Shows and Competition

I've always admired this painting of "Lucky" and entered it in the Equine Acadamy of Art show but it failed to jury in but I did get it into a show and competition held by the Westcoast Paper Company. Although I will miss this painting should it sell I will be delighted for whoever ends up with it. If I held onto all the paintings I like I wouldn't be making much of a living.
Lucky is one of the best work horses I've ever had. I raised him from a foal. He's called Lucky because he's lucky to be alive when he was born.
The boys wanted to see a foal born so we slept in the barn. I got up thinking it must be time and found my mare Sister looking like she was ready. I got the boys up and we waited, and waited until finally I called the vet. She instructed me to stick my hand in there and see what was going on and when I did there was nobody home. There I am with one arm up to my shoulder and talking on the portable phone to my vet when Stephen Jeffries, a visitor from England, happened to look over the bank and said, "What's that?". I looked over the bank and there was Lucky, all curled up and cold. What a dunder head, the other horses kept siding up to the barn fence and whinnying. I thought they were trying to encourage Sister when all the time they were trying to get my attention to come down and rescue this poor little critter. I hurried on down and picked up the little guy and packed him up the hill. Talk about imprinting. We've been buds ever since. I never had to "break" him. I just showed him once and he got the idea. He's about as honest and bombproof as I have ever seen in a horse. He paces himself in the field and can outwork any other horse on the place without breaking a sweat.
I think this portrait of Lucky, captures his personality and my love for the guy. I especially like the different textures I achieved. The dexterity of brushwork and harmony of value and color is exceptional too if I don't say so myself. Oh, there are deflugalties (new word) but I'm not going to say anything if you won't.

"Sunbathing Betty", oil, 16x20

My favorite model is vaporizing in the sun before my eyes. A dedicated model I couldn't allow her to fry in the 95 degree heat so this session only lasted 20 minutes but I really like how it came off. I've been using oil gesso and sanding it smooth. Using thin washes of Old Holland medium I mix myself I can control the drying time and application. I got some nice sable brushes that make me have finer control. I believe I'm developing my sensitivity to color and handling. I've looked at art all my life without fathoming the finer points of application until I attempt achieving certain effects with the brush.
Instead of diluting hue with titanium white I use the white of the canvas as one would when doing a transparent watercolor. I especially like quick drying glazes that I can immediately layer new strokes. Cool over warm, light over dark etc.

JC is an EFF (emergency fire fighter) for the BIA on the Colville Reservation. Home from U of E. Kentucky, he chases wild fires to earn money for university. He's going to be a famous writer (starting with his first novel, "White on Rez") if his papa has any say in the matter.

To keep him preoccupied he's doing what most young people are doing these days, chatting on his laptop. 30 minutes was about all I could get out of him. He found out how hard it is to sit still or rather my version of sitting still. He's got great features. I hope he takes up my suggestion that he approach the art deptartment at Uof EK or "YUK" as he says, and make $20 an hour as a model. He's a fit dude, packing his firefighting equipment around these mountains keep him fit as a marine.

There are no rules

Attending a show of Impressionists at the Seattle Art Museum, which compares the realism of Fragonard and Rembrandt to the Impressionists Monet and Renoir, I came home and started into a series using a technique of painting used by early masters and taught to me by Leonid Gervits which entails the use of underpainting and glazes, exploiting the natural brightness of the oil primed canvas itself. A technique used by the old masters and shunned by the alla prima work of the Impressionists.
I started this series with a team of horses under a monumental cloudscape. I love painting clouds and have always been attached to studying them. Studio paintings allow me to implement the visual vocabulary I have acquired over the past 35 years of dabbling in art.
Considering imagination to be one of the tools of painting I have yet to explore, I am delighted to explore where I might go.
I started the series with something familiar, a team of horses farming. That idea led to the next painting we call "Blessings", of a willowy woman, arms upraised in supplication, her light dress blowing in the breeze. A very optimistic image that imparts good feelings. This in turn led to the next idea in which I had intended to simply change the dress to one of green and place the figure on a green hill to express the idea of "Verdancy". I started with a nude to get the proportions right with the intent of dressing her with the green gown but the gestalt of the painting led to an entirely different painting, far more spiritual and iconic ending up with a goddess like figure emerging from the clouds bringing rain to the sun baked earth. Still staying with the theme of verdancy I placed the constellation Pisces in the upper left corner which is the constellation the sun is in when it crosses the equator in the northern latitude spring. I put a sliver of moon, one native americans say is the pregnant moon. I'm quite delighted with these paintings and am looking forward to where I might go using my imagination.
Having developed my painting technique through the exercise of alla prima, pleinair painting, I strive to develop content by means of imagination which I feel is another level of effort with enormous possibilities. I find I am at a point where I am familiar enough with the mechanics of making a painting that I the next thing to do is explore the content of my paintings. I will still paint en plein air as that is how one develops the visual vocabulary necessary to fuel the imagination on the journey into an un-mapped world. There are no rules in this world I intend to explore. The danger is to guard against diminishing the effort by editorializing although much of what I'm interested in is definitely political and aspirations that have developed out of a lifetime of experience.
Each of these paintings are 30"x40", oil, done on canvas.

Thoughts on Horse Farming

the pace of time
are horses in a field
working for a man,
a season of plowing,
a season of planting,
a season of harvesting
and a season of rest.
Baling sunshine for food
is how life is meant to be,
a cycle of energy
complete unto itself.
Companions working,
tilling the Garden of Eden.

Thoughts on painting, "En Plein Air"

I've painted, en plein air, from Maine to Washington state. I've stood on the dock painting lobster boats as they came in from lobstering and traded paintings to lobstermen for a sack full of lobster. Parked on the roadside painting landscapes of the Rockies or Wallowas, folks stop, look over my shoulder and take photos of me painting the landscape. We trade email addresses and they send me photographs, sometimes we trade paintings.
Whether painting on the side of the road or the wilderness, the thing I like about plein air painting are the 'Paintouts'. Paintouts have become a popular way for galleries, festivals and communities to ramp up the exposure to art. Such events are an opportunity for artists to meet other artists and compare their work. Galleries and community art festivals get an opportunity to showcase their local artists and invite outside artists, sometimes of great stature, to their community, which can be a great economic boon to all parties. Artists are invited to "paint the town", after a day or two, paintings are collected for a show and reception where the work is displayed, and awards presented. It's a great way for art to bring artists and the public together. The public gets to see artists at work and are thrilled to find ordinary scenes brought to life by gifted painters.
Artists have always turned to nature for both inspiration and knowledge. The Impressionists made a practice of working directly from nature. Today painting "en plein air", literally, painting "out of doors", has become something of a movement along with an interest in "daily painting" in which painters challenge themselves to do a painting a day. Google 'daily painting' and you will find blogs and websites displaying extraordinary galleries of artwork. Many of these pieces are available directly from the artist or sold at auction on Ebay for very reasonable prices.

Painting 'en plein air' fits our busy lifestyle. In an abbreviated world of acronyms and sound bites, small quick paintings done on the spot, are only appropriate. It is the artist freezing a moment of time, focusing like a Zen master and deriving inspiration from an intense reflection upon nature, like haiku poetry, distilling the moment into it's essence. A process where the heritage of the Impressionists meet the oriental art of Zen masters.

Much has been written about the Impressionists' interest in oriental prints. I think they were as interested in the process as much as the product. Untill Monet and the Impressionists took painting out of the atlier and Salon into the streets and forests, official art was considered to be work done in the studio. To consider work done "in the moment", on site, en plein air, was revolutionary. We can thank Monet for elevating everyday scenes to the extraordinary and bringing art to the common man. Painting was no longer an activity for the affluent but something anyone could do. With the advent of paint in tubes, artists developed a portable studio. The french easle and pochade to carry wet canvas, became synonymous with the image of the artist at work.
It is a privledge to make a living as an artist but it is also a job that puts bread on the table. Like a carpenter or plumber, doctor or dentist the artist and his tools find work enhancing our lives and culture, turning the mundane into the thing of beauty to be appreciated in our busy hyphenated lives.


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Kress Gallery Opening

The show in Spokane at the Kress Gallery went well. My friend Slatz was the guest poet and hushed the crowd with his wonderfully embellished poetry. Quite appropriatelly Slatz read from his suite of poems titled "Seasons" which went well with my series on the wall behind him titled "Seasons". To be honest, we didn't plan things this way but the collaboration started 30 years ago with myself playing guitar behind Slatz. I look forward to more such opportunities.
Perhaps it would be appropriate to organize a political fund raiser with all such artist types. After all it is an election year. Artist should let their candidates know what they think and ramp up the support for the arts. Thanks to Mapplethorp for blowing the government off with his explicit photography, politicians are allergic to the political risk of supporting art and the results are a culturally impoverished public art world.
Ryan Hardesty manager of the art@work program who hung the show and did an exceptional job. It was great to see my work all in one room. I had over 30 plein air paintings which just filled the room. Ellizabeth Mills, manager for Riverpark marketing department helped make the show possible. Luna's catered the event with wonderfully creative treats. I greatly admire the art@work program that the Northwest Museum of Arts and Cultures. Paintings can be leased with the rental going towards the eventual purchase of the piece or the piece can be returned and anther tried on. A great deal for artist finding a home and income for their work and a way for new collectors to get started. Thanks to all who attendende and for those of you that have the opportunity the show will be off for a couple months at Riverpark Mall.

One Man Show in Spokane, Wa

Up Coming Art Shows and Paint Outs

May-July, I have a piece in the Coos Bay Museum, Expressions West Show, have to try their marine exhibit and paintout next year.
June 6, Kress Gallery, Riverpark Square, Spokane, WA. Opening One Man Show, "Fresh Air, The Plein Air Paintings of Gregg Caudell. Reception, with poet, Slatz, reading from his series, "Seasons". I'll have my easle out getting paint on my good cloths. I should have called the show "Seasons" as I have a Season Series myself and many of my subjects are the same in different seasons, such as the "Willow" Series. I have a large sculptured willow tree outside my house that I paint in every season and time of day. It has great sweeping branches that are gold against a cerulean sky. The horses have stripped the bark off the lower branches making for interesting lines. It sits in a slough and must drink hundreds of gallons of water a day. A solar water pump that sleeps in the winter. It is just waking up now and is completely golden flowers.
Slatz, a.k.a. Dick Bresgal, and I used to go around with a group of other inspired types giving poetry recitals in the Spokane region. Dick still writes and keep his hand in such creative endeavors. It will be like old times, coming full circle. He's quite a character, about 6'3", long mane of silver hair, voice like a gentle giant and writes with the moon in the corner of his eye. Should be a great time. Come on down!

June, 2-8, Wallowa Arts Festival, Joseph, Oregon. I'll be visiting the area to paint and show. There will be an auction of plein air work on Saturday night at the Civic Center. Never been to Joseph but it looks stunning. Little Town by a lake surrounded by mountains. Sounds like home. The date runs concurrently with Spokane so it will be a shuffle for me to hot foot it back up to Spokane for the opening reception of my show and then back down to paint on Saturday.

August 1-8, not for sure but I've been invited to Cheyenne, WY, to a paintout. A bit far to go but I should be done putting up hay in time to make that one too. Like to think I could go down through Yellowstone but that is the hieght of tourist season and I've never been down the back roads of Idaho.

The Art of Farming

Riding a Sulky Plow is quite an experience. I would compare it to the delight cutting a nice furrow is to painting as a brush is to canvas until you get to the end of the furrows and it's like riding a bucking horse and just staying in the saddle is a challenge in the rough sea of sod. I can understand the term, "sodbuster" and have a new found respect for the term.

Plowing a field takes planning if you want to save yourself some work. The first furrow dictates what the rest of the day will go like. Even with a single bottom sulky plow you want long straight rows. Turns get the team out of the furrow and onto rough plowed sod and that's like riding a cork in white water rapids. I usually get off and SLOWLY turn the horses. I've been bucked off a time or two but ended up on my feet yelling "WHOA!!!!"

After we get the plowing done, we'll disk it all up and seed it to an oat hay cover crop with pasture mix seeded for next year. The price of seed is 3 times higher than previous years but then so is the crop. I may even put in some spuds. Do some Yukon Golds and Peruvian Purples. I don't mind if I can weed them with the horses. I'd much rather make my own fuel. Talk about a small 'carbon footprint', I'd rather a footprint of a horse "U".

There's not much that beats a good team of horses plowing on a sunny spring day. You can watch the trees turn green. The birds are great after the long winter we had. After each furrow we get a breather because the horses are getting in shape and cutting sod is a real chore. I take out my little sketch book and sketch the pond or the ol wagon wheel laying burned in the river bank, maybe the rear view of the team or the wall of canyon we live in. Eagles fish the river and swallows fill the air. Mixing Art and Life.

Horse Farming on the Sanpoil