keeping a sense of wonder alive...

postcards from PORTLAND

not finished yet.......

What’s cooking in my studio -- This painting of a home in California, is in progress. (it may take me a few more weeks to finish at the pace I work at)  What an incredible space with the entire two story open air wall out to the garden -- ah only in california!  Which reminds me, the SUN is shining in Portland today WOW.  That means I have no excuse to run. 

The sunshine is skipping along the floor!

Sun is dribbling in through the window panes!!

In portland tonight...

Tonight Brad Cloepfil is speaking at the Portland Museum of Art. He is a wonderful crazy local architect that has gotten quite famous and now has a second studio in New York.  He is on my list of ‘people I admire’ because he gets to say things like, “Allied Works is still an atelier...” 

Have you heard anyone use that word lately? 

It’s a french 17th century term for a workshop used by an artist and here he is at work...

brewery blocks

Brewery blocks c.1864- 2012  acrylic on canvas 11x 14"


This is a view of the Blitz-Weinhard Brewery which is in the Pearl District.  This Brewery operated from1864 -1999 and was renovated during the reconstruction and birth of the Pearl District.  This simple brick building used to have a major presence on Burnside because of its size.  Now surrounded by taller geometric glass, steel, and concrete towers, the entire character of the building has shifted for me.  I have fallen in love with the warm red bricks, the eccentric petite smoke stack, and the clumsy double-hung windows.

Heros of Beauty and Light

Young Woman with a Water Pitcher c. 1664-1665 Oil on Canvas 18x16"
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
JOHANNES VERMEER
 
This painting is from a book that is on my wish list called VERMEER The Complete Works by Arthur K. Wheelock Jr.  .....Many of Vermeers works were of woman posed near a window with the light falling in on them and are described by Mr. Wheelock as depicting a quiet moment of contemplation - when one gazes outward but looks within, a window into an individual's spiritual nature.  Ahhh what a truly extraordinary idea in today's 20th century blur of rush, rush, rush....His work is like a breath of fresh air to me.  The colors and the detail are amazing. He is one of my heros.