Thursday, April 9, 2009

Back Yard


This is a pretty typical scene in Grand Marais, MN. I painted this from the cozy interior of the Grand Marais Art Colony multi-purpose room during a painting work shop I was teaching (you're allowed a few comfortable witnter paintings a year). I'd go critque my students then come back and block in another section. If you are confused, its a trampoline at middle right.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009



Another painting that deals with scale. My friend Richard is painting in the bottom left corner of the image. Winter is a great time to paint these palisades on Clearwater Lake because you can get vantage points you normally can't when the lake is ice free. There was a road plowed up to this point and there were other trucks out on the lake, but we decided not to take an chance.

A friend was telling me a story of an ice fishing event that happened on this lake a number of years ago. There were so many cars on the ice that the ice started to sag and water starting shooting up through the holes that had been drilled.

Monday, April 6, 2009

Smoke'n Clouds


This is a studio painting composed from different sketches done along the north coast of Lake Superior. Scale is a huge part of living on the north shore. Things are massive sometimes and I wanted to give a sense of that with the boiling clouds against the little beach fire in the lower left part of the painting. I still need to add some one toasting 'mallows.

Winter at Clearwater Lake

My intentions this day were to hike to the top of this palisade and paint the view. Assuming that there would be a packed trail blazed to the top, I dispelled the need for snow shoes and left them at home. Of course there had been no visitors and the 4 feet of snow a the trail head stopped me in my tracks. Fortunately I had been struck by this scene earlier as I skied in so my efforts weren't in vain.

Wednesday, February 4, 2009