Today’s watercolor experiment: Several days ago I began with a photo and painted a study abstracting its contents. When I took the photograph, I framed it to capture the juxtaposition of different colors rather than emphasize the subject itself. I used the resulting abstract composition as the starting point for my next abstract study. My next […]
Today’s watercolor experiment: Until I get more familiar with some of the schools of abstract art (i.e., Abstract Expressionism, Kitchen Sink Art, Organic Abstraction, etc.) I’m going to rely on my own ideas to seed my abstract studies. Today is the third in a series of abstractions that had its origin as a photograph. This […]
I love signs. There are signs that are ambiguous, but state their meaning in no uncertain terms: There are signs that express frustration: Today I saw another sign. It struck me as ironic. The sign, when read in its entirety advises, its readers of their right to not be deterred from shopping, presumably by people asking […]
Today’s watercolor experiment: Today I began by abstracting another painting of mine. This painting (Abstract 072415) was an abstract of one of my photos. This time I used colors that were complementary to the blocks of color in the original. I wanted clean boundaries, straight lines between different colors. I used masking tape to cover one […]
It worked. Distraction, I mean. Yesterday I mentioned that this was the first year I didn’t get a happy birthday call from Mom, not because she forgot to call, but because she died earlier in the year. One of my ways of dealing with sadness and bad feelings has been to compartmentalize. However, it was hard […]
Birthdays are bittersweet. I love watching children who express utter delight at the attention and excitement on their own birthdays. I observed this with my grandson at his second birthday a few months ago. We dimmed the lights to show off the cake and its bright candles. William was focused on the cake and the […]
Today’s watercolor experiment: I liked the blocks of colors I used yesterday. As yesterday, I also worked from a reference photograph. But unlike yesterday, I present the painting before I show you the source of my inspiration: I know that I see the representation of a set of objects in this painting. This is most probably […]
I have been having a great time inking and painting small-scale architectural sketches of interesting buildings I photographed during my walks around New York City (Sea Food Building, The Beer and Soda Building, Clock Building, Studio School Building). However, I do miss painting abstracts in a larger format (Abstract 062415, Abstract 053015, Abstract with Film, Abstract […]
There were many places to get good bagels in New York City. Where my wife and I lived, it wasn’t a long walk to Ess-a-Bagel. In Yiddish, ‘essen’ means ‘eat’. Therefore ‘Ess a bagel’ means ‘Eat a bagel’. What could be simpler? The bagels were enormous there. So enormous in fact, that a diet expert […]
New York is a city of signs and symbols… and restaurants. To attract customers, the enterprising restauranteur needs to distinguish his or her restaurant by a symbol to attract the walk in trade and of course, by the food. What is the essence of good eating? Taste? Aroma? The person responsible for the display at Trattoria […]
