Marcel Guldemond

Robot painting finished (sneak peek)

2012-02-02T13:56:00.001-05:00

Here's a close up of the finished robot. I'll post a pic of the full painting once I've taken some proper photos.

Robot - final stages - work in progress

2012-02-02T10:44:00.001-05:00

Finishing up the details on the robot this morning - more pics later I hope.

#robot #workinprogress #ontheeasel

Robot sky - work in progress

2012-01-27T10:22:00.001-05:00

Here's a bit of the robot and the sky behind it.

Update: here's a second photo with the sky all finished.

#ontheeasel
#workinprogress, #10oclockart, #robot

Robots I can't show you - work in progress

2012-01-26T16:36:00.001-05:00

I'd really love to show off more of this robot painting, but of I'd really rather not give the whole thing away before it's finished, so here's part of it, at the underpainting stage.

#workinprogress #robots

winter house - completed

2012-01-21T10:00:00.000-05:00

Here's the finished painting, now that I've finished processing the proper photos. I'm still toying around with the title, but for now it's called "red house, yellow door, snow covered, winter's eve, world's gone blue, and boogers freeze."

As well, here are some more detail photos that I took with my phone:

Sketchy doodle robots world takeover

2012-01-20T13:52:00.001-05:00

I've spent a bit of time trying to figure out what to do for my next set of paintings, and I've done some doodling as a part of that process, and that included some robots.

While I continue to plot my world takeover, er, I mean, figure out what to do next, here are some of the sketches. Enjoy!

Winter house - adjusting the sky

2012-01-19T11:07:00.001-05:00

I just adjusted the lighting in the sky on the winter house painting. I thought I was finished last week, but today when I looked at it I knew it needed a bit of adjustment. I sometimes try to avoid that because there's not an infinite amount of time to do paintings and I have to get to the next one, and you'll never be 100% happy, but in this case, better to adjust out quickly and get it over with.

winter house sneak peak - more work in progress

2012-01-14T10:00:00.000-05:00

More from the blobby paint phase.

#ontheeasel #workinprogress #10oclockart

winter house sneak peak - blobby paint phase

2012-01-13T10:00:00.000-05:00

More of the blobby paint phase. The sky and clouds are done, and the town gets some colour. Getting closer and closer to finishing this one. This one's going very well, but when I add so many elements to it (house, people, town, landscape, stupid bramble-y bushes) it takes a long time. Maybe for my next ones I'll try to do dead simple landscapes or something.

#ontheeasel #workinprogress

winter house sneak peak / KISS

2012-01-12T10:00:00.000-05:00

There's a saying in software development - KISS - Keep it Simple Stupid.

I think it holds for art too. Of course, what do I go and do? Add a bramble-y bush into the foreground of this painting. The painting's going well, but boy am I stupid!

#ontheeasel #workinprogress

winter house sneak peak

2012-01-11T13:08:00.001-05:00

Work in progress photos from the underpainting stage.

winter house sneak peek

2012-01-05T12:31:00.001-05:00

Here's a sneak peek of the painting I'm working on. I feel really good about this one right now. Hopefully I still feel that way once it's done. There's still a lot of painting to be done between then and now and you never know how it's going to go. Anyway, more sneak peeks tomorrow.

#ontheeasel #workinprogress

Happy New Year Winter Comics

2011-12-30T11:09:00.001-05:00

To celebrate I'm sharing some winter comics I just rediscovered in one of my old note books. I was digging around in my old sketchbooks yesterday looking for some notes I made a few years ago when I came across these comics. I'd completely forgotten about them, and I'm not sure if I ever published them on serializer.net when that was active, so I thought I'd share them via my Google+ albums.

Enjoy!

Hockey! hockey! hockey!

2011-12-24T11:02:00.001-05:00

Detail photos of 2 new paintings I just finished.

#newpaintings #ontheeasel #hockey

Web site all tweaked up for the holidays

2011-12-24T10:59:00.001-05:00

Hi everyone,

I've reorganized and updated my website http://www.marcelguldemond.com/Artwork

Instead of putting everything up and overwhelming the viewer by asking them to organize it themselves through a general search page, I've pared down what's displayed to just my best work. As well, I've organized the art by series, and added a menu for selecting a series so it's easy to navigate.

Enjoy, and happy Festivus / Holidays / whatever you like to celebrate.

New paintings - hockey, lakes, trees and more

2011-12-23T10:48:00.002-05:00

I've finished cleaning up all the photos, and I've posted the new paintings to my website: http://www.marcelguldemond.com/Artwork and to my Google+ account.

Oh yeah, I've also re-organized my website a bit. I've replaced the general search mode with a view by series mode. I'll do another blog post about that soon, but the idea was to make it easier to navigate the artwork by organizing them by their content and style. I think it was too much to ask the viewer to try to organize everything themselves. I also increase the thumbnail size, and added a few other tweaks.

Hockey - work in progress

2011-12-22T11:17:00.001-05:00

Yes, I use a hellofalotta eraser. :P #ontheeasel #workinprogress

Day job, and comics! Lumberjack!

2011-12-21T13:13:00.000-05:00

Today I'm working at the day job, so I still don't have any work in progress photos to share, but tomorrow I'll be working on art again. I have some tweaks to do to my website, but hopefully I'll have time to get back to painting again after that and I'll be able to post some more studio photos.

Until then, here's a comic page from the long lost past. Maybe not too long ago, but what the hell. I think maybe if I get some time I'll start posting my self-published comics to my Google+ stream

This morning, it's shipping

2011-12-15T10:01:00.001-05:00

No art making this morning, as I'm packing some paintings up so I can ship them to some galleries.

Cheers,
Marcel

My Favourite Comics - Part 1

2011-12-09T13:35:00.001-05:00

My old friend Dave was in town the other day and we had him over for dinner. I've known Dave since 7th grade, and our paths have diverged and reconnected a few times since then. When Dave saw my bookshelf of comics and graphic novels, he asked me if I had any suggestions for good comics to read. I thought hey, what a good idea for a blog post or two. I haven't really kept track of what's going on in comics since I switched back to painting a few years ago, so this list might seem kind of dated. I'll try to include links to the books if I can find them.

In random order and off the top of my head:

Blankets by Craig Thompson - Dave's already read this one, so I'll just get this out of the way at the beginning. Dave and I both grew up in the same conservative Christian tradition, and we've both long since left that community behind, so this one, a coming of age in a stifling religious community story, resonated with both of us quite strongly. It's a masterpiece both in terms of story telling and the quality of the art, and has rightly garnered a whole lotta praise and hopefully lotsa awards too. (As I said earlier, I have no idea what's going on anymore.)

From Hell by Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell - The Jack the Ripper story. I haven't read it in a while, so I might be off on the details, but Moore weaves a powerful black magic/psychosis into a complex story, which, if I remember correctly, I found to be a real page-turner. Eddie Campbell's art is gritty and slashing, the inking itself looks almost bloody. The book is dark and dirty, like coal smoke, an antithesis to cleanliness of the Agatha Christie murder mysteries (which I love too). It's powerful stuff. And my favourite part might actually be Moore's afterword, called Dance of the Gull Catchers, about how we'll never know the true facts, and the real story is the stories that we choose to construct out of these mysteries, but I think I liked that mostly because of it's meta-consciousness aspects.

Essex County by Jeff Lemire - a collection of intertwined short stories about the various members of a family from a farming community in Essex County. Beautifully written, with a kind of awkward drawing style that somehow really works, really puts you in Essex County, and helps you feel the struggles of the characters as the wrestle with their conflicting feelings about themselves and each other. And it has hockey. It's a bittersweet work of art, a lot more than a slice of life, it made me happy and sad at the same time.

Holy cow, all 3 of those are Topshelf books. Didn't realize that until I actually looked up the links to the books.Good job Topshelf!

Ok, that's Part 1, I'll do Part 2 sometime soon.

cheers,
marcel

Sneak Peek

2011-12-08T15:06:00.001-05:00

This is a sneak peek at the painting I started this morning. It's going to be wintery, with lots of snow. #ontheeasel #workinprogress

And now for some doodles...

2011-12-03T16:13:00.001-05:00

I'm not really sure where my next set of paintings is going to go yet, and I'm a few days away from getting back to the studio, so until I figure that out, here are some doodles for your viewing enjoyment.

Cheers,
Marcel

Shooter - new hockey painting

2011-11-26T10:16:00.001-05:00

#10oclockart #ontheeasel

Here's a detail photo of the painting I just finished yesterday. I was going to call it 'shooter', but my neighbour suggested the more hockey specific 'from the blueline!' - which is where her 8 year old son scored from this week in a game.

Which I think is awesome. I don't think I can even hit the net from the blueline. Good one Nicholas!

Cheers,
Marcel

Shooter - work in progress

2011-11-25T10:22:00.001-05:00

#10oclockart #ontheeasel today

Cheers,
Marcel

Landlocked sailboat

2011-11-19T10:30:00.000-05:00

New indie-comic-style painting. (photo from my phone)

Cheers,
Marcel

Lakes and trees - new painting

2011-11-17T11:43:00.001-05:00

Here's a painting I just finished this morning. I have a lot of business-y things to get to today (shipping paintings, documentation, ordering frames, etc.) but I'm finding that it's important to start every studio day with some drawing or painting, regardless of what other things I need to do.

Cheers,
Marcel

Site was down today

2011-11-13T20:05:00.001-05:00

I hope that didn't cause anyone any inconvenience. Apparently my programming company's office building, which is where my site is hosted, turned off the power for most of the afternoon. Arg.

Cheers,
Marcel

Hellboy village and pine tree Canadiana

2011-11-10T15:58:00.001-05:00

Here's the finished piece from my earlier Hellboy post, and a second piece I finished this afternoon.

Cheers,
Marcel

Work in progress - what does Hellboy have to do with it?

2011-11-10T12:16:00.001-05:00

Probably nothing, except that my Hellboy comics have replaced my Tom Thompson and Group of Seven books as my studio reading material.

The photo is a new indie-comic-style-painting partially done, awaiting the 'inking' stage. More to come later today.

Cheers,
Marcel

Lotsa pencil - work in progress

2011-11-05T10:30:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I started doing the pencils on a bunch of new paintings. I also spent some time working on my new business card, and I've almost got the images ready for printing.

Here are a couple of pics from the studio of the pencils on the new paintings:

Cheers,
Marcel

Some how I missed autumn

2011-10-29T09:45:00.001-04:00

The temperature's been dropping here lately, and it finally feels like winter's coming on. Somehow I missed autumn and my paintings have skipped right from summer to winter.

The image above is one I finished yesterday. Enjoy!

Cheers,
Marcel

Winter experimental

2011-10-27T11:13:00.001-04:00

Experimenting with different colour sets for wintery indie-comic-style paintings.

Here's a detail of what it looks before the 'inking' stage.

Cheers,
Marcel

Is it winter yet?

2011-10-22T10:00:00.000-04:00

#10oclockart

I just finished a new indie-comic-style hockey painting. With this one I'm tried out a three colour scheme, instead of the two colour scheme I used with the last set.

Cheers,
Marcel

Monster sketch

2011-10-21T10:06:00.001-04:00

One of these days I'm gonna make some full sized paintings out of sketches like this.

Also, it seems the iPhone camera doesn't auto-darken as badly if you put a dark object in the photo, hence the sketchbook.

Cheers,
Marcel

Children's Illustration Has Been Eye-Opening

2011-10-15T11:05:00.000-04:00

I really had no idea until recently how much fantastic work gets created in the field of children's illustration. ( as mentioned by +Gianna Butterfield in some comments on a post I made in Google+ red balloon triptych almost finished ) It's really been eye opening for me, in a good way. (I need to get back to work, so I'll hopefully remember to post a list of some of the illustrators who I've found to be really inspiring later.)

Those comments reminded me that I sometimes wonder if a lot of the high end galleries miss the boat on it too; if the people who decide what's important art for the serious collectors are much too serious to appreciate a sense of whimsy? Are they too serious? Or am I missing something?

Although I'd love to be represented by one of those high end galleries, you know, like the famous ones in NY or LA. I'm probably completely naive imagining that they'd open the door to being able to make a decent living as an artist. I also know I have to stick to what I intuitively know what works best for me, and that includes allowing a sense of whimsy and wonder to show in the work.

Red balloon triptych - finally finished!

2011-10-14T16:33:00.001-04:00

Phew! It's all finished. I'll post some proper photos soon, but thus phone photo gives you an idea of what it's like.

Cheers,
Marcel

Red balloon triptych - work in progress

2011-10-13T12:34:00.001-04:00

Blobby paint going on one bit at a time, getting closer to finished. Hard to pull myself away to do some of the other more mundane things that really need doing.

Cheers,
Marcel

Big clouds - Friday work in progress

2011-10-07T13:34:00.001-04:00

I know most people are usually getting ready for the weekend/ scrambling to get things done before the end of the week,
But if you want a minute for some safe for work Internet distraction, here's the triptych with the clouds finished.

Cheers,
Marcel

Photographing Art Work - Tips

2011-10-06T21:37:00.000-04:00

German Shible on twitter asked me about photographing artwork, and considering the amount of trial and error I've gone through to figure it out (lots and lots of error, but that could just be me) I thought I'd put up a blog post about it, since the answer takes a little more than 140 characters.

Here's a list of the equipment I use:
- DSLR camera - so you can control the aperture, ISO, and white balance.
- natural / prime lens - I use a Nikon 50mm, which is relatively inexpensive and has very little 'fish eye' distortion to it, so I often don't have to straighten out the image with Photoshop. I use a 35mm lens for larger paintings if the painting is too wide to get with the 50mm in my relatively small studio.
- tripod - this should be solid to keep the camera from shaking.
- remote control for the camera - so you don't shake the camera by manually triggering it.
- gray card so you can adjust the colour digitally after shooting.

I set the ISO to 200 for a clearer image, and put the aperture at 7.1, so there's decent depth of field and the whole painting stays in focus even if the camera's not 100% square to it. Then I take a series of shots with different exposure times. These are usually between 1/2 to 1/5s exposures, so they're slow, which is why I need the tripod and remote control.

Since my camera is a 6MP Nikon D70, I can't get really hi-res photos of large pieces, so I also take shots of each quarter just in case I need a hi-res some time in the future, then I can (theoretically) stitch them together to make a bigger image.

Hope that helps!

Big triptych

2011-10-06T10:27:00.001-04:00

The day job is done for the week, so now I'm back working on the clouds on the triptych.

Someone on google+ commented on an earlier photo I posted that it looks like something from a kid's story, which I think is great. That feel has probably started to show up in my work because of the great books I get to read to my almost-2 year old daughter, and all of the great illustrators I've come across on twitter and google+

Hurray interwebs!

Ps- I'm also testing out blogpress' tweet and FB features, so thus might get double posted or something.

Cheers,
Marcel

Tree Balloon Triptych - work in progress

2011-10-01T10:38:00.001-04:00

Just Finished the sky, and I'm going to mix all the blue blobs with some umber so I'm not tempted to keep adjusting it. Sometimes you just have to say it's done.
(my studio's too small to have all 3 on the easel at the same time.)

Blue blobs pre-destruction:

Cheers,
Marcel

Triptych in progress

2011-09-29T16:33:00.001-04:00

Underpaints all finished. Let's see if this gets a hashtag: Ontheeasel

Cheers,
Marcel

Triptych - work in progress

2011-09-29T10:42:00.001-04:00

#ontheeasel thus morning #10oclockart
(detail photo)

Cheers,
Marcel

Work in progress - big triptych

2011-09-23T12:20:00.001-04:00

The sky is underpainted now. Next I have to pack for a trip to Toronto and The Hammer (Hamilton) for a friend's wedding, so that might be it for art this week.

I'm also going to drop off a painting at a gallery and pick up a pile of panels, so it's a work trip too. Being an artist isn't all painting, there are many other small business hats you have to wear too. Delivery guy, accountant, marketing maven, etc. Hard to do everything effectively.

Cheers,
Marcel

Proper photo of "departed" posted

2011-09-15T16:05:00.000-04:00

Hi everyone, I've finally managed to get a properly adjusted photo done of my newest painting, and here it is: departed

"departed" new painting

2011-09-10T11:31:00.001-04:00

Here's the completed steamship painting. I'm currently calling it "departed", although my titles have been known to change frequently.

It's a little more somber and subdued than I originally intended. That probably has something to do with the fact that I started it the week Jack Layton died. That kind of made it my memorial to Layton, although it's not really about him or his death.

Cheers,
Marcel

Robots go ArtRage

2011-09-09T10:46:00.001-04:00

Yesterday I found ArtRage, a digital painting program and used it to colour this robot drawing.

(I've been trying to find replacements for Photoshop, which is very expensive to buy new.)
I was looking at GIMP, which is a free open source program. I really didn't like GIMP very much and found it really frustrating to work with. It has a lot of the features of Photoshop, but I got too frustrated trying to figure out how to use it.

Then I found ArtRage, and the demo worked well enough that I bought it. ($59 compared to PS's $799)

The ArtRage app and UI is designed well and if you're used to colouring in Photoshop, then it all translates really well. You can paint in layers, and as you can see, you get a really nice effect with the oil brushes. Next I'll have to try out the inking and the watercolours.

It does have some drawbacks and isn't really a Photoshop replacement. It can't open more than one painting at a time, it's doesn't have Photoshop's gradient tool, and it can't record actions and apply them to a folder full of images ( very handy for resizing your digital photos for web uploading ), and importantly for my photo documentation of my paintings, it can't correct lens distortion. However, what it does do, it does well, and it's well worth the purchase price.

Now I just have to find something that can open the NEF files from the Nikon and do batch resizing on them and also allow me to correct lens distortion, and stitch together composite shots of paintings, then I'll be all good. Yikes, I might just have to buy Photoshop anyway...

Robots, you say? Wait, what the GIMP?

2011-09-02T10:05:00.000-04:00

I'm trying out GIMP on my new computer (the 6 year old PC is too bogged down to really use anymore, I've found I spend way too much time playing solitaire while I wait for Photoshop to do things. )

I did this doodle the other day, and thought that it would be a good test bed for trying to figure out how to colour and work with digital images with GIMP.

So far, I'm finding it pretty frustrating. I know Photoshop was really frustrating when I was still trying to figure it out, but I really don't want to spend days figuring out GIMP. For example, in PS, you can increase or decrease the size of whatever tool you're working with using the '[' and ']' keys. It's really important to be able to adjust your tool, whether that's the brush or the eraser, while still looking at your drawing. If you have to go futzing through a menu, that's way too many clicks and now you're off the drawing and you'll forget what you were doing. You can set up keyboard shortcut preferences with GIMP, but that's complicated and I still haven't figured out how to get that working for the brushes or eraser yet. And I'm even reading the instructions! (rare I know)

However, I'm still trying because new Photoshop is so bloody expensive. Then again, if it saves me days of learning, then just maybe it'll be worth it to just buy it. And of course the new Photoshop has some shiny bells and whistles. Ooooh, shiny...

Anyway, here's the robot drawing that I'd really like to colour:

Work in progress

2011-09-01T10:19:00.001-04:00

Where I'm starting from this morning:

Updated:

Here are the finished underpaints:

Cheers,
Marcel

Work in progress

2011-08-26T09:45:00.001-04:00

#10oclockart

Cheers,
Marcel

Sketches

2011-08-25T09:48:00.001-04:00

I haven't drawn many people with faces over the last few years, as I've been painting mostly landscapes. I guess my art brain felt there was something lacking there, so the other day I ended up sketching people and figures instead of working on paintings.

Here are a couple of the sketches: (apologies for the crap lighting from my iphone camera, I have no idea how to make it lighten things up)

Cheers,
Marcel

Business cards - work in progress

2011-08-19T09:37:00.001-04:00

The pencil stage of my design for my new business cards. ( The next stage is Photoshopping and adding some digital colour )

Cheers,
Marcel

New 'Coastal' Paintings Posted

2011-08-18T16:24:00.000-04:00

With photos from a 'real' camera instead of my phone! Enjoy!

Coastal finished

2011-08-13T15:39:00.001-04:00

It's nice and big too @ 32" x 54"

Detail:

Cheers,
Marcel

Coastal - big grassy

2011-08-13T11:41:00.001-04:00

Large areas of only one thing like this one of a grassy hillside, get me pretty wound up. It's hard to tell if the colours you're starting with are the right ones, and halfway through you're just desperately trying to keep the rhythm of the colours and the brushwork together, and you no longer know if it's going to turn out. I think in this case, it may have turned out all right.

Cheers,
Marcel

Coastal -work in progress

2011-08-12T10:03:00.001-04:00

What's on for today:

Cheers,
Marcel

Coastal, work in progress

2011-08-08T13:03:00.001-04:00

Underpainties from Saturday - I settled on one of the compositions from the sketches I posted earlier - and started on the next one. That's how far I got before I had to quit for the week. My programmer hat is back on now until Thursday - more work in progress updates then.

Cheers,
Marcel

Sketchy doodle

2011-08-05T10:58:00.001-04:00

More candidates for what to paint on the next panels:

As you can see, I'm also trying to figure out what to do for a triptych that I have panels for.

Now I just have to decide which ones I do and which ones end up in the never-to-be-seen-again pile. Hard to figure out because I kind of like all of them.

Cheers,
Marcel

Coastal - new paintings

2011-08-04T13:33:00.001-04:00

The two coastal paintings Are now finished. (photos from my phone, proper camera pics and titles will be posted later)

And some sketches, candidates for the next panels.

enjoy.

Cheers,
Marcel

Coastal (work in progress)

2011-07-23T14:48:00.001-04:00

Underpainting is finished, starting in on the blobby phase.

Cheers,
Marcel

Coastal. (work in progress)

2011-07-22T15:52:00.001-04:00

2 paintings I'm working on right now.

I often wish I could just leave the paintings at this stage; they're looking pretty good already, but I know the next blobby paint stage will make a huge improvement.

Cheers,
Marcel

More underpainties

2011-07-22T10:03:00.001-04:00

Oh so risqué! ;P #10oclockart

Cheers,
Marcel

New painting 2

2011-07-15T16:32:00.001-04:00

Decided to do 2 at the same time:

The first one was too much fun!

Cheers,
Marcel

New painting on the easel

2011-07-15T15:49:00.001-04:00

Cheers,
Marcel

one way or another, hi res image posted

2011-07-15T14:15:00.000-04:00

Proper not-a-crappy-phone-camera image posted to my website here.

The customer wanted a smaller version, and I didn't think it would work just to shrink the image, so I rearranged the composition to get the characters and the house in it, while still retaining the the same feel to it.

Share the arty goodness!

2011-07-15T11:38:00.000-04:00

Hey Everyone,

I've added sharing buttons to the artwork pages on my website so it's easier for people to share the pieces they like. I've also added follow links to the footer for my accounts on Google+ and Twitter.

ok, share away!

cheers,

marcel

One way or another, it's finished!

2011-07-14T13:31:00.001-04:00

Here's a commission I just finished.

(apologies for the crappy dark iPhone photo. Anyone know how to adjust that?)

It's a smaller version of this painting, whose full title is 'one way or another, a decision would have to be made.'

Cheers,
Marcel

Viking hat, making some progress

2011-07-09T15:18:00.001-04:00

Though I'm not sure how much longer progress will continue to be made; Saturday afternoons are always a bit of a slog. Not much left in the tank at this point in the week. Ah well, if only I learned to go to bed earlier, haha.

Here's the (weirdly dark?) photo. Enjoy.

Cheers,
Marcel

Viking hat returns

2011-07-09T10:07:00.001-04:00

Working on a commission this morning. #10oclockart

Cheers,
Marcel

Buncha canoes

2011-06-24T16:05:00.001-04:00

#ontheeasel right now:

Cheers,
Marcel

My paintings in Ottawa at Home magazine

2011-06-23T13:05:00.001-04:00

They did an article on Raw Sugar Cafe when my paintings happened to be hanging there last month. Raw Sugar has a copy, so I went over and took a quick photo. (thanks Nadia!)

Cheers,
Marcel

New indie-comic-style paintings posted

2011-06-23T10:06:00.001-04:00

village red balloon

I've posted the first set of the new style, replete with real-camera-not-a-phone-camera images, to my website. I'm currently calling this style 'indie-comic-style', as opposed to my customary blobby-paint-style, seen here:

spring ice

It's kind of a hybrid painting/drawing style, and it reminds me a lot of the indie comics I used to read and pick up at the indie comic shows that I used to do, which is why I'm calling it what I'm calling it. I never inked my comics like that, though, and as I mentioned in a previous post, I really wish I'd learned to ink like that. Much faster and more fun.Oh well, I'm a bit slow sometimes.

I'm not going to abandon the blobby-paint-style, as there's just too much one can do with that, but I'd also like to keep exploring what I can do with the indie-comic-style paintings. I just hope that they sell well enough to justify the effort.

cheers,
Marcel

Inner comic book artist revealed. .

2011-06-17T11:19:00.001-04:00

Trees, roads, lonely little lakes:

This pair mean that I'm all done my first set of drawy-paintings / painty drawings. I still have no idea what to call them, as they're kind of a hybrid. Really what they are is indie-comic style wall panel art. I think my past as an indie comic creator is coming out more and more.

Now I just have to figure out how to price them. :-/

Pricing is one of the more vexing aspects of being an artist/one person business. I'd like to make them available at a more accessible price point than my full colour blobby paintings, so I'm thinking maybe $500 for a 20x24 and $650 for a 22x30. I should really hear what the galleries say about them though, since they're the ones who would be selling them.

Cheers,
Marcel

I wish I 'inked' like this when I did comics

2011-06-16T14:30:00.001-04:00

Here's another new painting. I'm having a lot of fun with this stripped down format. It's a lot like inking comics. Or like I wished I had done them when I was still doing them, instead of what I did do with tiny little brushes and pens and getting way too tight with the drawing.

Ah well, the hindsight of old age and feeble-tude.

Cheers,
Marcel

A non-categorized artifact with canoe

2011-06-16T10:10:00.001-04:00

Not really sure what to call this style. Is it a painting? Is it a drawing? A scribbly doo-dad?

In any case, enjoy!

Cheers,
Marcel

Mining town

2011-06-15T10:12:00.001-04:00

Here's a new landscape in the drawing/painting style. This one's a bit bigger at 22x30.

Cheers,
Marcel

New Dock Diver

2011-06-14T13:34:00.001-04:00

Who knows if this new drawing/painting style that I'm working is going to be worth the effort? I'm liking the results so far, so I think it's got a chance, but it's both a creative and product development process at the same time, so you never know until you get it in front of people. This one's 20x24:

Cheers,
Marcel

Red umbrella, little red house

2011-06-10T16:26:00.001-04:00

Holy crap! New paintings!

It's been busy at the day job, and I feel like I've been away from the studio for far too long.

Here are a couple of new small experimental paintings I just finished.

Cheers,
Marcel

The last of the mini-hicans

2011-05-27T14:24:00.001-04:00

550+ mini-paintings and 7 years in, these are probably the last ones I'm going to do. It's been a great run for them but I'm more interested now in larger paintings. They've been great for learning and exploring, but now it's time to move on. kinda sad, but also exciting to commit to a new direction.

Cheers,
Marcel

It's a rainy day

2011-05-27T08:19:00.001-04:00

And I'm dreaming about going canoeing and camping, so I think that's what I'll paint today.

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Faster, looser, scribblier!

2011-05-20T12:38:00.001-04:00

I've been experimenting with some different painting styles, which you can see in the photos.

Instead of being focused on heavy paint, strong colour, and the quality of light, these pieces are much more spontaneous and focused on having fun with the drawing.

I've really enjoyed working this way, but the important question is whether or not people would like to buy them. I guess the only way to find out is to do a bunch and send them to the galleries!

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I'll be at Raw Sugar Cafe this afternoon

2011-05-15T13:27:00.001-04:00

C'mon down and enjoy a coffee and some art and Chinatownremix!

Cheers,
Marcel

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Climate Calling

2011-05-14T13:39:00.001-04:00

Here's a call for artists to get out in front of the movement to save a liveable climate. I agree with this in general, although part of me asks why is always artists who need to work for free. We have a hard enough time as it is trying to make enough money to get by. Most of us quit because it's just possible to have a decent life and be an artist.

Instead of asking people to sacrifice more, and donate more (which we all need to do anyway) maybe there's a better way. A win-win somewhere where artists can get paid something, even if it's not a lot, for their work, and help promote a cause at the same time. (The solar and wind power industries have transformed themselves into win-win situations, so it can be done.)

Yes, this is the most important cause that any alive today will have to grapple with, but still there must be a way to bring change without relying on pure volunteerism. In the age of the internet and crowd sourcing and kickstarter.com, there must be a way to do that.

The other thing about this call for artists is that it's really a call for propaganda. Art that's specific to a cause, whatever that cause, that's trying to influence people, is propaganda. Art that isn't propaganda, is simpler. It tells the truth. Commercially viable art tells truths that aren't terribly inconvenient and doesn't ask people to change. Propaganda does that. I'm all for saving the climate, but let's not call it art, let's call it what it is: propaganda. That's fine by me. Propaganda can still be great, and rewarding to do artistically.

Maybe I'll keep thinking about that win-win thing.

New canoe

2011-05-14T13:21:00.001-04:00

I'm trying out a bit of a different style, more focused on the drawing rather than the painting.

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Sketchy doodle time

2011-05-13T16:12:00.001-04:00

Experimenting with a new paintings styles, but I need to doodle my way through some ideas until I find some that fit...

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Winter spring hockey

2011-05-13T13:52:00.001-04:00

Just finished these:

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The show is up

2011-04-30T14:00:00.001-04:00

Here they are, this is the first Ottawa showing for most of them. I'll post again soon about it. Now I just have to run home and print some labels.

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Hanging my show at Raw Sugar

2011-04-30T13:16:00.001-04:00

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Oh yeah! Back painting again!

2011-04-29T16:33:00.001-04:00

#ontheeasel - New hockey painting:

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Spring update

2011-04-12T13:32:00.001-04:00

I'm trying out Mailchimp and here's my first email to my list: http://eepurl.com/dj0k2

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New paintings posted

2011-04-09T16:38:00.001-04:00

Spring ice, bees, fish

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Time to Regroup

2011-04-09T12:37:00.000-04:00

Now that my biggest shows are done for the year, it's time for me to regroup myself ( can you really do that to yourself? maybe I'm doing a one person strategy meeting? how come I can't find the right word for that? )

Whatever the case, now that the Toronto Artist Project and the Spring One of a Kind shows are over and in the books, it's time to get down to my todo list and sort out what needs to be done before I can start on the next round of painting. That includes things like updating my website, sending paintings to galleries, especially fun things like doing my taxes, and then figuring out what kind of art to do in the future.

Oh, I should probably also take a little time out to salvage what's left of my brain cells and let them recover a little bit. I hate to say it but I'm feeling a little arted out right now. I'm not too worried, I'm pretty sure the artness will come back, judging by the fact that the conversation in the back of my head, that one that you only notice when you're not engaged with something else like other people or a TV, that conversation about what kind of art to do this summer, has been going on non-stop since I left the One of a Kind Show.

I'll have more blog posts about all of that stuff coming up.

cheers,
Marcel

One of a Kind all done, still unpacking

2011-04-07T13:04:00.001-04:00

Yeesh, how long does it take me? There are still paintings in the Nissan for crying out loud!

Anyway, the show finished on Sunday and I made it home to Ottawa on Monday after running some errands. I was just too wiped out to blog about it until now.

I met a lot of wonderful people at the show. Thanks to everyone who came out and for all the super positive feedback. It's also great to know that all of the pieces I sold are going to good homes.

Now it's back to work as my mild mannered computer programmer alter-ego. Type type and away!

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Only 2 hours left

2011-04-03T15:48:00.001-04:00

At the One of a Kind show. Phew. I'm fading fast. It's been a long week and I could just go to sleep on the floor, except there are still tons of people here.

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Goooaaalll!!! Gets a photo

2011-04-03T12:19:00.000-04:00

File this under Awesome Customers:

Last fall I forgot to take photographs of
Gooooaaaalllll!!!! before I sent it to the gallery, and in a Murphy's Law kind of way, they sold it before I realized my mistake. All I had was a small detail photo of the drawing stage from my phone, which is all I could put on my website:

Then a couple of months ago a customer of mine emailed me to let me know that he had just seen the painting at his brother's house. (anti-Murphy or something!) From there he arranged for me to go over and do a photo session, which is what happened yesterday. (I'll post the cleaned up photo in a couple of weeks once I've recovered from this show.)

Anyway, I'd just like to say I have some awesome customers. Thanks so much for letting me come to your house and do my photo thing!

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Wooooot!!!!!

2011-04-02T16:35:00.001-04:00

I just sold this big painting Red tree November

That's the sound of a whole pile of monkeys falling off my back. :D

So busy here

2011-04-02T13:34:00.001-04:00

At the One of a Kind Show. The robot sez 'buy me!' ;-)

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Friday at The One of a Kind

2011-04-01T11:47:00.001-04:00

It's day 3, and the stroller brigade is arriving again today. Tons of people here with strollers and babies. If I lived close by and was on parental leave I'd take the baby to the show every day too. So many shiny things to look at.

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Rainy day in Chinatown

2011-03-31T09:33:00.001-04:00

I'm at Gwartzman's grabbing some art supplies before the show opens. Hard to believe that it's been almost 20 years since I worked here. Feels somehow simultaneously like yesterday and a different lifetime ago.

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New spring ice paintings

2011-03-30T10:11:00.001-04:00

I did get them finished last saturday, and even though the paint is still soft, they arrived at the show safe and sound:

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