JACK SAYLOR

The sea breeze effect.....

2012-02-20T21:48:00.002-05:00

"CUMULONIMBUS"

oil on canvas, 8"x 14"

Another piece just off the easel and headed for my show this summer. This painting harkens back to one of my earliest passions when my wife and I first moved to the coast. That is the weather. In fact I was (and still am actually) a bit of a weather nut. One of the first things I did when we moved to the coast, lo these many years ago, was to get my National Weather Service certification as an advanced weather spotter. If you want to learn about the sky and how to identify particular storm features, there is no better way (other than going to school for meteorology) than to go through this training program at the NWS. As a realist painter I am compelled to paint things as I see them, but the dimension beyond seeing is understanding and becoming a storm spotter instilled in me an understanding of the dynamics of storm systems and more importantly their physical structures. Over the past several years I have painted a few thunderheads (or "Cumulonimbus" clouds in weather speak) and I put a lot of emphasis on trying to get the "structure" of the cloud as I know it to be. No two clouds are ever the same but after years of observing them and indeed painting them, there are certain things that most of these lions of the sky have in common due to the unerring process of nature.

The painting pictured above depicts a storm I witnessed last summer while crossing the Pamlico Sound one afternoon on the way to Ocracoke Island. The view is to the west'ard and looking across the vast expanse of the sound toward the mainland. The storm is the result of the coastal weather phenomenon called a sea breeze. This occurs mainly in the hot summer months during the peak heating of the afternoon when the very warm air over the inland areas rises and the cooler air over the ocean rushes in to replace the warm inland air which has risen. The result for us at the coast is that fabulous cool ocean breeze that kicks up about 2pm every afternoon, and the result for those living inland is a line of thunderstorms that form at that point where the sea breeze collides with the hot inland air mass.

Several years ago I did another painting depicting the sea breeze effect and actually titled it such. Below is a picture of that early piece.......

"THE SEABREEZE EFFECT"

oil on canvas, 38"x 60"

The scale of the above painting added to the power of the subject matter. This was a very popular painting when it debuted in my solo exhibition "Forever" in 2000.

In my last solo show 2 years ago I concentrated on still life and trompe l'oeil work. Now for my upcoming exhibition I am going back to more scenic type work with an emphasis once again on the wind and the weather and it is very exciting!

And then there was Light

2012-02-09T21:13:00.021-05:00

"MORNING AT THE CAPE"

oil on canvas, 16"x 18"

Just finished this bright and cheery slice of summertime sunshine and as you can see it is quite a contrast from the previous image I posted. This sort of contrast is reflective of what I call the "chiaroscuro of life" meaning the way life can sometimes be dark and dreary and other times bright and cheery. This sort of life experience is certainly translatable into imagery when living by the sea. The "dark to light" transitions here are ever-present when compounded by the element of the sea and its dramatic nature.

The setting for this painting is the south facing window sill of the summer kitchen beside the keepers quarters at the Cape Lookout lighthouse. I was there one early morning late last summer after all the tourist had left for the season and it was one of those magical times when I was the only one there. Usually there are numerous whelk shells scattered about the place left there by beachcombers so I gathered a few and set them up on this window ledge. The way the warm early morning sun raked across the shells was beautifully balanced by the cool blue shadows cast by the brilliant deep blue morning sky. Although this painting is predominantly "white" I can tell you that there is very little if any pure white in the piece. The photograph of the painting really doesn't pick up the rainbow of color that I experienced there and thus put in the painting. This work will be in my upcoming show so if you go you will see what I'm talking about.

Once again I'd like to touch on the subject of light in my painting. As I mentioned in a post several months ago, that is perhaps the single most asked about quality of my work by both artists and collectors....."How do you get that sunlight!" Well as I stated earlier the light would not exist without the shadows so perhaps my ability to render convincing shadows accounts for some of it. BUT, IF YOU REALLY WANT TO KNOW HOW I GET THE SUNLIGHT IN THERE THEN PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT I'M ABOUT TO SHOW YOU AS THE SECRET IS CONTAINED WITHIN.......

I begin with my crystal clear glass cup which I keep at the edge of my taboret next to the easel.

Into this crystal crucible I pour a precious portion of the honey-golden liquid light (which dries virtually colorless, so it's not the color that does it). This is the medium I paint with and VOILA!!! Look at how the glass explodes with sunshine. The cup literally takes on an energy

and when I dip my ISABEY SABLES (pinceaux fins from France) into this elixir supreme the sun shines brilliantly.

Croyez-vous en magie?

I do!

The Dark Side of the Sea....(updated)

2012-02-04T07:14:00.002-05:00

"THE SEA CAPTAINS"

oil on panel, 8"x 10"

An update to the previous post.....This is the finished painting showing the inscriptions on the headstones (which have degraded over the years) as well as other adjustments made since the last post. I didn't want to leave this piece in an unfinished state on this blog. For my next posting in a few days you may need sunglasses.

The Dark Side of the Sea......

2012-01-24T22:09:00.009-05:00

"THE SEA CAPTAINS"

(work in progress)

oil on panel, 8"x 10"

This is a small piece I'm currently working on for my show this summer. I am close to completing it having only the carved inscriptions left to paint and some grass around the base of the stones. As I worked on it today, we were shrouded in a heavy sea fog and I could hear at regular intervals the ship's horn of the large dredge that was working our inlet just offshore. It was a perfect backdrop for working on these headstones. This painting depicts two graves that are located near the historic village on Portsmouth Island (which is the small deserted island just across the inlet from Ocracoke Island at the southern tip of the Outer Banks in North Carolina). The headstones mark the graves of two sea captains that perished in separate shipwrecks, one in 1810 and the other in 1821. The captains were both from New England and their headstones were made up there and shipped down to Portsmouth. I wanted to paint these because they are every bit as much a part of the sea as the water, or the boats, or the beach, etc. etc. When one paints the sea, it is not just the pretty things, or the beautiful waves, or the lighthouses or the sunshine. To paint the sea, I mean to really paint The Sea you have to feel it all! Throughout my career, I have embraced all that the sea is and have absorbed it with a passion which has manifested in some paintings that deal with the darker, more destructive nature of the sea. Below is one such example.....

"AFTER THE STORM"

oil on canvas, 22"x 34"

2008

The subject in this painting is a tragic, tragic story. The painting depicts the wreckage of a shrimp trawler that was lost at sea during a horrible winter storm. The crew were out fishing in the storm trying to earn extra money in a boat that was rotted to the core. All four men perished in the wreck and the boat was thought to have been lost at sea. Later, in the summer of the same year after a hurricane came roaring through, the trawler wreckage washed up on Cape Point at Cape Lookout, NC. A few weeks later another storm washed the wreck back to sea and it was never seen again. This is one of two paintings I did of this wreck. If you look closely, you'll see four seagulls flying overhead. It was my way of paying tribute to the four crewmen lost.

A lot of people only associate the sea with fun in the sun and the waves and I admit being an artist who loves to paint the bright, the breezy and the beautiful. But when I'm moved to paint that "darker side" of the sea, it stirs a deeper strata in my spirit and my passion for this place reaches a depth as deep as the sea itself.

"Racing to the Cape!"

2012-01-13T21:12:00.005-05:00

"RACING TO THE CAPE"

oil on canvas, 11"x 18"

Fresh off the easel today, this is a painting that will be in my upcoming show this summer. I just took a snapshot of it and thought I'd share it before it's varnished and sent to my photographer for hi-res imaging. I love this piece because I absolutely love the subject it depicts. Here in Carteret County, North Carolina we have a long and distinguished history of wooden boatbuilding and there have been several boat styles that have become legendary (I mentioned the famous "flare bow" work boats in a previous post) and in this painting two "Carolina Spritsail" sail skiffs are featured. Although the basic design for this glorious little sailor has its roots in the Chesapeake area, it was adopted in this area of North Carolina in the late 1800s and its design evolved based on the local waters here and has thus become what it is today. They are amazingly fast boats, especially when rigged out with the topsail as the two here are seen. These boats were originally used for basic transportation before cars, roadways and bridges made their way here. There is also a long standing tradition of racing them. I honestly can think of little else that is more beautiful than a gleaming white spritsail fully rigged, sailing against a blue sky. It goes right to the heart of what I feel about this salty old coast. I am very thankful that there is an active community of local boatbuilders and sailors who continue to keep these traditional boats alive and on the water. I have had the great pleasure of sailing in them and would like someday to own one. But for now I'm perfectly happy just putting them on canvas.....it's still a lot of work but much less maintenance.

The Artist's Wife....or should I say "The Knitter's Husband"

2012-01-04T21:32:00.008-05:00

If you're familiar with this blog then perhaps you'll remember a couple of entries I posted last year pertaining to my wife and her genealogical research and the trips in the field we took together. I would like to take this opportunity to tell you about another passion of hers that is particularly rewarding this time of year, rewarding not just for her but for those lucky enough to be on the receiving end of this passion.....namely me!

You see, Ann is a devoted knitter and although we live at the edge of the "Southern Outer Banks" it gets cold here too! Here I am on a freezing cold day bundled up in my fisherman's cap and cowl and as warm as can be. She also knitted me some fabulous fingerless mitts that are perfect for plein air painting in the winter months. She specializes in traditional designs and patterns many of which have their origins in Scotland and the British Isles. How perfect is that for an artist who paints the sea? I must confess that living with a knitter is a blessing on many levels. Not only do you get to be the beneficiary of their labor, but a knitter brings a peaceful spirit into the home that warms the soul just as wool warms the body.

Ann knits all year round and is constantly starting new things. She has a website that she posts her work on as well as several other knitting related subjects. So for all the times that she has been asked "Are you the artist's wife?", let me correct them by saying, "No, she's not the artist's wife, I'm the knitter's husband".

In the meantime.....

2011-12-26T20:55:00.005-05:00

"THE COTTAGE BY THE SEA"

oil on linen, 20"x 16"

I am working like mad in the studio these days on many, many new works for my upcoming exhibition this summer and with the exception of the few images I am leaking out here and there, most of the work will remain under wraps until the show opens in June 2012. So, I thought I'd share a couple of fairly recent paintings I have done that are not related to my show and have never been posted on this blog. The first piece titled "The Cottage by the Sea" illustrates most notably a couple of things that really go on with me and my motivation to paint what I do. Probably like most artists, my muse responds to different stimuli thus producing related responses on canvas. For my muse, music tends to be one of the most motivational sources or channels through which the notions to paint travel. These musical sources range from the growling viola da gamba compositions of Tobias Hume helping me to produce works such as my "Blackbeard Painting" to the piano sonatas of Beethoven which were "instrumental" in producing the feeling that led to the painting above. Secondly, when you live and work by the sea, after a while you start noticing the spirit of the sea not in the grandness of the ocean, or the tall ships that call at the port, etc. but you feel the sea in the small things like the shell on the porch rail with the salt parched patina and chipped paint. I really like the quietude of the little back streets and lanes of our small seaport town, away from the tourists and the bustle of the waterfront. Along these little streets all you are likely to encounter is the sound of a laughing gull, a cat lounging in the street, grass bugs and seaside sparrows chattering away and quite possibly the sound of a Beethoven piano sonata wafting through an open window in a small cottage by the sea.

"AS THE SPIRIT MOVES"

oil on canvas, 22"x 33"

This painting was a commission for a very good friend of ours here in Beaufort who was impressed by my previous paintings of black glass bottles. It turned out, totally unbeknownst to me at the time I was painting this piece, that this painting contained scores of symbolic meaning for this person. Shortly after we delivered the framed painting to her and hung it, she gave a big party and asked if I would explain the painting and describe some of the symbolism it contained (which I did), and although I was a bit uncomfortable speaking about all these symbolic components that I really didn't intend, I'm glad the piece worked out for her the way it did. Many times as the creator of these paintings, I probably build them up much grander in my own mind than they will ever be perceived once they're out in the world. But then I guess there are those pieces, such as this one that will mean more to the painting's owner than I could ever have imagined and for that I am grateful.

Ode to the Flair and the Flam.....

2011-12-17T07:28:00.003-05:00

"ISLAND HARBOR"

oil on canvas, 11"x 18"

This is a piece I recently finished for my upcoming exhibition. I have painted a lot of boats in my time, most of them were built here in Carteret County in the "Down East" communities. Like most people I say that these boats were "built" when in fact they are really sculpted. These boatbuilders (boatsculptors) use no plans to create these beauties. Instead they rely on their instincts, knowledge and what they call "rack of the eye". This sounds more like an art form than construction method to me and when you see the finished results there's no doubt that these boats are true forms of art, and I don't use this phrase lightly. In the painting above I depicted a round stern sink netter in a small harbor on Cedar Island, NC, and what really struck me was that this particular view really shows off some of the most notable "Down East" characteristics particularly the flare bow. The flam (which refers to the sloping sides of the hull) and the round stern are also prevalent in this view. I'd like to add that these local wooden boats are similar to the varying dialects of the various down east communities. If you listen closely you can hear slight nuances to the dialects and tell which community a person comes from. In the same way these boats exhibit certain characteristics that inform you as to which community they were built.......I mean sculpted!

Into Colonial Coast Country.....yet again

2011-12-02T22:34:00.008-05:00

Here we go again off to another secret location deep into "Colonial Coast Country" as my wife continues researching her family history. This was on Thanksgiving Day and we packed a picnic lunch and headed to an exclusive and quite remote old waterfront estate that Ann has been to numerous times. This was my second trip. I can tell you the spirit of those who dwelled here and plied these waters is still very much present. The above picture shows the main road (or cart path as it were) which leads to the property. The deeper into the property we went, the older and thicker the way became........

One of the first features you encounter as you enter the property is a large meadow with this old family grave yard along the meadow's edge.

Here's a wider angle view of the grave yard and its orientation to the water. Ann is off in the distance heading for the bluff that overlooks the water. This was no doubt a very strategic lookout point to see approaching ships and sloops.

At the base of the bluff is a series of small sandy beaches. We went down to explore these beaches and this is what we were greeted with....FRESH BEAR TRACKS!!! We figured this mama bear and her cub had already seen us coming and made their way off the beach up into the woods above us, and while we fortunately never encountered them it put us on a heightened state of alert.

Here's Ann standing next to the bear tracks.

This was the next beach we came to which I named "Isla de Muerta" (Isle of the Dead) because I thought all these clumps of indigenous clay looked like half-buried corpses. Especially striking are the two clumps in the left center of the picture which look like skulls (see detail below)

The next beach I called "Ballast Stone Beach" where I found these two ballast stones. There was a lot of ship activity along this body of water in the 1700s and these ballast stones are evidence of that.

As I mentioned in a previous post, trips like this one with my wife are amazing experiences. Because of the nature of her research into her historically very significant family history and the access she provides through her family connections to some incredibly exclusive and archeologically important territory, these are not just trips to places but are trips through the dimension of time and as an artist I find it absolutely FASCINATING!

Standing at this point of land and as I look out across the water, it doesn't take a huge leap of imagination to see a couple of sloops anchored out there. I know for a fact if I were to put on some scuba gear and dive around out there.....I'd see those sloops.

Birth of a Platinum Wave....

2011-11-23T20:57:00.001-05:00

I have recently begun a series of metalpoint drawings for my upcoming exhibition next summer and this is the first time I've ever used platinum. I have done several metalpoint drawings using 24k gold and pure silver but this is my first venture using pure platinum. I thought I'd post a couple of pictures sort of illustrating how basic this technique is. To the uninitiated, to be told that a drawing is done in pure platinum could conjure up all kinds of notions. Not to oversimplify but it is really just like drawing with pencil or pen except for the fact that instead of deposits of graphite or ink, microscopic deposits of platinum are left on the specially coated paper. The key is in the preparation of the paper which I coat with a specially formulated "ground" which, when dry, has a very fine tooth on its surface which abrades the platinum (or gold or silver for that matter) causing small deposits of the metal to be left upon the surface of the paper. The other critical factor is the fact that the metal marks can not be erased. So you best get it right! In the above photo you see from left to right my reference photo, the stylus, the drawing which is taped to an acrylic sheet, a magnifier for the tiniest of detail drawing, and a wooden bridge that I made years ago (I never touch the paper with my hand!).

Here's a detail shot of the platinum wire that I use and the stylus that I made to hold the wire. I had a devil of a time sourcing pure platinum wire and it ain't cheap! I decided to go with a very small gauge wire which is a little larger than dental floss, and although the small size adds considerably to the time it takes to complete a work, the detail and fineness of texture I can achieve with this is amazing.

(Detail of work in progress)

As I mentioned previously, the key is in the surface prep and I put an enormous amount of emphasis on this step. Above are the basic requirements for beginning a successful drawing, on top of my paper stretching board are left to right, the only paper I've used thus far which is Arches 140 lb. hot pressed watercolor paper which I stretch in order to be able to apply the water based ground. I have also used Arches 300 lb. hot pressed paper without stretching which also works fine. I'm sure in the future I'll try experimenting with other papers but for now the Arches works superbly and I'd rather focus on my drawing skills with the metal before I go off experimenting with other papers. The grounds that I use are the Golden Silverpoint Ground in which the ground is suspended in an acrylic polymer dispersion agent and is very convenient to use. The other is Natural Pigments powdered ground which is more labor intensive to prepare and requires much more deftness of application but the results are velvety smooth and I sort of like the challenge of its preparation....it makes the success of a well applied ground even more satisfying. I'll post the image of the finished drawing in a few weeks (hopefully).

It is now a "Pirate Trilogy".....

2011-11-10T22:16:00.012-05:00

This will be my final pirate posting for a while, but I need to let you in on something. My wife is deeply involved in researching her family history and has been working on an amazing project for a couple of years now. She is descended from some of North Carolina's earliest seafarers and is going through every shred of information that she can find in order to uncover some of the enormous mysteries that shroud not only her family history but history on a scale much larger than you would believe at the moment. She's working on a book and when she has all the pieces in place it will be published. I have been fortunate to be privy to a lot of her discoveries as well as accompanying her on some of her trips to places that are so old, deep and off the beaten path (or waterway as it were) that you can't help but feel that these mysteries in N.C. history have remained so because people just didn't know where to look.

I wanted to share this with you because it is powerful stuff and it effects me deeply as an artist. I have been to some seriously uncharted territory with my wife on her research trips and you can almost feel the history as it reveals itself to you (history of both regular folk and the pirates who infested these places). I am sworn to secrecy on any details regarding places, locations, people or specific subject matter but all of it has such an impact on who I am and what I do as an artist I thought I would share at least a few pictures of a "typical" field trip......

Approaching a secret point. This was one isolated and forgotten place. Though not an island it was accessible only by boat.

After we landed looking out from the shore. Nothing but woods at our back.

A small lagoon and live oak tree dripping with Spanish moss. Very old feeling here.

These and a few other old graves were the only "others" at this place besides us.

This is the sea history that really makes you quiver....

....and fascinates me TO THE CORE!!!

Provisioning a Pirate (since we seem to be on the subject of pirates lately)....

2011-11-04T07:17:00.007-04:00

"LATE SUMMER MARSH"

oil on canvas, 12"x 18"

Just finished this piece for my upcoming show and it brings back a lot of memories. This is the marsh that my wife and I lived beside for the first 7 years we were living here at the coast. As a matter of fact the centerline of our property went right down the middle of this creek. I did a similar painting several years ago from a slightly different angle and an earlier time of day, so this painting is sort of a reprise. The creek is officially known as North Leopard Creek for some strange reason, but it is also known as Bell's Creek and Gillikin Creek. We referred to it as "THE CREEK". This is a very old part of the coast and the locals speak with some of the thickest brogue I've ever heard (yes, even more pronounced than Ocracoke or Harkers Island). The old timers in this area say that the part of the creek which would be at your back from the view I painted above and which opens up into a larger body of water leading to the sea, was where Blackbeard's crew would row up into to buy, or trade for (but definitely not steal), local produce from area farmers. I don't doubt it a bit. Pirate's footprints are all over this place. In fact, the little community that this creek runs through is named Otway after the famous privateer Capt. Otway Burns, and though Capt. Burns was not technically a pirate there were many in his day who would argue that he most definitely was.

Plundering a Pirate's Ship....turnabout's fair play eh Mr. Blackbeard?

2011-10-26T18:07:00.004-04:00

I have just returned to the studio from the NC Maritime Museum where a few minutes ago another cannon from Blackbeard's flagship the "Queen Anne's Revenge" was recovered after 300 years on the ocean floor. The cannon made a brief public appearance in front of the museum before heading on to the conservation lab in Greenville, NC. It always amazes me when these artifacts are brought above surface for the first time. The archeologists handling the newly surfaced artifacts have to treat them like living organisms. After 300 years in the ocean environment they become part of it. Living sea organisms attach to the artifacts and become part of the artifact itself. This cannon even smelled like a beached sea creature, which I guess that's what it really is at this point.

Here are some pictures from the event......

Here comes the cannon fresh from the deep.

The team unwraps the baby from her wet blankets.

Thar she is!

Here's a view of the sunlit side. Check out the kid in the light blue jacket and his intense look. You can tell this experience is going deep in him...I know the feeling bud!!!

View of the barrel. All of the cannons discovered at this wreck site were loaded with their shot. There are supposedly 40 cannons with this ship so these guys meant business!

Like I said, they have to treat these things like living sea creatures so they need to remain wet. The cannon will now be transported to the conservation lab and will be placed in a desalinization tank for a few years then the concretions and marine growth will be meticulously ground off with something about the size of a dentist's drill.

This is an 8 footer and is the 13th cannon recovered thus far. They've got a long way to go.

Happy plundering guys!

Precious Metals

2011-10-10T08:14:00.008-04:00

"SENTINEL BY THE SEA"

24k gold & pure silver on prepared paper

5-1/8"x 8-3/8"

We have the most beautiful windswept (and often windlashed) live oak trees here on our stretch of the coast. They are absolute portraits of the wind, meaning you can see the wind in them. The drawing pictured above is a commissioned piece I just finished.

Years before working in metalpoint, I did several drawings of these trees in pencil. I always felt they lent themselves nicely to be rendered in pencil but I feel even more strongly about doing them in metalpoint now, that is to say gold and silver. This will be the last gold and silver drawing I do for a while now that I'm exploring platinum in a new series of metalpoint drawings for my upcoming exhibition. I will be working with new subject matter exclusively suited for platinum. I can't explain why certain materials and subjects strike me as compatible other than it just feels right. I wouldn't use metalpoint for just any subject. There has to be some connection between the subject and material used to render it, and although I'm not always conscious of what that connection is..... I sure can feel it.

The Briny Deep

2011-10-06T16:41:00.002-04:00

"OFFSHORE"

oil on canvas, 18"x 24"

Here's a preview of the open water series of paintings that will be a part of my upcoming exhibition next summer. I will be posting images of them periodically so keep an eye out.

Afternoon offshore....."Carolina Style!"

2011-10-04T07:41:00.004-04:00

Yesterday afternoon I took a trip offshore to photograph the open sea for some paintings I'm working on for my upcoming exhibition. Capt. Buddy Harris took me out in his custom built 50' Harris (yes he built her). Buddy is a renowned builder of true "Carolina Style" sportfishing boats (click here and read Capt. Tennant's history of the Carolina style boat to find out more). I wanted to go out on a day with some moderate seaswell so I figured with energy from Tropical Storm Phillipe out there and 15 knot westerlies there should be some good wave action. Got what I wanted as you can see from the roll of the boat in the photo above as we were heading out into open water after leaving the dock. Below are a couple of pictures from the trip.

First we went by our old friend Blackbeard's Queen Anne's Revenge watery grave. Divers were working the site probably checking out the status of everything down there after Hurricane Irene. You'll notice the ship went down only a mile offshore. You can clearly see the beach and houses in the distance.

This is a shot from the flybridge. I thought I'd go up top and chat with the Captain for a few minutes. I forgot how compounded the sea action is the higher up you go and I'm not one to get seasick but it was pitching and rolling a little too much and I didn't want to take any chances this early in the trip....so I just eased myself back down the ladder.

This is the sea buoy which is about 8 miles offshore. It is the last buoy as you head out to sea and the first buoy marking the shipping channel as you come from sea. The most amazing and eery thing about it is, it has an air cavity and air channel built into it with a horn at the upper end. The air pressure from the sea swell creates a rush of air that blows through the horn. Below is a short video I shot...

The effect reminded me of Spanish sculptor Eduardo Chillida's Wind Comb I saw when I was in San Sebastian Spain a few years ago.

Here's a shot a few miles beyond the sea buoy, but what caught my eye when I returned to the studio to review my photos was the shape of the cirrus cloud above. It first struck me like the "Batman" sign in the sky from the old "Batman" series but then it looked more like a white dove. Was it a sign......?

It was after all a very good afternoon!

Alumni Exhibition

2011-09-29T08:53:00.001-04:00

"SHIP IN A BOTTLE"

oil on linen

I will be taking part in the upcoming alumni exhibition at the Barton College art galleries in Wilson, North Carolina October 2nd through November 4th and will also be the guest speaker on the evening of October 22nd at 7pm. The work that I am contributing is the piece pictured above. It is one of my personal favorites and has never been exhibited publicly before. One of my top collectors has generously allowed me to borrow the painting for the exhibition. I think this work blends my passions for history, Dutch 17th painting and the sea about as well as any I've ever done.

Let the Show Begin

2011-09-17T07:36:00.000-04:00

I am fully engaged now in creating new work for my exhibition next summer at Carteret Contemporary Art. This is the most ambitious exhibition I have done yet, not in terms of scale of the works, but in the sheer number of pieces that will be created. I will be posting images from this new body of work periodically along with previews of some pieces in process. I am incredibly excited about the year ahead and all of the new work that will be forthcoming, including a new series of drawings in PLATINUM!

Stay tuned......

You must watch this!

2011-09-04T06:59:00.000-04:00

This is an absolutely amazing and hilarious video about a beautiful project bringing together 3 artists (actually 4 when you include the artist who produced it) from 3 different fields. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogYVswztw4M

Greetings from landfall

2011-08-30T07:31:00.003-04:00

While Hurricane Irene was devastating to parts of North Carolina including many of the "Down East" fishing communities and several counties inland and our thoughts and prayers go out to them, oddly we here in Beaufort were spared any major damage as were our beaches. This is particularly amazing considering we were ground zero. The eye passed over us beginning at around 8 am Saturday morning and for the next 3-4 hours we had total calm. Then all Hell broke loose right after lunch. The back side of the storms can often do the most damage because 1. the winds can often be stronger and more constant and 2. just like bending a piece of metal back and forth, if you've had 70 plus mph winds blowing in one direction for hours then reverse the wind for several more, and bend everything back to the other weakened side, things break. Below are just a few pictures from Beaufort. We were without power for about 2-1/2 days but other than that we sustained very little damage.

This is a shot of Taylors Creek at the height of the storm. A couple of sailboats broke from their moorings and ended up on shore, while the little skimmer trawler is riding it out perfectly. These commercial fishermen down here were born with salt in their blood and I think this is a perfect example of the difference between those born of the land (the recreational sailboat owners) and those born of the sea! No wonder why the folks from the old fishing communities refer to those who weren't born here as "Dingbatters".

Same sailboats as in above photo the day after the storm.

Morning after the storm and shop owners are dismantling the storm protection.

Today, just a few days later and right here before Labor Day weekend you can hardly tell anything happened. Again I find this utterly amazing as Irene was forecasted to be a Cat 3 possibly a 4 at landfall and she weakend to a strong 1. Beaufort is a very old town for a reason. Many of its structures date back to the 18th century, some very early 18th century. This town has seen a lot of storms and it is still here. My wife and I have ridden out several here and are always gratefully amazed at how well the town does and how safe we feel here despite the fact that we face the sea and are often the point of landfall for these beasts. But like I said we never EVER get complacent here.....check the tropical forecast models. Notice anything by the name of Katia?

In the "I" of the storm....

2011-08-23T20:48:00.003-04:00

Well, yet again we find ourselves in the crosshairs of an approaching hurricane. Although the most recent forecast models are trending a little bit more to the east which would put Irene just offshore, we never let our guards down when there's a storm anywhere near the coast here. With an approaching hurricane, especially when they're forecasted to attain "major" status, anxiety runs high and rightfully so. If you've ever been through one of these things you'll know what I'm talking about. Everyone channels their anxiety in different ways ( a lot of people consume copious amounts of alcohol to deal with it) I always find that my creative senses are heightened and I turn the anxiety into a creative energy. One example of this is the OBX sticker pictured above. In 2003 we were slammed by hurricane Isabel, then in 2004, there was a barrage of storms coming off Africa making their way across the Atlantic. Sensing a "here we go again" scenario I was inspired to design the OBX sticker above which basically replaces the "O" in the ubiquitous OBX logo with the symbol for a tropical storm. I sent the idea to the folks at OBX and they loved it! It was one of the first alternative designs for the traditional OBX sticker that they had ever considered and they proceeded to make stickers, tee shirts and license plates utilizing this design.

So how will I now channel my anxious energy pertaining to the approaching Irene? With an exhibition coming up next summer, no doubt there will a storm painting or two making its way into the mix.

"Buried Treasure".....Revisited

2011-08-20T12:10:00.001-04:00

"BURIED TREASURE"

24K gold & pure silver on prepared paper

6"x 9"

Studies for paintings notwithstanding it is a bit rare when I commit to drawing and painting an identical subject and when it does occur I have always produced the drawing first and later a painting if the subject interests me enough. However, in the case of the metalpoint drawing above, it began life as a painting (see my earlier post "The Shell Game"). The whole notion of the title "Buried Treasure" used for the painting referred to the fact that these whole whelk shells when found on the beach evoke great excitement when you find one (it's sort of like discovering a treasure). Then as the idea of doing this same subject in the precious metal mediums of silver and gold began to build, the title "Buried Treasure" assumed an additional meaning. We most associate the phrase buried treasure with a pirate's chest on some sandy beach full of pieces of eight and dubloons, so it only seemed natural to do this drawing in silver and gold. Enjoy!

To "The Faraway Isle".....

2011-08-05T21:59:00.005-04:00

"MORNING ASHORE"

oil on canvas, 10"x 16"

(click on image for detail)

Fresh off the easel after my return from Portsmouth Island, this little piece is headed for Nantucket to Cavalier Galleries next week. I am preparing for an extremely busy year ahead with a show next summer in North Carolina, several commissions and numerous new works for Cavalier and the New England audience. I am very pleased with the success my work is experiencing up north, I have always felt a very strong New England spirit trying to manifest itself in much of my previous work. Of course when your subject is the sea, it's really universal and be it North or South the sea is the sea!

An Island in Time....

2011-08-03T20:53:00.011-04:00

My arrival to Portsmouth Island (a long-deserted seafaring community on North Carolina's southernmost Outer Banks) in the morning was pleasantly overcast. I couldn't have been luckier because my first day there was to be spent touring the island and getting to know the place. If the sun had been out the temperatures would have been miserably high, but as it was temps stayed in the low 80's all day with a N.E. breeze.

This is Capt. Rudy Austin, a native of Ocracoke Island who has been taking people over to Portsmouth Island from Ocracoke for years. His father, Junius Austin took my wife and I to Portsmouth on our first trip there back in 1991. Rudy's family is deeply connected to Portsmouth Island and the folks that used to live there. I think the world of Rudy.

You will not find a wilder, nor wider stretch of beach than on Portsmouth Island. The island was settled early on by Native Americans then Pirates and later port pilots. Scores upon scores of ships have wrecked along these shores and at least one sand dune near this spot was formed by sand piling up over top of the ship's wreckage.......fascinating!!!!

By our Outer Banks standards, particularly the Southern Banks, Portsmouth Island is surprisingly large (for a sandbar). So, it was my distinct honor to be given the privilege of using this John Deere "Gator". The accessible parts of the island became even more so with this thing and it made outrunning the mosquitoes a breeze.

Here I am at the wheel following National Park Service volunteer Ed Burgess into the woods to go see some of the enchanted scenery tucked away in the island's interior. Ed and his wife Rene spend 6 weeks each year as National Park Service volunteers looking after the village and giving walking tours to visitors. They are two of the neatest people I've ever had the pleasure of knowing. It was a delight to be with them while I was on Portsmouth.

This is the Methodist Church built in 1914. This is the 3rd church as the two previous ones were destroyed by hurricanes. Small world story here....my wife's great grandfather was a circuit rider minister for the Methodist-Episcopal Church and preached in the Portsmouth Island Methodist Church in the 1800's.

Church Interior

Here are some of the houses around the island........

Tom Gilgo, Jr. house

Styron/Bragg house

side porch of the Garrish/Dixon house

(note the little structure in the back that looks like a dog house, it is actually a "cool house". Being that there was no electricity on Portsmouth hence no refrigerators, islanders would place a pan of water in the cool house which had screened openings on all sides and let the seabreeze blow through and over top of the water thereby keeping milk, cheese, etc. relatively cool in the hot summer months).

Henry Pigott's house

Wash Robert's house

(this is the oldest existing house on the island c.1790, the footings and braces at the foundation are from shipwreck timbers and ballast stones are scattered all around the place)

The ground water on Portsmouth island is briny and undrinkable so the islanders had to resort to collecting rainwater in cisterns. This beautiful cistern is alongside the old schoolhouse.

One thing you will definitely notice on Portsmouth are the numerous cemeteries all about the island. To me this picture of a cemetery in a far corner of a vast salt marsh captures the spirit of the place. This island is still home to those who lived here, no matter how desolate.

Being that this stretch of the coast is known as "The Graveyard of the Atlantic", lifesaving stations dotted the banks. This is the old lifesaving station on Portsmouth Island. It employed many of the island's male residents who would actually live in the facility while on duty even though their homes were only a footpath away. Many, many rescues were launched from this station.

Upon my departure from Portsmouth on the way back over to Ocracoke, Capt. Rudy treated me to a visit to this pelican rookery on a tiny island in between Portsmouth and Ocracoke. There were hundreds of pelicans from hatchlings to fully grown adults all over the place. It felt like a sacred spot. I was honored to see it.

After my Portsmouth Island adventure I was ready to do some serious chilling out on Ocracoke Island so I spent a couple of days there before heading back to Beaufort. Ocracoke has its own wild and windswept beaches which can be totally devoid of people in the middle of summer (and with water temps in the upper 70's to low 80's it's amazing to think you can have it, as well as the sharks, all to yourself). If you look closely at the left side of this picture you can sea a black barrier which is protecting a sea turtle nest. The protected area goes all the way to the surf forming a little "roadway to the sea" for the hatchlings as they emerge from the sand).

After I took the picture above I went up the beach on a long walk and came upon a shipwreck, probably from the 1800's that was exposed in the sand. These old wrecks just appear then disappear, then appear again etc. with the shifting sands and frequent storms. There's no telling how many wrecks lay beneath the sand up and down these beaches! What an amazing thing to be on a beach by yourself like this and just come up on a shipwreck!!! This is why I paint this place.....and will 'til the day I die.

"Gearing" up....

2011-07-19T21:11:00.002-04:00

Next week I'll be embarking on an adventure to one of the most remote places on North Carolina's Outer Banks, Portsmouth Island. It is located just south of Ocracoke Island and is accessible only by boat. Portsmouth is a deserted seafaring village on an island where sand dunes are created from shipwrecks on the beach, ballast stones are scattered about the place and the mosquitoes are probably some of the most ferocious in the world. They swarm in clouds and thus the reputation of the mosquitoes unfortunately overshadows the island's rich, rich seafaring heritage (at least amongst the handfuls of tourists who venture there). Ask the people who were born and raised along this stretch of the coast, whose ancestors made their livelihoods from the sea and they will speak about Portsmouth Island with reverence. To them it is sacred ground. I will be over there for 3 days gathering material for numerous new paintings and have been blessed with the great fortune of having one of the old homes on the island offered to me for my use while I'm there. I have been to Portsmouth Island a few times before, only day trips, and I have experienced the swarms of bugs so that's no big deal. But what really has my juices flowing is the remote and somewhat forbidden nature of this place and the thought that I'm going to be spending a couple of nights in this deserted village on an island whose only inhabitant is the spirit of the sea!

A Ghost Story

2011-07-07T18:17:00.008-04:00

"THE WIND AND THE WIDOW"

oil on canvas, 36"x 36"

I created this painting a few years ago and I must tell you the story behind it.....

About 10 years ago I was on one of our Outer Banks Islands discussing my work with an elderly woman who was born, raised and had lived her entire life on the island, and in the middle of our conversation about my work etc she got a sudden shudder with goose bumps and looked me right in the eye and said, "You're getting help from the other side!" I sort of chuckled and replied half jokingly that I didn't know if that was true or not but that I'd take help anywhere I could get it. Well if there is any "other side" coming into play then this painting "The Wind and the Widow" exhibits that trait more than any other (that I know of). Here's the story.......

It was in early November, yes just past Halloween, late one afternoon and I was on my daily walk around our old seaport town of Beaufort, NC. A deepening Nor'easter was pulling out to sea and the clouds were beginning to break apart letting intermittent blasts of golden sunshine through. As I was walking along the waterfront, one such blast of sunlight broke through and I just happened to look up at one of the stately old homes on the waterfront and noticed a most dramatic shadow of the house's widow's walk streaking across the huge masonry chimney. With the wind howling, trees wooshing and sailboat rigging singing away, it did not take a huge leap of imagination for my mind's eye to see the shadow of a sea captain's wife standing along the rail pining for the return of her husband, scanning the horizon for his ship that will not (or did not) return safely to port. Here's a little anecdote I need to insert at this point. My wife and I have a poster in our house of Winslow Homer's painting "The New Novel". There is a young girl laying on the ground reading a book. For some reason we named this girl MARGARET (remember this name). Later as I was working on my painting "The Wind and the Widow" and had painted the shadow of the sea captain's wife on the chimney, my wife and I were joking around and decided that my widow's name was Margaret after the Margaret in our Homer poster. Now back to the main story, I finished the painting, it went to my dealer who sold it and that was that. About a month later I was on my usual afternoon walk and was passing by the house with the chimney and widow's walk and happened to see the house's owner on his porch. This was a 2nd home and the owner was rarely here (and now I may know why!) and I proceeded to tell him about the painting I had just done of his roof, chimney and widow's walk and the specter of the woman's shadow along the rail and he just nonchalantly looked at me and said, "Oh, Margaret walks!" My jaw dropped. MARGARET!!! He went on to say that about a hundred years ago a woman named Margaret lived in the house. Right after she died people started hearing her ghost walk around the house. He told me that he and his family and friends have heard her walking too. So not only did I "imagine" the image of a woman at the widow's walk of a house with a known ghost, both my widow and the deceased woman who now haunts the house are named MARGARET.........

Coincidence or help from the other side?

BOO!

Back to the sea

2011-06-22T09:25:00.005-04:00

"WAVE ACTION"

oil on canvas, 14"x 24"

My previous post "The Blackbeard Painting" was a lot of fun and got a HUGE response, but just like our pirate captain had to always return to the sea so must I. In my latest painting just finished I've depicted a scene which is our favorite spot on Atlantic Beach. It is near this exact place that much of my "beach" subject matter comes from (shells, sharks teeth, seascapes, etc.). BUT, along this stretch of NC coast you are never too far away from the remnants of our sea roving pirate mates. About one mile directly offshore from the scene depicted above lies the wreckage of Blackbeard's ship the "Queen Anne's Revenge". My wife and I have often found on the beach several interesting objects that could quite possibly be from the wreck site. One in particular is an unmistakable shard of thick black glass from a 17th or 18th century wine bottle. That's the amazing thing about a walk along the beach here, you can see something not knowing exactly what it is and then let your imagination take over. You may imagine the old piece of metal covered in shells was once part of a most fantastic swashbuckling adventure ship now lost beneath the ocean and as far fetched as that sounds, along this part of the coast....you just might be exactly right!

"The Blackbeard Painting"

2011-06-07T23:35:00.018-04:00

"UNDER THE BLACK FLAG"

oil on linen. 30"x 48"

This painting depicts actual artifacts recovered from the shipwreck believed to be Blackbeard's flagship the "Queen Anne's Revenge"

(click on image for detail)

This is a post about one of the most unique still life paintings ever created and no I'm not too modest to say it. Not that one doesn't exist, but I have never heard of a still life painting of artifacts, much less shipwreck artifacts and pirates at that! But not just any pirate, we're talking Blackbeard. Not the Disney version, no yo ho ho or Hollywood fantasy....this is the real deal.

In 1718 a ship grounded on a bar just off the inlet leading into the port town of Beaufort, NC where I live and work. It was the large French Slave Ship once known as La Concorde but renamed after her capture the Queen Anne's Revenge by her captor, the pirate now known as Blackbeard. This was Blackbeard's flagship and the story goes that he had the ship grounded purposely (while he and his closest mates were in another sloop) in order to break up the large pirate company that he had assembled and thus making for larger shares of future prizes for the crew members that remained. In November of 1996, the wreckage of the ship "Queen Anne's Revenge" was found at the spot where she originally grounded in 1718. It soon became apparent that a treasure trove of artifacts went down with the ship and an all out recovery effort began which continues today.

A few years ago my wife and I owned a house here in Beaufort which was right around the corner from a house said to have been frequented by Blackbeard, and some claim that he even built it, not true. One day I was working at the easel and had an idea like a lightning bolt strike me right out of the blue. I wasn't even thinking anything close to this at the time...just WHAMMO! What if I could get access to the artifacts from the "Queen Anne's Revenge" and do a still life painting of them. I immediately saw the painting, flag and all. I could hardly contain myself. Being fairly familiar with some of the artifacts since the local newspaper gave almost weekly updates, I sketched out right then the basis for the painting I wanted to do:

It was crude and there actually wasn't a candle (I later told one of the divers on the wreck to find me one!) but this was the genesis. Since the State of North Carolina owned this site and was overseeing the recovery, I knew that I would have to work in concert with them. I put together a proposal, sent it to them and soon thereafter I got the call I had hoped for, they loved the idea of the painting. They allowed me access to all of the artifacts, not only the ones that had been conserved but the ones that were currently in the conservation process. I first went to all of the places that housed the artifacts to see what was available and to make notes, etc. so that I could arrive at the final composition. Deciding what the painting would consist of, how I would arrange the elements and most importantly, what did I want to say with this thing was very very stressful. I mean, how often am I going to get the chance to paint Blackbeard's stuff?!!! I also knew that more than likely this painting was going to receive a lot of attention, plus there were scores of archeologists, scientist, curators and thousands of Blackbeard fanatics that would call me out if I didn't do something pretty spectacular, again this IS Blackbeard. So I decided to put more than just the artifacts in the work, I was going to put Blackbeard himself in it.

As far as we know,Blackbeard was a man of significant cunning and intelligence, and based upon his penchant for impersonating the devil no doubt had a toe in the dark side. So below is the composition that I based the painting on and as you can see one of the main structural features is a pentagram which was associated with the "Pythagorean Society".

This is the structure of the composition and all of the elements in the painting are positioned in reference to this diagram (see composite image below). The letters refer to "The Keys" to the painting (see also below).

This is the outline for the composition based on the artifacts after I had researched them and selected the ones I wanted to use. The numbers are reference numbers for the legend that appears further below.

And here is the composite image of the structure and composition.

In case you care to know what all the numbers and letters refer to, then below are the "legends" that reference a lot of what is in this painting....though there are still a few "secrets" that I'll probably just keep quiet on.

click on pages to enlarge

And here is the legend for the numbers on the composition:

And now, here are a few pictures of some of the artifacts as I photographed them for the painting:

The Cannon

A "concreted "pewter plate was brought out of the desalinization tank for this shot, (my antique wine bottles standing in)

Large pewter charger with styrofoam cannonballs and an earthenware jug stands in for the bell

THE BELL! and a small brass device called a sector

one of the cannonballs (I photographed each individual cannonball and painted them as accurately as possible)

ballast stones, had hundreds to choose from!

this black glass wine bottle was too fragile to handle (this is the stuff that makes curators nervous)

When I had all of the photographs and other information I needed to execute the work, I set about creating a preliminary study to see how the composition would work and to get the okay from the State of NC and the archeologists, conservators and curators:

pencil study for the painting

A note about the flag used in this painting...my wife,a gifted seamstress, hand sewed the flag and its elements. When she was stitching it, my instructions to her was "sew like a pirate!" Little did I know at the time how well she could sew like a pirate (more on that later). The flag was taken to Ocracoke Island, a known haven for the pirate, and was photographed at night in an old house located at Teaches Hole, the place where Blackbeard was killed.

The study received approvals all the way around and I began work on the painting. I initiated work on the painting in my Beaufort studio and after a month we moved up to our other house at the time in historic Edenton, North Carolina's second oldest town and hauntingly beautiful, and I completed the painting at midnight in my Edenton studio. If Beaufort was the perfect place to begin this piece, Edenton was the perfect place to do the majority of the work and ultimately finish it. I have no doubt that Blackbeard as well as many other pirates dropped anchor in Edenton Bay.

Edenton Bay

It is widely known that Governor Eden was, shall we say not too hard on Blackbeard, in fact he was probably in cahoots with the pirate. Can't say I blame him based on the circumstances of the day. Governor Eden is buried in St. Paul's Cemetery in Edenton and during the time I was working on the painting I would on my afternoon walks sometimes just go pay the Governor a visit and remind myself that I was painting this piece in about as appropriate place as could be painted. The muse was bursting at the seams!

St. Paul's Cemetery in Edenton (this is not Gov. Eden's headstone)

The painting took close to 4 months to complete and after it was finished, the NC Dept. of Cultural Resources held an official unveiling with the media and State officials. The painting was purchased by a major benefactor of the NC Maritime Museum and given to the museum where it is now part of their permanent collection and will be exhibited in the new "Blackbeard's Queen Anne's Revenge 1718" exhibition opening this summer 2011, at the NC Maritime Museum. It was a once in a lifetime painting for me just like this very long post will probably be once in a lifetime too....at least I hope.

here's an encore

"UNDER THE BLACK FLAG"

The Shell Game

2011-05-24T20:32:00.000-04:00

"BURIED TREASURE"

oil on panel, 6"x 8"

I have noticed that over the past year or so I keep returning to shells. I am not sure but it probably stems from the fact that I've been spending a lot more time on some of North Carolina's wilder more isolated beaches such as Cape Lookout, Shark Island, Ocracoke Island and Portsmouth Island, where it is extremely common to find the most wonderful shells. Though most people will never know where a particular shell in one of my paintings comes from, I know when I'm painting it. I think the memories associated with the discovery of these shells from deserted beaches gets into the work somehow because while I'm working on a piece in my studio I'm constantly feeling and reflecting upon the day I found that shell and that's got to work in the painting's favor. Shells are not the easiest of subjects to paint especially when they're done alla prima as most of mine are, but when the form begins to emerge, it is thrilling!

Follow by email

2011-05-22T09:18:00.000-04:00

I recently received a request to add a new widget on the sidebar "Follow by email" so that alerts to new posts on this blog can be sent out when I post something new. I get a lot of viewers on this blog and I apologize I didn't add this sooner....frankly I wasn't aware that it existed. I haven't added the "comments" option to my posts yet because I'm afraid I wouldn't be a very punctual responder. I work really long hours at the easel, but if you ever want to send a comment, question or anything else please feel free to drop me an email on my contact page.
all the best,
Jack

Having some fun...

2011-05-13T13:05:00.002-04:00

"THE BEACHCOMBER"

oil on canvas, 12"x 24"

(click on image to enlarge)

You know, sometimes it's just what you observe in a very simple way that can result in the most pleasing work. I had a blast painting this piece quite honestly. Just like a relaxing walk on the beach where one can (hopefully) detach from all the issues of the mainland, this painting depicts a very simple moment in time and space when you realize how wonderful it is that a seagull leaves tracks in the sand....

The Original Down East

2011-05-07T07:07:00.007-04:00

"DOWN EAST"

oil on canvas, 20"x 32"

(click on photo for larger view)

True, there is a "Down East" along the coast of Maine that is much better publicized and also much more commercial hence.....well you know. But here along the southeast coast of North Carolina we have our own DOWN EAST. It's the real deal. The only thing commercial here is the fishing. This string of communities that stretch from Bettie to Cedar Island is nothing but pure old salt. Perhaps what the region is most famous for, especially to the people from "off" (the term used to describe folks who hail from the mainland) is the "Down East" brogue. Those today who descend from generations of "Down Easters" still speak with a very noticeable accent that some say is a carryover from the original English settlers. It is considerably heavier in some areas than others and of course is different from person to person and region to region, but for the most part, the majority of the Down East population speaks not only with this beautiful accent but often use phrasings that are unique to an old time salty culture. They are some of the best and hardest working people you will ever know.

Beach bites

2011-04-27T05:48:00.004-04:00

Whenever my wife and I go over to the beach we always look for shark's teeth....it's sort of an obsession.

Needless to say that over the years we have collected quite a few so last year while preparing for a show I thought I'd pay tribute to our passion (as well as the passion of all those who love to hunt shark's teeth) and do a series of little drawings. Each drawing is pencil on paper and is 4"x 3-1/2" and I float mounted them all side by side in a simple white frame so the effect looked like a specimen case in a lab. The trompe l'oeil effect was pretty neat.

Enjoy!

Silver and Gold

2011-04-02T06:24:00.001-04:00

"AT SALTER PATH"

24K gold & pure silver on prepared paper, 5-1/2"x 8-1/4"

Here is a metalpoint drawing I just completed and is headed to Carteret Contemporary Art as soon as my dealer, Charles Jones and his wife Lee return from Italy next week. I absolutely love working in metalpoint as time consuming as it is. The ghost-like quality of the deposited gold and silver really gives these drawings an ethereal presence on the paper that I find quite pleasing. I think my approach to drawing also bears out these results as I do not believe in line. I think everything exists as form and shape and that is how I draw it. I do not draw lines period. I like for the the paper to breathe through a drawing like the wind breathes through the trees.

The little things....

2011-03-23T08:34:00.001-04:00

"NET HOUSE HARBOR"

oil on canvas, 28"x 24"

In my previous post I discussed the awesomeness of the sea and the dynamics that occur here with sea and sky which are truly magnificent. But equally as compelling is the presence of the sea in the quiet little tucked away places. Indeed the sea permeates EVERYTHING when you live and breathe it. I find the most peace and contentment not when I'm lounging on the beach or relaxing on a dock, but when I turn a corner and observe a quiet little reminder that "you are by the sea". Such was the case one morning last Spring when I took a break from my studio and walked out into our backyard and went behind an old net house we have there and looked down at this little setting. I could hear the laughing gulls off in the distance, there was a gentle breeze and could smell the salt air. To me, a moment like this is every bit as powerful as the "MAGNUM OPUS" in my previous post....maybe more so.

MAGNUM OPUS

2011-03-07T18:17:00.005-05:00

"MAGNUM OPUS"

oil on canvas, 50"x 92"

This is a huge sea piece I did a few years ago but wanted to post it here anyway. So much of my work goes straight from the studio into a private collection as did this monster. I didn't even have a chance to get it properly photographed which explains the grainy image here. But its significance to the direction my work is headed made it important enough to share. The latin term "Magnum Opus" is typically used to describe an artist's, writer's or composer's single greatest work and to date I suppose this would justifiably apply to this painting of mine, at least in terms of scale. But I think more than referring to my work, I chose this title because of the "work" of Mother Nature that I was depicting in this painting. The thunderstorm complex that was exploding offshore was one of the most incredible sights I've ever witnessed. The convection and updrafting of the enormous cumulonimbus clouds was so rapid and intense that it was almost like watching a time lapse movie. You could actually see the tops of the clouds boiling. The storm was coming onshore and I stood on the beach until the lightening was a little too close for comfort. The energy from the storm and it's downdraft was being transferred into the ocean which in turn generated some really angry surf. This truly was nature's "MAGNUM OPUS"!

Sweet Summer

2011-03-05T07:42:00.000-05:00

"THE ISLANDER"

oil on canvas, 16"x 10"

Fresh off the easel and ready for delivery to the collector for whom summer comes a little early this year. Indeed it was nice having the company of this sweet little bit of "summer on canvas" in the studio this long hard winter but alas the birds are singing, the temperatures are starting to warm and the heads of the laughing gulls are beginning to show signs of their summer black color. That can only mean one thing......summer is on the way!

By the Sea

2011-02-11T06:28:00.003-05:00

My latest painting titled "By the Sea" is headed to Florida for a fine art fair that Cavalier Galleries is participating in. Though it may not appear so, the composition in this painting is one of the most complex arrangements that I've set upon a canvas. It's sort of like a visual Haiku (if I may be so bold to say). I wanted to create a sense of being in a place emotionally using just a few objects as simply as I could. My approach, as it often seems to be, is like having a photograph of an entire room and then trimming it and cropping it and trimming it and cropping it until you get it down to the bare essence that projects what it was that you wanted to express without all the other clutter. Sometimes you can trim too much and the painting loses all sense of itself and becomes meaningless. But when you do get it right what can emerge is a composition that is intriguing, engaging and most likely much more effective at delivering the expression you wanted to communicate than if you had shown everything....even if what you want to express is just a moment of quiet "By the Sea".

A Work in Progress

2011-01-24T20:13:00.000-05:00

This is a painting I'm currently working on for Cavalier Galleries. I have put in the underpainting where I needed to and am fully developing the other areas where you see white canvas (actually there's a faint imprimatura there) in an alla prima technique as that is really the only way to get the freshest most brilliant effect out of oil paints. In contrast to that statement 90% of what you see painted is underpainting because the complexity of most of the subject's surfaces require an indirect approach. I'll post the finished painting in a couple of weeks. Below is evidence that years of life drawing classes really did pay off!

This is more or less my working drawing for the still life painting above.

Black Glass

2010-12-18T16:09:00.001-05:00

"SPIRITS OF THE SEA"

oil on canvas

To me these old black glass bottles are the embodiment of the spirit of the sea. They are hard to come by and perhaps even harder to paint but they exude a spirit of life at sea, taverns in the old port town and of course the period of the "Golden Age of Piracy" like no other object I paint. First of all they are beautiful objects that display amazing qualities of handblown glass such as extremely raised pontils in their bases, air bubbles (or seeds as they are known) embedded within the glass and hand applied "string" lips. These bottles being utilitarian were produced in standard albeit irregular shapes each one slightly different from the other with no great emphasis on their being perfect. Although they are called black glass they are actually a very dark and smokey olive green which you can see when you hold one up to the light. I have a couple that are so old and aged that they really are black with some iridescence on the surface. You can see one of those "pancake onion" wine bottles in my painting "The Colonial" in the post previous to this one. The actual bottle used in that painting is from a backwater creek near the Historic Jamestown Settlement in Virginia. I purchased it as I have several other black glass bottles from a guy who is a blackwater diver. Below is a photo of him holding the bottle (the one in the middle) used in the painting as well as another one I purchased from him. Notice the marine growth which he carefully had to clean off. These bottles are English and date back to the late 1600s or very early 1700s.

The black color of the bottles is due to the iron content that was put into the composition of the glass to strengthen it in order to minimize breakage in transit as well as to darken the glass to prevent light from spoiling the wine inside. The various shapes represent the evolution of the design of the wine bottle starting with the onion, my favorite, and is represented by the left and middle bottles in the above photo. The onion proved to be too inefficient for storage and shipping so the bottle shaped evolved to become the "Mallet" as seen in the far right bottle above and eventually an even more economical design emerge called the "Cylinder" which is the tallest and slenderest shape and is the forerunner of today's wine bottle.

Below is a fresh haul of bottles amongst the dive gear which is unique to blackwater diving....visibility zero.

Below are some more shots of the divers with recovered treasure. What I love about the bottles I've acquired from this diver is knowing that unlike other bottles I've purchased from antique shops and the like that have passed through several "owners" prior to my owning them, these bottles were tossed overboard a sloop or some other 17th or 18th century vessel , perhaps even by pirates only to next be touched by the diver and then by me. That's about as close to the source as you can get and being a still life painter, I can sense a certain potency that is inherent in certain objects and let me tell you these bottles are ALIVE!

I love them too!

"The Colonial"

2010-11-21T06:02:00.003-05:00

This painting is titled "THE COLONIAL" and is headed up to Cavalier Galleries . It expresses what I feel about the period around the early 1700s. Living in an old seaport town like Beaufort where the living connection to this time period is still so evident, it is no stretch for me to assemble a still life such as this, put on some period music and "go there" if you will. The bottle in this painting is especially significant (see post above). It was recovered from a backwater near the Historic Jamestown Settlement in Virginia by a blackwater diver that I know and from whom I have acquired it and many other such bottles. It's an old English wine bottle and dates back to the very late 1600s or early 1700s. The most incredible thing about it is, the diver and myself are the only ones who have handled it since it was thrown overboard in river the possibly by pirates 300+ years ago.

Light

2010-10-21T12:47:00.002-04:00

"BY THE LIGHT OF THE CAPE"

oil on canvas, 30"x 26"

The aspect of my work that people comment on more than anything is the way in which I create light in my paintings. However what they are really seeing is not the light but the shadows. I never fuss too much over the light in my work, but I devote intense attention to the shadows. The light is a by-product so to speak. In addition to value, I concentrate on temperature and reflected light and color to keep the shadows open and luminous. The net result is the light which is created by very well painted shadows. So when someone tells me that they love the light in my paintings, I'm always tempted to tell them what they are really responding to are the shadows. The painting above is one I just finished and "light" was one of the central themes of the work. But if you will notice that all of the light areas are essentially bleached out as it tends to be out there at Cape Lookout in the brilliant sun, yet the shadows run a full range of values and display a myriad of color and temperature especially on the shadow side of the building. You can essentially "sculpt" light with shadows thus creating form and this is why shadows are so very critical when creating light.

"Ghosting"

2010-09-30T22:01:00.003-04:00

"GHOSTING"

oil on canvas, 20"x 35"

Ghosting in sailing terminology is moving in a flat calm when there is no apparent wind.....

This is my most recent painting which will be going up to Cavalier Galleries on Nantucket. A while back I came across this old wooden sloop which was sitting high and dry in a dusty lot awaiting restoration. I was at first struck by the profile of the vessel and the dramatic bowsprit that seemed almost too large with the boat being dismasted. But then my eye went towards the stern when I noticed the raking profile of the old ship's wheel and it was like being struck by lightning. I walked up to the hull and got a look at the wheel and the amazingly weathered quality of it which seemed almost like driftwood. I walked around to the stern and looked up and there was my painting! The austerity of this old wheel against the whiteness of the cockpit and cabin had an utter "Wyethness" about it. Not like a Wyeth painting but like Wyeth himself. I think of that fabulous photo of him by Bruce Weber where Wyeth is in his Navy issue pea coat. I made some sort of association when I saw this wheel and welled up with something that made me see that photo of Wyeth. The boat has been on stands for a few years still awaiting its much needed restoration and among the many reasons I titled this piece "Ghosting" (not the least of which is the ghostly whiteness and emptiness of the scene) was the sense that this vessel is making progress towards its restoration by at least being out of the water and near the workshop although no work has as yet commenced, thus this old girl is "ghosting" towards renewal.

Photo of the actual boat Mizalis

A REAL BOAT SHOW....

2010-09-12T15:01:00.004-04:00

On Saturday, Sept.11 a boat show of unique proportions was held at the Core Sound Museum on Harkers Island, NC to commemorate the restoration of a glorious vessel the Jean Dale. She was originally built on Harkers Island by Brady Lewis back in the 1940s and is a 44' Core Sounder. Jimmy Amspacher, an amazing local boatbuilder carried out the restoration on the museum site.

Here I am (in the stripe shirt) speaking with my friend and nationally acclaimed realist artist Bob Dance about the new painting he did of the Jean Dale in honor of this day. Bob has created numerous paintings of this boat and it is through his work that the legacy of this historically significant workboat has been kept alive.

A group of local boatbuilders gather along the rail of this fine "flare bow" workboat built by Harkers Islander Jamie Lewis (2nd from the right). It was Jamie's grandfather who built the Jean Dale and he and his brothers carry on the Harkers Island boatbuilding tradition. I have had the great pleasure of painting a few of Jamie's beautiful creations.

Here I am with Heber Guthrie of nearby Gloucester, NC discussing this sleek spritsail he built when he was only 20 years old. Heber is the nephew of one of the area's most famous boatbuilders, the late Julian Guthrie who specialized in building these spritsail sailboats.

And here is the ubiquitous island workboat, may they never disappear!

Metalpoint Drawings

2010-08-19T17:08:00.005-04:00

"Angel"

24k gold & pure silver on prepared paper

I have just added a few of my latest metalpoint drawings on the "Recent Work" page. I plan to dedicate a post in the not too distant future regarding my metalpoint work. I have a few pieces in an upcoming exhibition at the Green Hill Center for NC Art and a solo show next summer that will focus exclusively on metalpoint for which I have some truly fascinating things planned. More on that later.

From whence this comes.....

2010-08-15T22:20:00.047-04:00

This website is by an artist who lives in a very old and fascinating little seaport town tucked away on the southeastern coast of North Carolina. I thought the best way to introduce you to this site, my work and hence myself was to give you some idea about where I live and work and where the inspiration behind much of what I do comes from. Beaufort, North Carolina is a charming little port town with a roguish sort of quality carried over from its past. For all its quaintness, charm and beauty Beaufort's most notable characteristic is a shipwreck just offshore that speaks volumes about the history of this place. It is the wreck believed to be Blackbeard's flagship the "Queen Anne's Revenge". The waters off our coast were a favorite cruising ground for pirates in the early 18th century and many of our small port towns were havens for these sea rovers. And while some of these towns (Bath, Edenton, Ocracoke and Beaufort) have developed into quaint and charming places, there is still a very palpable sense of what once was. In fact the same could be said of many places in the North Carolina coastal region. It is this chiaroscuro of spirit that has so captivated me about the coast of North Carolina, beautiful and utopian and at the same time dark and dangerous. It can be summed up by observing that the wildly beautiful Outer Banks of North Carolina are also known as "The Graveyard of the Atlantic".....

Beaufort Inlet

Here's a bit more of Beaufort

(click on images for detail)

A Beaufort landmark

The Old Burying Ground, many live oaks and deceased
sea captains.

"Little Girl" died at sea. Her body was brought to Beaufort in a
keg of rum. Her grave is a shrine to many.

The tomb of Capt. Otway Burns with a cannon from his ship
the "Snap Dragon" on top. Captain Burns was a privateer
during the war of 1812 but was regarded by many as a pirate.

A local favorite (named after the pirate
Stede Bonnet's ship no less)...

Beaufort was and still is a gateway to and
from the Caribbean and many places
reflect that influence.

In many of the older homes here, one can just sense

"the sea" in them...

Beaufort has more "Spirit of the Sea" than any place I've ever known, the spirit of both today
and of yesteryear.

A view across Taylors Creek on Beaufort's
waterfront...

...and the wild horses that live there.

The inevitable fury of the sea
so lest we forget about the backbone of this region...

the commercial fishermen who risk there lives
to make a living.