A couple of weeks ago, Key and I moved up in the run order and thus got into a nosework trial. I was excited and pleased. The drive was about 2.5 hours (not bad) and Key has been really strong in practice lately. My goals were to watch my dog, look for an alert, and keep my mouth closed otherwise.…
Fallow: (of farmland) plowed and harrowed but left unsown for a period in order to restore its fertility as part of a crop rotation or to avoid surplus production. It’s been a couple of weeks since I wrote. That has been a deliberate choice. I’m concentrating on… well, I’m not sure. To say I’m concentrating on myself is not inaccurate,…
Noun: Someone who loves the rain, who finds joy and peace of mind in rainy days. I have a list of potential blog titles, and when I came across this one today, I knew it was just right. We got our first real rain in SO LONG yesterday. I swear I felt my soul take a deep breath. I took…
Some of you may notice that I didn’t post last week. That was a deliberate decision on my part. I had made it through a week of work and then taught my breakout at the WSO convention. Sunday was designated for chores in the hopes that a four-day workshop with Linda Kemp (Negative Painting Addicted) would be as easy as…
It’s been a busy week here at the Choate Den. Let’s do a recap and see if I can present a lesson. (Spoiler: I actually do!) Strada September Challenge As mentioned over the last few weeks, I participated in the Strada Challenge. And this year, I finished! Coastal Plein Air As I documented last week (okay, the second post last…
Art shows always seem to come at the same time. Feast or famine. It would be great to have one a month, but it’s more likely you’ll have five in one month and nothing for the next six. Right now, I’m entering the feast stage of the cycle. Over the next few weeks, I have a variety of art-related opportunities.…
I had every intention of writing a big long post, because I have lots to report and many paintings. And the day and weekend caught up with me. And my phone stopped cooperating. And I scratched my eye and had to go to the urgent care. So, it’s 8:30 on Sunday and I’m calling it and I’ll try to write…
For the last three weeks, I’ve been exploring the idea of artistic style. Week one was about determining if my style was noticeable. Week two explored what elements of style might come easily to me. And in the penultimate post, I discussed what elements of style my paintings displayed. So where is all this taking me? Earlier this year, I…
As usual, I came up with a plan for this series someplace in the middle of the process. I’ve had the idea for a series on painting style for a while, but my ideas seemed too uncoordinated for a real series. Then I had a week without a topic and… BAM! This series started. To recap, I started with a…
Take a simple survey (this link will take you off this site.) Style is a fairly encompassing term which can refer to several aspects of art. Style can mean the technique(s) used to create the artwork. Pointillism, for example, is a method of creating a painting by using small dots of color and allowing color blending to occur within the…