In Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism, Marishi-ten is the goddess of the heavens, goddess of light, and a solar deity. Although Marishi-ten worship predates Zen, it is geared towards a similar meditative mode to enable a warrior to achieve a heightened spiritual level. Losing interest in issues of victory or defeat (life and death), he is freed […]
Peregrine 90 x 38.5 inch painting in acrylic and sumi on gilded paper
Today I completed a LOOOOONG project — the painting of fellow artist Peregrine Honig in black and white acrylics over sumi-painted and gilded paper. It’s somewhat larger than life. I first painted the paper black with sumi ink. Then I gilded the clothing area in silver leaf. My plan was to paint black on the […]
‘Joanne’ painting 35×21 inches on tinted paper
Today I completed this (little bit scary) portrait of my Mom (Joanne) painting in white and black Golden Liquid Acrylics over paper tinted blue-gray using dilute sumi and prussian blue applied to the paper by wiping with a sponge. This and the previous painting of ‘Lee’ completed a few days ago are experiments in the […]
‘Lee’ painting 35 x 21 inches
‘LEE’ 2009, 35×21 inches, acrylic painting on tinted paper
Crosby watercolor and ink 90 x 45 inches
When my “Sarah” drawing was first exhibited at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, the founder’s wife appreciated it and invited me to create a similar life-size portrait of her husband, Crosby, a giant of a man and huge patron of the arts. They loved this portrait and it was later purchased by the museum […]
“Linda” 75 x 45 inch acrylic painting on unprimed canvas
I’ve been working for a couple of weeks now on a couple of long-term fascinations of mine — painting with a limited palette in a grid, and my wife’s beautiful face ! I suppose this latest endeavor was inspired (in part) by the needlepoint stockings my wife and I are making for a niece and […]
Self Portrait, painting in acrylic on linen, 60×40 inches
Today I completed something a little bit ‘different’… Looking back to the velvet paintings displayed at the 5 and dime when I was a kid — maybe they’re still up there today — hula girls, Elvis in all his glory, typical 60’s kitch in stiff opaque color practically glowing out of that black-black velvet… Well, […]
43 x 27 inch acrylic on BFK painting (self portrait improved)
This painting in acrylics on BFK paper went through several states and many weeks before arriving at an acceptable result. Here’s the final state of the painting: BFK is a very soft paper — because the tip of the flow-pen actually touches the surface, the paper becomes abraded (deeply abraded) as the tip repeatedly passes […]
54 x 29 inch gesture painting (self portrait)
Another ‘gesture’ painting — this one uses the same gesture character set as my earlier (and smaller) airbrushed “Jim”, but the gestures are slightly larger (1/4 inch squares) and are painted using the Paasche Flow Pencil, so the tip touches the paper. It’s painted on Rives BFK, so the paper surface has been abraded quite […]
Painting with Paasche Flow Pencil
I’m working on a short series of painted self-portraits at the moment. I’ve mounted a Paasche Flow Pencil (very much like an airbrush, only without the air — the ‘nozzle’ is conical and a needle valve seats in the nozzle in order to control the flow of paint. The Paasche is not a very high-precision […]