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, […]
Exhibition: Backstage Pass opened at Kemper Museum
Last night, Linda and I had a ball at the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art here in Kansas City. It was the opening of their new show, Backstage Pass: Collecting Art in Kansas City which runs September 7–November 4, 2007. By pairing artworks from area private collections with examples by the same artists represented in […]
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 […]
“Jim” acrylic gesture grid painting on Rives BFK 42 x 24 inches
Today I completed a second painting of “Jim” using the 16-value geometric gestures from the previous attempt, but scaled down so that each is 0.2 inches square, producing an image about 40 inches high by 22 inches wide. The 200 x 120 gesture grid (24,000 squares) was painted more than six times using four colors […]
Backsliding… “Jim” painting 80 x 44 inches (image area) — a colorful MESS
Yesterday (February 13, 2007) I completed a first LARGE painting using an airbrush mounted on my CNC machine to paint 22,000 0.4 inch squares (200 x 110 squares) in four transparent colors on Rives BFK paper. One of 17 simple shapes designed to produce tone in even steps from lightest to darkest was painted in […]
computer controlled airbrush gizmo complete
Jan 22, 2007: Computer controlled paintbrush gizmo up and running as of 30 minutes ago!!! Parts for airbrush assembly – the airbrush itself is just above the angle iron with the solenoid already installed. Solenoid plunger above it, little bent aluminum airbrush retaining clips above airbrush – the angle iron gets bolted into the aluminum […]
Exhibition: Mike Lyon: Large Scale Drawings and Woodblock Prints
An exhibition of my recent work titled: “Mike Lyon: Large Scale Drawings and Woodblock Prints” runs September 1, through October 21, 2006 at Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, 2004 Baltimore, Kansas City, Missouri. Opening: 7-9 pm First Friday, September 1, 2006, hours 11-5 Tue through Saturday, 816-221=2626. Here’s the gallery’s mailer (folds are in the mailer, […]
“Sara” 42×77 inch woodcut from 17 blocks
The large (42 x 77 inch) prints of “Sara” reclining on her messy bed have been successfully completed — I selected 8 for the edition plus two proofs. There is some variation among the edition, the greatest differences being in the depth of the deepest tones behind the head and in the top background — […]
Lily Drawing Complete 54 x 23 inches
June 17, 2006 Today I am about a third of the way through another pen and ink drawing, this one of my god-daughter, Lily… Although Lily is usually smiling and showing off, I liked her ambiguous expression in this image… Yesterday noon, Lily and her Mom, Sarah, showed up at the studio with a half-hour […]
“Sarah” pen and ink drawing 7 x 3.75 feet Complete
The first two papers I tried for this life-size figure drawing weren’t strong enough and they were torn to shreds relatively early in the process. I finally had success (after almost a month of experimenting) with Arches 300 lb. hot press watercolor paper — it is VERY strong and held up beautifully! The squiggly lines […]