Remnants Revisited

Last week I featured some new work that was inspired by a visit to an old mannequin refurbishing warehouse. This week I'd like to include a couple of earlier charcoal drawings, along with a watercolor piece that developed from this same beautiful and haunting experience in a lonely warehouse, among remnants of a time long forgotten.

Re-imagining Remnants

A while back I ventured into an old, dilapidated mannequin refurbishing warehouse that hadn't been used since the late 1970's. The abandoned warehouse was full of old mannequins from the 1950's, 60's and 70's. The macabre experience was one of disconcertion and uneasiness. I have been working on an ongoing series of images based on that encounter for some time now. Elements of this body of work still find their way into my recent images and will become more predominate in the near future.

This encounter in the mannequin warehouse often brings me back to an episode of The Twilight Zone written by Rod Serling entitled The After Hours. This episode takes place late at night in a department store where the line between the living and the inanimate blurs irrevocably.

I'll be featuring some earlier and more recent works as well as preliminary renderings from this series. I've posted a piece I've been working on based on this experience that is finding its way into my new series entitled Altered Perceptions.

Preliminary Sketch

I spent some time in Charleston, SC and Savannah, GA recently and I was drawn to a particular 19th century statue I came across in Charleston. I'm fond of statues with elegantly sculpted drapery where the form underneath the figure is still somewhat visible. This statue is a beautiful example of this. The sculptor kept the facial features clearly evident while chiseling the veil that lies over the head and ghost-like visage of the marble bust. This is an example of one of my preliminary sketches I do in pencil to work out scale and placement of forms before moving on and rendering the final piece. Here I included into the composition, a swatch of Victorian era pattern and a print of an old photo from the first half of the 20th century.

More Travel Sketches

Thought I'd share a few more travel sketches. One of my favorite countries to visit is Italy, and one of the most unique cities on planet Earth is Venice, Italy. Venice is so rich in history, culture, and architecture that it often finds its way into my sketchbook. Piazza San Marco (St. Mark's Square) in Venice is a great place to sketch. I'm particularly drawn to the exquisite Byzantine architecture of St. Mark's Basilica. One sketch of the great cathedral seen here found its way into a final piece in my Divine Messenger Series. The sketches in this week's blog were drawn on location from the following places.

Grand Canal, Venice, Italy

Piazza Navona, Rome, Italy

Bernini's Elephant in Minerva Square, Rome, Italy

Shop Street, Galway, Ireland

Santa Maria Della Salute, Venice, Italy

Florence, Italy

Saint Mark's Square and Basilica, Venice, Italy

Cathedral Basilica of Saint Mark, Venice, Italy

Travel Sketches

My work is heavily influenced by my travels. I always keep a sketchbook on me and many of my sketchbook renderings act as preliminary drawings or inspiration for more finished pieces. I often sketch quickly in pen because it forces me to record what I’m seeing more accurately. Sketching also helps me to really study and observe my surroundings on a whole different level than the casual observer. I'll be sure and post sketchbook drawings periodically.

These sketchbook renderings were drawn on location from the following places.

Capitoline Hill, Rome, Italy

El Castillo, Chichen Itza, Mexico

Venice, Italy

Charleston, South Carolina

Salzburg, Austria

Subiaco Abbey, Subiaco, Arkansas

Student Exhibit

Just thought I’d showcase some of my last semester, Intro to Studio Art students’ work from the December, student art exhibit which hung in the art department halls at NWACC. Many of my basic studio art students had little art training prior to this class. They worked really hard and ended up with some impressive results.

Light and Shadow Pattern Objective: To learn to render full value and perceive light and shadow with close up of found object. The overall design of the finished product is the most important aspect of this project. The end result may be so close up that it hardly resembles the object you are rendering, but rather, a strange landscape or abstract geometric or organic form.

Rhythm Objective: To create a sense of rhythmic variation and to explore visual emphasis.

Rectilinear and Curved Shape Composition Objective: To Investigate composition using design principles of repetition, similarity, variation, balance, and harmony, using the whole picture-plane and creating figure-ground interrelationships with rectilinear shapes.

In Progress

Our mind can produce images that are not completely dependent on external stimulation. These images can be mistaken for real objects. My work is often based on the mysteries of perception and consciousness. At this point the inner workings of the brain are still shrouded in mystery even within the circles of neuroscience. Much of what we experience is the result of information being passed through neurons in the brain, but it is still unknown how neural information is coded. How memories are stored and retrieved or how time is represented within the brain is unclear. Neuroscience is hazy about what exactly is consciousness or why we dream. I continually explore examples of this though my art.

My work often involves layering of images and the juxtaposition of organic and geometric forms. This piece I’m currently working on is an example of this.