So, finally we are caught up and I can report the day as it happened.

This morning I got up determined to actually paint (the last three days have been filled with all sorts of fun things, but not as much painting as I SHOULD be doing.) Because my horse paintings just weren’t going right, I decided to concentrate on landscapes and see if I could insert a horse at some later stage. This turned out to be a great plan because I felt like Cindi, my instructor, and I were finally able to get on the same page and I understood what she was trying to impart. I think you’ll see the improvement in my paintings.

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At noon we took a break to go see the Cross Gate Gallery’s Sporting Art Auction, currently hung at the Keeneland Sales Pavilion until auction day. It was incredible! Think of going to a museum hung only with your favorite subject of art (mine is… horses). All my equine artist heroes were there, and we met an incredible gal named Chelsea Dickson who toured us around and let us examine the back of a few of the more valuable pieces. The most expensive piece is a work by N.C. Wyeth entitled “Horse Race.” Seeing it in person, you don’t realize that the top is very prism-like. Chelsea explained that he was influenced by a Russian modernist movement celebrating prisms (wish I could remember the name). It was a cool tour.

For the rest of the afternoon I worked on another piece, before getting distracted by a turf race and then following the horses back into the barns and getting a series of bath shots.

When I got back to the paddock, class had ended and everyone had cleared out to return to their normal lives. I’m sorry I didn’t get to say goodbye, but I did get some photos of the group today to remember them by.

Other notables included..

I watched the last race, then headed back to my base.

One more day before I get on the plane. Tomorrow I will tour a couple of breeding farms (Darley and Three Chimneys) and try to find the Thoroughbred Center (they have a sculpture there I really want to see.) Then Saturday I’ll pack up and visit Old Friends before getting on that plane and coming home.

Home seems like a good place to be.

Wednesday dawned in the same cool, overcast manner of Tuesday. I bundled up and headed to Keeneland for the first race day of the class.

Unfortunately, this proved a little too much for my senses and my painting was… well… rather distracted. This was compounded when the class got a chance to go ONTO the racetrack and photograph the race with the official race photographers (Renee was one of them and she was in our class.) It was getting late in the evening bye the time I posted this, so I can’t show you the great photos I got and can only rave about how close and high quality they are (this is another subject to come back to at a later date.)

The horses in the paddock were almost as entertaining as the racing horses.

What was odd about wandering around is that I would see people and think how familiar they looked. It took me a while to figure out why this was…

When not entertaining myself with exercising horses, race horses, or some other horse-related past time, I did draw and paint a little. A very little…

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I have to say, this was the hardest day for me. Obviously I was enjoying the trip, but the painting part was not going as well as I hoped. I wasn’t getting what Cindi was telling me and I wasn’t getting the kind of horse-painting-related input I was hoping for. It wasn’t the workshop was bad, it just wasn’t what I hoped. I went back home that night and thought about what I could do differently the next day…

On this second day of painting class I resolved to get up extra early to get some exercise shots on the track and walk around “behind the scenes” to get some reference shots and ideas for paintings. Keeneland is wonderful because they really allow a lot of access to barns.

Of course, by arriving at 6:00 am I was too early to get anything except this kind of shot.

While this has an abstract beauty that may translate well into a future painting, I think you can see why I am thinking that this won’t work for a lot of camera space.

So, I hung out and concentrated on getting shots around the barns.

By the time it was light enough to get some good reference shots, the horses were no longer looking at me like this…

Cameras, tourists, and even artists are pretty common place around Keeneland. And NO one has any respect! For example, these two helpful souls decided to pose while I was trying to get a SERIOUS artist-y shot.

No respect. 🙂

As for painting, well, it was a light day for several reasons. The main reason is that the class elected to go on a series of field trips. We saw the AAEA Shades of Blue & Gray, The  Horse in the Civil War and then over to Georgetown to view the Fall Open Juried Exhibition and Sale. Those two items took up the whole afternoon.

Frankly, I was relieved because my paintings were going no where. I had done two value and composition sketches the night before and had come to “work” planning to work on a piece using these. Halfway through the morning, however, I switched to another piece.

The AAEA shows were AMAZING. I saw the work of my fellow class participants and a lot of other great artists. I also learned a lot about what the AAEA is looking for and their jurying process. A lot to think about there.

By the time we were done there, it was time to quit for the day, so I made my way back to base camp. On my way back I got behind this car.

I loved the top bumper sticker (I’m not sure what the other two are yet) and when it pulled into the knitting shot down the road that I posted about my first day, I knew it was destiny.

Small, cozy, a little wacky, and utterly charming!

Furthering my attempt to catch up, here is the first day of the painting class.

Day 1 (Monday)

The class met at the Track Kitchen in the morning. The food is every bit as good I had heard, and from the first instant I felt like an “insider” to the not-so-secret behind-the-scenes life of a “racetracker.”

Our instructor is talented equine artist Cindi Nave (professionally known as C.W. Nave) dean of painting at the American Academy of Equine Art. This class is a small one: Diana Dee Sarkar will spend all four days in the class, and Renee Torbit (one of the track photographers at the meet) will only be spending Monday and Tuesday and parts of Wednesday and Thursday. The group spent a couple of hours going over our goals for the workshop and our painting styles, then changed locations for a bit of a treat.

Equine artist Booth Malone is spending the week as “artist in residence” at Keeneland.

In return for staying at this charming little “caretacker’s cottage” on the Keeneland grounds, he has to produce a painting to hang on the walls. The goal is the walls of this little house will eventually be filled with equine art by the world’s top artists. The pieces that are already there are impressive.

Our treat was viewing Booth’s temporary studio and receiving instruction from Cindi inside the house (it has turned unexpectedly cold in Lexington).

After this, we toured Keeneland. Because Monday (and Tuesday) are “dark days” (meaning there is no racing) we had access to, well, everywhere. Keeneland is as beautiful as I had hoped.

Then Cindi suggested we get set up to paint. Well, you know me. I thought she meant… well… I don’t know. So I went and got set up.

And then nothing happened.

For a while.

I did a sketch.

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Nothing happened.

I went sneaking around to where there were actual animals (sneaking around is becoming a bit of a theme on this trip.)

And then when still nothing happened I went looking for the group.

Cindi meant “get set up” around where she was… not any where. Oh. Got it. Confused as usual. I was now behind on exercises, but sort of eventually got caught up. We started with a value sketch, then changed it (light to dark, dark to light, etc.) Next we “excavated our subject” by taking a subject and doing a vertical and a horizontal sketch to figure out what was important.

By this time it was getting late in the day, and Booth had invited us over for a glass of wine and some artist talk.

Yes, they get the same comments I do: “Oh, you paint horses” and “Oh, it’s a horse.” Yes, it’s tough to make a living as an artist, no matter what your level. Yes, people can be incredibly callous and unfeeling in their requests and comments. And yes, we’ll still keeping painting.