Eyes to photo to pastel to oil

Hello dear blog reader!

 In the early 2000's our family took a trip to the Oregon Coast

where we saw this tree standing all alone in a windswept meadow.

I was studying pastel painting at the time, 

so first I made a pastel work.

Old Lone Tree 
pastel   19 5/8" x 12 34"

When I began using oil paint, I again tried to capture this nice old tree.

Old Lone Tree II 
Oil on Wallis paper 10 x 8 inches

Going through paintings and papers, etc. doing a bit of clearing out,

as you do (as I do) every now and then, finding things like this is fun. 

I cleared - it seems like tons of old pastel paintings and life sketches, 

saving just a few if I liked them enough at this point in my art life.

Thank you for reading this blog. 

It is hard to keep up with everything (along with actual painting!)

now that I also have a website 

and try to write a monthly newsletter! 

In it I write about ART, and would love to

have you join me in my adventures!

Click here to go to my newsletter sign up page.

Click here for my main website page

See you in the next blogpost!

🎨

Charting my oil paint colors

I've always thought I should have some sort of list or chart of my paint colors (oil paint). 

I have some old OLD tubes from when my brother and I were taking oil painting lessons

 (I was about 12 and he was 9 or so). Plus, I have collected many tubes of paint along the way.

So, when I received artist Todd M. Casey's The Oil Painter's Color Handbook as a gift, and read the section about doing a swatch chart ... I am now doing the charts of my paints.

It is honestly a bit easier and less complex than doing color charts like this:

from Richard Schmid's book Alla Prima II

But that is not to say I don't want and need to do those charts! I
 do! ... and someday I will, and these swatch charts will be helpful when I do.

There are instructions for how to make the swatch charts so I followed

them and they look somewhat like Todd's. My gray gesso may be a little darker

value, but that is fine.

My reason to make this a blog post is to explain it so I have a record 

of when and how I did it, and I hope it is slightly interesting for someone. 

My goal is to also post when I make my color charts, as well.

8 x 10 inch gessoed canvases taped to a panel

my blues, greens and violets 
(letting them dry before untaping the canvases)

There they are! All my oil tube colors. I have so many. 

These are the main colors I use:

Titanium White

Cadmium Yellow Light

Cadmium Yellow Deep

Yellow Ochre

Cadmium Red Light

Alizarin Permanent

Cerulean Blue

Cobalt Blue

Ultramarine Blue

Pthalo Blue

Burnt Umber

I use my extra colors that you see in my swatches every now and then; 

but I remember someone said 

that using an accent color 

is like using spice in your recipe ... you don't want too much.

If you have made swatch charts of your paints, I would love to hear about it, and

if you made color charts ala Richard Schmid, I would love to know how that went!

Thanks for reading!

If you are here through Follow It, thank you -

and if you clicked on the Studio Journal heading on my website,

then you have already seen my website. 

For those who haven't, here is the link

to look around, and thank you for looking!

https://www.terirobusstudio.com/

🎨

How I wash my brushes without solvent

Painting Tools - Still Life
oil on canvas panel
5" x 7"

Hi blog readers!

 It has been a minute since I

posted in my Studio Journal, so I thought I would post something today.

I have a YouTube video channel, which is Private at this time. But that is the way I posted the following video that could download easily for those who might be interested in how to clean your oil painting brushes without using solvent.

Brush Washing Video

Thanks for watching!

... and for more paintings please check out my website:

TeriRobusStudio

I hope you find something you like! 

Please email me or comment here if you have any questions.

yours in art,

Teri

A Valentine's Day Adventure

My Valentine's Day painting and snowshoeing adventure 

happened because the day dawned sunny,

not too cold, and windless. I have said that I am a fair-weather painter

and even though it was not 70° out, I did consider it "fair weather" because of

all the sun and no wind!!

The other thing I wanted to do besides paint outside on this lovely day was

to try out my electric socks that Santa brought me for xmas. Ever since our dog mushing days in Fairbanks, my feet have been very sensitive to the cold.

Eaglecrest ski area on Douglas Island, is a vast playground and with

all the snow we have had, I thought it might be a good place to find a winter scene to paint.

Near the lodge in the upper parking area, there was a x-country ski trail (?) that had not been used for several snowfalls, so I trekked uphill on that trail to find a spot to set up.

Once I found a good place, I trekked back to the car, got my pack

and headed up.

 

ready to paint standing in my snowshoes

I realized that my skinny tripod legs might sink down too deep in the snow! 

But I tested it and it held while I snapped my pochade box onto the tripod.

The first thing I saw as I surveyed the scene was a Ptarmigan! 

So white! even against the snow ... and moving very slowly because it saw me.

Willow Ptarmigan (Lagopus lagopus)
Alaska State Bird

The shadows and the sparkly snow were really enticing. I think the temperature was about 30° and the sun was at my back. I could block the sun with my body so my colors weren't washed out on my painting and palette. I'd forgotten to bring my umbrella.

My set up was pretty near the bunny hill

and it must have been a school learn-to-ski day, 

because there were recess-like playground shouts 

and happy voices echoing through the air. 

Another voice I heard echoing in the valley was

the cry of a Red-tailed Hawk (Buteo jamaicensis alascensis).

 first painting - 5 x 7

My painting went well ... so well that I was finished with this small one in about an hour.

Since I had another panel, & I was still not too cold,

I decided to try another painting.

I had to work fast because I didn't want to 

have the sun go down while I was there, or get cold. In a situation like this, 

painting as quickly as I could and concentrating

on just the big shapes with no detail 

helps me to not make the painting too tight. 

 Have you heard the saying "think slow & paint fast"?

I feel like I did accomplish that; 

For me, I got a nice representation of the feeling of being up there

in the snow with the Ptarmigan and hawk.

2nd painting - 8 x 10

The electric socks helped me to stay standing on the snow for nearly two hours. But I learned I should move around a bit more, even with the socks on (they are so neat, there's an app on my phone to turn the heat up or down!).

So here are the two paintings. I took pictures of them outside today (another nice day!).

Ptarmigan Country
oil on linen mounted on Mulitmedia artboard

Eaglecrest Valentine
oil on Masonite

Thank you for reading about my 🩷Valentine's Day adventure! 

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Happy painting and creating! 

♥♡♥

🎨

Blogiversary Guest Artist!

My graphite drawing of Matt's carved Cormorant

16 years ago today I started this blog, knowing nothing about blogging. 

But I bumbled along, kept going because I just love my art journey

 and this seems to be a good way to keep track of it. 

(Except for the fact that a few of my posts from early days

seem to be gone ... ?)

I decided to publish my January blogiversary posts as a guest interview. 

Last year I interviewed Cristine Crooks. You can see that post HERE.

This year my wood-worker, wood-carver husband has agreed to an interview!

Find your fav beverage and get comfy for this ...

Matt with his traditional Dowitcher decoy

He made the Pelagic Cormorant (below) and it is SO lovely. 

I try to remember to do a small drawing of each of his carvings 

(pic at the top of the page).

Here are a couple photos of Matt's carvings and

different stages of work.

Mew Gull in-progress

Removing wood from a Raven

Surf Scoter decoy with keel

Q. What is/are your medium(s)?  

A. The primary material in my bird carvings is, of course, wood. I favor red cedar because it is naturally weather resistant and that was important for the hunting decoys I started out making. It's also soft and easy to shape, fairly light, and takes glue and paint well. I've split and milled pieces from logs but most often I buy planks at the lumberyard and laminate them to get the size of block I need for a particular piece.  Alder is my second choice because it has a consistent density so is easy to carve; I can sometimes find suitable pieces in the wake of the crews that trim under the powerlines around town.  Yellow cedar is another rot-resistant wood but it has variable density and is a challenge to carve. All of these are local wood species, which ties into my effort to use resources found in Southeast Alaska. Basswood and tupelo are wonderful for carving but I don't really want to get into using (or shipping) wood from other regions.

Oh, and I use acrylic paints over a primer layer to color my birds; it forms what is essentially a protective layer of plastic around the carving, and then I finish with a layer of paste wax, which lends a nice sheen as well as a bit more protection.

Q. Where are you from, and does that affect how and what you create?

A. I grew up in Rockland County, New York which was rural when I was born and had morphed into a suburb of New York City by the time I left for grad school in Fairbanks, Alaska in 1974. I was vaguely aware of bird decoys but had nothing directly to do with them; I think the main effect is that when I became interested in carving decoys after we moved to Juneau in 1991 I focused initially on the work and styles of prominent historic East Coast decoy makers.  I've since learned about and grown to admire the work of early decoy carvers on the West Coast and am still expanding my horizons as I learn about Mississippi Valley carvers.

Q. What brought you to working the way you work?

A. Once I began learning about decoys it became evident that the best of the old carvings, the ones that showed artistic skill, had been bought up by wealthy art collectors during a craze dating to the mid-'60s, and when pieces became available they were selling at extraordinarily high prices. It struck me as ironic that most of the people who had acquired these birds had little affinity for their original purpose, and unfortunate that those carvings would never be accessible for those interested in how they were intended to be used. Knowing that I'd never be able to own one of the classic originals I decided to make my own to the best of my ability. I also decided to carve my decoys by hand, mostly to see if I could make a decent quality bird in the same way that the old-timers did.  This self-imposed rule of using no power tools after bandsawing a rough blank and drilling the eye holes is still my way of doing things in my shop. 

Q. Who are your most important artistic influences? 

A. First of all, my grandfather, Hugo Robus (1885 - 1964), a painter and sculptor. Although as a kid I didn't pay all that much attention to him or his work, he demonstrated that being an artist was a worthwhile endeavor (I think he'd be quite surprised that I've gravitated to the art world to the extent I have!).  

In terms of my carving, old-time East Coast decoy makers such as Elmer Crowell (MA), "Shang" Wheeler (CT), Charles Sumner Bunn (NY (work formerly attributed to Wm. Bowman)), Harry Shourdes (NJ), and a crowd of other carvers who incorporated a good sense of form into their working decoys.

Q. What is the most difficult or challenging aspect of your work? 

A. There are three aspects to carving birds that are particularly taxing. The first is symmetry; it's no good to carve only one side of the bird perfectly - the other side must be carved to match! There have been many times when I've been pleased with how a detail or area on a carving has turned out only to face the challenge that it needs to be mirrored perfectly on the opposite side. 

The second big challenge is to represent a soft, fluffy, air-filled surface (i.e., feathers) with a hard material such as wood - there is not a perfect answer, but having the proper contours and colors helps. 

Finally, I am pulled between a desire to be free and impressionistic with my carving and painting and a tendency towards realism springing from my career as a wildlife biologist. 

Q. Does your art help you in other areas of your life?

A. Being retired, I think it's really valuable to have something to do each day, and in addition to the house-related chores it's good to have work waiting for me in my shop, whether it be carving a bird or maintaining and sharpening tools, etc. It's a great thing to be able to spend time doing something I really enjoy and it's also great that it keeps me occupied.

Q. Has your style changed over time? 

A. Yes, in at least two ways. At first, knowing that carving is subtractive and that once material is removed it cannot be replaced, it's difficult to remove enough wood - one is constantly afraid of ruining the piece by lopping off too much. As a result I know that my first Scaup decoy bodies had rather the look of loaves of bread - flat sides with small rounded corners up to a barely rounded back!  It takes awhile to develop the confidence needed to remove enough material to reveal the contours of a bird's outer surface, and the birds I carve now are much curve-ier.

Secondly, I've progressed over time from a strict adherence to waterfowl species to a greater variety of other bird families. I began carving decoys because I wanted to hunt waterfowl and didn't really want to buy plastic factory decoys; besides, there was an allure to making and using my own. After carving a puddle duck rig of Mallards and then a sea duck rig of Scoters I realized I didn't need additional hunting decoys but still wanted to carve, so I progressed to 'confidence decoys' such as gulls and herons and then began carving shorebird decoys (solely decorative - hunting of most shorebirds was banned in 1914) and eventually based on requests I've expanded into carving hummingbirds, warblers, kingfishers & Steller's Jays, loons, cormorants, Great Blue Herons and even a few birds of prey.

However, a consistent theme throughout my work is to craft a piece that is an accurate representation of the form and behavior of a particular bird species without laboring over a photographic level of detail; my carvings spring from a working decoy origin, and working decoys were tools meant to represent birds with 'just enough' detail to make them believable.

Q. How can we find you and your work online?

A.  I have some of my carved birds shown on a Facebook page called

 "Working Birds Decoys."  

After experimenting with selling in a retail setting I've fallen back to carving birds 

on commission only 

(people want the bird they want, not the one your've already carved!).

Thank you Matthew!

I appreciate all the time and thought you went through for this interview! 

Matt and I go into our respective studios 

coming out now and then ask each other for advice on this or that, and I agree that having projects you love to do, and challenge you - are

good for the psyche! (retired or not)

Whimbrel

My drawing of another of Matt's
whimbrel carvings

 

Thank you very much for reading my studio journal. 

I will relay any questions you might have for Matt.

If you haven't been to my website, where you can find original paintings, 

here is the link:

Teri Robus Studio 

🎨

Happy Painting (& carving!)

Welcome the New Year - 2024!

Happiest New Year to you!

It is time to continue work on a brand new painting

that I began at the end of December.

This was a pretty bouquet for our table.

 I wanted to turn it into a Christmas bouquet painting, or at

least, a winter bouquet painting.

This is my first sketch using the Art Graf 

water soluble graphite stick that I got as a

xmas gift from my dear artist friend, Timi 

(she also gave me some gouache paint tubes to experiment with!

... and I have begun doing that).

Using just a round paintbrush, wetted with water

 I scrubbed the graphite around.

This is about 9" x 6"

Here are the photos of my progress when I

remembered to take them.

You may have noticed that I switched the

position of the plate. Why? I just liked it.

(note to those who really look at things closely,

I did something different than just decide to

switch the plate ... I am curious if anyone

knows what happened. Let me know.)

 adding color

Still Life with Pomegranate
oil on Masonite
 12 1/4" x 7 3/8"

Thank you for checking into my studio journal. My plan

is to continue this journal/blog, so feel free to

pop in now and then.

all the best to you in this new year,

Teri  🎨

TeriRobusStudio