop. Why, oh why didn’t I get these bulbs sooner?

Photo taken in studio. No color correction applied! Perfect!

"Clutches" by Lesley Spanos. Oil painting on Gessobord, 5" x 7". Copyright ©2011 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

There’s a little game I like to play to challenge myself when painting people. As I work on the initial composition, I ask myself “How much information can I eliminate, and still tell this person’s story?” This forces me to narrow my focus, and hone in on what drew me to the scene in the first place.

In this case, I liked how the woman held her clutch purse while perching delicately behind her wheat-bellied partner.  Showing their faces would not have enhanced that story, so… off with their heads! That’s how we see things, anyway – in bits and pieces, not everything all at once.

This painting is from my State Fair USA series. I photographed this couple as they arrived at the fair. After some research, I think this might be a Yamaha Royal Star Venture from the early 2000s. Any experts out there who can verify this?

"Pacer" by Lesley Spanos. Oil painting on Raymar panel, 6" x 8". Copyright ©2011 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

Watching harness racing at the state fair is like stepping back in time one hundred years.  Makes me feel like I should be wearing a long dress and corset and singing Camptown Races.

The Indiana Pacers basketball team is named after these horses. In the early days of the team, they played in the arena at the fairgrounds, right next to the harness track.

"Kitchenaid" by Lesley Spanos. Oil painting on Multimedia Artboard mounted on Gessobord, 5 x 7". Copyright ©2011 Lesley Spanos, all rights reserved.

The good folks over at Daily Paintworks have started offering weekly art challenges. Some of my absolute favorite artists on the net are in DPW, so it’s a real treat to get the opportunity to participate. Each week is like a mini-lesson from a master artist. This week’s challenge is  the One Color per Stroke Challenge, offered by Carol Marine. I have drooled over her work for ages, admiring her ability to simplify complex areas into just one or two supremely confident and dead-on accurate strokes. Anything that offers more insight into her technique is a must-do.

Working one stroke at a time isn’t easy for someone like me. My way is to tweak the paint until it looks right. My brain screamed, “It’s too  hard!” but I pushed on. I think the lesson here is to slow down and OBSERVE. I felt like I was painting at a snail’s pace, yet the painting actually came together quicker than usual because I didn’t keep fussing with it forever.

BTW, this mixer, oddly enough, is another State Fair image. Yes, you really can paint just about anything at the fair! I like strolling through the food concession stands early in the morning before they open, photographing kitchen stuff like this through the glass. This red mixer was stunning in the early morning sunlight next to a bowl of lemons.