Portraits in the traditional manner

The first is a portrait of Thomas Ellison, a cabin boy on HMS Bounty, who was one of the three hanged on HMS Brunswick, Portsmouth Harbour 1792.
The second is a portrait of William Bligh done in the manner of portraits in the 18th.Century, wherein the background and the foreground contain objects directly relating to the sitter. In this case the ship HMS Bounty and a frontpiece from Bligh's published journal 'Voyage to the South Seas'.

Portrait in a comtemporary style

This is a portrait of John Morgan and his grandson Sam. John and his wife Robyn manage a construction and earth moving company while Sam spends a lot of his day watching the drivers manouver their vehicles. Since being given a small geared battery car to drive, Sam has shown a remarkable ability to park, reverse and generally drive the vehicle like a professional.

Judging the 'Masterpieces' of the 20th century

An allegory is 'the description of one thing under the image of another'.
I call this allegory 'judging the masterpieces of the twentieth century' and it is also (92" x 48"). The painting style is Rococo and at least seven great artists of the past can be seen in among the crowd. You may also recognize the painting being catalogued. There is Rembrant, Michaelangelo, Leonardo, Titian, Turner, Rubens and Holbein. Coming up the pathway is the painting 'the scream'. Nature's abundant beauty provides the contrast to the ugliness in store for the judges.

The greatest difference between twentieth-century painting and the painting that preceded it was depth. Modern painting is not concerned with depth. Modern painting is about flatness. Klee, Picasso, Mondrian, Matisse all championed the two-dimensional surface. Why a whole culture should have renounced such a rich tradition as chiaroscuro painting is a great puzzle. Depicting light and depth has become something like powdered wig making or French polishing - a lost skill. If all of a sudden nobody knew or cared to know how to play the violin you would think of it as a cultural loss, that civilisation would have dropped back a notch or two. But it saddened few when perspective dropped out of painting. Such is the astonishment here.

Painting for a Time Capsule (92" x 48").

In Charles Dicken's novel 'The Tale of two Cities' a man about to be executed described life as a circular experience in that when we finish life's journey we find we are back where we started. Later T.S Elliot said something similar. This is the general thesis for my picture. I had in mind people interacting and representing the arts and sciences. I wanted painters, writers and musicians and I wanted a situation and era that suited their excitement of discovery.

I chose the late eighteenth century the age of romance and reason. It is also a good midpoint in the evolution of architecture and the sciences. The costumes of the late Baroque era are fantastic, in particular Canaletto's Venetian displays, so my first figure became the girl in the huge red dress.

I have put certain items in the middle distance, owls and giraffes, sheep and geese a palace and an observatory. I always try to crowd and detail the middle distance in my large paintings. It is mischevious and fun - and in this case provides a counterpoint for those with gloomy dispositions. I also find children love to discover these disguised creatures.

I wanted an Icarus like figure to represent ambition (my sense of humour got the better of me and I paired him with a wingless chicken - a creature that could once fly but had lost the urge. I I also liked the idea of an abundance of food as an amplification to the abundance of activity.

Alexander and the Gordian Knot (GR 1)
(50" x 50")

I was asked by a child what is lateral thought?
Why not a painting on lateral thought? Who had the first lateral thought? Adam? Never! No Alexander the Great maybe with the cutting of the Gordian knot?

The story:

The father of gods had ordained that when it came time for the people to select a king, they must choose the first person to ride up to the temple of Zeus in a wagon. Gordius innocently fulfilled the oracle and was made king. (The system might be an improvement over a methods of election held today. Certainly it would eliminate political campaigns). In any event, Gordius seems to have done very well. One of his first acts was to dedicate his wagon to Zeus and to place it near the temple, the yoke tied to the pole by an intricate knot of cornel bark. ( Ah.. good, waggon pole and knot- can paint that) Another oracle declared that anyone who succeeded in untying the knot would be the conqueror of all Asia. The knot stayed tied until the arrival of Alexander. Then, as everybody knows, he cheated on the oracle by cutting the knot with his sword instead of untying it. Zeus honored his initiative by making the prophecy come true.
'If then such praise the Macedonian got
For having rudely cut the Gordian Knot'
.....Waller ...to the King

Alexander III of Macedon died in his 33rd year. He had reigned for 12 years and eight months.

The Perils of a Chemical Life

I was asked to demonstrate how classical themes could be relevant to modern day problems. I took the theme of chemical pollution, both of the body and environment. Of course the Knight attempts to rescue the addict (the white maiden) from her swamp though she is already wedded to her serpent. The broken city in the background has also produced the environment wherein she exists.
What chance the Knight? I believe it would need no explanation if placed in the foyer of a drug rehabilition center.

Thor God of Thunder (GR 2)
(50" x 50")
In Norse mythology, Thor was the god of war, thunder and strength, and son of Odin. Thor destroyed the enemies of the gods with his magic hammer. It was he who chased away the frosts and called gentle winds and warm spring rains to release the earth from its bondage of ice and snow. He was also the god of the household and of the common people. He even married Sif a peasant woman. The lightning's flash was his mighty hammer Mjolnir, hurled in battle with the frost giants. The rolling thunder was the rumble of his fiery chariot.

Thor was a good-natured careless god, always ready for adventure, and never tired of trying his great strength. He could shoulder giant tasks with the greatest ease and slay bulls with his bare hands. For sport he sometimes rode among the cloud-veiled mountains, hurling his hammer at their peaks and cleaving them in twain.

This adventurous god once visited Joturheim, the land of the giants. The king of the giants looked at him scornfully and said, 'Is this stripling the mighty god, Thor? Perhaps you are mightier than you appear. What feat do you deem yourself skilled in?' ' I will test my prowess in a drinking bout with anyone,' smiled Thor.
The king thereupon bade the cupbearer bring a drinking horn, and said, 'Whosoever is a good drinker is able to drain this horn at a single draught'.

Thor placed the horn to his lips and drank long and deep, but when he removed it the liquid had scarcely diminished. Three times he tried to empty the horn and failed, and at last he threw it down in disgust.

Next he was challenged to lift the king's cat from the ground. After a great effort he only managed to raise one of its paws. 'Is this the mighty god we have been taught to fear?' scoffed the king.

Thor held his temper and offered to wrestle with anyone who would stand against him. A toothless old crone accepted the challenge. Thor placed his arms about the woman and tried to pull her towards him but she refused to budge. Thor scratched his head, lurched forward, and tried again. Still he could not move her. Next he pushed her hard then shouldered her, still she stood like a rock. Then with mad rushes Thor attempted to throw the frail woman to the floor but, in spite of his best efforts, he could not succeed and was in turn lucky to stay upright himself when she wrestled with him. In great shame he departed the palace.

Outside the gates he was surprised to see the king ride up to him. 'Mighty Thor,' said the king taking him by the shoulder, 'when you attempted to empty the drinking horn you preformed a feat so marvelous, that had I not seen it myself, I should never have believed it. At the end of the horn lay the sea itself, and when you come to the shore you will see how much the waters have fallen away. Then terror overcame everyone when you lifted the cat's paw from the ground, for that cat is the serpent that encircles the earth, and the whole world shuddered when its hold was loosened. To stand against the old crone for so long was marvelous, for it was indeed old age with whom you wrestled, and no man may conquer her. It was not the prowess of the frost giants that overcame you Thor, it was their magic.'

Thor, in wrath at being so tricked, reached for his hammer, but when he would have thrown it the king of the giants had disappeared. Thor returned to his mountain peak and continued to beat his hammer for the world but with ever-increasing sadness. The fifth day of the week is still called 'Thor's day' after this strong god.

The African Shandy (GR 4)

There are two problems here depending on whether you earn you living as an artist or you do it for enjoyment or other purposes. In the first instance hunger and finding shelter are great motivational tools. In the second you need to be obsessional, like knowing you hid a bottle of Jack Daniels around the house but can't remember exactly where ... and it's 3am ... if only you knew where to start to look?

I suffer both so I find I must plan ahead;
1. Always carry a pair of scissors and be prepared to mutilate any newspaper, magazine or publication that comes within cutting range, and if none do, you must actively give yourself time to seek them out (10 min per day minimum). Be a serial cutter and cut out anything that startles, frightens, causes you to pause, gives you a tightness in the loins or a warm wet feeling, sinks or raises your spirits or any other strong response. It could well be a line or a drawing a pattern or merely a color scheme. Caution ... don't be selective in what you look at- and try not to be distracted by reading any of the articles. Many excellent artists have some difficulty with reading anyway so that is rarely a big professional problem. 2. Put all these cut-outs in a folder.
3. When the folder holds 20 or 30 start a new one. Don't be distracted by trying to catalogue anything ... if you do, then you are probably a better accountant than an artist. 4. Try and forget about the pictures you have kept - but every now and then, as you relax at the bar, open a folder and look again. Not only will this make you incredibly popular it will enhance you artistic reputation.
Gradually certain pictures will begin to echo in your mind. They will haunt your existence like bad cholesterol counts and you will know you must do something about them. Then, your artistic slump will vanish, just in time for your real torment to begin. Now it becomes what, how, which combination, what is the essence of the feeling; and how do I paint (describe) it; how do I start? I had a folder here with great color schemes somewhere ... now which one was that....? How can I encapsulate the feeling, yet be subtle and convincing? What forms, lines, textures, patterns, color, can I apply?
But just think, when it is all over - and if it all works out brilliantly - you can wildly celebrate, wake up hung-over and start all over again.

Now where did I put that red folder with the picture of Englishman on safari in the pith helmet, the Las Vegas showgirl and that picture of the Florida swamp ... and the tree monkey ??

Sylvia (GR 3)

Renoir thought farmers should fire the odd shot at artists who painted in the fields. 'Not to kill, just frighten them off - as you would a fox or a crow.
I promised to demonstrate in a painting lesson how various painting techniques, when understood and mastered, could be transferred to a variety of surfaces. The flesh in this painting was made silver as a result and the model was named accordingly.

Kissing Practice

Those dedicated students of the 'history of painting' will recall an oil painter of excellence in the late 19th Century called Bouguereau who painted the most delightful nudes, cherubs, angels and pesants. To a large degree they were usually quite innocent and inoffensive as the dictates of the era demanded when an artist was painting for universal display. Bouguereau had the rare technical ability to paint the human form in such detail and realism that veins and arteries could be seen just beneath the skin. In normal depiction this might be ugly but with Bouguereau's idealism it just made the figures more real, regardless of whether or not they sprouted wings from their shoulder-blades and flew aloft.
My painting 'Kissing Practice' employs similar techniques yet applies some tension and force to the composition. I realize beauty might need to be sacrificed when desire enters the equation but that is the point is it not? To capture beauty in painting may it not also be necessary to include passion, tension and force, particularly in the usually passive adolescent female part of the equation?