Not quite dark yet
and the stars shining
above the withered fields.
Translated by Robert Hass
by Yosa Buson
St. Valentine’s Day!
Tag: gallery
In the Studio
I am finishing up the second “Western Shadows (bison skull)” painting. I will try to get a proper photograph of it when it is complete. There are some pretty interesting textures happening that aren’t apparent in this photograph. I’m planning on doing at least one more of these but who can tell?
Shadows of the West
I’ve wrapped up my herd of cow heads so now I’ll move on to other paintings. I’ve decided to use this particular painting for the promotional card for the show “Shadows of the West”. The show is going to start March 31st of this year. I have a lot more work to do before now and then! I will post more information about that as the date looms closer.
I am attaching an image that shows three other paintings that are part of the 5 cow heads I recently completed. I still need to take final photographs of one of these.
Look Ahead (candy)
Look Ahead (Candy)
This is an 18″ x 18″ acrylic painting that I recently finished.
Before I took the final photograph I took a snapshot with my iPhone in the studio. My subjects have been bouncing around from minimal landscapes to portraits of cows (cowscapes)? I thought it was interesting seeing the latest cow portrait next to “Cloud & Sea” on my easel. Wondering how these paintings will relate to one another in the context of a gallery show. Each painting was done by the same hand, same mediums and the same general approach. They are different paintings but they both are sort of a simplistic study of isolation/solitude. These two in particular had a nice relationship and set my mind at ease to some degree.
Building a collection of paintings for a show is both exciting and a bit daunting. I am always wondering if I shouldn’t narrow my scope and make a really tight collection of paintings with a very specific subject holding them together. The problem is when I’m working I always get excited about “the next painting”. Often this leads to something seemingly unrelated to the previous piece. Tangents and random explorations are part of the creative process and lead to new ideas and often new approaches. In a perfect world I would love to have a massive space where I could hang paintings to really get the overall feel. Then I would replace paintings that were not bolstering the show. Remove paintings that felt redundant or didn’t enrich the overall feeling. Create new paintings that would fill out the collection in just the right way. Of course this is not a perfect world and that is just a daydream. So ultimately I will follow my gut when choosing pieces and have a little faith…
If you say run
I wasn’t intending to post a photo of what I was working on tonight… but here we are. Still with David Bowie stuck in my brain. I always liked him but was never more excited about him than hearing Kurt Cobain say “that was a David Bowie song”… Today on rollingstone.com I was reminded of the excellent sketch he was in on Extras… oh man it reminds me why I loved Rickey Jervace as well… To a much lesser degree obviously. None of this has a thing to do with my late night painting… just thoughts and marks on a board. Also beef, it’s what’s for dinner.
Gallery Wall
I have three paintings in a group show at the confluence gallery. The show is called “Shadow & Light”, a pretty nice theme for an art show that can be extended in a lot of psychological as well as literal directions.
These are 18″ x 18″ paintings, they appeared gigantic when it was time to box them up but they look so small here! I will not be able to attend the opening of the show so ended up mailing the paintings… always seems a little scary!
Endless Roar #1-#6
I painted six small water paintings. These are 10″x10″, so fairly small. The painting I singled out with a close up I am giving to my niece for Christmas… Just wrapped it!
Lost Words
This is the second typewriter painting I have done. I used my Grandmother’s typewriter as reference for the image. This particular painting was 20″ x 20″, a bit of room to play. I wanted to keep this loose and intriguing. The last thing I wanted was to turn it into a technical rendering which is utterly dull to me. I was pretty happy with the result and a little sad to see it go when I sold it in October.
In high school I took a “typing class” at my mothers suggestion. Now typewriters are simply a curious historical artifact. The electric typewriter I used in school did not possess any of the beauty of this antique… But it was the late 80’s!
Ryan’s Electric Crow
This poor crow electrocuted himself on a poweline in Seattle. My buddy Ryan knows I have a fondness for crows so he gave it to me. I have used it for reference a number of times and then pop it back in the freezer! Ryan’s electric crow has seen better days!
This is another painting with a lot of interesting textural depth. I built up heavy vertical lines with acrylic medium. It also has an undevrcoat of interference pearl that results in a dynamic lighting that you can pick up a bit of in this photograph.
Ripple then Wave
Waves
I finished some of the desolate water paintings I started on recently. These are two of the paintings of which I am particularly fond. You can see some interesting surface qualities if you look carefully. These are most noticeable on the first image, particularly along the left side. These odd textural anomalies are my favorite things! These paintings both have deep translucent depth, more than 1/8th inch so the light really moves through the work.
brian sostrom 