Drawing (but NOT Quartering) Body Parts!

As you may or may not know, I offer a number of prints on Fine Art America. A few of them are of paintings I've done, but most are some of my many MANY photographs that I've played with a bit to make them look more like paintings.

And I'll have to admit -- I'm underwhelmed by the sales so far.

So...what to do, what to do?

Well, I'd like to be able to offer more prints of paintings, but frankly, I can't afford to pay for high-resolution digital images to be made of my artwork. And I don't have a large-format flatbed scanner.

My latest brainchild is to make some drawings of people, or at least parts of people, that I can scan on the equipment I do have. The drawings could be either in black-and-white, colored pencil, or -- more likely if I want color -- scanned as line drawings and then add color on the computer, so they'd be hybrid drawings + digital art.

These two drawings are details showing the joined hands of two young woman dancing. It's a subject that's near and dear to my heart since I've had a fetish for clasped hands and interlocked fingers (especially girls'/women's hands) for as far back as I can remember -- there's something terribly intimate and sexy about it. (I always loved the fact that in the many dance classes I've taken, many female students seemed to like holding MY hand(s) that way!)

I don't know if there's a market for this sort of thing or not. I've seen many art pieces in which the torso, heads and faces were executed in an artistic way. I'm thinking of other body parts besides hands, and...I dunno...maybe!

In addition, I understand there's a way to make the Fine Art America prints appear on my website. I'd like to figure out how to do that. It's hard to say if it would help, but I doubt it would hurt!

Once again -- stay tuned. Oh, and by the way -- my website URLs are SouthwestSpaces.com and MarkJunge.com.

Thoughts on Some Gallery Artists' Receptions

Last night I attended three art gallery receptions in Palm Springs, CA. One of those was for an artist I actually know; the other two I stumbled upon but decided to check 'em out.

The artist is Carrie Graber (www.CarrieGraber.com). She paints architectural details and interiors, often with a female in the scene who looks an awful lot like her. ☺

This is one of Carrie's paintings. It's realistic, yet she somehow achieved a look that would allow the piece to fit into contemporary homes or offices (unlike MY paintings, which are modeled after 19th century -- or older -- artwork). Most of her paintings seem very light and airy, even this nighttime scene. Her work is detailed but uncluttered which I believe is partly what gives her paintings that open look. They're quite pleasing to look at and would fit anywhere.

I noticed Carrie framed her paintings in a simple, natural-wood (pine? maple? ??) tone -- not a wide molding at all. I also noticed artwork in the other galleries I visited were framed the same way. And ANOTHER artist I know and like, Mary-Austin Klein (www.maryaustinklein.com), uses similar frames for HER pieces!

Clouds Over East Mojave             Mary-Austin Klein

(I love the zen-like feeling of Mary-Austin's art -- realistic, almost photographic; yet, uncluttered, lots of open space as with Carrie's work).

You can see the kind of molding I'm talking about here on Mary-Austin's paintings:

Again -- very simple, minimal blonde-colored wood molding. The grain is visible when you see it up-close.

All this made me think (OMG -- he's thinking!): is this a trend in framing contemporary art? Is this something I need to consider doing? And -- do I need to think about simplifying my painting and go for "zen realism"?

Don't know, don't know. I still love the works of the 19th century American Hudson River School painters and the drama they often portrayed. But I like Carrie's and Mary-Austin's look, too. And I'll bet they sell better in today's art-buying taste!

Some things I have to think about. (I should attend more gallery openings, too!)

Matins

I'm not sure if my latest painting is at a crossroads as far as what I'll be painting in the days ahead...

It's not exactly a desert landscape, and there's a human in the view! Still -- I like the results, but I'd have to do some serious thinking about how to include humans in the vast "wastelands" of the desert landscape.

In addition, conceiving of this image, and executing it, took longer than usual. I may have to increase the price to compensate!

Anyway, this is Baldwin Lake at the Los Angeles County Arboretum, Arcadia, CA. If you were a fan of "Fantasy Island," you've seen this lake as the "lagoon" that "Da plane! Da plane" supposedly landed in -- although, as you can see, it's much too small to land a plane here. (The Queen Anne House, the white-with-red-gingerbread trim structure Mr. Rourke used as his headquarters, is off to the right out of the field of view).

The painting is a combination of reality and fantasy. The Arboretum isn't open when the sun rises, so I've never seen the place with the backlighting I've depicted. Peacocks do roam the grounds, but they tend to remain near the entrance -- a good brisk walk off to the left. And I've never seen a young lady in a gauzy white dress standing there like this.

In addition, the lake's appearance goes back to 1997. Most of the papyrus plants (the green "pom-poms") seem to have died off. Also the curved palm tree on the right actually curves away from the lake, not toward it, and it's tall enough so the fronds should not even appear in the painting.

In any case, this is an idea I've had in my head for many, many years -- something tropical with exotic birds and an attractive young female (well, I assume she's attractive!) with my favorite color harmony -- yellow-green-blue. And the aquatic papyrus looks so tropical (African, in fact -- they grow along the Nile River from Egypt to Uganda and Tanzania).

I'll probably put the painting up for sale eventually. First, I'd like to see how prints of the image do.