Friday, November 17, 2006

The Gray Days of November

Hammock River-November, 6x8 oil

Kingfisher Morning, 6x8 ,oil

Each painting is $100, unframed, shipping is free in the US, to purchase contact: jan.blencowe@comcast.net

Busy, busy week and lots of news to share, but first the paintings. I did the top piece yesterday along the banks of the Hammock River. When I unpacked and began to set up I realized that I had forgotten to bring my white paint! Naples yellow made a great stand in though on such a gray and misty day. Fortunately my board was primed with Art Spectrum "Blue Haze" primer and I was able to save some of that for the water where the lighter sky was reflected. This is a technique that watercolorists often use to get those bright whites, they let the white of the paper remain untouched and that's essentially what I did here. The second one I did today also along the Hammock River. The tide was very high so high that the spot i usually park my car in was under a few feet of water!! While I was painting I had a noisy Belted Kingfisher for company and that of course is one of the wonderful things about painting outdoors you get to see all kinds of birds and wildlife.

On Wednesday, Madison CT community access channel 18 did an hour long interview with me. What an experience! I brought my easel and a whole stack of paintings with me to the set, where they have a faux fireplace and easy chairs, coffeetable and other props. There were three huge cameras and studio lights. I had spoken with the interviewer the previous week to go over topics we might cover in the interview, but there was no script or cue cards, so it was right off the cuff! It took a while to get set up and then we began, about 35 min. into the interview the technician came out and said that there was a problem and the tape wasn't rolling!! LOL So we had to begin all over again! It was a wondereful experience though, I got to talk about my art, why I love plein air painting the importance of conservation and preserving open spaces and wetlands, why art is important to human beings, how the internet has changed the buying and selling of art and many more things. I never knew I has so much to say LOL If all went well during the edit this began running on channel 18 in madison CT today and they have plans to distribute it to other community access channels across the state. It is going to be very weird seeing myself onTV !

More News: I've recently become a resident artist at the Gallery at 85 Main Street in Centerbrook CT. I dropped off 8 paintings for their holiday show Treasures which is open during regular gallery hours and on Saturdays and Sundays during December. If you live in CT or are planning to be in the area and would like an invitation to the opening please e-mail me jan.blencowe@comcast.net . The opening will be on the evening of December 14th, 6-8pm The Treasures show will also feature a Giving Tree that will be decorated with miniature paintings created by the gallery artists, a portion of the proceeds from the sale of the miniatures will go to a Hartford area charity serving women and children.

Also.....two of my paintings were juried into the Connecticut Plein Air Painters Society Annual Members Show. The show is on now at Hartford Fine Art and Frame, 80 Pitkin Ave. East Hartford, CT through January 7th, 2007.






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