Just Practicing

Posted by Aline on April 15, 2014

I got my head spun around this week by a glimpse into the perspective of another kind of artist, the kind that has found a home in the world of “contemporary” art. I am using the word “contemporary” here in the sense that has come to be associated with it in the art world, namely, nonrepresentional art. Plenty of contemporary (in the original meaning of the word) are painting representational pictures, elegantly and successfully, but it seems like few of them are represented by tony NYC galleries or being acquired by museums. There’s a bias in favor of abstract. All the buzz goes to the unconventional. Something called a “concept” has become more important (perhaps) than the skillful execution. What I have been working on these past nine years is skillful execution, and I’m not even there yet. But if only I could reorient my brain in the direction of coming up with concepts, I might not need to get any better with the representational skills.

This particular angst is nothing new for me. What is new is the spin, the perspective, the insight. I was at a gathering of students celebrating the last class with a party. At Bea’s, of course. I had taken the same class last semester. It was the Explore, Express, Exploit class, triple E we call it–the class in which I tried very hard to do something different. See, e.g., prior blogs here and here. The party included a critique, not just by the class instructor (Patrick McCay), but by all present, students and professors. Tongues had been loosened by copious supply of wine, and the critiques soon dissolved into many conversations occurring simultaneously and uproariously. Being on a diet, my wine intake was limited to one glass, so I was able to observe and be entertained by the chaos. It was such good sport that, when they ran out of paintings to critique, demand was made for me to submit two of my paintings from last semester to the withering analyses. (I had the two outside in my car because they were on their way in the a.m. to the Institute for hanging in an exhibit.) So, yes, they were framed, and clearly “finished”. Nevertheless, many potential improvements were found by half the crowd and denigrated by the other half, all good fun and maybe a little educational, and the party was about to come to an end, its ostensible purpose having been fulfilled, when a visiting dignitary, the dean of something and second in command at the Institute, demanded to know what direction I was going, given that one of my paintings had ended up representational and the other did not. (That may be the longest sentence I have ever written!) I tried to dodge the question, which was not difficult since everyone else in the room was still talking all at once, but he silenced the room and insisted that I provide an answer. Ahhhgh! I confessed that I had no idea where I might be headed, that in fact my usual MO was plein air painting and working from the live figure. Both, I didn’t have to say, being totally representation. So he said, and I quote, “That’s just practice.”

I don’t really disagree–what I have been doing is a lot of practicing, but toward what? For the first time, I wondered if there is a chance for me to see over the fence into that field of unconventionality, that field seeded with new concepts. One needs a goal, and I guess the one I had set for myself was to become a portraitist. But I haven’t been working very hard toward that goal lately, and maybe that is the fault of my goal, not of me. If portraiture is not the right goal for me, then I can’t stay excited about it. It may be time for me to Explore more deliberately an Expression that is beyond representational. Exploitation, what’s that?

Meanwhile, I am still practicing. Last Tuesday’s figure session produced this one:

Beard with Hands

His forehead is too high, but I can fix that.

Friday I had a simultaneous committee meeting and the need to drop off those two paintings competing for my attention, so I took in my charcoals. In the first 20 minutes I produced a drawing that I liked so much that I could not bring myself to touch it after the break.

Ghost Face

My start-over produced this drawing.

Becky, A Head Shot

Her nose is too long. Damn! Too-long nose cannot be fixed without resizing the whole bottom half of the face. [I fixed a problem with the shape of her left eye–on our right–that I only noticed after posting the image to my blog.]

Today, I decided at the outset not to obsess over any details, to try to be conceptual instead of representational–just as I have decided at many outsets before this. Today, however, I have the added consideration of last Thursday’s critique. Sure, I had that Friday as well, but it was too new then. Hadn’t sunk in.

Sweet Thinking

Is it, in terms of direction, an inch or two away from my usual? I kind of think so.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn and Bernerhof Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; in French Hall (the main building) of the New Hampshire Institute of Art in Manchester, NH; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

You may also view paintings with prices and order prints at my Fine Art America page. If the painting you are interested in is not there, or if you prefer to bypass that experience, you may contact me using this feedback form.

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3 drawings and a painting

Posted by Aline on March 17, 2014

I confess–I haven’t done much art in the past month, since my return from Florida. I might be suffering a little bit of burnout. Or discouragement: I received yet another rejection from the Oil Painters of America. Will I ever paint a picture good enough to win OPA’s seal of approval? If I live long enough, and then only maybe. Perhaps I should switch to painting still lifes. I met an artist older than I who entered the field later than I, taught himself from materials found on the internet, and concentrates on paintings of one kind of object in still life paintings. Not a beautiful object per se, but so lovingly and beautifully rendered by this artist that he wins prizes, and gets into OPA exhibits. I long ago resolved to stick to the one medium so as not to spread myself too thin, but perhaps I should also have chosen to stick to one, still, subject matter. I’ve always had a serious tendency to bite off more than I could chew.

Then there was the weather: My answer to the cold and snowy conditions was to favor drawing to painting–lugging around the oil paints and easel is that much greater a burden when you are slipping on ice or slogging through snowdrifts. In a related story, not at all helping to get me out of this funk, was the loss of heat for a week, last week. Oh, the irony! I had an automatic generator installed after the freak October blizzard shut everything down in 2011, yet lost heat earlier this year due to an electrical problem. This second loss of heat was due to a malfunction in the furnace, but we screwed around for days trying to solve the issue without going to the pro. Lesson learned. Go to the pro immediately, damn the expense.

On a more upbeat note, recently I was in the news! In a good way. The Bernerhof exhibit got some publicity, and the reporter used the material that I had written up for my contributions very carefully and accurately. Stellar job! Here is a link to the article. Bernerhof article The stuff about me appears on the third page. I’m confident there will never be a better article written about my painting.

Between the Tuesday Life Group, the Friday Life Group and the Saturday Life Group, I did get in some art making. I have picked out my favorites over the last month to show you. I believe, despite the judgment of the odious OPA, they are, you know, kind of, like, OK.

Margaret in B&W

Dennis, Shirtless

I managed to rein in all urges to polish his face, humming a mantra in my head “Carolyn Anderson”. (She who can suggest all with a single stroke.)

Georgia, Reclining

Shelley’s Back

On the last two, because they presented a simplified view of the figure (no breasts!), I was able to spend time on representing the quality of the flesh and drapes more accurately. Each of those two poses lasted about 50 minutes. In 50 minutes, you are lucky to just get the drawing close to accurate. In hindsight, I particularly appreciate how I rendered that draped pillow under Georgia’s head, and particularly regret leaving that clump of hair looking so stiff.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Gallery at 100 Market Street in Portsmouth; at the Bartlett Inn and Bernerhof Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

You may also view paintings with prices and order prints at my Fine Art America page. If the painting you are interested in is not there, or if you prefer to bypass that experience, you may contact me using this feedback form.

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Oscar Night

Posted by Aline on March 2, 2014

Finishing my Oscar Night painting was a top priority when I got home after my Florida trip, along with tax returns and a report that I have to make annually to the Sierra Club regarding my NH chapter’s activities. (I mention that nonart stuff as an excuse for not posting a blog last week, as if anyone noticed.) The title of my Oscar painting is “Going for Gold”, and there is no longer any reason to conceal the title of the movie it represents–our Oscar Night party took place Saturday. Nobody had much difficulty matching my painting up with “Chariots of Fire.” Some other artists made it very hard to discern their movie, but not my favorites: Bruce Jones’ circus scene (“The Greatest Show on Earth”) and Rick Dickenson’s portrait of the ship that played the Bounty in “Mutiny on the Bounty”. I wish I had thought to snap a picture of each of them, but I found them on our Facebook page:

You can figure out which is which, can’t you? And that is a wonderful photo of Elaine Farmer laughing in front of the Bounty. For more pictures of the event: Facebook page for East Colony Fine Art, with photos of the shindig. Here is a snapshot of our group, those of us who stuck it out to the end, anyway. (I was not the only one feeling the pain.)

East Colony Artists on Oscar Night

You’d never know that we usually have a hard time finding anything to wear that is not spotted with paint, much less something fancy to wear on the Red Carpet. We had an actual Red Carpet laid down as you approached the entrance to our Gallery, and other trappings, including champagne, of an extravagant star-studded celebration. Popcorn too, for the unstar-studded populace. A large, flat screen TV was playing snippets from our Oscar-winning movies, with music, but the crowds precluded us from taking it in–but crowds are a good thing. The game of matching paintings with Oscar titles was taken very seriously by everyone, even though nobody was sure of what the prize was going to be.

And here, at long last, is the absolute final version of Going for Gold.

I took it in to hang last Monday, but then realized that I did not like the frame. More precisely, I loved the frame by itself, which was a match to the one on “Margaret and her Nook” (see next photo), but not on this particular painting. So I took it home again, and rooted around in my frame inventory to come up with a modest, thin frame. I wanted black, but could only find gold. So I added the vertical black strips on each side to simulate a black border. (I’m sure my faulty photography is responsible for the left border above looking slanted.) The new borders were barely dry when I hung the painting Friday afternoon. Here is how it looked on my wall:

See, straight borders on both sides. Above the Oscar painting is one I call “Athabasca Falls” because, you guessed it, it is a painting of Athabasca Falls in Alberta, Canada, as night was falling. Long story, that. And on the right you see Margaret and her Nook. On the pedestal is a giclee of Freckles, a cat I used to know–and love. That’s my browse bin with other giclees on offer. I’m not sure who the gentleman is–he was sitting with his wife on a big ottoman and I could not ask them to move. Behind him is a short bio and photo of me hanging in a frame. This is my “half space” for two months. Some “half spaces” are a little larger than this one; usually I can hang about six paintings, but then, all three of these were larger than my usual.

I have been bad at getting the word out about these events. In June I will be sharing the Featured Artist spot with Lawrence Donovan. He’s the guy in the front, on the right, in the tuxedo. We are trying to work out a theme that we can both live with. And I have resolved to beat the drum very loudly to get everyone I know out for my opening reception. So get ready, y’all!

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

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Final and Complete Report of Marco Island Painting Binge

Posted by Aline on February 19, 2014

After a snow-impeded itinerary, I finally returned to the winter wonderland that is New Hampshire. Another snow storm yesterday has locked me at home. The city didn’t bother to plow my little stub of a street until it was sure it could build a barricade at the bottom of my driveway worthy of good ol’ New England complaining. Still, I don’t mind . . . didn’t want to go anywhere today anyway, not when I have the lovely task of reliving my adventures in Marco Island, through this retelling.

All thirteen of my Marco 2014 paintings are painted on 9 x 12 carton paper, acquired from Judson’s Guerrilla Painter art supplies. Two paintings are candidates for cropping, as you will see. The first 8 were posted last week, using photos taken with my phone or my iPad. Now that I have new versions taken with my Nikon Digital SLR, I will include them again. A few have endured improvements since last week.

I would love to hear from my followers which painting(s) are their favorites.

Marco 2014 No. 1

This first painting is still one of my own favorites.

Marco 2014 No. 2

I added the sky and make other changes as planned. I can see room for more improvement–punchier lights on the foreground objects.

Marco 2014 No. 3 – The Beach

The quickest, simplest is the favorite of many people. I touched up the bird spots. Several had suggested making the spots into kites (the toy, not the bird), but I was concerned about bringing in that level of detail.

Marco 2014 No. 4 – Sea Grapes

Although I wanted to improve on the definition between light and shadow, I lacked the confidence to do anything about it.

Marco 2014 No. 5

The only improvement I made to No. 5 is the color of the shadows on the building. Less green, more blue.

Marco 2014 No. 6–Calusa Boat Yard

No changes to this one. But when I posted it last week, I didn’t include any narrative, and it deserves a narrative. On my right, over the railing, is a roof covering a shelf-like area where successful fishermen (women don’t seem to be into that kind of thing) can clean their fish. There’s a water spigot and a tube into which the waste is shoved, which apparently drops the waste somewhere in the water underneath, where the waiting pelicans cannot access it. There is a prominently posted sign forbidding the feeding of the pelicans. But they hover nevertheless. Because mistakes are made. Sometimes a particularly motivated fish escapes the grasp of the fisherman and dives in the waiting maw of a pelican.

I was in that spot because of the shadow afforded by the roof. So I was kind of in the way, but not so much as would require me to move. One of the fisherman wanted this painting, but he was willing to pay only $100 for it. I felt it was worth at least $200. I hope he’s sorry now!

Marco 2014 No. 7–Pond with girl and goose

I defined the figure of the little girl to show her posture better. She was a real little girl, but she never sat for me on the bank like that. The Canadian goose was one of a pair cruising around with a pair of Muscovy ducks. The walkway pavement really was a purply black.

Marco 2014 No. 8–dog walkers’ park

I reworked this painting a lot. The bridge alone got about four repaintings. A figure went in, came out; the original dog came out, a new one came in. I was looking for something expressive, trying to channel Van Gogh. Here was the previous version.

Marco 2014 No. 9

Mary lives on a golf course, of course. If you don’t live on either water or a golf course on Marco, you are doing something wrong. We reconnoitered the course but found nothing to inspire us to paint, but on our way back to her house, we both fell in love with this huge palm, catching light here and there, so that’s where I set up. It was close to the back door to her lanai (screened in terrace containing swimming pool–standard equipment in Florida). In the lanai, watching me closely, was her black cat, Tara. So I popped her in the painting. Jungle cat with green eyes.

Marco 2014 No. 10

Yet another park–the same where we had painted our picnic in the rain last year. Both Mary and I decided to paint the reflections in the lake. She draws in pencil, then paints in watercolor. (I had intended to take pictures of her paintings too, and share with you. But forgot until this minute. The fog of age.) Anyway, she takes a lot longer to complete a painting, what with all that drawing first. I was finished with mine, grousing about the difficulties (I have a list of them with respect to reflections), and was just diddling around with it when a huge flock of ducks swooped down and started swimming furiously around in circles. Whassup? I thought. A few of them climbed the bank over on the right, out of my frame, investigated, and returned to swimming in circles. Then arrived a man and woman laden with buckets. They dumped the contents of the buckets under the tree lately investigated by the scouter ducks, and a parade ensued. This was what the ducks were waiting for! Since I wasn’t doing anything important anyway, I stopped fussing over the ever-changing tree, grass and house reflections and changed up my pond to accommodate a representative grouping of circling ducks. Are the ducks too black? That’s how they appeared to me in that low light, silhouetted against the bright water.

Marco 2014 No. 11

Flo joined us, down from Cape Coral, and the three of us caught up with that same group of outdoor painters who go out each Wednesday to paint together at specific locations. This week’s location, the Esplanade, includes fountains, retail establishments, boats (moored to the right in this view), and lots of people. Rich people. We spread out. I chose to paint the bar because I thought it was time that I tried something really difficult. I had my eye on the bank of liquor bottles in the background. I spent all day on this one painting, and much of that time was spent repainting the elements, trying to get them to work together. Perhaps I overdid it. Does it look stilted?

Marco 2014 No. 12 – Vanda orchid

Although our weather was warm and sunny all the time I was there, one day was extremely windy. The three of us decided the better part of valor was staying in the shelter of the lanai and painting Mary’s Vanda orchid. I tried to mix up the color of the orchid from my various reds and blues, but it just wasn’t working–not even close–, so I borrowed some Magenta from Flo and voila! That made me curious about magenta–why wouldn’t it mix from blue and red? Turns out it is special; because blue and red don’t mix past purple on the spectrum of color–they don’t meet on the color spectrum. A synthetic red called quinacridone makes possible the purply red known as magenta or fuchsia. I am adding Magenta back to my palette and bowing respectfully to all quinacridones.

Marco 2014 No. 12 detail of orchid

Flo’s version of the orchid was more of a closeup, and just like a kid, when I saw her treatment, I decided I wanted that too, so here is my cropped version. Is it better than the one with roots in the foreground and swimming pool and palm tree in the background? By the way, I need to thank Deirdre Riley, who paints flowers awesomely; she advises what I call the big blob attack method of painting flowers, whereby you paint in the general shape of the entire arrangement, then pick out lights and darks to form the shapes of individual flowers. That approach stood me in good stead with this extraordinary plant with a single stem smothered with individual flowers.

Last, but certainly not least, here is the cut-down version that I prefer:

Marco 2014 No. 13 v.2 (6×12)

Before cropping, this is the painting:

Marco 2014 No. 13 (9×12)

I haven’t actually cut it up yet, so if you think I am wrong to do so, please tell me now. Not later!

The location is the Rose Marina, where I have painted before, but this time we explored our way around the water to a residential neighborhood that has this view of the action. Notice there is a major bow sticking its nose in at the right. While I was painting, this ship, the Marco Island Princess, got underway with its passengers for a sunset cruise in the Gulf . . . analogous to a Mount Washington dinner cruise on Lake Winnepesaukee, but much smaller. The foreground is a grassy knoll that drops down to the water out of your view (and mine), which complicates your understanding of what is happening. That’s why I prefer the cropped version. Yes, there are a couple of pelicans in the painting.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Gallery at 100 Market Street in Portsmouth; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

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Heady Stuff

Posted by Aline on February 3, 2014

I’ve been saving up my heads, maybe subconsciously in order to use some cute/puny title such as the title above. Good heads, bad heads. The bad heads are, it should go without saying, on me, not the model. My progress on head-making is not as fast as I feel it should be, so I am more often than not disappointed in my output. On the other hand, when a head turns out good, I’m taken by surprise. You could say my life is a constant trip from disappointment to surprised delight, and back again. Its’s a trip with no Arrival. What I ought to do is just shut up about it. So I will. I present these heads in no particular order, sans judgement. Maybe you will like one or two of them.

Serious Rebecca

I wasted a bit of time trying to convey the way her earring looked both metallic and dull. Sigh! What’s with me and the accessories?

Serious Margaret

My art buddy Tony would call this “trois couleurs” because he likes to throw around his French. It started life as black and white on toned paper, but after I added white for the highlights, I thought she looked too pallid–hence the pink. For the pink I used a piece of pastel. My drawing box contains various types of charcoal and charcoal pencils, white pencils and white “charcoal” (who do they think they are kidding?), and stubs of pastel-like sticks in several shades of pink and one blue. Don’t ask me why. It just happens.

This is Margaret again. I tried to tease a little “Mona Lisa” smile out of her, so this one is captioned “Not so serious Margaret”. Many models have a hard time keeping their eyes open. That doesn’t matter so much when you are concentrating on painting or drawing a figure, but it becomes mighty exasperating if you are doing a portrait.

Oh, the Hair

You are supposed to hear the title of this drawing with the same inflection as the newsman lamenting the Hindenburg disaster. (Oh, the humanity!) Not implying the hair is a disaster. Au contraire (Tony, I like to do the French thing too), the hair is wonderful but daunting. of course, in 20 minutes I could only suggest the presence of masses of hair and perhaps that is just as well.

Daydreamer

Ok, this is cheating a little. But there is more head there than body.

DSC_0605 - Version 2

Here is another example of the three colors, and another, real cheat–this is a zoom in on the head to make it fit within the topic. Here is the whole drawing:

Can you tell that she is pregnant?

This is an example of going against the measurements. Her chin and jaw as observed came across as too manly. I think it was an effect of the angle. I shaved it back to make her look more like herself.

While these heads are not all pleasing me, at least I have learned to get matching eyes. Mostly. Eyes are difficult because there are two of them. Both should be about the same distance from the nose and on the same horizontal level. Both should be the same shape. But usually you are observing them from a 3/4 perspective. One eye is farther away and on the other side of the nose. Its size, shape and position is greatly affected that that. Cookie cutter eyes don’t work. Picasso was on to something when he painted eyes from two entirely different perspectives.

19533_00_picasso_woman

Picasso’s “Woman Seated in a Chair” is in the collection of the Currier Museum of Art, here in Manchester. Since becoming a docent there, I have come to appreciate this piece more than before.

I am currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Gallery at 100 Market Street in Portsmouth; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the McGowan Gallery in Concord–the all-too-short exhibit of “Love, Lust and Desire” in which both sizes and prices are severely limited; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

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Two Works Progressing

Posted by Aline on January 27, 2014

I painted a second layer on my Oscar Night piece entitled “Illustrating Heroic Effort”. I tackled it intending only to tinker with the background, but the figure jumped under my brush. Also, I thought I should let you know a little secret: that painting does not come in the horizontal shape that I shared with you last week. My composition required that horizontal format, but I didn’t want to use a large, expensive, stretched canvases for this short-term-gratification project, and I didn’t want to buy a custom frame for it. My solution was to center the action on a 12×16 canvas and paint black voids at top and bottom so that the illustrated part looks as if it is coming to you via TV, where the wide-screen movies are presented with black bands top and bottom.

Oscar Night phase 2

Here, for the sake of comparison, is phase 1:

Illustrating Heroic Effort

The biggest change that I have made to Version 2 is the darkened background. Peter Granucci has taught me that every well-designed painting is either mostly light, or mostly dark. I was having trouble deciding which way I wanted to go with this one. Version 1 is the mostly light version, with the dark accents (also necessary) being the shadow side of the figure. This version 2 is a mostly dark version, with the highlights (again necessary) being the lit side of the figure. However, the sky and ocean are also light. Too much light perhaps, for a mostly dark painting. I’m leaning toward returning to mostly light. I think the black voids on top and bottom go better with the higher key value scheme.

After painting this layer, I received belated but good advice from Cameron Bennett, who, as an illustrator himself (which I had forgotten because all the courses I took with him were for doing portraits), took an interest in my ruminations re illustration vs. Fine Art.

Oops! That term “Fine Art” beacons me down a detour that I eschewed last week but can no longer suppress (what? you never mixed a metaphor?): so many terms used in the field of art are terms that sound generalized but that have come down to us with meanings very specific. Fine Art is not art that is lovely or “fine” but something that is created to be sold in an art gallery or be exhibited in an art museum. A lot of it is not lovely. “Genre” usually would mean a “kind” or “category” of painting; instead, it refers to a specific subject matter (ordinary people and places, daily life) for painting. “Modern Art” doesn’t mean art that is modern, in the sense of being made today–not even in the sense of breaking away from classical traditions; Modern Art refers to a specific collection of nonrepresentational art made between 1900 and 1950, give or take. (“Nonrepresentational” means, at least as I am using it here, without attempt or desire to accurately represent reality.) “Contemporary Art” used to mean art that is made by living artists, but now it excludes representational art and includes dead artists, and is working its way toward meaning the nonrepresentational art of the period between 1950 and . . . ? I wonder if this sort of morphing of general terms into terms of art (pun slightly intended) occurs in other fields as well. I can’t think of any in the field of law.

Anyway, Cameron gave me some specific suggestions that I hope to implement before my annual Florida trip (next week). Mainly, the hands are not sufficiently suggestive of motion. It just looks like I can’t paint hands. (Maybe I should insert well-painted hands in a box in the corner so as to squelch that impression.) Version 2 might be a little better in this regard. The increased blurriness just happened when I painted the new background over the hands.

My other Work in Progress is actually no longer in progress, but I have the in-progress photo to show you where I was with it at midpoint. This was a two-session pose, so I chose a larger canvas (20×16) for it.

Soft Treatment wip

At this point, I was intending to paint the pattern on the coverlet and was also prepared to fuss quite a bit with the yellow drape.

Formalism with Becky

By the following week, I had lost interest in the coverlet and had become more concerned with unifying the color scheme. So I slashed ruthlessly at the drapings.

I never did get around to painting the left side of the (unstretched) canvas. I can cut away those two inches, but if I do, I’ll have to saw down a panel to mount it on and order a custom-sized frame for it. I’m not sure it’s worthy of that much respect. If only the facial expression hadn’t turned out to be so snarky!

Here’s how it would look as a 12×16:

Cropped Version

Strangely, I find I miss that slashed coverlet treatment, which probably demonstrates how schizoid I am between classical representation and modernistic suggestion-of-reality representation.

Thank you for listening to me work this all out. I see now that what I need to do is fix that snarky expression and then reevaluate the amount of respect due this painting.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Gallery at 100 Market Street in Portsmouth; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

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Getting Ready for Oscar Night

Posted by Aline on January 20, 2014

Illustrating Heroic Effort

Like Marlon Brando in “On the Waterfront,” I “coulda been . . .”– not a contender but an illustrator. A life drawing professor (in my senior year at Cornell I lightened up with some “gut” art courses) encouraged me to go for graduate study in illustration. I brushed it off as totally inconceivable. Thinking back, I’m not sure why it was so inconceivable. Probably because my expectations of myself were so grandiose. I intended to accomplish something globally meaningful–foreign service and diplomacy appealed to me then. If only I had pursued illustration as a career, I would now be so much further along the road to artistic distinction.

My respect for illustrators has ballooned since I got into the art biz myself–their skills underpin both Illustration and Fine Art. [Aside: one of the pointless debates prevalent in the art community is how to distinguish Fine Art from (a) Illustration and (b) from Craft.] Many illustrators are also fine artists [i. e., makers of Fine Art]. Many of them stop pursuing commercial work altogether in order to concentrate on making Fine Art. They have to be among the best, or slightly nuts, or both. (I also suspect a highly compensated spouse factors into those decisions.) Illustrators tell a story? Illustrators paint by commission? That’s exactly how fine artists operated in the past. Monumental paintings depicting events and telling stories were always painted to satisfy a patron. Like the Sistine Chapel. Like Rembrandt’s “Night Watch”:

The Nightwatch by Rembrandt

Like DeBray’s “Antony and Cleopatra”:

Jan de Bray – The Banquet of Antony and Cleopatra

Commissioned or not, telling a story is illustration. Why is there even an effort to distinguish illustration from fine art? Photography–invention of–accounts for a lot of new issues besetting artists. Photographers can tell stories, produce portraits with a lot less effort and expense. Artists have had to find new ways, different markets, in order to survive as a full-time artist. Hence: abstract art. To sum up, the existence of abstract art is a reflection of the artist’s need to find a meaning in her art that is distinct from story-telling or portrait-making, now the role of photography. That’s how I see it, but bear in mind I have never taken a single course in art appreciation or art history. I have no business pontificating on matters of which I am uninstructed!

But I have wandered far from my main topic. My painting above results from an order to produce a painting that illustrates an Oscar-winning motion picture. Oscar Night at East Colony is March 1, the day before the actual 2013 Oscar awards ceremony. Each of the 30 East Colony artists is choosing a movie, and our patrons and followers will be invited to guess what movie is being illustrated by each of us. Winners will receive a cute little Oscar replica. Oscar Night: Saturday March 1, 4-7 p.m., at 55 So. Commercial Street, Manchester, NH.

Because of the contest, I can’t tell you what movie I am illustrating, but isn’t it all too obvious? I feel it is obvious because the movie was one of my favorites (along with “On the Waterfront”). Hint: this movie would have been nothing without its music .

To create my illustration, I looked for images on the internet that matched up with the figure I envisaged as my central figure. The blurring motion of the hands was suggested by one of those images. It’s not a slam dunk to suggest hands without actually painting hands. I think I got it. Even more important to the illustration was need the feel the runner’s huge gasps for breath, and his straining to keep his speed up. The shapes and value changes in his chest and neck achieve that, I hope. This painting is, however, not completely done. The background that I invented to stay in the background is nevertheless too dull– appropriately so in the story-telling sense, but a cop-out in the painterly sense. The background should be able to stand on its own as a painting, don’t you think? I have a week to get it right.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Gallery at 100 Market Street in Portsmouth; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Go back

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Pussycats and Ignudi

Posted by Aline on January 14, 2014

Fur. Final 20×16

I finally “finished” (I had to stop fussing with it because deadline to submit was Friday) Fur. Note the size of the painting–it is much bigger than life. I’m pleased with its furriness, and proud of the gold heart locket which I dreamed up without any help from a reference photo. Now, cross your fingers in the hope that the juror for this exhibit, Eric Aho, isn’t a dogs-only lover, and isn’t allergic to cats (but I am, so that’s not determinative).

I don’t often create something specific in response to a call for art, but in the case of Purr, oops, I meant Furr, I like to think the Call for Art got me thinking, which led to the inspiration to paint this particular picture. The title and theme is “LOVE”, and the juror is an abstract landscape artist whom I greatly admire, which made me stop and consider the possibilities. The idea of Love led, of course, immediately to the idea of Cats, and thence to the idea of the fur that makes cats so lovable. To tie more unmistakably into the exhibit theme(as if that mattered!), I included the heart locket. The claw showing at bottom left is my acknowledgement of the unpredictable and imperious nature of Cat, whose soft furriness conceals a weapon to punish whoever fails to give proper respect. All that thought, but the result is likely to be yet another canvas stashed away in a portfolio. That doesn’t matter. What matters is, I painted. I submitted. I tried.

Our model for Tuesday Life Group showed up armed with thumbnail reproductions of Michelangelo’s paintings on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, from which selection we were to choose a pose. The pose we chose was one of the twelve naked, male figures lounging in the corners of each of the three major sections. Before going any further, I’d better show you the drawing that resulted:

After Michelangelo Ignudi

We were puzzled by the wreath—an item I associated more with Roman emperors than with Christian iconography. On a whim, I included it in my drawing, and was pleased with the effect–it added interest and weight to the top of the page, but I didn’t believe that had been Michelangelo’s purpose in so adorning these particular figures. So I was off to Wikipedia to find the explanation. Turns out the wreaths are acorn wreaths, and the figures wearing the wreaths are called “Ignudi”. And that’s it. No more knowledge to be had. There is a suggestion that they could be angels; angels don’t necessarily come equipped with wings. As for what the Ignudi were doing in the corners, I bet they are purely decorative. Those corners would have looked “naked” without the Ignudi. According to Wikipedia, the painting of the Ignudi demonstrates, more than any other figures on the ceiling, Michelangelo’s mastery of anatomy and foreshortening and his enormous powers of invention. So there you are–he was showing off. Not so different from the reason I included the wreath in my drawing.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Gallery at 100 Market Street in Portsmouth; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Sublime to . . . .

Posted by Aline on December 30, 2013

Rebecca in Silhouette

It probably looks as if I am obsessed with shadows, but there was another reason (excuse?) for me ending back on the shadow side of Rebecca last Friday. I thought we were going to have seven artists crowded in the East Colony studio, so I set up in the far corner. It didn’t hurt that I was next to an electrical outlet (hot water teapot and easel light). And with my recent interest in the abstract, how awful could it be to gaze directly into the light?

The bluish structure in the background is a big ladder on which we clipped the spotlight. Remembering how Assael dramatized his nudes, with red spotlights, I pretended my spot was orangish. I give myself a pass on the likeness because of the difficulty in seeing into the shadow against the light. I like it a lot, so it is Sublime.

Fur (wip)

. . . Ridiculous? This is phase two of the Love project that I described two weeks ago (here). I don’t really have a plan for finishing it. I will keep playing with it until I am satisfied or until I have made a mess of it. Right now we need some whiskers to punctuate the fur, and the heart-shaped locket could be improved. Maybe a catchlight in the eye that is showing? It does live up to its title, I hope.

Not much else in the way of art making got accomplished. Christmas was a wonderful surprise, with all my family together for our big breakfast, an event which not even an abscessed tooth could ruin. Today the tooth got taken care of, and I am still in recovery from that experience. Not that bad really, but a shock to the system. An excuse to goof off.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; for one more week at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

A Step Backward

Posted by Aline on December 23, 2013

I was shocked to realize that I had regressed last week, after having absorbed, I thought, the teachings of Steven Assael, this thought having been based on the successful portrait of Margaret three weeks ago. More Blue, more blue, was his mantra. Instead, last week, I saw red in the shadows of “Shadow Side”. And painted red.

Here are the Work in Progress from two weeks ago, then the “finished” RedVersion from last Tuesday (camera phone), and finally, the corrected version:

WIP No. 5 with camera

Red version

The Shadow Side of Rebecca 20×16

Fortunately, I saw my horrific error the same day, last Tuesday, and left the painting out on the cold (brrr!) porch so that the paint would not dry. Saturday I took it with me to work on while I was sitting gallery at East Colony. To amend the skin tone, I used Michael Harding’s “Kings Blue” and kind of massaged it into the skin with sable and fan brushes, little by little. You can imagine with what trepidation I embarked on this voyage, but I had determined that the painting was a total loss without this correction, so I had to give it a try.

I wonder why it is so hard for me to see the blue in what’s before me. Before I had my right-eye cataract surgery, I had never seen the blue and purple in shadows. I had been taking it on faith, assuming it was a convention adopted by artists, that making shadow colors cool was the true path. Imagine my amazement when I saw my first purple shadow on my street. Wow! So maybe the left-eye cataract is hampering my ability to see cool colors in living flesh tones. Why not in the paintings? People who are “color-blind” are so both in reality and in illustrations–I assume.

A number of weeks ago, I did a nice portrait of Nancy, my daughter. It was done practically in the dark. She was lit, but my easel and palette were not. Nevertheless, I am pleased with the likeness and the expression. Nancy has been through a lot of hard stuff, and something of that shows on her face, although it remains as beautiful as ever.

Pensive Nancy

I delayed photographing this painting because it generates impossible glare. Even as dry as it is now, I cannot find any angles or lighting that eliminate glare. I used my blemish retouch tool in iPhoto to smear away a lot of it, but the result is disappointing. Yet another puzzle for me to sort out. Life is good.

The most recent painting is from our Friday Life Group session.

On Yellow Drape

By this time I had acquired a little clip-on easel light. For a change, I could see what I was painting in the East Colony studio. (We have been keeping overhead lights off so as to increase the drama created by our spotlight on the model.) I had intended to paint another portrait, but was charmed by the pattern of light and shadow on her body. Full figure on a tiny canvas (10×8).

If you are reading this blog posting in a timely fashion, you are probably like me, a Christmas downplayer. At this stage of my life, I resent complications that distract me from the art and other appointed tasks. I will be so glad when it is over, and with two days to go, I am still pondering what I should do for my loved ones. Their walls must be reaching saturation point with the paintings I shower upon them. But I do truly wish all of you the best experience possible during these challenging days.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; in the Community Gallery at the Currier Gallery in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Duality Continues

Posted by Aline on December 16, 2013

Before I get into certain issues involving the EEE class, check out these pretty decent likenesses I achieved using charcoal on Mi-Tientes pastel paper. First, from the Friday life group, here is Rebecca.

Portrait, Rebecca December 2013 (12×9)

I truly cannot count the number of times I have tried to do a portrait of Rebecca, with varying degrees of success. I posted a bunch of them in this blog (“A Month of Beckys”) about 7 months ago; over a year ago I included the very first one here in a blog titled simply “Becky”. Despite the annoying texture of the pastel paper (I chose the more highly textured side by mistake), the one I just completed is the best. That’s encouraging since it means I am still improving and have not yet hit my limit, if there is one.

My other likeness attempt came as part of the Saturday Life Group’s meeting. A popular male model whom we have not seen for many months was back in NH, and one pose gave me the opportunity to try for a likeness of his face. Looks pretty accurate to me, but I may be biased. Here are both of the longer poses from Saturday–the first one, as you will see, did not afford any view of the face–and I remembered to use the smoother side of the paper:

Mike No. 1

Mike No. 2

Drawing a man who is “ripped”, as they say, is a lot of fun, and just what we needed after so many months of rounded flesh.

Putting all that likeness stuff aside, we can get to the bigger issue: can Aline come up with a paintable abstract concept, and go on to paint it appealingly? Jury is still out, but hope has not stopped springing. The two that I am going to show you are both from the EEE class, of course. Thursday was our last class. Many of my classmates intend to take it again in the Spring. I, however, am putting my money on the Master Portrait Workshop with Dan Thompson and don’t feel I can afford the luxury of taking two courses in a single semester. But I stray from the main story: the EEE class adjourned halfway through our allotted time at the Institute to regroup at Bea’s place, to eat, drink, be merry, and critique each other’s works. First up was my now-familiar abstracted landscape evoking stained-glass windows and Monet. Patrick stood by his initial eval, but my classmates objected strenuously to the light-colored wedge, which they felt was distracting. Peter Clive was present as well, so I asked for his opinion. He advised repeating the wedge shape in the lower right corner. Classmates seemed happy with that solution. Therefore, on Sunday, after having endured a few restless nights trying to make sense of that advice, I dutifully inserted Wedge Minor into the masterpiece (please hear that with ironic inflection). This smaller echo remains as unexplained as the original Wedge Major. Fortunately, it being abstract, I didn’t have to justify it in terms of a representing a recognizable object. Most important, the new element has to blend into the scene as if it had always been there.

This is your first view of this piece as translated through my Nikon SLR, so this version looks better simply because of that. I had the devil of a time getting an image without glare inasmuch as I had ladled on the paint and parts of the painting will reflect glare no matter where you set up the light sources. My solution was to go with less light and increase “exposure” in the editing room. Details got lost, however. There are more of the red dots in the middle background, for instance.

My last EEE project, started Thursday after a lot of planning, is complicated. Shiao-Ping Wang presented a program at the recent meeting of the Manchester Artists Association, a program that I had, as program director, requested of her. “How do you translate an abstract concept into a work of art?” She showed us how she did it, explaining how her love of water became represented by a specific shape that she repeated in many inventive ways. A few days after that, I saw a call for art for an exhibit on the theme “Love”, to be juried by Eric Aho, an abstract landscape artist whom I admire. Here is a short video with Eric, which gives you an idea of what he does as an abstract landscape painter. Because of the juror and because of Shaio Ping, I decided to make an abstract painting for the show, based on something I love, namely, cats. And fur is what I particularly love about cats. Patrick had shown me years ago his painting of white chickens using a brayer instead of a brush. The breasts of those chickens looked unbelievably soft and downy. So what I intend to make is a painting about cats, using furriness as the symbol and perhaps deploying a brayer in my quest for irresistible texture. But yet another influence out of the Contemporary Gallery of the Currier Museum led me to plan a hidden image of a larger-than-life cat face in the background of my abstract, furry foreground. So far, I have completed only that background. I have to let it dry now, before attempting the more difficult task of layering on the furriness without totally obliterating the face.

Love and Fur WIP (20×16)

(By the way, as the party was breaking up, Patrick told me that I had all of the other aspects of art making under control–I just needed more help with the conceptual aspects–advice that suggests I should reconsider my decision to take the portrait workshop instead of another dose of EEE. )

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; in the Community Gallery at the Currier Gallery in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Up and Down, Back and Forth

Posted by Aline on December 11, 2013

Well, I committed an unforgivable sin last week. I forgot to go the EEE class! Forgot! Such a quixotic thing the brain is–simply because I had no Docent Training class in the morning (finally graduated), my brain relaxed, dozed off, and failed to remind me that I had the class Thursday evening. I need a calendar that punches me in the arm a half hour before I’m supposed to be someplace. But instead of class I had an nice dinner out with my daughter, who really needed to get some food in her system.

I had big plans for that EEE class, the next to last class in the course. Now I have only one left and no time to make up for the lost Thursday. . . because everything takes longer that it should, and so many unexpected chores keep popping up with regularity. Now I am going to have to execute on my big plans without the help of the EEE class.

And by “the class” I include not only the instructor but also my fellow students. Here’s why. A few weeks ago I posted a work in progress along with the finished version and cryptically (some might say “coyly”) asked you to ponder their merits before I commented myself. Well here is my comment: I was sitting at my easel trying the wrestle something out of the WIP version–my effort to go abstract with landscape, remember? Not feeling it, frankly. In an effort to achieve more drama, I was applying black paint (gasp! I used to not even own black paint) to the areas that had drawn my mind’s eye, and then kinda went nuts with the black, finding patterns to outline all over the place. Suddenly, I heard whisperings behind me, classmates talking about something they were admiring. I ignored, continued my Van Gogh-like thrashing. The classmates behind me moved in to stop me, called for Patrick to see what I was doing. The whole class stopped and watched as the piece was placed on an easel for all to consider, and Patrick immediately without much thought at all declared it to be an “award-winner.” I am virtually certain that now he has had a few minutes to think about it, he would take that pronouncement back. Anyway, I was not allowed to work on it anymore, and frankly, that was OK with me, because I was sick of it. It’s still in the classroom, left to dry, then there was Thanksgiving, then the class that I forgot. So my image is from the phone:

Imaginary Elements

My classmates enjoyed the stained glass feeling. I was enjoying (somewhat) the process of applying thick, dramatic paint, but when it was over, I did not get that singing-heart feeling that some of my paintings give me. Maybe abstract is not meant for me. Patrick already told me not to try pure abstract.

Meanwhile, on an entirely different track, I am trying to duplicate the success of last week’s “Margaret with her Nook.” Here is another look at Nook, with the background cleaned up:

Final–Margaret and her Nook

Yesterday I started on the Shadow Side of Becky, and remembered to take progress pictures with my phone. Next Tuesday, I hope to complete this painting, which is a large 20×16 oil on linen:

WIP No. 1

WIP NO. 2

WIP No. 3

WIP No. 5 with camera

I chose to be in the dark for this painting in part because I have enjoyed chiaroscuro effect that comes with drawing the figure out from darkness. Also because I have learned that to make a figure rounded, I needed to find a bigger range of light and dark. So far, I am liking it lot. I just hope I find it within me to bring it to the same level of finish as I found with Nook.

Reminder to those of you within driving distance of the Currier Museum: I have a painting hanging in the Community Gallery and you can get into the entire Museum for free if you arrive before noon on a Saturday.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; in the Community Gallery at the Currier Gallery in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Just One Thing

Posted by Aline on December 4, 2013

I went a whole week without painting! That made me feel disconnected somehow, as if I had landed on some strange, new level of existence. But I got other stuff done, stuff that needed to get done. And there was Thanksgiving. No problem there–went to my son’s house to get stuffed and was not allowed to bring even one dish. I had to “sit” the gallery for East Colony the day before Thanksgiving, during which I read parts of some art books. I never get around to finishing books anymore. And I copied some Van Gogh drawings out of one of the books. On Friday I went to a Boston Symphony Orchestra concert–Brahms and Beethoven, an unbeatably enjoyable combo, enjoyed that day by probably the oldest audience I have ever seen there for the Friday matinee–younger folks were apparently out Black-Friday shopping. Saturday, East Colony held its annual holiday gift sale, for which I contributed 6×6 panels, and someone finally bought “Toughie”. (When I created Toughie for the Womens Caucus for Art show a few years ago, I thought Toughie would be gobbled up by the first person to lay eyes on it.) Forgot who Toughie is? Here’s a reminder:

Toughie

But all week I was thinking about finishing the painting of Margaret that I started last week (link here), and yesterday morning I got to do that. Yesterday morning, the painting already looked so very close to being done that my fellow artists asked me what I was going to do with the rest of 3 hours. “Bask”, I replied. But as it turned out, I had no extra time for basking. I worked slowly and carefully and painstakingly to reach this conclusion:

Margaret and her Nook

The background needs cleaning up, especially around the head, where my habit of correcting the drawing by painting the negative space is revealed. After working on this painting, I understand too well why my slap-dash works had to be called “studies”. Should I strive to become a more polished painter, or may I return to striving to become looser? Can I do both? Talk about being of two minds! I am torn in two.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; in the Community Gallery at the Currier Gallery in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

The Ghost of Steven Assael

Posted by Aline on November 26, 2013

Actually, Steven Assael still lives, but his spirit visited me this morning. You may remember how impressed I was by him in the course of a workshop that I took last summer. I was impressed and frustrated. Read all about it here. This morning, at our regular meeting of the Tuesday Life Group, I felt as if I had, for the very first time, successfully applied his method for painting a nude, and boy! did it feel good! Not all of the painting is a success . . . yet. Our model will be giving us another session next week in the same pose. But I am so thrilled with this start that I had to share it with you. While I was still in the act of painting, I wanted to shout out to the room for the other artists to gather around and see what I was accomplishing. Here is the image:

Margaret and her Nook WIP

The big deal here is the quality of the skin, especially on her back. The key technique: I feathered it with the fan brush that I acquired for the Assael workshop but never got around to using because I never got this close to finishing. My heretofore preferred way of painting nudes is more impressionistic. Perhaps the only significant difference is a simple one: Assael feathers his brushstrokes on the skin; my Impressionistic style favors obvious unmodulated brush strokes. I guess it has taken me several months to let go of my old conceit and actually try to create the kind of glow achieved by Assael. To see what he did as a demo for us, click here. This new painting method may not represent a permanent new me, but it is something that fascinates me, and offers new challenges for painting nudes. Keeps it interesting!

And on another track, way off to the side of the above:–my exploration of abstract landscapes. Here is a Work in Progress:

Imaginary Elements WIP

Here is the finished painting: (I need to know what you think–then next week I will report on the class’s reaction.)

Imaginary Elements

Here is another start on something, another abstracted landscape I guess. I’m thinking it would make interesting wallpaper at this point, so I have to dig down and find a more compelling reason for it to continue in existence.

The Start of Something

Remember how I bellyached about not have having any photographic record of all my Blackstone Valley paintings? One of my buyers came through with an image of the Castle Hill painting that they purchased.

Castle Hill

This is a fairly accurately rendered painting of funky farm buildings located in Whitinsville, Massachusetts. I think the stone wall stole the show. The wall was built by hand by men employed by the landowner to keep them busy (and earning money) during the Great Depression. The funky buildings resulted from the same impulse, I believe.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; in the Community Gallery at the Currier Gallery in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Only People

Posted by Aline on November 19, 2013

I am still trying to paint an abstract landscape in the EEE class, but the current effort is kind of a mess and I left it behind to dry in the classroom. Fresh eyes this Thursday will, I hope, inspire me with what to do to make it something I can be proud of.

Meanwhile, I’ve been working hard on the figurative side of representational art. Some nude, some clothed, some full figure, some portrait. I am happier with the the painted ones, but I’ll start you off with the drawings –selected drawings. Some of them are disappointing and I don’t want the world to see how uninspired I can be. Here’s my favorite:

Map of the Back

Graphite, charcoal pencil and charcoal on drawing paper–not an ideal combination. I was feeling my way with the media. But I like the result moderately well. The next pose was a standing one, with the model’s head silhouetted against the bright window. Hard to see well enough to represent. I tried, but am sparing you the result. We (the Saturday Life Group which meets at the NH Institute of Art) are now drawing in a studio with side windows, instead of the studio with the overhead skylight. I prefer the side light, but it’s hard to take when it’s in your face.

Grumpy takes a cup of tea

“Grumpy” because he prefers to pose in the nude plus he can’t really enjoy that tea while posing. We promise not to make him keep his clothes on again.

Dennis in his clothes

It was cold in the studio that day, so we had to let Dennis stay dressed. He was happy about that.

Map of a different back

Mike is a new to us, relocated here temporarily from California. He’s a real pro, when it comes to modeling–comfortable and inventive with his props, like the pole and the “stool” he was sitting on. For the next pose, I chose to draw a portrait of him:

Portrait of Mike D.

At last, we’ve reached the paintings! There are two of them, both painted in the workshop studio behind East Colony Fine Art’s gallery. The challenge again is the lighting, but not from windows–either there’s too much fluorescent overhead, or you can’t see what you are doing. We are wising up and bringing task lights that clip on easels, or hang around artists’ necks.

Leaning against the wall

Challenging circulation

Well, that’s a stupid name for a painting. Sigh. Yes. Do you know how hard it is to distinguish one nude (painting) from another by its title? So many nudes, so many standing, so many sitting, so many reclining. Then you try identifying by the color of the drape. So many blues, so many reds, so many yellows, etc., etc. The major distinguishing feature of the last painting was the fact that Margaret’s leg kept falling asleep. Of course it did–what else could we have expected? But that became my idea for a title.

The first one is of a new model and I’m not sure she would be comfortable with being identified by name, which makes titling the painting even harder. The elements of this painting just came together so beautifully, and I quit working on it before I spoiled it. Always a good thing.

Both paintings were done in oil, on the brown carton paper sold by Judson’s Fine Art Outfitters, with very little medium. Does it appear to you as if I were working in pastels, not oils? I think it’s that combination of the dry paper with the unmodified paint. The paint drags across the surface of the paper. When you stop to think about it, that’s what pastels are: pigments without the oil binder. So when the paper soaks up the oil and leaves the pigment sitting on top, you get the pastel effect.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; in the Community Gallery at the Currier Gallery in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Two Projects Are Resolved, and a Theme Continues

Posted by Aline on November 11, 2013

Bear Notch sunset 24×36

Bear Notch Sunset (named for an overlook on Bear Notch Road in Bartlett, NH) is the piece that I started as an abstract painting inspired by Tom Thompson. Like all of my previous attempts to paint abstractly, it morphed into a recognizable landscape. But this time I collaborated–I gave in to my natural predilection in order to rescue the painting (after all, 24×36 canvases don’t grow on trees), but am still determined to keep working on the abstract angle. Proof: here is the one I started immediately after declaring Bear Notch Sunset finished:

Design Inspired by Nature 11×14

I had no photographic reference for Design Inspired. It grew from a mental image, which I tried to capture in paint, thinking if it’s successful as a design, I might do a larger version. However, I currently am not inclined to go big with it. Not that I didn’t enjoy the expressiveness of applying this thick, dark pigment. (I switched internally for inspiration from Tom Thompson to Vincent Van Gogh.) But I don’t feel like repeating that design; I’d rather come up with a new idea to use in the same manner. Maybe not a landscape.

Unfinished business: I promised images of my four paintings from the Blackstone Valley Plein Air Competition at the end of September, but I have only one to show you. Two of them were purchased, one to persons unknown, and the other to a nonresponsive purchaser for whom I have only an email address. A third I donated to the sponsoring organization (“Alternatives”). But the fourth has come home, and, alleluia! it was my personal favorite:

In the Shadow

The little community was aswarm with painters (25 but seemed like more), while I was tucked away in this secluded spot that the director had led me to. I felt very special. I was on the balcony of one of the red brick mill buildings that Alternatives inhabits. The roof over the balcony cast a huge shadow over the millstream below. It may help your orientation if I tell you that the waterway disappears over the edge of a dam on the right. The play of shadow and light on the water and on the aquatic plants intrigued me, but I worried that you couldn’t tell what was happening. Others have assured me that they easily “read” it as what it was. Was the subject matter too abstract for the customers? Or just not evocative of a landmark? Doesn’t matter, I’m happy to have it still in my possession.

The Alternatives event was outstanding, as good as Castine except with respect to the number of avid collectors at the finish of Castine. Both were first-time events, which makes the undertakings even more admirable and their success amazing. Alternatives treated the artists like kings. We got box lunches delivered to us in the field on the first day, and a buffet luncheon back at headquarters on the second day, and more food at the auction that night. High class all the way. I wish I had made a point of meeting the juror, Charles Movalli, but at that point I was on the edge of wipeout and still had the drive home ahead of me (2 hours at least).

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Epsom Library in Epsom, NH; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment (email: alotter@mac.com).

Fixing up and the Start of a Bushwhack

Posted by Aline on November 4, 2013

Thanks to everyone who appreciated the drawings last week. Black and white can be boring, especially when not brought to a polished finish. It is fun for me to go back through them occasionally, hopefully to discern some progress being made, and drawing is the backbone of (most) painting. I will show you perhaps an exception at the end of this post. (latest project being painted mostly from my head without references)

And today’s post is full of color! I made small refinements to three deserving plein air pieces. The first goes back to Castine, Maine, on the pier facing the student (Maine Maritime Academy) ship, the U.S.S. Maine with its tug. I had allowed the lit facet of the yellow tug to brown down, which sacrificed drama, and more importantly the contrast that had attracted me to the scene in the first place. So here’s the original, and after it, the new and improved version:

The State of Maine (with tugboat)

My second redo is actually a finishing up. A Spring painting of the valley behind Franconia Notch in Sugar Hill was interrupted by showers, and the sky was left as blank white canvas. One of my closest friends and admirer of paintings begged me not to touch it as he thought it perfect as is. Do I listen to such pleas? Well, I hung back for yea these many months but decided I had to fill in that emptiness–without violating my friend’s sensibilities. I concluded that what he liked was the extra crisp edge of the mountain range line, so I made sure to keep that sharp, and the high contrast between sky (light) and mountains (dark), so I maintained that contrast as well. While there, I punched up some of the other small lit areas–meadow, roof top. Here’s the before and after:

Franconia Notch, May 2013

Finally, I applied the advice that I had received at the Manchester Artists Association meeting last month, to my first painting of Clark Pond (link to that post here):

Clark Pond in Auburn WIP

Clark Pond will now be framed and readied for exhibit somewhere. (Probably East Colony Fine Art Gallery, where I just took down my figurative show and put up landscapes that are dearest to my heart. Each show lasts for two months.) I was excited to learn that the Currier Museum is allowing us docents-in-training to exhibit one of our own pieces in the Museum (basement) for the month of December, but I have another project in mind for that particular honor.

And that project is the one I am calling a bushwhack, since I don’t have a trail to follow, and have no clue how to reach my rather amorphous goal–to paint an abstracted landscape inspired by Tom Thomson.

Here’s the scoop: I am painting in Patrick McCay’s EEE class with a start from the photo of the cloud shadows. (posted here) In addition to experimenting with the idea of abstract landscape, I was influenced by a book that Bruce Jones brought to Bartlett for the getaway weekend–a book full of the paintings of Tom Thomson, a Canadian artist working during the earliest decades of the last century. Thomson painted juicy, blocky abstractions of landscapes and used the complementary colors of dark blue and orange to great effect. Here is a stunning example:

Sunset by T. Thomson

I wanted to paint something that had that same impact. My painting looked like this when I left off a week ago Thursday:

Bear Notch WIP

Something about my painting wasn’t working. Patrick suggested that it evoked a forest fire with the dark spots represented charred remains of forests. In theory I didn’t care what it evoked since abstraction was my principal goal. But it wasn’t working as a whole, so last Thursday, I abandoned the abstraction goal and transformed my painting into an identifiable landscape that I hope will have almost the same impact as the Thomson. You will have to wait until next week to judge. (I forgot to photograph it before I left the class studio.)

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Epsom Library in Epsom, NH; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; starting Nov. 9, at the Studio 550 Art Center in Manchester NH, as part of the annual 6×6 show of the Womens Caucus for Art; and at her studio by appointment.

Back to the Drawing Board–Literally

Posted by Aline on November 1, 2013

Maybe it’s the result of my overbooked life, but I suddenly found myself longing for the simplicity and discipline of the black and white drawing. Never mind that it turns out not to be simple after all (a fact I had almost forgotten). Pencil drawing also turns out to be sloooow! But drawing has acted like balm for my chapped soul.

It started a week ago Tuesday. I was running late and really preferred to stay in bed, but I had to show up for Tuesday Life Group because I am the one with the key. So I unearthed a drawing pad, grabbed my box of charcoals and pencils and charcoal pencils, and rushed to the studio. My drawing pad, looking back on it, was intended for pencil, not charcoal. I used the hard and medium charcoals that day, and the image, being mangled in the pad all this time, is greatly degraded, but I think you can tell it was a successful session:

TLG 10/22/13

You might wonder how I can treat a successful drawing so carelessly. The process of making a successful drawing is pleasurable, and I have the remains of the image to remind me how pleasurable. But nudes, especially not painted ones, don’t have any other purpose than to give me the pleasure of creating them. No one buys them. And I have so many stored away now that I can’t take the time to enjoy them as past projects. When this drawing pad is full, it goes under the bed with all the others.

Next was a Friday Life Group session with Dennis again as our model. I kept trying with the hard charcoal.

FLG 10/25/13

As you can see, I got enamored of the podium Dennis was sitting on, and the shadow he was casting on the wall. And his hands, but I had to do those separately:

Dennis’ Hands

Working on interlaced fingers is a little like working on a jigsaw puzzle. I did them a second time hoping that my understanding would have improved with practice. Not so much, I’m afraid.

The next day was Saturday Life Group. We had a new model, one that was obviously a yoga practitioner. SLG starts with five 1-minute poses, then one 5-minute, then one 10-minute, then one 20-minute. I sketched all but the 20-minute on sketch paper. Usually I throw them away afterward, but first made photographs for the blog:

1-3 of the 1-minute poses

4-5 of the 1-minutes poses

5-minute pose

10-minute pose

In all of these drawings, I was facing the windows (our venue has changed–no more overhead skylight), so the model is backlit. After the ten-minute pose, I changed paper pads and started using the drawing (as opposed to sketching) paper. I still hung onto the charcoal. I first toned the sheet with a film of charcoal powder so as to enhance the play of the backlit around the edges of her body.

20-minute pose

Reclining portrait

A good likeness, this one, except I dropped a few pounds off her tummy. Finally, I switched to charcoal pencil.

Recumbent

Graphite pencil got the nod for this one; by comparison to paint or charcoal, it takes a much longer time to build up the darker values. Nevertheless, I could not resist depicting the Halloween-themed drape behind her.

Dennis in pencil

I needed a few more hours to work on the values.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Epsom Library in Epsom, NH; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment.

Smorgasbord of Art

Posted by Aline on October 22, 2013

My artistic output last week hit all the bases: nudes, portraiture, experimental landscapes, and plein air landscapes.

Skipping over Tuesday primarily because I don’t remember what I did and I do remember being unhappy with it, let’s start with Wednesday. Wednesday is usually a plein air day, but not last week. Adrienne held another one of her all-day figure study marathons, from ten a.m. until seven p.m. I had no pep, but was determined not to let my health issue stop me. But I could not keep it from slowing me down. Larry Christian and I were the only ones to stick it out to the finish, but I had to stop painting when I ran out of surfaces to paint on. For the last 45 minutes or so, I watched Larry working his charcoal magic on 10-minutes poses of the two models together.

I had two interesting compositions from a side angle:

Foot First

Girl Talk

Foot First was a pose of about two hours, I think. We were late getting up and running, and I had to cut out early to take my daughter to an appointment. The Girl Talk pose was maybe only 20 minutes. No, that can’t be right–it must have been at least an hour.

When the Girls next changed positions, they presented me with profiles of each. After 20 minutes, we found a compromise to keep me happy with long views of the profiles and Larry happy with frequent pose changes. Even as the models changed their poses frequently , they kept their profiles toward me. My view or angle would change slightly each time, but I managed to extrapolate from a current profile to the original profile.

Two Profiles

Thursday was the EEE class, wherein I am trying to discover abstract paintings in my plein air studies. The studies were 11×14. The class projects are 16×20. For both, I used a lot of paint applied with a palette knife. I love thick, juicily painted paintings, a la Van Gogh.

EEE No. 1

EEE No. 2

I was in the Mount Washington Valley and environs all weekend. The semiannual Artists Getaway Weekend organized by Byron Carr and sustained by Sharon Allen’s cohort of plein air fanatics brought together, in addition to Byron and Sharon, Bruce Jones, Sandra Garrigan, Patricia Sweet MacDonald, Jim O’Donnell, Elaine Farmer, a Gentleman Jim from Georgia whose surname I never got. I left for Bartlett after class on Thursday, taking only small panels (8×10) with me. I knew by that time that my fatigue will keep me from covering the usual amount of canvas. Sure enough, I finished only four paintings over Friday and Saturday, despite the fine weather we had.

Saco Riverbed

The Davis Farm

Thorn Hill Road View of Ledges

Mount Washington

The last painting, the one of Mt. Washington, took me only little over an hour, including nodding off time. ( Patricia caught me napping with brush in hand, so there’s no point in covering it up.) It is a simple composition, straightforward in execution. No broken color, no short strokes, no uneven thickness of paint. I was not surprised when many of my colleagues refused to believe it was mine. But they agreed I didn’t likely find it under the pumpkin truck either. I really could not have painted such a distant scene any other way on such a small canvas.

I have a new idea for this week’s EEE class: on my way back from Bartlett, traveling the Bear Notch Road, I took some photographs of the cloud shadows on the mountains up North and am planning to make something abstract out of those images for the class this week.

left center

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Epsom Library in Epsom, NH; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment.

Health Matters, yes it does!

Posted by Aline on October 14, 2013

You may not have noticed, but I did not publish my usual post the week of September 30, or the week of October 7. Before Friday evening, I had been drafting a post in my head; I planned to use it to mull over the phenomenon of retirement generating more “optional” stuff to do and the psychology of slowing down anyway just because the pressure of earning a living has been lifted. Thinking philosophically or finding excuses, whichever you prefer.

But before I could commit those weak ramblings to the ether, an event occurred that provides a better explanation of my inability to perform at peak levels for the past weeks–perhaps the past few months, even. Unsurprisingly, I am all over that new, more concrete excuse, like a rat diving on cheese, and say in celebration, hail to the UTI and its curability with antibiotics.

How it all went down: I had been feeling kinda crummy for a few days, and even had a spell of faintness, but nothing interfered with my performance of essential tasks. I got to appointments, shopped for pet food, cooked, etc. Suddenly, late Friday afternoon, in the middle of trying to reconcile a bank deposit for one of my nonprofit organizations, I started to feel really chilly. I suspended that banking task and went to prepare an early dinner. I turned on the central heat and plugged in a space heater. I kept getting colder. By the time my hamburgers were ready to be served, perhaps only ten minutes, I was shaking uncontrollably–paroxysms might be the right word. I couldn’t talk, much less drive. Ambulance was called–by my 17-year-old granddaughter. Big scare put into family. Not so much me– I could not focus on anything except my desire to get warm. After a few hours of hydrating and testing in the ER, Good News! I was in terrific health but for this one thing, a UTI (urinary tract infection), curable with the right antibiotic (Cipro). The doctor said something about the infection being well-established, suggesting it had been present in my system for a while. That got me thinking of a health event that occurred on my way to Castine, back in July, which I could not explain. I looked up the symptoms (vomiting with lower back pain), but didn’t follow up with my doctor because the symptoms evaporated.

This morning I was infused with a microburst of energy, which resulted in the images that I will be sharing with you below. In the past three weeks, I have been more prolific than would appear from this meager supply of five images. The weekend of the Blackstone Valley Plein Air Competition resulted in four paintings. I forgot to photograph any of them, and had to leave them there for another month. One has been sold, and if the other three are too, we shall be at the mercy of the buyers for decent reproductions. It was a marvelous weekend, and I will go again next year if invited. I’ll save the details for when I actually have visuals to go along. Two additional paintings are at the Institute, drying. They are from my fall semester class with Patrick McCay, called “Explore, Express, Exploit”. They should be ready for photographing next week.

Here is the painting I made of Dennis on the Tuesday before Blackstone Valley:

Dennis in Plaid Shirt

I complained a lot about the plaid shirt, but I secretly was enjoying the challenge. Looking at it now, from a new perspective, I admire the casual but effective depiction of his feet.

After Blackstone, I hit the ground running. Well, painting. I met up with the Cornwall Four (including me, four of us who took Cameron Bennett’s “Inspired by Cornwall” workshop in August) at a new water location in Auburn. I identified it today from a map as Clark Pond:

Clark Pond in Auburn

The scene had everything–almost too much–bridge, the start of fall foliage, water, reflections, lily pads. Yet I added the rock formations on the left; really, they added themselves. The lily pads raft together to form little islands, which may confuse the eye. One of the first lessons that I learned in my first landscape painting experience, from Stanley Moeller in 2005, had to do with water lilies. He told me to underline them with “black” (darkest of pigment, which was not necessarily black) to indicate the shadow they cast upon the water. I couldn’t see but the thinnest of shadows, but he said “Trust me” and I did. And do. Still heeding his advice, I added the most delicate and unobtrusive of shadows under my pads. This painting came under critical review by Peter Clive last Monday at MAA and when I am more of myself, I will be making some perfecting changes–playing down the reflections of tree trunks in the water; playing up the light on the rocks and bridge; settling down the water on the other side of the bridge, which doesn’t recede like it should.

The next day being Tuesday, I did a figurative of new model (to us) Michael, but I don’t like it, so I’m not showing it to you. Wednesday, I was back to Clark Pond:

Clark Pond in Auburn

What a difference two days made! We have liftoff! (Fall foliage is a Big Deal here, where tourists flock jus to stare at our trees. How strange is that?)

Margaret

I wasn’t feeling too great last Tuesday, when I painted this new figurative featuring Margaret. I get a lot of kidding about how fast I paint, so Tuesday, someone commented that I wasn’t going as fast as usual. I felt that too, and hoped the slowing down was for the better. I concentrated on the flesh tones, trying to get them just so, a la Steve Assael. Now I’m wondering if it was just the UTI manifesting itself in sluggish behavior.

Friday morning we got together in the back of East Colony Fine Art Gallery to try it out as a location for figure study. The podium is quite high since it started life as a work table. The lighting is abominable since it consists of fluorescents over a worktable. But there was room enough for my core group of artists, and plenty of easels. Along with Margaret posing nude, my daughter Nancy posed clothed. Nancy was “shadowing” Margaret to see if modeling is something she could do. Naturally, I chose to paint Nancy:

My Daughter Nancy

Another plaid shirt. She has my mother’s admirably straight nose. We had the fluorescents off and a small spotlight on our models.

That night, of course, was the night of the ER, and I have been recovering ever since. Now that I know what symptoms I should have noticed before, I am noticing them, but my fatigue should never have been overlookable. I suspect the paroxysms of shivering took a lot out of me. On the bright side, the back pain I have been putting up with for weeks has subsided–not arthritis after all!

Bottom line, I have been shirking all but the most imperative of duties. One of those duties: I took upon myself a viewing of “Gravity” 3D on the iMax screen. I heard it should not be viewed any other way, and I was worried I would miss out if I didn’t act today. I can now report that the advice was justified, and worth the prioritizing.

The rest of this week will be taken up with Tuesday Life Group, trip to Boston to collect my painting at the Arboretum, and bridge–all on Tuesday, Adrienne’s Fall Figure Marathon all day Wednesday, docent training at the Currier and my Triple E class with Patrick, Thursday, then a drive to Bartlett for the 3-day Fall Artists’ Getaway Weekend. Glad I found out what ails me before all that went down!

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Epsom Library in Epsom, NH; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment.

Have Brush, Will Paint

Posted by Aline on September 24, 2013

I haven’t gone far, but I did go, and that’s got to count for something. Or against something. Sometimes I worry that I am not painting enough stuff near my home. If I don’t do that, who will? I think of Van Gogh, Cezanne, and how they practically documented their surroundings. Both of them were certainly obsessive and almost manic. I wonder if that is what it takes.

First up is Wolfeboro. I participated in the Paint the Town event last year, painted two paintings and sold one. This year I spent all my time (I think they gave us less time) on a single painting and did a pretty good job on it.

Back Channel in Wolfeboro

But it didn’t sell. The blue building houses a hardware store. Even a painting of a hardware store would be desirable if it were painted by Van Gogh. I am not Van Gogh. Alas. When will I learn to paint a desirable subject?

For IPAP weekend, (IPAP stands for International Plein Air Painters, I believe), I started out well, subject-wise. This is the entrance to Beech Hill Farm, a good place to go for ice cream and other neat things tangentially related to farming. Pigs and sheep are present for the viewing as well.

Beech Hill Farm near Hopkinton, NH

I’m thinking of calling this “Portrait of the Artist’s Automobile”. Yes, it kind of ruins the picture for anyone whose car it is not, but I’m perverse that way. It being my car, I could have moved it, but I deliberately chose to include it. Please take note of the rain puddles too. It did rain, and I did persevere without pause.

Day Two of IPAP weekend was Saturday, and I could not give up my attendance at Saturday Life Group, so I arrived quite late at Wagon Hill Farm, in Durham. This Farm is conservation property, with beautiful rolling hills and a few antique wagons to provide some farming flavor. I saw no evidence of active farming. Indeed, I hardly ventured into the property before I unloaded and set up my gear with nothing but a rolling hill to inspire me.

Wagon Hill Farm in Durham NH

I like it.

Day Three we drove out of New Hampshire to Acton, Massachusetts, to the home of one of our members. “Home” does not quite describe the property. I did not even see her actual home. What I saw was old growth woods with one log cabin in decent shape and one tumbledown shack, with chairs sprinkled about, all on a big pond, large enough to be called a lake. I found a chair in front of the log cabin and painted two paintings from that spot. Next time I’m going for an area inhabited by lily pads.

Isabelle’s Rock, Acton Massachusetts

‘Belle really liked this one because she has herself painted that rock many times (like a mini version of Cezanne’s many paintings of Mont Victoire) and she felt I really captured it.

Isabelle’s yellow-orange kayak

In the title to this piece, I specified the dual colors of the kayak to make sure the viewer didn’t think I was confused. Getting that kayak right was challenging. Trees and rocks are so much more forgiving, but man-made objects have to be spot on. I am pleased with the shine of sunlight hitting the kayak but unhappy with the shadows cast by the tree branches. To me, the shadows look built in, part of the kayak’s surface. Note the lanterns hanging from the tree limbs. Windsocks and other whimsies decorated the property. She also served snacks!

In terms of bathroom facilities, always an important factor for us girls, Beech Hill gets the blue ribbon with real rest rooms. Wagon Hill had a portapotty in the parking lot. Nyala (that’s what Belle calls her woodland estate) boasted something else, I’m not sure what exactly, but I rank it under the portapotty. Still, better than going in the woods, which I have, on occasion, been forced to do.

In addition to the above official NH Plein Air events, I have been sneaking around with several of my classmates from the Cameron Bennett workshop. Four of us have been meeting up to paint on Massabesic Lake and at the Griffin Mill Pond and Dam in Auburn. One of the best paintings I ever painted was done at Griffin Mill Dam, years ago. I tried to duplicate that success.

Griffin Mill Dam 2 (12×16)

It didn’t happen. In some ways, this is the better painting technically, in that the individual elements are more expertly done; but the whole doesn’t jell for me. I realize now that I was not in the exact same spot, because this time I plunked myself down without a second thought right in the middle of a bridge. When I painted the earlier painting, I wasn’t so bold. Ah, age brings with it a certain devil-may-care attitude. That’s because Life IS Short now. Here’s the original:

Griffin Park dam (8×10)

Isn’t it lovely?

Here’s another from the Griffin Hill Dam, this time looking straight across to the barn up the hillside. That’s right, all buildings in New Hampshire are related in some way to farming.

Griffin Mill Dam 3

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu, an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Boston Arboretum Visitor Center, 25 Arborway, Boston; and at her studio by appointment.

The Heck with Nudes!

Posted by Aline on September 17, 2013

Who would’ve thunk it? We got bored with nudes! So last Tuesday, we asked our model to keep his clothes on, and he was very happy to do so, being very new to the experience of modeling in the buff. We all had a really good time, and we all produced pieces that we are proud of. So I decided it was time for another sharing of my blog with my fellow artists.

Nancy C’s

Nancy Crowley works most often in charcoal, and most often will do the whole figure. We were surprised to see she was focusing so much on the head. I love the blocking of light and shadow in this one.

Jan’s

Jan Wittmer joined us very recently and has become a regular, but I can’t say I know what she usually does. I thought this was brilliant though. I learned later that this was her second take on this pose, which may account for the fact that it is not overworked.

Nancy H’s

Nancy Healy is a pastelist, and probably the one of us with the most experience being an artist. She always does masterful work. You can tell she is standing at her easel.

My own

This is the photo that I took with my phone, so I am not giving my image any advantage over the others. Actually, it is at a disadvantage, being the only one in oils and therefore the only one with light bouncing off the globs of oil paint. Ah, well. You can tell I was sitting at my easel.

Invitations:

I had two event postcards to get out before this week, and got around to neither of them. Coming up on Friday of this week (September 20) is the reception at the Boston Arnold Arboretum, 125 Arborway, of the Jamaica Plain Open Studio exhibition of “Artists in the Arboretum”. The reception is in the Visitors Center and starts at 6 pm and ends at 8. I will be there, but cannot promise to stay until 8 unless the food and company is particularly good. The exhibit will continue through October 13, and you should confirm viewing times by calling 617-384-5209.

The second one is a “Call for Collectors and Art Enthusiasts”: Blackstone Valley Plein Air Competition. There will be a reception and an auction on Sunday, September 29 at 6 p.m. The judge for the competition (known as a “juror” in art parlance) is the well known Cape Ann artist, Charles Movalli. The competing artists are outstanding, and I guess I just feel grateful to be included. Bev Belanger, of East Colony Fine Art Gallery, is also participating. I should be scared to death, but I’m too old to get worked up over such things. I think. It would be awfully nice to see some familiar faces or names. The address for the reception and auction: Alternatives’ Whitin Mill, 50 Douglas Road, Whitinsville, Massachusetts.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu, an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; the East End Art Gallery in Riverhead, Long Island; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Boston Arboretum Visitor Center, 25 Arborway, Boston; and at her studio by appointment.

The Rest of the Story

Posted by Aline on September 11, 2013

Seated Nude A

Seated Nude A is from the Tuesday session of two weeks ago. Nancy C. urgently requested that I not make another mark on it, with about a half hour to go. I respect her judgment, so I only clarified the feet after getting her permission. Ii’m always saying I want to paint more loosely. The difficulty is knowing when to stop, so I need a Nancy C. around at all times, I guess. This is the Carolyn Anderson side of me.

Seated Nude B

I don’t know where Nancy C. was, but I got a little further into Nude B. I think the story here is the good contrasting skin values. I painted in broad shapes again. Don’t you see a similarity to the figure I had going with Steven Assael’s help here? I have to give another plug to Michael Harding’s King’s Blue. It seems to be just the right blue to add into the shadowed skin tones. Nowhere is it more evident than on the edges of Nude B’s shadows. I am getting away from the more chromatic shadows that I used to indulge in, e.g., Nude A’s thigh. One could say I improved a great deal in one week’s time, but one may be saying next week that I am just as fast a backslider.

Becky Portrait v.2

This is the portrait that I was reluctant to show you as a work in progress. The wayward eye is gone. You can’t even notice the tiny change I made to the outside face/jaw line. I think I should bring it in even more. There is still something about this picture that bothers me. What is it exactly? I think it is the modeling of the face. Kinda crazy, really. I need the model back!

Here, for sake of comparison, is the version 1 next to version 2:

unfinished portrait of Becky

Becky Portrait v.2

Could it be that it is the tightness that also annoys me? I must work on loosening up in portraiture now that I am getting a feel for it in figures.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu, an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; the East End Art Gallery in Riverhead, Long Island; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; at the Boston Arboretum Visitor Center, 25 Arborway, Boston; and at her studio by appointment.

Making do

Posted by Aline on September 3, 2013

This is not the blog I intended. This is a substitute blog, making do with unused photographs that I happen to have already uploaded to WordPress. The problem is computers. I have two computers at home now, resulting from my retirement. I call one the Office computer, for obvious reasons, so I guess the other one is my Home computer. Home computer is an iMac that I bought years ago, used, on eBay. Everyone who spends any time at all in my house has their own account on Home computer. It had been acting flaky, but only when it refused to connect to the internet did I take action. Maybe it is a coincidence, but running Disk Repair only made it worse. The repairs were not completed: the program stopped in the middle and said it could not repair the disk and that I should back up what files I could and then reformat (erase) the disk. That’s a scary message. I never made contact with that disk again. Well, maybe that is a bit overdramatic. I can’t get the damn thing to start up. I sure hope that I will be able to make contact when I get the cable that I need to connect Firewire between these two computers. I have a drawer full of Firewire cables. But Office computer is pretty new and has an 800 FW port, while Home computer boasts only a 400 FW port. So I purchased a $9 400-to-800 cable on eBay and am awaiting its arrival with a heart filled with hope. (Home computer has so many of my images, irreplaceable images.)

But in the meantime, I thought, I can bring the new images from the camera’s USB compact flash card onto Office computer, and from there to WordPress, using the card reader that used to live with Home computer. But Office computer refuses to acknowledge the presence of this alien card. I changed its USB cable just in case the problem lies with the cable. Yes, I happen to have another drawer full of USB cables with every configuration possible (except the one that would connect my two computers). Still no action. I can see a little light blinking in the card reader, but it looks a lot wimpier than the strong light I remember from when it was paired to Home computer. Another coincidence? Who knows! I am reeling. Almost gave up on blog altogether when I realized that this very situation may be worth blogging about, ’cause everyone relates to computer frustration.

But enough of prologue. Let’s see what I have in the media library that you haven’t seen yet.

Fletch under the Assael Influence

This is a fairly large (16×12) study (see, I am learning at least to consider them as studies!) from a recent Tuesday Life Group session. The Assael workshop had just ended, and I was very attentive to the shadows, making them as dark and as blue as I could. There is also a “philosophy” that I think I observed in Steven Assael, which now infects my own: get close, then closer, then closer, then closer, almost to infinity, until you are as close as you believe you can get. Close to what? Perfection, I suppose, but to break it down into parts: value, color, shape. Remember when he played on my painting, running over the shapes I had drawn, then left, instructing me to fix the drawing? (Revisit that post here.)

So here’s the Assael process as digested by me: you sketch in large shapes just to make sure the composition will work, then plug in the values and colors very roughly (as far as the drawing is concerned), then when those values and colors are “perfect”, you perfect the drawing by tightening up the shapes.

In this study of Fletch, I was trying to apply those principles without having first articulated the principles in my head, so it was haphazard. When I ever get my photos back onto a computer under my control, you will see in my last two figure studies something closer to the Assael process, although they will look rougher. Rougher yet closer to perfect? How can that be? It’s a puzzlement, and a delight, a never-ending search for the Way.

The other image I have been holding back is this work in progress–so much “in progress” that I was embarrassed to show it:

unfinished portrait of Becky

One of the images on my compact flash card is the finished–hmm, closer to finished–portrait of Becky. I corrected the wayward eye and worked on the values and colors. I carved back on the left side of the face as well. Dangerous to change drawing without the model as reference, but I felt I was making adjustments on the basis of information already there. Clearly the eye was too far to the right, so I only had to remember the shape and move it ever so slightly to the left. (Do wish I could show you now instead of later!) When I decided the face was too wide on the left side, I kept the same line and just moved it by millimeters (hope “millimeter” is small enough to be my meaning–let’s just say VERY small degrees) by painting the negative space: more hair, less face. I had to trust that the line itself was accurate. A leap of faith in myself. Well, I had no choice, did I?

So that’s it. I have nothing more held back, you know it all.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Kimball-Jenkins Gallery in Concord, NH; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu, an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; the East End Art Gallery in Riverhead, Long Island; at the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter; and at her studio by appointment.

Sidewalk Art Show in Portland, Maine

Posted by Aline on August 28, 2013

Bruce Jones and I tried again, this time in Portland. I had to get up at 4:20 a.m. in order to get myself and my helpers to Portland by 7:30. This was our second experience with outdoor art shows. Our first was the Beacon Hill Art Walk. We enjoyed Portland more. For one thing, we were not under the noisy, dirty elevated rail line. For another we were not in a wind tunnel.

Our spot in Monument Square

As you can see, we had an end location, thus enabling us to extend our real estate. We spread our paintings over three extra panel surfaces, and set up our table display out of the way of browsers. I stacked about 12 unframed panels on the table for bargain hunters. Bargain-hunting art collectors may be an oxymoron: People enjoyed looking but no one asked for the price.

Bruce and me waiting for business

The day was gorgeous–so crisp in the morning that my daughter brought two sweatshirts with her. But the temperature heated up as the day weathered on, and by the end of the day, I was sunburned. I carry sunscreen and insect repellant in my plein air pack, but never thought to bring those things to an art show. Another thing we didn’t think to bring was bags to put the art in if we sold something. Whew! Good thing we didn’t sell anything! I am now pricing clear bags with die-cut handles and wondering if they will be strong enough for a large painting in a heavy frame. I’d have to buy a box of at least 250 of them to find out.

I brought 20 paintings to hang on what turned out to be six display panels, and this time out, most of them were figurative. Half of the figures were nudes. Cameron will perhaps be pleased to learn that I hung 4 out of the 5 paintings I completed in his “Inspired by Cornwall” course. You wouldn’t think anyone would care about paintings of people whom they don’t even know, but my paintings and drawing of black women attracted the most attention. Also, consider that fact that someone bought my portrait of the black African girl (“Red Headdress”) at the Londonderry Art in Action. Pretty interesting phenomenon. My landscapes were almost totally ignored.

Side A: My Figures

Side B, my mixed side; Side C, Bruce’s landscapes

But in the end, the results were the same as Beacon Hill–no sales. We watched as the guy across the square from us sold his giclee prints like hotcakes; we had to admire his organization and salesmanship. We didn’t bring any giclee prints. But we handed out cards and may hear from those interested art lovers as a result of meeting them there. Probably not this one:

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

Mixing it Up

Posted by Aline on August 20, 2013

I don’t have any major project under construction (like the poster competition), but I am keeping busy with the paint. Having lots of smaller projects of different kinds makes me happy. In fact, it dawned on me quite recently that I don’t even know how to finish a big project–I seem to specialize in plein air paintings and portraits and nudes from 3-hour sessions–all of which are by some artists considered good only as studies for something bigger. I’m taking a portrait drawing class with Deirdre Riley at the Institute, and we are working on one charcoal portrait for the last three weeks of 3-hour sessions. Deirdre asked me last Friday if I wanted to start a new one or try to bring what I already had to a more polished conclusion. I answered, polished conclusion, because that’s exactly what I don’t know how to do. The demo by Stephen Assael drove that point home. Now there’s a man who knows how to bring a painting to a polished finish! Every molecule of paint must be in the right spot before he is satisfied.

Next week, I hope to be proudly displaying a charcoal portrait finished to the nth degree of development. Unfortunately, the usual quickies are all I have to show for this week. I will start with the most polished, which you have seen before, because it deserves a second look without all those annoying light reflections. This is my third attempt at getting a good photo of it, and I think third time was the charm.

Profile in Red Sweater–Grace

Red Sweater is from the Cameron Bennett workshop, the last one, the interior one. I’m really liking how the red sweater came out–such a simple thing compared to facial features or even the head wrap, but at least I got it right.

Next is a pair of 6x6s; yes, it’s already time to start on the 6x6s. Our (Womens Caucus for Art) 6×6 show was held in February, but that show was a postponed version of the November exhibit. So now we have one again in November and time is running short.

Garden in Prescott Park

The Garden is painted from a photo that I took last week at the Prescott Park Arts Festival. There was no vantage point from which to paint this scene, but I can remember, with the help of my photo, the light that made it so enchanting.

Day One

The line of children is from a fairly old photograph taken of a granddaughter entering first grade, on that first day. It caught my fancy one day and I decided it was worth at least a 6×6 format. I might try to do more with the faces. I kind of gave up, maybe too soon. I’m proud of the gestures.

Overlooked in previous weeks–no, not overlooked because I consciously set it aside, let’s say postponed–is another portrait of Fletch. It may not capture his likeness as well as some others of mine, but I wasn’t focussing on likeness. I was fresh from the Steve Assael workshop, and my attack on this painting very much reflects the Assael influence.

Fletch under the Assael Influence

Last, and least (as far as size is concerned) is this portrayal of four little piglets taking a nap at Phoenix Farm when I visited it with Sharon Allen a few months ago. I was charmed by how they lined up, alternating heads and tails. These adorable little piggies are probably big porkers by now, being readied for someone’s dinner table. No Charlotte to save them.

Four little piggies napping

Piggies was painted on a tiny 2-inch by 2-inch canvas. The painting is destined to be a favor for one guest at a charity event called the Storybook Ball. East Colony has volunteered to decorate a table for the event, and we chose as our theme the storybook “Charlotte’s Web” by E.B. White. (It was my idea.) Each guest at our table will take away an original 2×2 painting, but that’s only a small piece of the project. Our table is going to be spectacular rendition of barn and web and spider and all the other characters from the book. The charity benefiting from all this activity is “CHAD”, or Children’s Hospital at Dartmouth.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (both are in Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Kimball-Jenkins Gallery in Concord, NH; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings hang in the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter and a poster reproduction hangs in the Currier Museum of Art, also in Manchester. Reception September 5, 5 to 6 (blessedly short) with the Congresswoman and the artists.

Inadvertently omitted from the above line-up in weeks past was the painting I shipped down to the East End Art Gallery in Riverhead, Long Island. And coming up in September is the Boston Arboretum exhibit, which chose one of my paintings for its annual Jamaica Plain Open Studio exhibit, which you would know all about if you were one of my Facebook friends.

Prescott Park in Portsmouth

Posted by Aline on August 12, 2013

Saturday I had a grand day, painting with an old pal, Flo Parlangeli, in the urban seacoast setting of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. We were taking part in an event organized by the New Hampshire Art Association. There were flower gardens and bridges and boats to see, with families, boaters, tourists seeing them. Later there was music to hear. Many also stopped to investigate what the artists were up to. I believe there were even a few sales. I thought the quality of all the artwork was pretty high. My first painting was a view out of a densely shaded part of Prospect Park towards the brightly lit homes across the street.

In Prescott Park

Some of the figures were suggested by the appearance of actual people, others I just made up. I am trying to develop a skill for making a few strokes of color suggest people.

After getting one serious painting under my belt, so to speak, I experimented with the next two paintings. I deployed my largest brush with my medium mix of Gamsol, stand oil and Liquin, and first covered my panel with creamy yellow paint, thereby creating a wet surface to paint into. Continuing with that big brush, I blocked in big shapes, working very fast. As long as feasible, I kept using the big brush. I never did move to anything smaller than a medium brush. It was fun and energizing. I don’t know if the results are anything to write home about, but these two paintings have a different feel to them.

Waiting for the Show to Start

People had reserved their spots by setting up lawn chairs and blankets along the front, but those chairs and blankets were empty because no one wanted to wait in the sun. There were plenty of people in the shady background, but I wanted to populate my sunlit chairs, and so I continued my experiment with slashes of color. Enough to suggest people? The water in the background is the Piscataquog River that separates Maine from New Hampshire. The Portsmouth Naval Station is represented by the buildings on the right, across the river.

Backstage at Prescott Park

Actually, this is behind the back of the stage–trailers, chain link fence, tent, stacks of wooden fencing (I guess–I didn’t really analyze what exactly I was observing here). I see a flaw that I would like to correct now–those dark “holes” in the staging should feel more like gaps through which you can just make out some trees on the other side. Yes, those multicolored blotches are trees. I was listening to my inner child.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Kimball-Jenkins Gallery in Concord, NH; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings hang in the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter and a poster reproduction hangs in the Currier Museum of Art, also in Manchester.

Inspired by Cornwall

Posted by Aline on August 5, 2013

All last week I was preoccupied with my participation in the workshop with Cameron Bennett, which he titled “Inspired by Cornwall” because it was. . . inspired by his time living in Cornwall and becoming familiar with such artists as Alfred Munnings and Laura Knight–the Newlyn School. We were to paint the figure in landscape, en plein air, because that is what the Newlyn painters did. Their history has been made into a movie, “Summer in February”, which is being described with such terms as “complex”, “wild”, “incendiary”; our assignment, to re-create the that atmosphere, was a departure from the usual workshop fare. Every day was threatened with rain, but we must have had the luck of the Irish with us because the sun shone for us each day. Until Friday.

Monday, Cameron handed out an essay written by him on the Cornish painters, treated us to a slide show of representative paintings, and demonstrated his own approach to the subject at the location–Pretty Park– and with the model that we would use the next day–Margaret.

Tuesday and Wednesday, we painted at a local cemetery with Dennis (he of the portrait that I did a few weeks ago) in the morning, and with Margaret at Pretty Park in the afternoon.

Dennis, bridge in Pine Grove Cemetery

Margaret in Pretty Park

Thursday we went to the Seacoast and spent most of the day on this pose.

Grace at Odiorne, with Big Hat

When the sun seemed about to leave us, and the wind picked up, Cameron set us up on the edge of the beach with only 40 minutes to paint, and like a drill sergeant, prodded us on to finish a gestural study.

Grace, standing at edge

Friday, we were all but comatose and welcomed the excuse of potential rain to retreat into the Institute to paint a figure in an interior setting. I never quite got around to the setting.

Grace, another profile–red shirt

It’s not good as a portrait, but I like it as a figure study.

Cameron showed more slides to remind us of what we were supposed to be learning. I hope I absorbed the learning by osmosis because my brain was pretty drowsy by that time. At the end of Friday, we staggered out of the building into a gorgeous late afternoon, too tired to notice.

About the Currier Museum poster competition that I may have mentioned once or twice in the past: I made it into the semifinals, and as a result, I have a piece of my artwork hanging in the Museum. Yea! ( I didn’t win.)

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Kimball-Jenkins Gallery in Concord, NH; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program); and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings are also hanging in the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter. And a poster at the Currier Museum!

A Cloudy Day on Top of Cannon Mountain

Posted by Aline on July 22, 2013

Cannon Mountain is a ski mountain, owned and operated by the State of New Hampshire as a State Park. During the summer, one of the ski lifts, a tramway, takes tourists up to the top–and down again–to enjoy the view from the top and the sights along the way. Today I was lucky to be on the tram that passed over mama bear, grazing in the path of the tram. Ordinarily the views both from the tram and the top are of distant mountains in Maine, Vermont, Northern New Hampshire, and Canada. Today, those views were momentarily available on my ride down. Down, after enduring the wind and chill of the summit, trying to make a painting. Good thing I don’t really like to paint long-view vistas, because the only objects visible were those located within 100 yards.

For photos of what it could look like from the top of Cannon Mountain, check out the website here.

For how it looked today before the clouds completely enveloped the summit:

Housing for a Cannon ski lift (or, what I could see before clouds completely socked in)

I tried another painting when I got back down to parking lot level, but really dark and threatening clouds came rolling in our direction and we hied it out of there. We drove over to Crawford Notch prospecting for sunlight, stopped by the Bartlett Inn to make sure our October Artists Weekend reservations were in, and, failing to discover any better weather, ate our way home. (Stopped for supper at the Yankee Smokehouse in Ossipee and for ice cream at Morrisey’s in Wolfsboro.)

Most of last week I spent laboring, still laboring, in the effort to whip my files at the law office into submission. On Friday, however, I took a break to attend my portrait class with Dee Riley, and produced this drawing of new model, Dennis.

Portrait of Dennis in charcoal

I did not think (and neither did Deirdre) until today that his ear looks awfully small. Maybe he has small ears. The class will be spending two more sessions on this pose. I will miss the next two classes because this Friday I will be in Maine for the Castine Plein Air Festival, and next Friday I will be at a plein air with figure workshop with Cameron Bennett.

Cameron taught portrait drawing and painting at the NH Institute of Art before moving to England last year. He is offering this workshop at short notice to coincide with his visit back home to New Hampshire. Most of his old (previous, some also like me, old) students are excitedly looking forward to seeing him again, getting the scoop on practicing art in England, and sopping up all the learning he acquired in the byways of Cornwall, because the title of the workshop is “Inspired by Cornwall”.

As we are already nearing the end of July, let me alert you to Trolley Night coming up on August 1. Trolley Night, a/k/a Open Doors, consists of trolleys providing free transport between the art venues of Manchester, starting with Langer Place, where East Colony Fine Art Gallery is located. Trolley Night in Manchester used to happen four times a year, then it was three times a year. Now, only twice. So don’t pass this one up. The East Colony Gallery puts on a special show just for Trolley Night, in addition to the regular exhibit: Picnic! is the theme of the special show. So come Thursday, August 1, between 5 and 8. The food is great, the people welcoming, and the art fantastic.

If you have voted in the Currier poster contest at my behest, thank you (whether you voted “correctly” or not). If you have not done that yet, here is the link to the Museum’s home page: Currier. Look there for the link to the poster contest. This may work better for those of you who had trouble with my link to the contest site.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Kimball-Jenkins Gallery in Concord, NH; at the Bedford Library in Bedford; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program); and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings are also hanging in the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter.

Thumbs down and thumbs up

Posted by Aline on July 8, 2013

The poster competition deadline was today. I submitted last week, after much fruitless agonizing. I’d been obsessing over the lettering issue. I was seesawing between disliking formal lettering and being horrified by small misalignments of hand lettering. Here is where I got to toward the end.

poster, next to last version

As you might notice, the word “and” leaves a lot to be desired. I just couldn’t leave it like that, which meant I had to paint it out yet again. In desperation, I went out and bought multiple sets of stencils and stickers, hoping one of them would solve my problem, but none did. Without really knowing where I was going, I started to paint out the latest version of “and” when I realized that you can still read the letters when they are partially obscured. Clouds, I thought. One of my followers had actully suggested that, and now I was ready for that solution. Which resulted in this:

poster–final version

Am I happy? No, I realized I was never going to please myself, and I had just better stop messing with it. So in it went. I cringe when I focus on the lettering at the top, and just hope I don’t get laughed out of a competition where most of the entrants know exactly what to do with lettering.

On a more upbeat note, the painting (or study) that I created Tuesday turned out really well. I think so, and Peter Clive, our mentor, said about it something to the effect that it was one of my best, and in addition, it showed feeling.

Fletch, in profile

Every day this week I am immersed in a workshop with Steven Assael at the NH Institute of Art. If I can ever get the photos from my phone onto my computer, I will post the progress pictures from his demo. All I can say for now–amazing. I think I have found a kindred spirit. Stay tuned for a shift in my style.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Kimball-Jenkins Gallery in Concord, NH; at the Bedford Library in Bedford; at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program); and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings are also hanging in the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter.

Review of June’s Poses

Posted by Aline on July 2, 2013

On the theory that you can never have too much of beautiful nudes, here is my entire collection of the Tuesday June poses, two of which you have already seen but through the glare of wet paint. Margaret times 4:

Margaret-June 2013-#1

Margaret–June 2013–#2

Margaret–June 2013–#3

I still need to finish the background for No. 3, and perhaps bring up her left knee, which for most of the time I could not see at all. That stool swivels, and it was very difficult to get her back into the exact same position after each break. In fact, every time she took a deep breath, the stool swiveled a little.

Margaret–June 2013–#4

No. 4 is obviously unfinished. We all wanted another session on this pose, but since it was the last one with Margaret for a while, we will all have to wait until the fall to finish it up. The pose was one inspired by another painting, one that Tony spotted on a magazine. There’s usually one element of a pose or scene that attracts the eye, and in this case, it’s the curve of the hip. I spent most of my time working on the hip and legs. You can tell. You may also recognize the brown leather sofa. I should start including “brown leather” as a tag to facilitate a search for all of them. Will start with this one, but can’t promise to edit all previous ones.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program); and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings are also hanging in the Manchester office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter.

Do overs and lupines

Posted by Aline on June 25, 2013

A couple of months ago I posted a rave on Anders Zorn, and I think I may have found him a few new fans. Today, I have another, similar artist for you to sample, through a click back to Robert Genn’s site here. The artist is Joachim Sorolla (WA keem SarOYah), a Spanish contemporary of both Sargent and Zorn. He was a master of all the same skills that I admire in Sargent and Zorn, plus he was a magician with white. Not actual white, but that hue as changed by light and shadows.

And now for a commercial: please visit this address for a view of all the artworks accepted into an online exhibit called “Women’s Rights, An Artist’s Perspective”. My painting “Grandma’s Jewels” was juried into this exhibit. All of the artwork in this and similar exhibits is something called “conceptual”, that is, a message is conveyed, to the most intense degree of drama possible. Picasso’s “Guernica”, for example. I think it would be hard to be a conceptual artist all the time, but some artists thrive on it. Personally, I just like to find something beautiful and paint that. Beauty does not convey message, at least not any message that packs a punch.

OK, with all that out of the way, on to this week’s topic: Do-overs. Lupines. In the past few weeks, I have been outside doing a lot of plein air painting. My best paintings have a way of being alla prima, without any going back to correct or improve. In fact, I cannot think of one that I was able to turn from mediocre into superlative. Yet I keep trying! Of my two from the Forbes House (discussed last week here), I did produce one winner, the little one of the “coverlet”. The other one was a bit messy, and I took a knife (palette knife) to it, thinking to reclaim the panel for another project. But that damned Urge to Fix overcame me, and I repainted the bloody thing, using the ghost images as my guide to the placement and shape of the boats.

Milton Landing, before scraping

Marina, repainted

I’m afraid the result may not have been worth the effort, but no effort is really wasted in this learning process. Or is it?

Then last Thursday, I took the day off to go lupine painting with the lupine experts of the NH Plein Air group. Lupines are a flower that blooms in June rather extravagantly in some places. The town of Sugar Hill has so many lupine fields that it holds a “lupine festival” every year to encourage visitors to the area. Lupines come in shades of blue, pink and white, sometimes within one plant, but mostly blues and purples. They look a lot like the Texas bluebonnet. I have had trouble painting lupines in the past, but I wasn’t giving up on them. Yet.

I produced three lupine paintings. Not happy with any of them. The first was the obligatory field of lupines against the backdrop of receding mountains featuring Mount Washington on the misty horizon. The second was lupines by the lake. In both of these, I was really more interested in the receding mountains and the lake, respectively, than I was in the lupines. The lupines seemed kind of stuck on. An accidental presence. So I painted a quick lupine closeup as my third and last opportunity to conquer the lupine hazard.

When I got home, with the advantage of distance from the actual scene, I decided the problem was my schizo approach to the lupines. To make the first two paintings better, I had to downplay the lupines, stop treating them as pimples on an otherwise idyllic landscape. And for the third study, I just needed a few more strokes to define the nature of the lupine and its leaves. Not so much of a do-over, more of a touch up.

I hope you have not been holding your breath! Here they are, the befores and the afters:

Field of Lupines, BEFORE

Field of Lupines, AFTER

Pearl Lake BEFORE

Pearl Lake, AFTER

Lupines close, BEFORE

Lupines, AFTER

Not only am I cursed by this compulsion to fix mediocre paintings, I am cursed by the compulsion to write about it, doubling the time and effort expended. Should I make this my last lupine festival, or is there hope for me?

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program); and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings are also hung somewhere in an office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter, probably the Manchester one.

She’s Back (More Margaret)

Posted by Aline on June 17, 2013

Margaret in a Twist

June is the month of Margaret, but since we are not meeting on Fridays, we’ll have only the four Tuesday sessions to try to capture her elusive likeness. (Prior agonies were explored in this blog.) This profile isn’t too bad, but what I was concentrating on was the body–the subtle swellings and shadows that reveal bones and muscle and fat. Not much fat on Margaret, but that just makes what is there all the more fascinating. As usual, I enjoyed playing with the colors, exaggerating the warmth that I was seeing in the shadow side. I see a few things (e.g., the way the chair back comes forward) that I would fix if I thought I’d be showing this anyone, but that’s unlikely to happen. (I mean in person, not online.)

Saturday, a welcome change of pace: I took the opportunity to join the NH Plein Air artists in the second annual paint out at the Forbes House Museum in Milton, Massachusetts. Last year we had lots of sales (commission to benefit the Forbes House), so we had some hopes for a repeat. But this year, no bustling crowds. My theory–everyone had graduations to attend. Never mind–the weather was outstanding and we were doing what we love to do. For painting subjects, with the Museum’s encouragement, we left the grounds of the Museum to seek out local water scenes. My driving companion, Flo Parlangeli, has a connection to water that sets her heart to pounding. I’m sorry I didn’t think to take a photo of her painting and her two paintings. She was painting them both at the same time–one on her easel and one in her lap. Pretty peculiar, but it was all because she was working in acrylic paint, which dries fast. The fast drying quality was something Flo was using to her advantage. She’d let one dry and work on the other, then pick up the first and paint over the previous layer, then repeat with the second one.

Milton Landing

This was my first one, which I spent about three hours on. I placed it in an Art Cocoon and to make sure it didn’t flop out, I taped the corners. But I was careless, and turned it upside down, and the panel did flop out of its bed. As a result, I lost some of my crisp dark edges at the bottoms of the boats. I had thick, white paint in those areas that just flattened and spread out over the edges. I like to paint thick, wet into wet, although there is a limit to how much paint you can pile without losing control of the situation. I was too close to losing control here even before the accident with the Cocoon. This also illustrates why Flo was using the fast-drying acrylics.

So Flo was not going anywhere and I was finished with the boats. I could have taken her car and driven to another location. Instead, I set up in a new spot nearby, in the lee of the boat ramp, where I was visited by a family of ducks. Such as the joys of plein air painting, offsetting the distress caused by wind gusts that try to make off with umbrella and anything attached to it (like your easel).

Covelet at Milton Landing

I thank you all for your feedback on last week’s project, the lettering for my Live Free poster. I am still mulling over all the suggestions. In the meantime, I have covered up “. . . and”. Some objected to the ellipsis, but it was part of the original challenge–just in reverse order. I decided to conform to the challenge more literally–when the paint dries, I will paint in letters for “and . . .” When I complete the project, I will post the final version. And if I have nothing more interesting to talk about, I will describe all the suggestions I received and reasons why I did or did not take them.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program) and at her studio by appointment. Two paintings are also hung somewhere in an office of Congresswoman Carol Shea Porter, probably the Manchester one. Currently, the only location for viewing the nudes is at her studio.

A Month of Beckys

Posted by Aline on May 27, 2013

My life is just a little bit crazy right now, what with retirement deadline looming and two major art events coming up next week. Yet here I am, whiling away the national holiday making good on my promise to post weekly. It’s a Good Thing though, this weekly blog, perhaps as important as all those other important things. For however long the internet lasts, it will remind me of where I was on Memorial Day of 2013, just before those three major milestones.

(I’m glad at my age to still be counting milestones other than birthdays!)

So, to get to the point: Major Art Event No. 1 is taking place this coming Sunday, June 2, in Boston. From noon until 6 p.m., I with 71 other artists will be participating in the Beacon Hill Art Walk. It’s not your typical urban art show in that many of the artists will be set up in gardens and on firescapes. Bruce and I, however, are setting up a conventional tent right at the S(tart) point on Cambridge Street shown on the map here. I introduced you to Bruce Jones last week as my partner in this Beacon Hill venture. It’s the first of its kind for both of us, possibly the first of many partnerships if this experience is a happy one. I’ve decided to go eclectic with my display, meaning a couple of landscapes, a couple of figurative works, and my steam locomotive.

: Side-lined

Engine 501, depicting the real life orphan at the North Conway train station, has been looking for a forever home via the Bartlett Inn for at least a year now. Maybe Boston will be the place where it comes together with the right guardian. (For those of you in the dark, “forever home” and “guardian” is animal rescue speak, dear to my heart.)

Major Art Event No. 2: I am opening at the East Colony Fine Art Gallery. Some weeks ago I was juried into this artists’ cooperative gallery, located in the Langer Place Building, the very same building where I conduct my figure drawing sessions, and where the Hatfield Gallery is located, where I also exhibit. Friday I hung six pieces, all of them plein air landscapes. All are, of course, my favorites. (But I have more favorites left, to take to Boston.) My first reception as a member of this gallery takes place on Friday, June 7, from 5 to 7 p.m. I would love to see all my friends there, cheering me on, especially those (you know who you are) who have complained I don’t do enough to market myself.

Back to the business of Becky: I have three new paintings to show you, none of them exactly “finished”, but I may not ever touch them again since I got what I needed from my efforts.

In the red sweater

I love the texture of the bare, clear-primed canvas and so my leaving the background unfinished was a choice. Nevertheless, it will probably be classified as a work in progress if it survives a few hundred years. Painting a clothed model was a change of pace, one that I enjoyed very much, but I guess I was in the minority because the following week when Becky asked if we wanted her clothed, the response “No!” rang out. So I painted this:

The Faraway Gaze

I couldn’t finish this one simply because of the size of the canvas: I chose to bring in a 20×16 canvas on stretchers, which I would never use for plein air so why not? I knew I had better concentrate on the face, then the chest since I could leave the background and the hair to memory or invention or both. Everyone, including myself, thought my lips (the ones I painted) were great. What makes them work, though, is how well I painted the chin and philtrum–lips don’t exist in isolation. OK, check off lips; next up is noses. Her nose here is pretty good, which gives me hope. Becky’s ear is amazingly simple–most people have complex ears, lots of folds and dips and valleys. I think I will make Becky’s ear my template for ears so I don’t use up so much time on them. Nobody really cares what happens inside the ear as long as its placement is correct, the shape is correct, and the tilt is correct.

From the large to the small: this painting is only 10×8 and it felt even smaller to me because I was trying to get the whole figure in. It’s hard to paint small, I discovered–that little stroke that does the job on a bigger canvas makes a blob on the small canvas, and sometimes wipes out a nuance I had been counting on. I thought if I went small I would end up with a small, completed jewel of a painting. Ha! But this one could be a jewel with just a few corrections here and there, and maybe tomorrow I will get a chance to make those corrections. That depends on the other members of the gang. Most will probably prefer to move on to a different pose. I must say, it was nice to paint the other side of Becky’s face for a change!

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery and the East Colony Fine Art Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at the law offices of Mesmer and Deleault at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program) and at her studio by appointment. Through May 31, nine of her Boston Arboretum paintings are on display at the Leach Library in Londonderry, NH. On Sunday, June 2, she will be participating in the Beacon Hill Art Walk, in Boston.

The White Mountains of New Hampshire

Posted by Aline on May 20, 2013

New Hampshire has a Seacoast region, a Lakes region, and countless quaint farms and towns, but to the rest of the world, New Hampshire means but one thing: the White Mountains. They do rather stand out, compared to all those other things. I believe “white” comes from the glimpse that early seafarers got of them, when covered by snow. Or perhaps it was the sun glinting off the granite.

In any event, they became the subject of many 19th century paintings. Champney, Bierstadt, and dozens of others explored and painted the Whites. For a complete rundown, go to White Mountain Art. Right now there are two major exhibits of White Mountain paintings, one in Jackson and another in Plymouth. The former we have visited twice before. The latter is housed in a brand new Museum of the White Mountains on the campus of Plymouth State College. We stopped there to check it out on our way to Bartlett last Thursday. We came away with a map showing the coordinates of several locations, that is, the coordinates to the spot where the painter stood to paint or make his sketch (probably not many of the paintings were painted outdoors). My painting buddy, Sharon, aspires to paint like the Old Masters, and her enthusiasm led her to download a GPS app to her smartphone, and led both of us over hill and dale in search of the right spots. It was fun. Unfortunately, progress or tree growth interfered with many replications.

My plein air painting No. 1 is a covered bridge not far from Plymouth.

Smith Millenium Bridge

Friday, we got in two painting segments: the first was in the strawberry fields below Cathedral Ledge.

Strawberry Fields (Cathedral Ledge) (No.2)

Usually, my first painting is my best, I think because the inspirational tug is strongest with the first try. If you don’t count the covered bridge–it was on the way into the mountains, not quite there yet–this is the first. And it could be the best. But there are four more, and you might like one of them better.

Friday afternoon we went on our first expedition in search of Old Master painting spot: Mt. Adams as captured by Champney. The actual spot was right in the middle of the Auto Road up Mt. Washington, but we found a better one off to the side.

Mt. Adams (No. 3)

Mount-Adams-Benjamin-Champney-1852-24-x-30-inches

The snow-streaked mountain in the background of my painting is Mt. Jefferson, and on the far left is the beginning of Mt. Washington, which is a sprawling kind of mountain, lumping its way to the highest point in the Northeast. (Last January I had painted a view of this lumpy part of Mt. Washington on that misery-filled plein air weekend.)

Saturday we found our own spots. The day before, on our way back to the Bartlett Inn from the Mt. Adams spot, a stream near the highway had caught our eye and so the next morning we went in search of it. Sharon sometimes ends up in my paintings, and I was particularly glad of the added interest her hat brought to the scene.

Roadside Painter (No. 4)

After a while, the noise of the traffic hurtling by next to us faded from consciousness and all we heard was the gurgling water.

In the afternoon, Sharon introduced me to Echo Lake, at the foot of White Horse Ledge. It was an idyllic spot. Sandy beach, picnic benched (excellent to paint from–you can really spread out your stuff), lively visitors (and I don’t mean the black flies)–one of whom demonstrated the echo for the rest of us.

White Horse Ledge over Echo Lake (No. 5)

My painting had at one point a much more literal depiction of the ledge, but its very literalness bothered me, so I loaded up my palette knife and spread paint liberally. Perhaps something in between would have worked better. Supposedly there is an image of a horse, whitish maybe, delineated in the cracks of this ledge, but I sure couldn’t see it and I wasn’t about to fake it either.

Sunday was a travel day, but we did get in one painting late in the day before heading back South. It was the product of another Champney search, this time in Sugar Hill. Mt. Lafayette is on the left and Cannon is on the right. Personally, I would call it another view of Franconia Notch.

I’d say this is about half done. The dark clouds arrived, threatening rain, before I even touched the sky. The sky had been a dull gray before that anyway. Cannon is a ski mountain, and I’m not sure I want to put the ski trails in. But why not? I don’t know. View is from Lovers Lane, in Sugar Hill.

All of my paintings on this trip were 9×12, except Roadside Painter which was 10×12. I figured I was out of plein air practice, and the smaller format would help me finish paintings. That was correct. Perhaps smaller will mean more salable too. Eventually, I plan to take them back to hang in Bartlett Inn.

Or I may take them to the Beacon Hill Art Walk on June 2. I am trying to decide whether to take only figurative works, only landscapes, or the best of both. I’m sharing a tent with Bruce Jones, who does beautiful work in the style of Don Stone. I’m not sure I want mine compared to his.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at her law offices at 41 Brook St in Manchester; at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center in Manchester (part of the Healing with Art program) and at her studio by appointment. Through May 30, nine of her Boston Arboretum paintings will be displayed at the Leach Library in Londonderry, NH. On Sunday, June 2, she will be participating in the Beacon Hill Art Walk, in Boston.

Art in Action

Posted by Aline on May 6, 2013

Today, I am still wiped out by the effort of participating in a two-day event called “Art in Action.” The Londonderry Arts Council puts it on twice a year. They were also responsible for the Art in t he Common show last fall which bravely welcomed my nude paintings. They also set up the arrangement with the Leach Library whereby nine of my paintings are displayed there. The Londonderry Arts Council is quite an admirable organization of many artists. Since we have nothing comparable in Manchester, I am grateful that they allow all regional artists to benefit.

Participation entails setting up an area to display your artwork — a mobile gallery of sorts– and space where you demonstrate your art-making–a mobile studio. I kept it simple by displaying only 10 framed paintings, a few giclee prints and two cards. Cards (note cards) seem to be the one thing everyone else had lots of. I sold one of my two, which made for a pretty good percentage of cards sold! For my Day One demonstrating, I continued on my single-minded quest to capture a likeness of Margaret, and once again failed. Everyone else thought it was a wonderful painting, but they don’t realize how woeful the likeness is.

This is actually Margaret. After painting her from life last Tuesday, I tried two more times, using the photo in black and white, to draw her features in black and white.

And here is the painting from the photo:

Margaret herself has advised me that if I put in the moles, that would make her recognizable, but whether I am drawing her with paint or charcoal, I truthfully do not see the moles at all.

My frustration leads me to understand why many artists resort to the projecting an image onto the canvas, instead of drawing it freehand. Hmmm. Should I try that? To do so would certainly not help me improve my drawing skills, but I suppose if I had a photograph in front of me and a commission to paint from it, the projector would be a valuable shortcut, almost irresistible. I’ll wait for the day when I have a commissioned portrait to paint and the subject cannot for some reason sit for it, and then decide whether to succumb to the projector.

For Day Two, my daughter graciously agreed to sit for her live portrait, which included an accessory–her miniature Pomeranian sitting on her lap. I’m happy with the Pomeranian, less so with my daughter–their portraits, that is.

The weekend ended on a high note: I had to part ownership with my Girl in the Red Headdress, as a young woman fell in love with it on Day One, and even though she felt she could not afford to buy it, came back on Day Two after having dreamt about it. It reminded me so much of my first big art purchase. I fell in love on Day One and came back on Day Two to take the plunge. The artist, Roger Graham, became a client and a friend, and by the time he died, I owned probably ten (whose counting?) of his paintings, some hanging at my law office and some at my home/studio. I never regretted a single purchase. If you buy what you love (not what you think will be a good investment), you will never regret it. I was happy for her and for The Girl, who has found, in animal rescue parlance, her new forever home.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

The Joy of Completion

Posted by Aline on April 29, 2013

Detail from Portrait of Grace

The “Joy of Finishing” was my first thought for the title to this posting, but “Completion” is better. And not just because “completion” brings with it fewer double entendres. You could “finish” or come to an end of a project without being satisfied with it. “Completion” connotes a goal achieved. I could go further in this amusing wordplay by comparing “accomplished” as in “mission accomplished”, but that could get raw.

This week, therefore, I celebrate three completions. Last week you saw the intermediate stages of two of them, so you have some idea of what to expect. Above is the detail from the bigger one. I said I wanted to make the background from the colors of the headscarf and whaddya know–I did!

Portrait of Grace

Grace did not realize we wanted to repeat the pose from last week, so she arrived with a different scarf, wearing different earrings, and carrying a different drape. Just as well–three elements were thus eliminated that I might have spent valuable time on.

This is a pretty good likeness of Grace, but of course, profiles are so much easier than 3/4 or full facial views. Have I mentioned that before? I hate to repeat myself, especially when the point is obvious when you think about it: matching up eyes, eyebrows, lids, etc., etc., especially in the 3/4 view where the shadows make them look different, is really, really tricky. Also, faces are not symmetrical, so too much matchy-matchy would be wrong. Given all that, trying to figure out where the eye on the left should be higher or the one on the right should be lower can give me headache sometimes. No, all the time.

The other just-short-of-finished figure from last week came out OK. I think I messed around a little with the face, to no good purpose, but the main focus was the hand. Now shorter, narrower, and with a hint of finger structure, this hand no longer detracts from the painting as a whole.

Figure Study (M on BLS)

However, the face is not that of Margaret, so I moved in closer, metaphorically, on a second sheet of canvas:

Portrait of Margaret

Still not Margaret. If I had had more time, I would have lengthened the nose perhaps. Or shortened it. But it’s hard to say what exactly is wrong. Peter Clive said, “Margaret is elusive.” I called her “sneaky”. (Which I think she appreciated.) Likeness or not, this painting came out well. What do you think of the background? I was thinking of light through thick green glass, but chose not to take that concept all the way–it was just my inspiration.

You might notice that the head is tilted differently in the second attempt. It’s just impossible to keep a head from moving. If I were alone, and were painting a portrait, I could keep telling the model how to adjust her attitude, but when painting the entire figure, there is so much to keep aligned that you tend not to trust your opinion about where the head should be–especially if changing it might decimate a colleague who thought he had it right. (I apologize for the long sentence but couldn’t find a spot to break it up.) Still and all, frustrating as it is, I would not trade it for drawing from a plaster cast of a head, illuminated by a steady, never varying spotlight. The harder it is, the more ways we learn. I hope. I sure hope so.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu , an American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at her law offices at 41 Brook St in Manchester; and at her studio by appointment. Beginning May 1 through May 30, nine of her Boston Arboretum paintings will be displayed at the Leach Library in Londonderry, NH. On Saturday and Sunday May 4-5, she will be exhibiting and demonstrating at the Londonderry annual event “Art in Action”; the location of Art in Action will be the large farmstand operated by Mack’s Apples, 230 Mammoth Road in Londonderry.

Race up Mount Washington

Posted by Aline on April 22, 2013

I’m sharing with you this week a magnum opus WIP (work in progress) that has been in progress for over a year now. It’s not that I’m lazy, at least I don’t think so. Or that I have too many other projects going. I just stopped working on it for many months, waiting for my desire to finish it to return. I explained this in my blog of a few weeks ago, here if you want to read it.

Usually, I am fast to paint and perhaps too fast to declare my painting done. I don’t have time to get bored or the scope to get intimidated. But I almost always have one big painting in the works, and it usually takes me a month or two to work out the problems and declare it finished. This one has been a totally different experience. It has intimidated me with its scope, size and complexity. I now have barely got all the canvas covered, and am only beginning to try to pull it all together as a whole.

Mt. Washington Phase 4

No smart aleck mountaineer (my son) has yet asked, but perhaps I should make it clear that I am not going for accuracy in the configuration of the mountain ranges depicted. The people are, however, based on real people whom I observed at the 2011 Race to the top of Mount Washington. From the hundreds of photos that I took while waiting for my son to finish (33d–that’s really good!), I picked out some vignettes to incorporate in this panoramic scene. I have drawn and/or painted most of them before I started on the present mammoth. (OK, it’s 30×40, not really mammoth, but quite big for me.) Here are my studies, in no particular order:

Fans

Awaiting the Stragglers (3-legged dog)

View of race with vista

Whew! (a top female finisher)

Andy with bike

A Very Special Guy

Bike Race spectator on Mt. Washington (Find him in the magnum opus)

These small paintings are more faithful portraits of the mountains and the infrastructure at the finish line. The two portraits are of my favorite cyclists, the ones I was there to cheer on.

Mount Washington is often referred to, fondly and respectfully, as “the Rockpile”; if nothing else, my painting does give the viewer a sense of why that is. Despite all my practice paintings, I’m still not satisfied with my technique for depicting rock piles. I also intend to enliven my landscape with many more spectators and cyclists. If you examine the distant road, you will see, you might see–some indistinct blobs of color; they are supposed to suggest more cyclists on their way up with spectators along the route.

I would not want to leave you without a nude this week. For the past month or so, I had been sticking to 8×10 and 9×12 canvases for the Tuesday and Friday sessions with live models. Last Tuesday, counting on having my model in her pose for two straight weeks, I brought a larger canvas to work on–16×20. I was using a piece of oil-primed linen from a Centurion pad. If I don’t like all of it when I am finished, I can always cut it down. So I started large.

Figure in Turban and red drape WIP

So far, so good. I have high hopes for this one, but am a bit perplexed by the color of the background. I think I would prefer something that more closely echoed the colors in the turban. Or perhaps a much darker background to set off the figure and the turban. Stay tuned!

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at Stella Blu American Tapas restaurant in Nashua; at her law offices at 41 Brook St in Manchester; and at her studio by appointment.

A Milestone Reached

Posted by Aline on April 15, 2013

Last week, without really thinking about it yet fully conscious of it, I produced something, finally, that I have been aspiring to for many years now. Here it is:

Jon, supine pose

This aspiration started with a class that I took with Patrick McCay at the Institute–a course called Explore, Express, Exploit. At that time, what I had in mind was achieving a style that was loose as opposed to tight. Following Patrick’s course, I took Painting the Contemporary Portrait with Cameron Bennett. Cameron gave us a list of portrait artists, “portrait” being loosely defined and the artists being avant garde, and suggested we look them all up to find one who could inspire our own modern and unique take on portraiture (again, loosely defined). I glomed onto Carolyn Anderson, American artist living in Montana, somewhat obscurely. She seems to be an artists’ artist–known to and collected by fellow artists but not yet collected by museums.

Since then, her work has always been in the back of my mind, even when I am producing the hard-edged, detailed works that seem to come out of me unbidden.

You’ve seen a few nudes from me. Here is the only one I found on Anderson’s website:

Anderson nude

And here is one of her portraits, lovely beyond words to describe:

Anderson portrait

By comparison, I know, my big breakthrough seems heavy-handed. But it occurred–bloomed– quite naturally that Tuesday morning, without a trace of the manipulation that I felt I was guilty of when painting loosely for effect. “Loosely” implies something casual, effortless, airy–not something forced or faked. Here is one of my earliest efforts, and it’s not horrible, but still you can feel the strain it put on me:

Translation of life drawing into Oil

I know from past experience that this reaching a new level, slightly closer to the high level occupied by my hero, does not mean I am permanently raised on that new level. On Friday I tried not to slip back too far. I worry about being too self conscious about it. A Catch-22. You can only succeed by not trying so damn hard.

So here is Margaret, the model with whose limbs I have recently struggled in vain to organize*. I got a break when we posed her with her hair covering up one of her shoulders.

M on brown recliner, WIP

*”organize” is the word used by Robert Liberace to describe the first stages of a drawing or painting, which the parts are sized and fitted together–the jigsaw puzzle stage. It’s so the right word that I am adopting it.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

Aging

Posted by Aline on April 9, 2013

Well, it happened again. I forgot to post Monday’s blog. I was so pleased with myself Sunday for taking the photographs and uploading them to WordPress, that I must have subconsicously given myself credit for completing the job. Or it’s age. Twice in three weeks–not good! Good thing I am wrapping up my law practice.

Yes, it’s official. I will not be renewing my license to practice law in the state of New Hampshire at the end of our fiscal year. As of July 1, my status will become “inactive”. Of course it may take weeks after that to tend to my clients and sort through and dispose of the accumulations of 29 years. Some of my clients I will continue to be able to serve (e.g., by preparing tax returns) but for those requiring the services of a member of the Bar, I will try to place them with new lawyers. The tax clients will be the hardest to place–not many lawyers want to represent taxpayers in trouble with the IRS. That’s because usually the trouble originated in some fault of the taxpayer–well, not “fault” exactly, but behavior. When people get smacked down or just depressed, they can’t cope with taxes, and of course, to the IRS, it’s just another same old story. Our system of income taxation confers upon the taxpayers great responsibility and great trust. Alleviating that burden on the taxpayer is, in my opinion, the only decent argument in favor of a sales or value added tax. Thank God I won’t have to even think about this stuff in a few months (except, as I said before, a few tax return preparations).

So this week’s original topic was going to WIPs (works in progress), WIP and RIP (rest in peace) are two possibilities existing simultaneously in a half-finished painting, like alternate universes. RIP means I never return to finish the painting. WIP is a hopeful designation. Two unfinished paintings this week are, I hope, WIP and not RIP.

But let me show you first–three completed charcoal drawings from our Saturday Life Group. I’m pretty psyched about them. Our couple was back, and all of us were a little more at ease with each other and the whole concept of two entwined naked bodies. For one 2-minute gesture pose, they even struck a kissing pose. It dawned on me that I could not get more appropriate pieces for the McGowan Gallery‘s annual Valentine’s show, “Love, Lust and Desire“, than these drawings. And pieces in the show are limited in size to 8.5 by 11, so when I decided to bring my 9×12 high-quality pastel paper to SLG that morning, Fate was with me.

I don’t quite remember (age again?) which poses were what length, but the range was 20 minutes to 50 minutes.

LL&D No. 1

LL&D No. 2

LL&D No. 3

I started all three by smearing the paper with soft charcoal. Then I deployed the kneaded eraser to bring out the lights. The paper was not white, so I could have increased the contrast by using white pastel, but for some reason, I felt that much contrast would be too intrusive. Does that make any sense at all?

WIPs I have several, but the most important is my Mt. Washington Oeuvre. I slapped some more paint on it, and it’s beginning to take shape. I’m getting excited about it again, as the background gets covered with paint.

Phase 3–Biking on Mt. Washington

I have to keep reminding myself that I conceptualized the mountains as semi-abstract. I cannot allow myself to get hung up on painting realistic rocks. For the figures, I need to resize them–the ones farther from the viewer need to shrink a bit. I plan to refer to the original photo references for each figure, on my iPad if I can get it to stop going to sleep. Consistency in the direction of sunlight also needs some work.

The next work was a WIP yesterday, when I should have posted this entry, but when I got to Tuesday life group this morning, everyone else wanted to move on with a new pose. So although I may need to tinker with shapes and values here and there, this is essentially a done deal.

Jon seated on stand wip

By the way, I made up the background at home, thinking to get a head start on today’s session. Head start, finish line, same thing almost. One of my cohorts today commented that I had a nice touch with interiors, suggesting I should consider that as a specialty. So watch out for that as a new theme, possibly. I’m pretty opportunistic, like a leaf in a stream of water, just letting it carry me wherever. So far, no interiors have presented themselves as likely candidates for painting subjects. George Nick did some interiors that I admired greatly (many shown in his gallery of 2008-2010 paintings here), and Paul Ingbretson, just one floor below our studio, has an interior that would knock your socks off (see it here–called Warm and Cool). And Van Gogh was very much into interiors. Can you think of other examples? Seems to me to be a pretty untapped seam. Hope I’m not mixing metaphors there.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

Hello, Again

Posted by Aline on April 1, 2013

To those of you who noticed and cared that I did not post anything last week, I apologize. To those who never noticed or cared, I don’t know what to say. Really? Your lives did not seem emptier? Mine seemed peculiar. I am so used to the follow up discussion among my friends that it was as if we had lost a piece of our conversation template. Perhaps I have gotten spoiled, so it was a good thing to experience a little deprivation for a short time. I have no excuse for missing a week, if that’s what you are waiting to hear. I suddenly realized on Tuesday that I had never posted the Monday blog, or indeed even taken the photographs with which to illustrate it. Instead of bending myself into a pretzel getting a late entry out, I decided to lie back and wait for complaints, if any. Too few complaints were received. Oh, well.

The upside is all the extra material I have for this week. The headline news is progress on the painting that I started a year ago of bikers racing to the top of Mount Washington. Here is a link to what it looked like last year. I brought it out to work on March 23 because of Peter Granucci. He invited us to his studio in Gilsum (where?–middle of nowhere but close to Vermont) for a workshop on stalled projects. I had the perfect candidate in the Mt. Washington painting. He forced me to do exercises of value studies for the painting, six of them, and claimed that each was better than the one before, and only then was I allowed to apply those principles to my big canvas. So annoying to have to apply real rules when all you want to do is follow your instinct. But my instinct had dried up, I guess, and that’s why the canvas had seen stashed away for a whole year. So now Phase 2, which will I hope lead to 3 sooner than a year from now:

Phase 2 of Mt Painting

Another feature from Figure Fridays with Peter Clive is this 2-session study of Fletch reclining on the ubiquitous brown leather sofa. I had two hours remaining when I finished the figure study, so I started a portrait too.

Reclining Male on Brown Sofa

Portrait Fletch Mar 2013

Compare the new portrait to this one from last month. Am I getting better?

Fletch portrait on darker bkgrd

The Saturday group is back in business after two weeks off. Here is the pick of that session.

Reading (Nook) from back

Finally perhaps my favorite of the group is this portrait of Grace. I think I am finally getting the hang of something–the color of the skin, the modeling of the shoulder, and the light touch for the mouth. I’m really fond of this one!

Portrait Grace Mar 2013

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

Viewer Discretion Advised

Posted by Aline on March 11, 2013

The weather has been crazy up here in New Hampshire. One day last week everything had to stop for a snow storm, and the next day Spring seemed to arrive. Because of the snow day, what was supposed to be three successive sessions with Becky as our model were interrupted, and as a result, many fine artworks have gone unfinished. Quelle tragique! (Obviously I am referring to the fine artworks in progress by my cohorts, as well as my own.) Here are my almost-finished works from Friday and Tuesday.

Becky on the Green Chair

This one may be finished. I need a critique from Peter to be sure. Since I was working on a 9×12 support, the face was quite small, which frustrated me because it was really beautiful. I decided to quit the one above and start up a portrait, which was going to be finished the next Friday, weather permitting. Which it didn’t.

Half-finished portrait of Becky

And no Sunday sessions, possibly due to a mix up involving Daylight Savings Time. But I still have extra material to show you this week, thanks to the Saturday Life Group. Two Saturdays’ worth, in fact. Not only two Saturdays, but two models on one day–a rare event! But so hard for us as artists to pull off.

I’ll start with the earlier Saturday. Pretty normal stuff, not shooting for the moon, just charcoal on the Mi Tientes pastel paper. I don’t care for that exaggerated texture but I have a lot of it to use up, and it might be growing on me.

Becky, left side view

Becky, right side view–another imitation of Ingres’ Grande Odalisque (see my prior discussion here)

Becky, front view

For the second Saturday, we had two models, both new to us, a couple. We found that posing them in a tableau where they seemed to be interacting with each other made for better results. Here is our first longish (20 minutes) pose.

Duo Jamie and Catherine, No. 1, 20 minutes

The second pose was our longest, about 45 minutes I believe, and as you will see, the models were side by side but not really interacting.

Duo Jamie and Catherine–No. 2, 45 minutes

We had intended that second pose to last the rest of our session, but as a group, we were so disappointed by it, that we abandoned it for another intertwined pose. However, I did enjoy my drawing, which was basically just of the guy, with the girl in the background. The light was interesting. (That studio at the Institute has an overhead skylight, which distinguishes our Saturday drawings from all others in the Langer Place studio.)

Duo Jamie and Catherine–No. 3, 25 minutes

It was hard to account for all the limbs and still keep their positions believable. When a body disappears behind something, it has to come out the other side looking as if it belonged there. If you examine my drawings closely, you can find much fault, but overall, the effect is pleasing, I hope.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at her law offices at 41 Brook St in Manchester; and at her studio by appointment.

Through March 29, you can also view (and purchase–of course!) my 6×6’s at the Artstream Gallery in Rochester, NH.

Marco Island Paintings Part Two

Posted by Aline on March 7, 2013

Each painting has a story, but 14 stories is a bit much to ask my followers to, um, follow, so I am just adding a few comments underneath, same as I did for Mary’s paintings in my prior post. Super-short stories, in effect. Unlike the spread of Mary’s paintings, I organized mine in chronological order to the best of my memory.

We were huddled behind some shrubbery seeking shelter from stiff winds on a relatively chilly day (for the tropics), so the subject was not selected by inspiration but forced by necessity. Usually my first painting turns out to be the best, or at least one of the best, in a series of outdoor paintings. As I was working on this one, I thought it was going to be an exception to that “rule”, but now I am liking it better. . .probably because I am far enough away from the scene to be able to forget reality.

Island Woman. It becomes a scene of intense frolicness (frolicity?) on the weekends, but we wouldn’t have been able to park anywhere close then, much less find a place to set up easels.

Lanai Sunset. Strictly speaking, not plein air, but inspired by sight, memory and assisted by iPad photo. Perhaps still a work in progress.

Waterfront Home. The boats are up in the air on hoists, and I worried about how it would read. But not important now, I think. The water looks liquid, don’t you agree?

Frangepani Tree. Economy of effort:–beautiful bark, few leaves, and blossoms rationed to bloom at the ends of branches for short time. This one had buds but no blooms yet.

Farmers Market Musician. We were chased out of the grounds proper and forced to set up behind the “band”. Lucky for us!

Octagonal house. Occasionally, we can’t resist recording the unusual.

MarGood Park View from the Gazebo. Our 2d visit to this spot. Behind me was the skiff that I painted two days before. It was while I was working on this scene that I got skiff-owner’s request to purchase my painting of his boat and his dog. I posted that news here. Pelican landed just in time to get included in the painting.

Dinner! These are six of the 2 dozen blue crabs that I received in partial payment for the skiff-dog painting. Don’t they look delicious? (I think they were blue before being steamed.)

Fishing under the Jolley Bridge. Had highest hopes for this one, but now worry it has missed the mark. There is a slight curve in the bridge, so don’t get on my case about perspective!

Waterside Dining. That’s how they characterize it. I left out the blue dolphin that Mary chose to feature. Dolphins all over the city, like moose sculptures in NH. Cows in Chicago. Gnus in New London. (look it up)

Two Tiny Visitors to Residents Beach. What? You don’t see them? I thought they were warblers, but the bird book suggests they are more likely wrens. Also met my first Red Knots and Brewer’s Blackbirds in the course of making this painting. (Beach is to the right, past the vegetation barrier.)

Plein Air Still Life? I’m always saying: I don’t “do” still lifes. This not really “still” because the light keeps moving!

Morning of my Travel Day: San Marco R.C. Church. Foreground, what foreground? What can you do with a parking lot? Had to pack up and catch plane in afternoon, so I forgot to get photo of Mary’s version, which was excellent.

I hope that adds up to fourteen. I wish I had a better photo of number 15, which I had to leave in Florida with its happy new owner. I took a photo of Stephen holding his painting, but it turned out horrible. Here instead is a photo of my collector, which I lifted from the Naples Daily News, online edition.

Crabby Stephen

He may look like he only knows about collecting (and cooking) crabs, but he is also experienced in matting and framing, so the painting is in the best of hands. I asked him to send photo of painting when and as framed.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

Through March 29, you can also view (and purchase–of course!) my 6×6’s at the Artstream Gallery in Rochester, NH.

If you happen to be near Tampa, Florida on March 7, 8, and 9, you could (and should) catch Nude Nite, happening with music and other entertainment at 3606 E. 4th Ave., in Tampa. Hours are 6 pm to midnight. (Nude NITE, after all)

Your Last Nudes for a While–A collection from the Circle

Posted by Aline on February 16, 2013

Still a work in progress

That photo is a product of my cell phone. While in the throes of packing my gear for Florida last night (I’m writing this from Cleveland airport during a long layover), just for the sake of comparison, I snapped this image of the same painting with my Nikon.

Yes, my hand shook a little ( couldn’t afford the time to set up properly with tripod), but the colors are truer. Bearing that in mind, here are the cell-phone-pix of my fellow artists:

The Front by Nancy H.

The Back by Nancy C

Nita’s Portrait

In the course of packing for Florida, I came across a forgotten painting, forgotten only a matter of weeks, perhaps. It’s interesting for the uncharacteristic brownish flesh tone. It reminds me of Rembrandt’s palette.

brownie

I recognize that beach chair, but can’t remember the last time I’ve seen it. So this painting may be months older than I originally thought. I found it in the framing studio so it seems likely that it predates that great framing effort for the Londonderry show in September.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

In February, you can also view (and purchase–of course!) my 6×6’s at the Artstream Gallery in Rochester, NH.

Potpourri–Nudes, Landscapes, Almost Abstract

Posted by Aline on February 11, 2013

Sideways (12×9)

Once again I lead off with a nude. I love my nudes. This was today’s. You probably recognize the model. Our Saturday group got cancelled by the snowstorm and my painting from Tuesday is not finished, so it’s the only nude I have for you today. (We have Tuesday’s model again this week, so I will finish that one up and post it before I leave for Florida for two weeks.) I am not sure that I will be able to keep to my Monday blogging schedule while I am down in Florida, but I should be able to post photos of the paintings from time to time.

Today I finally noticed why I sometimes see shadows as orange. When it’s cold in the studio, we used a space heater to keep our model comfortable. The heater glows orange. Her breast looked as if it were on fire yesterday. That was the clue. But it doesn’t explain other orange shadows, the ones on the other side from the heater. Maybe it’s simply what I see, after having one cataract removed. Can’t wait for the other one to go.

I also loves me some landscapes. Without a Saturday Life Group session, I was unleashed to paint a landscape. Ever since the Eric Aho exhibit, I’ve had this notion that I too could paint an abstract landscape if I simply gave myself permission . Turns out, it’s not that easy. I have, in the past, made paintings that look abstract–well, only two, to be exact. One happened in a magical state of unconscious creativity (as seen in hindsight, of course), and the other’s subject matter was inherently abstract. “Spirit Lake” is the former; the name I gave it may be a subconscious bow to the process that created it. Click here to go to my web page showing Spirit Lake.

The inherently abstract one was a close up view of the mangrove swamp in the Ding Darling National Wildlife Preserve.

Mangroves, Ding Darling

So Saturday I taped up a 16×20 piece of oil primed linen on a drawing board, and got out a volume of spectacular photographs by Tim Palmer, of some of the most spectacular scenery in existence. I met Tim some years ago at a Sierra Club meeting, and told him I wanted to use his photographs as inspiration for paintings, and he gladly gave me permission to do so. His book, titled “Luminous Mountains: The Sierra Nevada of California”, had been waiting patiently in my studio all these years to be put into service. I opened the book and did not get further than the frontispiece, a magical scene titled “Volunteer Mountain, Yosemite, at Sunset.” I tried valiantly not to paint the photograph, but I’m sorry to report, my product is not very abstract. Not abstract at all.

California Landscape

It’s also earthier, less magical, than the photograph. Isn’t that strange? I may try again, next time limiting my palette–no blues or greens allowed.

I also took the Saturday opportunity to modify, perhaps improve, the frigid plein air paintings of a few weeks ago. I actually made something of that first effort in the windy, subzero meadow off Route 302.

Mt. Washington from 302, No. 4

The scene of the Jackson church needed some cleaning up, and fresh whites (actually not pure white, but white with a tiny bit of yellow). Compare:

Jackson Community Church, looking west, BEFORE

Jackson, AFTER

The differences are perhaps too subtle to show up in this medium, same as a photograph can never do justice to a painting, unless it is printed as a giclee and there is nothing between you and the giclee print. (No digital interface, e.g.)

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

In February, you can also view (and purchase–of course!) some of my paintings and drawings at the McGowan Gallery in Concord, NH, (“Love, Lust and Desire” is the theme) and my 6×6’s at the Artstream Gallery in Rochester, NH.

If you happen to be near Orlando, Florida on February 14, 15 or 16, or Tampa, Florida on March 7, 8, and 9, you could (and should) catch Nude Nite, happening with music and other entertainment at these locations, respectively: 639 W. Church St. (blue freestanding warehouse just East of I-4) in Orlando; and 3606 E. 4th Ave., in Tampa. Hours are 6 pm to midnight. (Nude NITE, after all)

Welcome, Groundhogs*

Posted by Aline on February 4, 2013

Skin Colors

Yesterday’s quasi portrait is my pick of this week. It could be improved, for sure. But overall I am pleased–with the gesture, the drawing, the colors, the modeling. I wanted to leave the background unpainted, to show off the fact that I made no changes in the outside contour of the figure. But now I do need to make some changes, so I will try to match the color of the paper I was painting on to eliminate that dark edge atop her left arm, and to carve away at the neck and jaw on her left side. I would also like to point that I snuck in a tiny glimmer of teeth showing between her open lips. Even more so than hands and feet, teeth are the painter’s nemesis.

This brown card stock, which I have been using a lot lately, is called “carton board” and is made by Judson’s (Guerrilla Painter). It looks like stiffened brown Kraft paper but is sized to accept oil paints without absorbing them. It does kind of absorb the Gamsol, but dries out quickly. It leaves a spot. You can see a spot near her left jaw, where I was trying to carve away at it without deploying paint.

Other things I want to change about this piece: the eyes–too heavy with the dark line, I think; the transitions between colors in skin tones–too abrupt in certain places; the hair: too restrained–she has quite a mop, and showing that would add interest to the painting.

In my stories about the Circle of Six (or Seven), I showed you several examples of what my colleagues were doing with the same poses, but somehow I missed capturing this one by Steve:

Steve’s Best

Steven thinks this is his best drawing of Becky. For the blog that showed more takes on this pose, go here.

I have heart-warming news in abundance today. One of my little 6×6 paintings was selected by one of the sponsors for the Notecard project of the Women’s Caucus for Art. OK, that requires an awful lot of explanation. The WCA pulls together an annual exhibit to showcase members’ 6×6 pieces, which are sold for $66. Artists purchase the 6×6 blank panels from WCA and the money we raise from these sales of blank panels to artists goes into the scholarship fund. (We award a $1,000 each year to a NH woman attending art school in NH.) The sale of the finished panels generates revenue for the artists and the gallery, not the WCA. So this year, for the first time, our beloved leader (Suzanne Whittaker) developed the Notecard Project: ten sponsors donate a largish sum of money in exchange for the credit that goes with the publication of sets of ten note cards, each set containing reproductions of all ten 6x6s chosen by sponsors for such honor, to be sold throughout the year in various retail locations. The money raised from the sales of the notecards goes to the scholarship fund. The money raised from the sponsorships pays for the printing of the notecards, and a little bit goes back to the artists chosen to be in the notecard pack.

That takes so long to explain because there are so many interlocking elements. I was intending to show you my oown 6×6’s eventually, but had so much content on other subjects that I never got around to it. Here they are:

A Walk in the Woods, 1

A Walk in the Woods, 2

A View of the Bay

A View of the Forest

Barrington Editions, a business that creates giclee reproductions of artists’ paintings, is the sponsor who chose one of mine for the notecards. They chose the one I call A Walk in the Woods 1. To create these pieces, I cut up old watercolors to the correct size and mounted them onto the 6×6 panels. I enhanced them with black and brown ink, then I covered them with an acrylic gel, which protects the watercolor paper and adds a nice shine. Inspired by the shine, I decided to construct wires simulating windows. This turned out to be much more difficult than I had imagined, and I became worried that the wires were too fussy, especially for the first two, which seemed to stand well on their own. So in the end, I added the window wires only to the last two above, then forgot to photograph them in their little cages.

Other big news, which cannot wait: Nude Nite Tampa invited BOTH of my pieces. These two.

Artists and Model

I’m not quite ready to part with Artists and Models, but now I have to. Am wondering if it will be any cheaper to ship two smaller pieces than the one large one that went down to Orlando last week, at a cost of $122. (I do hope it sells, but in case it doesn’t, the trip back home is already paid for.)

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

*I really have nothing to say to groundhogs, but am so grateful that Phil has ordained an early spring for us that I just had to call out.

Breaking Bad

Posted by Aline on January 14, 2013

My weekend was dominated by my iPad (Christmas gift) and my discovery of the HBO series “Breaking Bad”. Apparently it’s been around since 2008, but only recently came to my notice. Convergently, my iPad excels at downstreaming (if that the correct term) episodes of Breaking Bad from Netflix, 46 episodes starting in 2008, each about 48 minutes long. I made only a small dent. Needless to say, not much art got created. So in a way, I acted out in my own very small way the title of the series, which refers to the conduct of a high school chemistry teacher who breaks bad and sets up a secret lab to manufacture crystal meth.

Thank goodness for Nita and Nancy, my fellow Circlers, who have provided images of their creations to flesh out this sorry specimen of a blog entry. All three of us painted Tuesday morning, and Nita painted Friday as well, while Nancy and I were gallivanting to Boston for the Symphony and the MFA. Let’s start with Friday and go backwards for a change (it’s good for your mental agility, they say):

Nita’s Friday Project

I’m so impressed with this portrait. It is well drawn, and the lips in particular are so delicately painted (and accurate for the likeness, if that matters–it matters in the sense that you score more points for a likeness, but doesn’t matter in terms of quality of painting). The modeling of the facial structures is also well done. And the eyes are good. Skin tone, really good, well I could go on, but you get the idea.

Because we were a smaller than usual group on Tuesday, we gathered around the brown leather sofa, on the sunlit side of Adrienne’s studio.

Nancy’s pastel painting

Nita’s Oil Painting

My Oil Painting

I took this painting to a collegial critique on Wednesday and got some really useful suggestions, which I promptly implemented, all except one which I forgot about until just now (add red reflection of the drape on his thigh). My handling of the pillows and the sofa itself drew more admiration than the figure. Here are some–perhaps all, at least all that I could locate–of my prior interpretations of that sofa:

The Feet Have It

Owning the Brown Leather Sofa

On the Brown Leather Sofa

Vote for your favorite brown leather sofa painting by commenting below. If you want to. Don’t feel obligated!

I will be participating again this year in the McGowan Gallery’s annual “Love, Lust and Desire” show–it’s a Valentine theme for the month of February. The reception will be February 1, from 5-7. The show is unique, or at least pretty unusual, for the limitation on the size of the artworks: 2D, no larger than 8×11. The prices are accordingly affordable. McGowan is a superb, high-end gallery, worth regular visits any time you might be in the neighborhood. 10 Hills Avenue, Concord, NH. My contributions to the exhibit are mostly small oil paintings on treated paper. I included two copies of master’s portraits that I am particularly proud of. One is a self-portrait by Pietro Annigoni , the other a detail from a painting by Jacob Collins. I love this black and white closeup of his model’s head almost better than the original half-figure-in-color version.

After Jacob Collins (detail from Carolina)

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

Slacker!

Posted by Aline on December 10, 2012

I only painted thrice last week, and it’s thanks to my Tuesday and Friday morning life drawing sessions and the Saturday Life Group that I accomplished that much. It made me realize how little time I have been putting in on studio projects, and on painting in the great outdoors. I used to be a pretty decent, very enthusiastic plein air painter. Without actually counting, I would bet I produced over 50 plein air paintings in 2011, compared to 25 this year. I miss it. But so much of my artistic energy has been absorbed by the figurative and portrait sessions that I haven’t been carving out time for plein air outings. Now the weather is getting nasty outside. My New Year’s resolution, adopted early, is to find more opportunities to get outside to paint–starting with our first ever Bartlett Artists Winter Getaway in January, followed by a visit to Mary on Marco Island, probably in February.

Meanwhile, the story of this week: Since our Tuesday model and our Friday model and our next Friday model is the same person, those of us who do both Tuesday and Friday decided to make it a repeating pose, enabling a total of 9 hours on one pose for those who wanted it. I will probably the only one of us who will use all three sessions on a single painting, although I expect not to use the entire final session on this painting.

“Huis Clos” (“Inside closed doors” or “no exit”?) WIP after 2d of 3-session pose

One of the more interesting aspects of this painting is the background architecture. I had recently watched a video, part 1 of Dan Thompson painting a figure, in which he recommended painting in the background, at least temporarily, in order to use it as a roadmap. It works. Before I drew in the Exit door on the left of the painting, I had drawn the figure’s arm too close to his body. By situating the frame of the door where it intersected the body, I uncovered the drafting error in the arm. The cubicle on the right (it’s the bathroom) helped me with sizing the figure’s left leg (leg on the viewer’s right).

Because I knew about the extended pose, I started this painting on a 16×20 sheet of primed linen. I intended it to be a whole body pose, but allowed my impulsive first blocking in to change my mind. What you see is the product of two sessions, and it is almost finished. Some tinkering with the facial features and decisions on the background are needed next week. When it is finished, I will roll it up and stash it away with so many other paintings on which I have lavished hours of time and effort. And love. Paintings that, unlike landscapes, no one else is likely to savor.

At SLG (Saturday Life Group) I continued the experimentation with compressed charcoal that I had started in Larry Christian’s class at the Institute. Here is the final pose of the session:

40-minute pose, view of the back

Yes, I do like backs.

There is another drawing, from a 20-minute pose, that I wanted to include today, but for some reason, the photo I thought I took of it did not turn out. Too bad. It was a good one, and different from the one above. I will include it next week if I can work it into next week’s topic, whatever that might be. I hope next week’s topic will include work in my studio, inspired by the successful completion of my reorganization exertions. Yes, that’s my excuse for no studio painting: I have been laboring on moving stuff, and removing stuff, to create more space in my bedroom/studio for the studio portion. Books, heavy books, had to be carried downstairs to make room for just art books on the studio shelves. Underbed storage units had to be emptied to make room for clear bags, saved drawings and such art-related, seldom-accessed items. Dust bunnies had to be captured and disposed of (sneeze!). Furniture had to be rearranged and some of it relegated to the guest room. Today, I ache all over. Well, that’s nothing new. Arthritis. Really slowing me. Down.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

Catching the Odd Perspective

Posted by Aline on November 12, 2012

I haven’t mentioned it before, but I have been taking a figure drawing class at the Institute with Larry Christian. Larry’s approach to drawing the figure is the opposite of academic drawing. He pushes us to draw quickly, intuitively, expressively. The techniques are familiar ones, but to please Larry, we must apply those techniques more fluidly and expressively to create an image that is unique.

I took this course with Larry before, in the spring of 2006, when I was just getting started as an artist. At that time, I was obsessing on landscapes, particularly plein air painting. Now that I have done a 180 on that preference, and also come to admire Larry’s drawings, I was motivated to retake the course, hoping to find out how Larry achieves his dramatic effects. For the only images of his work I could find online, click here. By way of contrast, look at Anthony Ryder’s drawing, so meticulous, and also lovely, but definitely academic in style.

Most of our work product in Larry’s course is not fit for public view. We bring nothing to completion. We produce pages and pages of gesture drawings, 30 or more of them each week, and then do our exercises on the technique du jour. One week it was drawing shapes instead of lines. The next week, drawing negative shapes. The week after that, creating form with darker values for shadows. Most recent week, creating form by wiping out darker values to create light.

Last week did produce a few showable drawings. And one of them contributed to the title of this week’s blog.

Bent

We applied charcoal evenly over the paper in order to create a non-white ground, and then erased that charcoal to bring out the shape of the model. I got lucky in my angle on the crouching pose–the simplicity of the shape and the shadow distinguish this drawing. The one before it was a more traditional pose, more complicated, yet less interesting.

Seated

Now that the course is winding to a conclusion, I have a pretty good idea of what I will be practicing in order to emulate Larry Christian: Use compressed charcoal; draw negative spaces; and my shadow areas will be all in one value. That last point was a revelation.

The other example of an odd perspective is my painting from yesterday, Sunday. I brought a larger canvas (12×16) and had less time (we didn’t get started until 45 minutes into our 3-hour session with the model), so perhaps that inspired me to paint more with the larger, simpler shapes. Or maybe I was influenced by the success of my crouching pose above. In any event, here it is:

Pillowed

In evaluating this painting, I remembered one from a month or so ago, which, by consensus of my friends, I had ruined by smoothing out the shapes within shapes. It’s very hard to restrain oneself. Right now I’m looking at that light patch on her forehead, thinking it should be smoothed. But I had a light patch like that on her breast at one point, and it disappeared and I don’t even remember doing it. That’s how hard it is to restrain oneself.

Following up on the Soo Rye Gallery opening last Saturday, I’m hoping you are dying to see my photos taken at the reception.

Totem displayed in Soo Rye Art Gallery

High and Dry on exhibit at Soo Rye

Lotus Studies, on exhibit at Soo Rye

Bea’s drawing, displayed in Soo Rye Gallery

Bea’s portrait of Becky

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

The Week of “Super Storm”

Posted by Aline on November 5, 2012

Haven’t you heard enough about Sandy already? New Hampshire is one of the suffering states, but I got off pretty easy. Looks like I’m going to have to pay for a new roof without help from the insurance company. Being unscathed myself, I insisted on holding the Tuesday life group. It was, after all, a pretty nice day, weather-wise, a little rainy but hardly any wind to speak of. But most of the other artists were dealing with one storm-related problem or another and couldn’t get here for the group. So it was just the model, another unscathed artist, and me.

We set up in the window side of the studio and had our model lounge on the familiar old brown leather sofa. We found ourselves looking down on him, which felt strange at first. The model stand that we usually use puts the model at my eye level or above. (I sit to paint.) We also forewent any supplemental lighting inasmuch as the sun was streaming right in at our backs (yes, SUN). No dramatic shadows to fall back on for creating interest. But as it turned out, I didn’t need any drama from lighting. I accepted a full-on frontal foreshortened pose with the model’s feet practically in my face. (Of course that’s an exaggeration–I did say “practically”.) I was super pleased with this development because it furnishes a response to a taunt from one of my colleagues who, upon viewing last week’s blog, complained that I was not giving enough attention to feet. Since he is also one of our models, I suspect it is HIS feet he want more attention paid to. Nevertheless, feet are feet:

The Feet Have It

I have to point out that it is not often that you get to depict the wrinkles on the sole of a foot. Having recently watched a documentary on Lucien Freud, I also felt as if I were channeling him every so slightly, as I tried to paint the effect of hairy legs.

On Friday, four of us met with Peter Clive for a quasi-workshop session. Peter had during the summer been attending our Tuesday group whenever he could, but currently his teaching schedule at the NH Institute of Art kept him there on Tuesdays. So he offered to come instead on Fridays and critique work in progress, when corrections are possible. In the course of the summer and now the fall, Peter has seen quite a few of my paintings. He compliments me by saying something like “That’s a nice study,” or even “That’s a great study.” He said that about The Feet. Noting his use of the word “study”, I had reconciled myself to the reality that a serious artist does not go around producing a finished painting in three hours (actually less when you consider setting up time and break times). The fact that I consider these paintings as complete if not completely wonderful just shows how far I am from being a serious artist. There is a whole level of professionalism up there that I can only imagine.

However, the work that I did Friday was, at the end of the three hours, pronouced a “painting” by Peter, “not just a good study”. Yes, he actually said those words.

An Actual Painting

He liked the composition, which I admit, I had worked out early in the process. before paying much attention to the figure. So that was unusual. Perhaps because of that, a certain painterly quality emerged for the whole painting. But when I got home, I noticed that the right leg was too short, both as measured against her left leg and as measured against her torso. So I “fixed” it. I tried to duplicate the original foot before I covered it up, but the new foot (FEET again!) doesn’t look right. I may have botched this painting by correcting one errant part of it that may not have mattered in the big scheme of things. All is not lost, however–the same model is returning in two weeks for the same pose, and I will get another crack at that foot. I am also hoping to paint a larger version from the same pose.

Totem, 11×14, $300

Lotus Studies 13×13 $265

: High and Dry, 11×14, $300

A plug for the Soo Rye Art Gallery opening on November 10, reception from 5 to 8 p.m. The address is 11 Sagamore Road, Rye, NH. All the artworks being exhibited are priced no higher than $300. I contributed “Totem”, “Lotus Studies”, and “High and Dry”, three of my all-time favorite paintings. If you can’t get to the opening, the show continues through the end of December, but I expect that a lot of the art will be sold at the opening.

Here is some history for these three paintings:

Totem was accepted in a regional show juried by Don Stone for the Rockport Art Association (Massachusetts, not Maine). I painted Totem on the coast of Rhode Island, near Narragransett, with my artist friend, Mary Crawford Reining. The totem, actually more accurately called a cairn, in the painting really did exist exactly as I painted it. Other cairns had been built by person or persons unknown, but this one was the most adventurous. It was more than a cairn–so I titled it Totem. Earlier in that morning, I had painted another, more complex view of this rocky beach, and had an hour left over. Only much later did I realize until later what a successful painting Totem was.

Lotus Studies won Best in Show at a Manchester Artists Association exhibit, about a year ago when the MAA had a gallery of its own, but I created it at least a year before that for the Women’s Caucus for Art annual 6×6 show. That had been my first year in the WCA, hence my first 6×6 show. I had easy inspiration from photographs taken at the lotus pond in Wickford, Rhode Island, again visiting Mary. The next year we tried plein air painting at the pond, but my output was worthless.

High and Dry has no distinction to report, but it deserves an award, in my humble opinion, for oozing the most charm. I have Mary Crawford Reining to thank again, for High and Dry: this time I was a visiting her Marco Island home for perhaps the third year in a row. None of my Florida paintings had amounted to much until this one, and I still consider it the Prize of my Florida collection. Funny thing is, Mary had had her eye on this boat for a long time, wanting to paint it but never having got around to it. So I swoop in and steal her subject as it were, and make it one of my best from Florida.

Only in the writing of these descriptions did I notice the huge debt I owe Mary Crawford Reining for guiding me to these three inspiring subjects.

Aline Lotter is currently exhibiting:

at the Hatfield Gallery in Manchester (Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH); at the Bartlett Inn in Bartlett; at the Red Jacket Inn in North Conway; at the Soo Rye Art Gallery in Rye NH; at the law offices at 41 Brook St in Manchester; and at her studio by appointment. Also, if you want to plan ahead, on December 1-2, a two-day show of unframed works at Adrienne’s studio on the 4th floor of Langer Place, 55 S. Commercial St., Manchester, NH; the artwork will be priced no higher than $150! At least six artists are participating in this sale.

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