Latest "Lane Marker"

31" x 47"

This is the largest of the "Lane Markers" group. I would have expected to work on and finish it after the smaller ones. My fascination with/fear of, insular cultures is showing.

CK Art Company web site

I've updated my business web site: www.ckartco.com , and added some services. I'm open to suggestions regarding the names of these new sevices. Really, I'm not that attached to the names "Ding Doctor" and "Spangles". I will have a service "Project Tutor", where you just hire me as needed, to help with your d-i-y project. I'm also going to develop workshops which are geared for the do-it-yourselfer.

I need to get the business geared back up, and am excited about these new options.

Even the Spiders are Badasses Around Here

I love how cocky (and nihilistic) the spiders become this time of year. They've spent all Summer bulking up, and they're just not gonna take any more shit. They weave webs right across my regular walking routes. I got in my truck yesterday, and a huge angular spider had claimed my mirror to door area. I tried to knock it to the ground, but it bunkered down in my side mirror. "It's your funeral, dude". I drive to the post office, and the spider immediately comes out, as I'm driving, to finish killing and eating the prey it had just webbed. "Dude, it's your funeral". I drive and watch as it gobbles. Finally the wind blows it down the side. I park and it's managed to hole up in the groove between my cab and truck bed. It immediately comes out and continues munching away on its meal. I drive home and it's still hanging in there.

Then this web is built overnight near my door. Just how ambitious is this spider???

An Unexpected Turn

I was torn between stick arms and these quasi-whatever ones, but it didn't seem to matter that much. I'll add "fingers" once those areas dry. Maybe a face?....maybe not. I see lots of figures in my future.

Lane Markers - so much for delicacy and refinement

31" x 47", in progress

Most definately I'll go with #2. These are so hard to see in person. The color was so harsh in this one, a high keyed green over the metallic. I tried glazing it down with burnt umber and alizarin, but then segued into apocolyptic imagery, with the disintegrating flags/banners/?

Studio Buzz

I've not painted for a few weeks, and have lost momentum with the metallic ground paintings. I decided to go ahead a start another group of small shaped pieces. My plan is to work within a much more narrow and focussed area, using a limited palette (although the red-purplish "comma" shape just screamed to be different) and a really simple, central shape/object. This one keeps haunting me, and making me want to zero in with a more narrow focus.

Meanwhile, I'm pulling out paintings from around 2005 and reworking them. Above is the reworked version. I'll be brave and show the earlier piece below. Title was "Conscription of Venus", may or may not keep. The above could well fall into the "Lane Marker" series, and it has me thinking of these markers with a broader subjective vista in mind.

So, with the metallic paintings, which I do plan to continue working on, and another pair of paintings (for now, a secret project), I have four distinctly different groups of paintings going. I really like this a lot. I can move deeply into the process and then back out to a broader perspective.

Rachel Draws a Lot

A delightful blog I found linked to on Steven LaRose's blog.
Rachel Draws a Lot.

Mary Addison Hackett in Nashville, TN

I had a wonderful visit with artist Mary Addison Hackett last weekend, and she's posted a great photo essay of the trip on her blog, Process. MAH recently moved to Nashville, TN from L.A., and we so we went gallery hopping on their artwalk night. I also had the pleasure of seeing her paintings in person.

Great Things are a Stirrin'

A meaningful review of an excellent show.

Brenda Goodman Work 1990-2010 at John Davis Gallery.