First Entry

I went to the CWA Meeting last night. Ron Ranson was the guest artist. Very charming man with a great sense of humor. I gleaned some wisdom from his presentation. First, keep your publicity photos up to date! He is using outdated photos so it is a shock to see him because he is now 82 years old. Still teaching all over the world. He commented on another famous artist who was teaching into his 90's. I thought, " I have 15 or 20 years left to teach." He uses very simple tools to paint - his famous Hake brush (I was able to buy the last one!! which I played around with a little today) a rigger brush, his knuckles, fingernails, a cut up credit card, occasionally a round brush or two, and 7 colors. He has mastered his tools, therefore, he is able to paint with confidence and gets it right the first time. He can paint quickly and cleanly. The down side is that all of his work looks the same. I don't think I want to get to the point where everything is so predictable. Once I master something, I am off to the next discovery. I am in the process of framing 10 of the Nick and Guitar series for the Gallery Concord show. It will be great to see them all together. Between the framing and observing Yom Kippur, the next few days don't leave much time for art. I am anxious to start exploring some interesting drawing materials and techniques and doing some interesting painting. I read in my experimental drawing book about drawing with a tennis ball. I am going to try that this weekend. If anyone else would like to explore this unusual drawing "tool", send me an e-mail with the results. I will post my efforts as well.