Dreams of Glory

This is another of my series of paintings on the theme of country kids and hockey. This one gets the girls involved too. I call it "Dreams of Glory". When we were kids, it was common for the boys to dream of playing hockey in the NHL (National Hockey League) and the girls would dream of becoming Olympic figure skaters. The dog was usually happy to just live in the moment, jumping on anyone who happened to take a tumble!

This painting measures 16 X 20 inches. It is painted on stretched canvas using alkyd paint. You can tell it is a good old frosty winter day in the country by the crystal blue sky and the hoar frost on the trees. The farm house and outbuildings in the background, along with the style of clothing worn by the kids, suggests the 1940's and 1950's. My favourite part of this painting is the low sheen of the ice surface, suggested by the soft reflections and the crisp skate marks that define the surface.

Wall of Fame

The month is flying by and I haven't found time to publish another post until now. This is one of a series of five paintings that I completed on the theme of nostalgic memories of winter skating in the country. The time period is the 1950's. In those days, hockey skates were made of uninsulated leather, dyed deep brown or black, or often a two-tone combination of the two. I call this painting "Wall of Fame". It represents the dreams and aspirations of many boys who grew up in rural areas, playing pick-up hockey on farm ponds and rivers, hoping some day to play in the NHL. In those days, the league consisted of only six teams and any school boy could name every player on every team.

The painting is done on stretched canvas, rendered in alkyd paint, over an acrylic underpainting. It measures sixteen inches high by 20 inches wide. Since I no longer had my own skates from my boyhood years, I purchased this pair in a country auction to use as a model for the painting. I hung them on our barn wall and leaned a hockey stick that I had in the garage beside them to create an interesting grouping. The rough texture of the weathered barn boards make an interesting background for the polished leather surface of the skates. I added some snowflakes in the air to create an atmosphere of winter and a sense of animation in what otherwise is a still life.

Look Into My Big Brown Eyes

Christmas is over, so I want to move on beyond Santa to close out the year. Today is New Year's Eve, the last day of 2009. The winter is just begun, even though it always seems to be well established by this time each year!

This is an illustration that I did a few years ago as a piece of licensed art. For those who don't know, licensed art is designed to appeal to companies who need images to enhance or complete a product which they wish to bring to the market place. They pay a fee, or royalties or both, in exchange for the right to use the image in a prescribed manner on specific products and for a set period of time, usually three years. I do a fair amount of this type of work and I sometimes also license my more traditional paintings as well.

I call this piece "Look Into My Big Brown Eyes". It is a whimsical rendering of a polar bear character, especially appealing because of the "Elton John" sized glasses that he is sporting. This type of light-hearted image can be attractive to companies that produce such products as greeting cards or stitched products.

The illustration was done on illustration board using acrylic paint with a few touches of pencil crayons. The size of the original is 7 inches by 10.25 inches. You can find a complete selection of my licensed art images at www.porterfieldsfineart.com/RichardDeWolfe/richarddewolfemainpage.htm.

Jolly Old Saint Nick

It's Christmas Eve and I just realized I haven't posted anything for Christmas! I decided to go with this one, an illustration I did some years ago, of the Jolly Old Elf himself. At one time, I worked full time as a freelance illustrator, creating realistic images like this for advertising, editorial, posters, etc.

It is painted on hot press illustration board using acrylic paint, applied with relatively fine sable brushes. The speckles of 'snow' on the wreath were created using a stiff tooth brush to splatter the paint with a flick of my thumb. The ribbon and some of the finishing highlights are done with airbrush, something I used often in illustration during the 1970's and 1980's. The lettering is hand done in acrylic, predating computer fonts.

500 Years of Female Portraits

This clever video by Philip Scott Johnson is titled ‘500 Years of Female Portraits in Western Art’. The music which accompanies the captivating faces as they continuously change and evolve from one to the next, is Bach’s Sarabande from Suite for Solo Cello No. 1 in G Major, BWV 1007 performed beautifully by Yo-Yo Ma. The video was nominated as Most Creative Video, 2^nd Annual You Tube Awards.

Posemaniacs

If you are an artist who paints figurative pictures, you know how difficult it can be to work out poses at various angles. There are a number of aides that have been available and these have proven useful over the years. The old tried and true wooden mannequin has served artists for centuries and in more recent times, photography has been used to freeze an action or difficult to maintain pose, which a model just could not hold for any length of time.

One of the latest tools to assist artists in rendering life-like figures, is available on the internet, at www.posemaniacs.com. The site contains every conceivable pose from every possible angle, both in male and female forms. I find one feature of this site to be truly amazing. When you select a pose, you can then drag it with your cursor, and rotate it a full 360 degrees on the horizontal axis! There is no charge for the use of this material, but donations are accepted to finance the production of additional material.

Check out the site at www.posemaniacs.com, and prepare to be amazed by the quality and wealth of information available to artists interested in the human form.

Pleine Aire Painting - The Farm Next Door

Here is the finished painting of the farm next door. It measures 12 inches by 16 inches, which is a great size to work on when using a portable easel or paint box in an outdoor setting. Small enough to manage easily, yet large enough to paint freely in a fairly short period of time.