~KOS Art Expo:
A Labor Day Museum of the Beautiful
and the Curious~
PAINTINGS BY RALPHDOG
By Ralphdog
By Ralphdog
By Ralphdog
I do some paintings on site outdoors (i.e. 'en plein air') but more often paint from photographs and sketches. Most of my subjects are within a couple of miles our our home, which is on a hilltop surrounded by farms. This time of year I'm mostly drawn to paint on those beautiful sun 'n clouds days when you just want to lay down in the grass and watch the cumulus clouds drift by. — Ralphdog
Art by mflinn
I think it’s time for a little something different.
Believe me when I tell you that I boiled this cabbage down, boys, (and girls) from a much lengthier essay. This is the Hemingway version.
I grew up in Southern California. I wanted to be two things - an artist and a drummer. No surprise that my heroes at the time were Rick Griffin (whose “Murphy the Surfer” cartoons appeared in Surfer Magazine) and R. Cobb (whose editorial cartoons graced the pages of the once-great L.A. Free Press). Oh, and Ringo. The standards those artists set were so high that they made me a better cartoonist simply because I tried to imitate and steal their styles. Much later the great Mike Luckovich inspired me and still does.
Eventually I weaseled my way into a paying (I calculated that over a 10 year period I made about $2.50 an hour) editorial cartooning gig at the local Weekly. It was the most fun I ever had as an artist.
I joined Daily Kos in 2005 and in 2007 I was invited to submit art for a proposed print book called “Art in a Liberal Frame (Selected Writings and Images from the Daily Kos Community)” Thanks to nonnie9999 I can credit Cosmic Debris for editing, Assistant Editor, Decembersue and Cosmic Debris for the book’s layout and the page design was by Josh Cool. The cover art was by that same Josh Cool. I was thrilled to have two cartoons included in that publication. It was a small black and white, 112 page effort and way cool.
This was one of those cartoons:
That little mascot on Rush’s shoulder is “Ival the Eyeball” and he always got the last word in my cartooning. I drew 2 features over the years - IdahOblivion and Mondo Gaga. About 500 cartoons in all.
Towards the end I grew weary of trying to caricature the real-life caricatures of the political world - I mean, really, you can only do this kind of work for so long without realizing that you’re having nil, zero, nada effect. But in 2011 I did a series of ‘toons about the current president - long before he was seriously in the running, some 5 years later.
In 2011 the Scumbag gave several speeches about wanting to be president in which he used some pretty foul language - thus:
That same year he was clowning around about whether or not he would run for the highest office in the land. So:
And finally, in 2011 when it seemed so clear that the Republican party had lost its collective mind, I drew this:
I sometimes get the urge to ink a toon or two but there are so many gifted graphic editorialists these days and it’s a young, angry young person’s game so, for now, I’m comfy in the paint world.
Oh, by the way, eventually I became an amateur drummer, too. Thanks, Ringo.
By CaptBLI
Fireflies
Blinky Sparkly
Fireflies seen for the first time by a child,
Gasp dash toward “Where’d it go?”
Blink lunge squeal with delight
Cultivator
Neck craned, jaw thrust skyward,
Grinding clods with worn soles,
stooping to finger the dust remaining.
Limp shouldered stiff atop a curved spine.
The posture and shadow of anticipation.
Finally the bliss that burst from the berry grown.
baby’s first kiss, nectar of the earth,
a farmer dines on the rewards of toil.
My script echoes my heart, dreams and deeds but rarely my appearance.
I've jotted a few lines in some unusual periodicals and described some of my photographs. A readership developed. Trusting and courageous editors have been generous with my submissions. I am glad that there has been a place for my words.
— CaptBLI
From GlastoSara:
A photo taken by my husband a few weeks ago at sunset, from our front garden. I’m about to do a painting inspired by this …
Let’s call it Summerset Dragon (tbc).
Stay tuned … and here it is:
The Sky Dragon
If I mess with it any more, it will just get messier. I’ll want to do it again, but three times as large!
(My other half thinks this is better than the photo, I don’t agree.)
A Poem by hay seed
The Light
The desert at sunset comes alive in the dying light
The cool quickening breeze—glimmering light
White sand beach, the foaming surf effervesces
Dark caves under waves, their edges churning in light
A morning sunbeam, illuminating a moss bed
For only a moment—a spark of green light
Windswept fields of delicate golden dried stalks
How far you waved to reach this softness of light
The amber glow in a dying flame
Shifting the shadows of firelight
I Belden, walk in the pines every evening
For the orange display and to say—ah the light
Comic Book Pages by Matt Z
One of my better comic book covers
A page from my “Head” issue of Gilda And Meek: “Warlocks: Beyond Reality: Part Three: Like Ewoks On Crack”.
Early attempt at inking and shading by me in my most controversial issue, Gilda And Meek “Skeletons”. Isn’t it just precious how uneven the lines are? I got better as time went on.
My name is Matt Zimmer and I have written and drawn a very crudely drawn (mostly penciled) comic book known as either “Gilda And Meek” or “The Un-Iverse” depending on if I’m describing the main characters or the saga as on a whole. I’m currently drawing the 45th issue but I have the first 34 uploaded on my spiffy blog:
gildaandmeekandtheuniverse.blogspot.com/…
I’m hoping that someday if and when I finish the dang thing (there are 92 issues planned) I can shop it around for an epublisher and maybe hire a better artist to clean things up. The comics on the blog are pretty much Gilda And Meek in the raw.
The drawing sucks but the writing is pretty good if I do say so myself. Check it out.
A POEM BY ANGMAR
Elegy, for the fireflies
Blinking, hovering- the tiny will 'o the wisps
Childhoods spent pursuing little lanterns on muggy July nights
We raced around enchanted.
They came to our backyards- with magic, and the Summer was truly begun...
Like moths, their tiny spirits- they seemed like Souls.
Walking amongst headstones later, in graveyards,
it's almost bright enough to read
But that was a lifetime ago, now
Soon to be gone.
Fireflies are facing extinction due to habitat loss,
pesticides and artificial light:
Around the world scientists say this display is under threat -- with the loss of their natural habitats, pesticide use and artificial light putting some of the 2,000 or so species at risk of extinction.
(Angmar Barrow likes to write about nature.
"I'm concerned for the planet and the future, which is reflected in my writings."
I'm a Socialist/Environmentalist.
Groups: ' Classic Poetry Group.'
' Regenerative culture for an altered planet'
Website-GreenRevolution: A Direct Action Environmental Protest Group
on Facebook and here on dk)
MUSIC AS ART BY GAS (Nocturne in Blue)
Nocturne in Blue for Muted Horn and Muted Strings (1995, Berkeley Symphony, K. Nagano, cond., GAS, horn solo)
Watercolor Paintings by Laurel in CA
Watercolor still life: zinnias from our garden, with lace curtain
Coyote reservoir at dawn
Some seabirds at Cape Cod
Photos by gizmo59
Sunset El Monte Canyon, San Diego County, CA, January 1, 2020.
Maple and Birches, My Back Yard, Erie County, PA, May 4, 2020
I’m a chemist, not an artist. I wish I could paint, but at least I can capture images in photos. A capable painter has greater control over the image, and can emphasize the parts of the image s/he want the viewer to notice, while deemphasizing or deleting others. (Excellent example: GlastoSara’s painting above.) Absent Photoshop, all a photographer can do is to be in the right place at the right time, and to use framing and cropping.
I like the idea of approaching an image as abstract shapes and colors. I like to photograph nature, but I also like to show the human impact on the environment. The last photo, though whimsical, could be placed in this category.
-gizmo59
A painting by boran2
IRL I am a recently retired lawyer, now full time alleged artist (at least I allege it) and ebay junk dealer. I paint smaller works exclusively in acrylics. I have posted here on Saturday mornings for a number of years. I like to paint architecture and western scenes mostly. Below is a western scene, a Sedona, Arizona roadway at dusk. It is 6x6 inches on board.
Paintings by duccio46
I do woodworking for many other artists, so having a lot of dust to contend with, I switched long ago from oils to acrylic. This acrylic on canvas I did en plein air in Land's End in San Francisco, just west a few miles from the Golden Gate Bridge. That is the Marin Headlands across the way. The acrylics dry quickly outside, especially in a windy environment like this place, so layering and a dry brush technique is kind of a must. I tend to work small for the same reason. After a few hours out there, one is frozen through. We went and had burritos before heading back to Vallejo. They are great after a session in the wind, because you can hold them and unfreeze the hands while dining, and also heat your core back up.
I like early renaissance art, and I pick up these real estate catalogs from the boxes on Market Street in San Francisco. I had an idea to paint some of the tiny images in the catalogs as small religious formatted paintings of little Heavens waiting for someone to recognize and buy them. I found a scrap of plywood that had been torn out of an old building. It had been painted many times, except where there were raw stripes where some kind of framing had been. There were nail holes and the scars of time in the wood. I made a template and cut out the arched shapes and then gessoed over the rough surface and started painting a whole series of them.
This one was titled Business Opportunity. It described a typical three story building with flats or offices above a storefront. Here is my layering and dry brush technique for this acrylic on wood. When painting on wood, one must put a coat of shellac on the raw wood before gessoing, so that stains don't emerge from the tannen in the wood and leach into the painting causing spots and future darkening.
Here is another from my real estate series. This catalog entry was titled Detached Rancher. (LOL) This one doesn't use the dry brush so much, but is a layering over an imprimatura. Imprimatura is a first color painted on a surface overall - a tinted ground - upon which the image is sketched in and then painted. Much of the imprimatura is allowed to show through here and there as a unifying technique, and sometimes important areas in the picture are left relatively unpainted except for this original tint color layer. In this one the house is mostly the imprimatura with just some paint sketching in the details of the architecture.
Another small acrylic on canvas. This one I painted from a photo I took while driving through the Napa Valley. I painted it over a raw sienna imprimatura because I wanted the green colors of the hills to be opaque on the canvas - feel like the land and see the canvas (earth) texture.
Painting is such an interesting and fun thing to explore.
A Poem by DrLori
Some years ago I read a study about how researchers were able to measure REM sleep in fetuses in utero. Which means that before birth, infants dream. What they dream of, no one knows.
A few people who have read the poem have come away thinking I must be pro-forced birth. Nothing could be farther from the truth, although I wish that all children who are born are wanted, cherished, treasured, and valued for who they are. So there's no subtext here. — DrLori
Painted Furniture by kaja
Frida Tables 1 & 2
by
kaja
These two small tables are the third and fourth in a series that I have painted. I have finished two previous tables using a Mexican themed tile design. One of those is in a previous Expo Exhibit. These two tables, measuring 15.5”w x 20.5”l x 14”h, are painted in 4” tiles using acrylic paints.The designs represent elements from paintings by Mexico’s Frida Kahlo. Her paintings are powerful and haunting. She lived her life in pain and yet produced an amazing body of work. Her story is one of tragedy and joy. She is one of my favorite artists and one I enjoyed using as inspiration for self-portraits with my students.
My First Painting, by Caterina Sims (Cmae)
My first painting, I did this for my first year of art class. I was sixteen.
I thought I would submit something different, since I can't paint something new right now. I am bravely, (lol) posting my first painting, it is the only one I kept, not because I thought it was good or bad, but just because it was the first, that's all. I had only drawn before this. I taught myself to draw, starting from the age of ten. Well, anyway, we all have to start somewhere. This is painted in acrylics. I was sixteen, my first year of high school, in 1982.
A Wall Hanging and Some Older Art by Gwennedd
I had lots of fun making this.
I very recently ( last week) painted out the walls in my living room, and since the colour was changing, I had to put aside a large wall hanging I had woven years ago...the colours wouldn’t match. I came up with this hanging because it was an adaptation of the one I had made to hang outside on my porch. Unfortunately, because I live in a windy place, it had to be permanently brought inside in case it got damaged banging around outside. Then I got the idea to use that hanging, but make it bigger and better! This is the result. The “leaves” are air-hardened clay, painted with designs that look vaguely tribal. Some of the beads are clay as well. The rest is just string and beads that I’ve collected over the years.
The second image is an acrylic I did over a year ago. I was experimenting with backgrounds and shapes. I rather liked the result.
Paintings by Michelewln
Birth of a Star
Lavender
My painting style I've been told is Expressionist. I will see an image in my head and then transfer it to canvas.
Additional Paintings by Ralphdog
Making Hay, by Ralphdog
100 Acre Pond, by Ralphdog
Nunda Hills, by Ralphdog
The great thing about painting is that you can keep learning, keep getting better, without ever hitting a limit. — Ralphdog
Paintings by Leslie Salzillo
’Kamala’ by Leslie Salzillo —I did this portrait of Kamala Harris several years ago while doing a series of ‘women I most admire.‘ I couldn’t be more pleased To see her rise in leadership. Her strong, inspirational and selfless contributions to this country will go down in American history.
‘COVID-19 Pandemic’ by Leslie Salzillo—The true horror of this virus is what inspired me to create this disturbing piece. So much suffering and death has been caused by Donald Trump and the current cowardly Republicans in Congress.
SPECIAL NOTE
This is only part one of our KOS Art Expo Labor Day festivities. Please visit Angmar’s museum later this afternoon. Time well spent. On that note, I borrowed Angmar’s formatting for this diary.
