It has been a pleasure although a challenging one, to work in acrylics to express my ideas.  After an inspiring trip to the Sea of Cortez  after the dreary taking a break from the grey of winter in the North.  I think I understand why Mexican art is so colorful.  It must be the light at the Tropic of Cancer.  I look forward to spending more time there to discover why else the house are so colorful and the culture is as spicy as its food.

Sea of Cortez, 12x24, acrylic, Available, email; gcaudell@msn.com

Working with acrylics has been daunting although once I've found the right process I'm excited to pursue more work.  It has it's detractions but it has attributes that oils don't allow.  I especially like how fast it dries so one can proceed with the next part of the process.  It's also less toxic than oils and their solvents.  Something that is problematic in the closed space of my studio, even with an exhaust fan.  I like large washes to achieve effects although I like working impasto en plein air, I have yet to develop a good impasto technique in acrylics but have alot of exploration to do with achieving new effects with acrylic mediums.

My 50 year reluctance to using acrylics has been a dedication to the heritage of art history bias that "important" paintings are oil paintings.  I see now how rediculous that prejudice is especially with the advent of digital art, something like how the artists of the 1800's felt about painting when photography came along.  Today there is a question whether digital art is art.  Of course it is, art is the expression of ideas by mark making.  I doesn't matter if that mark was made by a stone age artist or a person or machine using "code" to generate an image.  Fear of change is fatal.

 San Jose del Cabo, Baja California and the Sea of Cortez otherwise know as the Gulf of California.  The resort Meca of Baja.  Extrordinary disparity between the have and have nots.  One dependent on the other, both in a landscape of sun and the fecudity of the Sea of Cortez, that the famous marine explorer, Jacque Cousteau called the Aqarium of the World.  

As winter buries us in snow and cold we seek the opportunity to re-charge solar selves under the sun at the Tropic of Cancer.  As John Steinbeck wrote in his "Log of the Sea of Cortez", the desert is only a footnote to the Sea of Cortez".  A place that still seems to be full of life despite the assault open Earth's habitats.  Although the fishery may be smaller and pearls no longer the treasure locked along the shore by oysters, there is still an admrable spectrum of wildlife both marine and avian.  Whales and manta rays swim with pelagic fish and frigate birds, pellicans and fish hawks.  I'm sure the desert has it's features but the ocean compels my interest.

Wandering the tourist part of San Jose one finds the typical merch one would anywhere in Mexico's resort towns.  I did find the central palaza which was an energized community event where local families, artists and musicians played off of one another.  

                         

Fishermen that we are, we scored a trip with Captan Allehandro and young deckhand Christian who put us on Dorado.  A delicious fish that is milder than tuna but the same flavor.  A new favorite.  After catching 4 of them we went searching for Marlin without success.  Winter is less successful than fishing in the summer but far more pleasant than summer temperatures of 100+ degrees.  We enjoyed a pleasant 80 degrees and slept outside under the stars in the cool off shore breezes. 

I look forward to going back and make it my own happy place.  Not a difficult task as there will be much fishing and new paintings.  One goal will be to learn enough Spanish to get to know the locals.

Vayacon dios me amigos and amiga.

 Place, as in plein air.  Because I believe in reincarnation i.e. that not only one's body is recycled by nature but one's soul is recycled on the wheel of karma to learn the lessons one needs to grow as a being, that place is where one is launched/reborn or to start again.  I feel that place must be memorized so that one's soul/spirit can begin again.  I record that place by painting en plein air.  I am memorizing/memorializing the Sanpoil Valley as that place.  Curiously I must have a lot to learn because most all of my life for many moves has been along the 48th parralell of the U.S. Perhaps I was with David Thompson.  (look up who died with him along the 48th parallel when he was surveying the 49th paralell.

"Sleeping Salmon Mountain", 12x24, acrylic, Available, email; gcaudell@msn.com

"Winter, Sanpoil Valley", 30x40, oil, SOLD

 The cold and snow continues in the the mountains of eastern washington.  Painting en pleinair is a challenge but one perseveres hoping for the warm spring days to come.  The birds are anxious and have delayed nest building and the bees are hunkered down hoping for trees to bloom and provide badly needed pollen to sustain themselves and grow their brood to replace all the workers that didn't make it to spring.  C'mon girls hang in there!

 Raven and Coot, 6"x14", acrylic 

Raven and Coot

Tsimshian

Myths and Legends of Alaska, Katherine Berry Judson

A LONG time ago, Raven wanted all the birds to look well, so he painted them.  Raven painted Coot last.  Then Coot began to paint Raven, who wanted many bright colors.  So Coot painted Raven with bright colors with one hand, but in the other hand he hid charcoal.  When Raven looked away, Coot quickly blackened all the bright colors with charcoal.  Then Raven was angry and he chased Coot.  But Coot ran too quickly, so Raven threw white mud at him, white mud which spattered over Coot.  Therefore Coot had white spots on his head and back.  But Coot flew away and left Raven all black.

Peace Angels, digital drawing

 The anxiety and fear of the day

 weighs on my happiness like a cloud hiding the sun on a cold winter day.  

I kick a mosaic of autumn leaves and angels fly from my feet bringing a smile.

Betty's Brook #5, 30x40, oil

 

Betty's Brook #4, 36x36, oil

 

Quotable Me

 "The artist paints from a vision within and sees himself in the world around him."

3rd in a Series; Betty's Brook, 24x24, oil

I guess I'm into a series, Betty's Brook. There's an enormous artesian spring on the Westfork Ranch.  It never freezes in the winter no matter how cold.  It is deep in the alder, aspen and cottonwoods and runs into the Sanpoil.  The trails that run through it are made by range cows, moose and deer. It is a bird paradise with many waterfowl and marsh birds nesting in the spring, returning in the fall on their way to southern climes. It is a classic wetland the sort salmon used to call home.  

The process is one of distilling the impressions of the place into a technique that is the language of expression.  The artist paints from a vision within and sees himself in the world around him.

                                                              Betty's Brook 3, 24x24, oil, SOLD