An art collector in Mounds View, Minnesota has purchased "Aquarium (after Adolfo Girala)".
This piece of art incorporated silicone, gel and acrylics. The silicone was the tube type one might use on windows or in the bathroom. 20 x 20 gallery canvas.
Sold! An art collector in Palm Springs, California has purchased "Errol Flynn, Boris Karloff, and Lady Gaga Together at Last".
Sold. An art collector in Yucca Valley, California has purchased "Whiskey and Dad". This painting has 10 ounces of Kessler's Whiskey embedded in the acrylic paint and canvas.
An art collector in Saint Paul, Minnesota has purchased "No Mortgage".
A couple weeks ago, in January, when it was as cold as a frozen bone, I made a large fire, using logs of birch, because I wanted some chunks of embers and ashes for next painting. My idea was an abstract representation of my studio, a painting that would embrace the heavily textured surface of the canvas.
I started by using tape to portray the images I thought I might want. That took a couple of days,staring at the canvas, taping and retaping, until I felt I had an image that I liked. I knew from the start that I would use orange, yellow, and black. A strong and uncomplicated color scheme.
The Studio is 36 x 36, on a gallery canvas.
Cow the Cat is visiting my studio today.
We have a fire pit in the backyard and like most folks, with a fire pit, we utilize it to burn a marshmallow, bake bread on a stick (Really! It's quite good!) or roast a hotdog once in awhile.
I had ran out of acrylic pumice and I wanted something to mix with my paint, something with some character and oomph, then Tami said, "What about all the ashes and chunks of charcoal in the fire pit?" I scooped about about a gallon of ashes and cold embers. I mixed the ashes with a gray house paint, then I went to town on this 36 by 36 canvas. The paint was like a dense lava with small boulders in it. I loved it.
After it dried, I had this canvas with a very interesting field. But what to do with it? I kicked ideas around of how to use it -- portrait, landscape whatever. I made my mind up after I saw some work by Beauford Delaney at the Minneapolis Institute of Art.
The painting, Enbridge Pipeline and Northern Minnesota, has been accepted at the Robbin Gallery fine art juried Extremely Minnesota Exhibit. The show will run from November 4 through December 24, 2021.
A tar-sands oil pipeline is under construction across northern Minnesota. The pipeline crosses through wetlands and lakes with seasonal wild rice harvests, as well other fragile habitat. There have been ongoing protests led by Winona LaDuke, Anishinabe peoples, climate change activists, and more, but to this point the powers-that-be are winning the battle.
Dimensions: 26 x 38
Material: Acrylics and paint pens on watercolor paper
