Merry Christmas!

Block print anyone? 

I carved this one from a cork floor sample (approx 3.5 x 4.5 inches). 

It worked just fine! I found some very nice paper 

that took the block print ink so nicely. I used black ink only. 

Example below. These are our Christmas cards.

Dunlin - block print by TeriGardnerRobus, after carving by MatthewHRobus 

Dunlin - red cedar wood carving by MHRobus

I wanted to try a block print of one of Matt's carvings, so I sketched it first.

Dunlin sketch - 5 x 4 inches

Cork block with ink

Dunlin are amazing little shorebirds. They are highly gregarious in winter, sometimes forming large flocks on coastal mudflats or sandy beaches. Large numbers can often be seen swirling in synchronized flight on stop-overs during migration or on their winter habitat.

Here is a great photo of them.

Dunlin  (Calidris alpina)

Photo by: Jonn Leffmann

 [CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], 

via Wikimedia Commons

Thank you to all who checked in during this past year. 

Best wishes for a Happy Holiday Season!

Salon Challenge #2

Our 2nd salon challenge was decided 
by picking items out of a hat.
(I mean the written word of the item.)  
We just blurted out things that might
be interesting to paint in a 

Cubist Still Life

and picked 4 out of a hat. We chose:

1 - A gourd or pumpkin

2 - An old shoe

3 - A round glass "thing" or bottle

4 - A sea shell

 I sketched my items, from all different perspectives, 
onto brown paper with charcoal 
and cut them out.

I wanted to make my cubism still life as a tondo 
because I had seen some cubist paintings made that way.

Examples of tondo shapes (they can be oval too):

Picasso - Still Life With Chair Caning - 1912

Braque - Still Life With Violin - 1914

Picasso and Braque as you may know
invented cubism.

We chose an 8 color palette:

Alizarin Crimson Permanent    
Cerulean Blue
Ultramarine Blue    
Yellow Ochre
Dioxizine Purple    
Phthalo Green    
Turquoise
White

Sketchbook sketch (about 5 x 5 inches)

I thought I might use more dividing lines, but I didn't.

Here is my sketch onto a panel 24" square.

I forgot to take painting progression photos ... 

Below are the photos when we revealed our cubist paintings.

Patrick's

Barbara's

Timi's

Apex    oil on panel     20 x 20 inches

Thank you so much for checking in!

Happy Painting!