Is it a Good Thing?

One would think it is a good thing to have artists as friends, especially being in that line of business.
However sometimes I wonder, is it really a good thing?
I received this today from a fellow artist and supposed friend.

It is definitely me, incredible likeness, not so sure about the Depends. Actually I believe it is a good thing, a very good thing at that. Thank you Eric I will treasure it!
The guy's a pretty darn good painter to say the least, here's his web:
http://ericbowman.com

Finally found one in Carabelle

I have been going down to participate in the Florida  Forgotten Coast event for the last 4 years now and absolutely love it. The place has so much charm and variety. Options galore.

I usually find myself painting in Apalachicola but I have always been fascinated by Carabelle, even though I have never really gotten a good angle on it. Lots of great stuff but difficult to compose.
Well I was happy to finally get a decent composition I could work with on my latest trip down to Carabelle.

Thanks to Jenny Miller for snapping this photo while I was busy plotting and planning.

Thanks to Denise for purchasing it!

"Afternoon Splendor" 12 x 16 Oil on Linen Panel

Winter Park FL - Albin Polasek

I started off my plein air season this year down in Winter Park Florida, near Orlando.
This was a new event for me and I really enjoyed it. It is held and run through the Polasek Museum.

What a treat this place was! I have walked by some of Albin Polasek's pieces in Chicago years ago and didn't even know it. This guy was incredibly talented, one of the best I have even seen besides Michelangelo especially with the female nudes. Incredibly sensitive, and the poses he created and are absolutely entrancing and very alluring.

Seeing that it was raining at the beginning of the event I spent the first day in his studio painting and taking in all of this wonderful inspiration.

Interior shot of his studio.

Eve - Albin Polasek - as I noted earlier - incredible sensitivity!

Maiden of the Roman Compagna

Loved this piece so much felt the need to paint it.

"Maiden of the Roman Compagna" 12" x 16" oil on linen panel

He even had his portrait painted by Charles Hawthorne.

Morgan Samuel Price and I went into Orlando to the Bohemian Hotel to check out the Dean Cornwell paintings, amazing!!!

It was really nice to see  some originals of his work. I have never seen one before only admired them from books, pretty amazing work to say the least.

Painting outside of the Prado and Park Ave, love those red chairs.

Stephen painting a nocturne with what appears to be studio lighting. He had a marine battery with a converter with two plugs, I could have been charging my laptop had I known. Pretty cool set up.

I rented a car in Orlando for my 3 week stay in Florida and somehow got stuck in a Mini. Amazing how small that car really is! Surprisingly I had plenty of head and leg room, but my gear was usually falling out of the back, no real room for my easel, but it was fun to drive.

Thanks to Hal and all of the folks in Winter Park, as well as David and Lynn in Maitland for hosting me, it was a very enjoyable trip!

A Step Back in Time, Apalachicola

I recently went back to Apalachicola for the Florida's Forgotten Coast Plein Air event. Always a great time, lots of wonderful people and talented artists to boot, plus a lot of cool stuff to paint.

This year I was fortunate enough to meet Lawrence the local barber. He has an incredibly unique barber shop on the main drag in Apalach, in fact he has been in the same place for the last 51 years and it is pretty much unchanged. He purchased it from the original owners who started the business in the very same spot back in the early 1900's.

Thanks to Greg LaRock I saw the Barber shop one afternoon which I have never even noticed before. He is only open one day a week on Fridays and half a day on Saturdays. 

I was out painting in the rain on this Hopper-esc scene across the street from the Barber Shop Friday morning when I saw him walk in and flip the open sign. Naturally I stopped what I was doing and ran across to inquire as to wether or not I could paint inside of his shop. He was very kind and allowed me to set up in the corner. It was a little tight but what a treat it turned out to be.

As I set up a few customers began to stream in. I started drawing in the scene and originally had Lawrence standing behind the chair giving a gentleman a hair cut. Naturally eavesdropping on the wonderful stories being told. Before I was even ready to begin painting that customer slipped out and to my surprise Lawrence went to the back, hung a net from the ceiling, and began to mend it.

This new design enabled me to keep the beautiful old barber chair exposed, versus being covered, and also brought some of the waterman life from the outside Gulf into the barber shop.

I busily set to work and as each patron would come in, he would break away, cut their hair and then go back to mending the nets again, hence the title, "The Double Shift". I really enjoyed the local conversations and realness of this taking place before me, what a treat!

Thanks again to my new dear friend Lawrence. We chatted on and off over the 4 or 5 hours I was there as he told me all about the old place and the three original chairs which he still has, the old Coke sign, which if I remember right was stolen. The air compressor used to blow the hair off, and even the way the floor joists sagged in the spots were the barbers stood for hours on end for close to a century. At one time there were four of them cutting hair, business was booming, now a days business has slowed but he still goes in every Friday and half a day a day on Saturday, and in his down time, mending nets, remembering back to when he and his wife used to work the Gulf for Oysters as well as cutting hair.

This is real life.

Thank you Lawrence!

Final piece -

"Working the Double Shift" 18" x 24" oil on linen panel