A Special Night

Andrew commissioned this painting for his wife. I painted from his photo of them at the Empire State Building.

14" x 11" Oil on Linen
NFS

Here is the sketch:

I set out a full palette for this painting:

And started with an transparent iron oxide underpainting that I like to have show through near the edges. It also avoids any glaring white showing through from the canvas.

Will you marry me Sarah?

Will you...

11" x 14" Oil on linen.

Not For Sale

This has been on my easel for a very long time. Life and

programming has been cosuming my painting time. At

any rate, I think it may be done.

Five Stages

8" x 10" Oil on Linen.

Peter Sagan collected a literal hand full of stage wins at the Tour of California this year. It will be interesting to see him head to head with all the other top sprinters at the Tour de France. I can see him giving Cavendish a run for his money since he continued this dominance in Switzerland. I cropped my composition to put his hand at the upper left sweet spot. The shoulder to his left is Boonen.

Cycling Photogs

11" x 14" Oil on Linen.

In a Private collection.

Leon Z allowed me to paint from his photo reference. He said, "This shot just says something..........I'm not sure what, it just speaks to me!" I agree.

 I really liked the contrast between Jono and Beth as they wait for the approaching racers at the US Pro Cycling Challenge in Colorado. I thought at first this was Liz  since she is always wearing some pink. Beth Schneider confirms it is her in the comments. She is about 4 ' 10" and Jono is well over 6ft. 

Mountains Leader

11" x 14" Oil on Linen.

On Sales at DailyPaintworks (click to bid.)

Here is a closer composition of the Polka Dot Jersey. The lost edges and exaggeration are pushed a little farther. I wanted this one to more closely match the Green Jersey painting.

Polka Dot Jersey

11" x 14" Oil on Linen.

On sale at DailyPaintworks (click to bid.)

The Polka Dot Jersey in the Tour de France and several other stage races is worn by the leader in the climber's classification. I expect that we might see Andy Schleck  in that jersey as the attacks to take time out of Cadel Evans. It might look like this.

Cavendish Winning

10" x 8" Oil and Linen.

On sale at DailyPaintworks (click to bid.)

I think we will be seeing the rainbow jersey in this pose a lot this year. Mark is not succumbing to any World Champion Jersey curse. Mark won the sprinter friendly World Championship Road Race last year, so this year he gets to has to wear the rainbow stripes in road races. He might be wearing a classification jersey (like the Tour de France Green Jersey.)

For this painting, I used photo reference from 2010 (that I have permission to use) and dressed him in the rainbow stripes. 

Dancer

11" x 14" Oil on Linen.

For Sale at DailyPaintworks (Click here to bid.)

Mike Gladu shared a nice photo of  his niece Madeline dancing. The frozen moment of time made a great painting subject. 

Fan Dancer #4

10" x 10" Oil on Deep Gallery Wrap Canvas.

In a private collection.

Wayne, Pa

This will be the last dancer, for now. I saved the most dynamic to finish the quartet. I think they would  look great hanging together. 

Fan Dancer #3

10" x 10" Oil on Gallery Wrap Canvas.

In a private collection.

Wayne, Pa

For the third in this series I picked one of the most dynamic standing poses. The pronounced wrinkles and interesting line made this fun to paint. I worked at keeping some hard and lost edges in the figure. Finally, there is the hint of her form in the shadow in front of her.

The next in the series is going to go in a different direction.

Fan Dancer #2

10" x 10" Oil on Gallery Wrap Canvas.

In a private collection.

Wayne, Pa

This second fan dancer offered a solid pyramid to work with in the composition. I placed her slightly off center to avoid too much symmetry. I worked carefully with the narrow choices of color.

Fan Dancer #1

10" x 10" Oil on Gallery Wrap Canvas.

In a private collection.

Wayne, Pa

This is the first in a series of "fan" dancers that performed at the Beijing Paralympic Games. My wife captured part of their performance in snapshots and I love their poses. I'm not sure how many I will do, but there is some good material from which to work.

Swan Reflection

10" x 10" Oil on gallery wrap canvas.
On auction at DPW.

This swan has been in my photo reference for a while. It has nice wild reflections and is romantically from near Chillon Castle in Switzerland, I believe. The swans I recently painted reminded me of this one, along with looking for a good reflection to paint.

I hope to be posting more regularly now that the holidays are over and I seem to be on the mend from a very persistent bug.

German Restaurant

11" x 14" Oil on Linen

Even though I am no fan of smoking, I zeroed in on this couple when looking at the DPW Challenge for painting part of a busy scene. I tried to keep the background simple and wish I had held back from detail overall. Mid-sized figures like this are indeed a challenge.

Chris at the Finish

18" x 12" Oil on linen.

This is a view of Chris Horner coming down the finishing "chute" at this year's Solvang Time Trial Stage of the Amgen Tour of California. The motorcycle should really not be here, but sometimes you miss the deviation turn. Oops! It almost looks like they are trying to beat the eventual winner to the finish line.

Jens About to Win

20" x 30" Oil on linen on panel.

In a Private collection.

Checking Behind is a favorite of my paintings for me, so this summer I have been working on a larger revisit to the same subject. Only this time, I put a Leopard Trek Jersey on the rider to update it for 2011. I like to think that this is Jens Voigt about to win after a daring breakaway.

Chris and Tod

8" x 10" Oil on Linen on Panel

Chris Horner on his attack up Sierra Road in this year's Amgen Tour of California. This painting is based on a Jono Devich photo (thanks!) with a lot of editing. The whole scene includes Alex & Casey, Levi, and two more motos further in the background. This was the attack that won the race on a beautiful and hectic day climbing the mountains overlooking San Jose.

In this composition, I wanted to have the focus balanced between the camera lens and Chris' figure. I also wanted to capture the "likeness" of Tod on the moto. If I was to revisit this, I would give the scene more space to breathe inside the edges of the painting. I also would want to downplay all of the details away from the camera lens. I really enjoy how the cool shadow on the bright pavement looks and want to repeat that success.

Nice Doggy

11" x 14" Oil on linen.
In a private collection
Lynnwood, Wa

Victor is a very docile dog. He doesn't really get bothered by a good pat (Bonk!) on the head. Here Carmen is giving him a pat goodbye. Compare this to Bye Bye Victor where Carmen is reacting to a slight scolding for being a little rough. I enjoyed visiting this set of reference photos again. I wanted to capture the moment and motion of that vigorous pat. The amount of details involved quite a bit of time.

Compositionally, there are a lot of interesting points to draw your eye. The sharpest contrasts and the natural focal point of a face are toward the top, but the pyramid of the figures anchors the painting. Her swinging hand is near the center of the picture, but not quite; the motion helps your eye to Victor's head. I liked playing up the relative motion of her arms and the tip-toe on her left foot that she has from the good back-swing.