Museum Residences Quick Draw 1st Place

 

 

Daniel Sprick makes a surprise appearance

 

Stephanie Hartshorn at work

 

Clyde Steadman

 

Jennifer Bobola

 

Terri Lombardi

 

Cheryl St.John

 

Chris Serr

 

Tim Deibler working on his first painting

 

Scott Ruthven completing his second painting  

 

Ken Valastro at work

 

 

award for my painting "Looking West" what a great honor! The paint-out was held on September 5th, at the Daniel Libeskind designed DAM rooftop terrace garden. This quick draw paint out was an invite to award winners and ribbon winners only, making the competition a high level showcase of some of the best plein air painters in the west.

The event was scheduled from 4-7pm allowing only a small window to setup, decide on subject matter and get to painting. I chose a west facing vantage point, one that included both cityscape elements and atmospheric ones. I utilized a simplified palette of Cad Yellow, Alizarin Crimson, and Ultramarine Blue. I use this palette because it forces me to make decisions and value adjustments quickly, without the excess tube color around to distract. With all the paintings complete and the time limit closing, we all placed our paintings on display for the silent auction and waited for the judging to commence. Ron Hicks was present, and for those that know of his work, it was a real pleasure to have Ron lay eyes on the paintings and do the dirty work of determining the winners. For those that don't know of his work he has a solo exhibition coming up at 1261 gallery, and it will be a colossal display, don't miss it!

As all artists talked and shared our shock of having Daniel Sprick in attendance and watching him work en plein air, the judging was handed out. To my amazement, I was awarded 1st Place in the competition! Coming in 2nd Place was Scott Ruthven, and in 3rd was my good friend and amazing abstract painter Jennifer Bobola!

Overall a humbling and inspirational paint out and competition, I am still reeling from this decision and honored to have been amongst such amazing painters and to have such a prestigious award bestowed upon me, thanks Ron!

I received award money and a number of prizes for this 1st Place award, including an ad in Southwest Art which I will be putting into production in 2014! I will be in attendance for the Abend Miniature show demonstrations throughout the month of December, and am looking forward to large scale works in oil that are on the easel for the end of 2013, and into 2014. Look for more on these paintings and where they will be shown in coming weeks.

A special thanks to GTMD, Christine Serr, Javier Flores, Ron and Judy Proctor for the great photos!

A final thank you to all the folks that view the blog posts, comment, share, and support freelance and gallery artists! Look for more posts soon, and to leave you here is

an excerpt from OutdoorPainter.com with a short interview from Clyde Steadman about the Museum Residences paint out:

Life is unpredictable for a plein air painter. Sometimes you paint in a windy mountain meadow, and sometimes you paint on top of a David Libeskind building in downtown Denver.

Clyde Steadman can attest to this firsthand, as the photo below shows. The artist and teacher was invited by the building's management to paint from the grassy rooftop of Museum Residences during the recent Colorado Plein Air Festival. The structure, which Libeskind designed to mesh with the addition he designed for the Denver Art Museum across the street, houses condominiums.

Steadman was joined at the Museum Residences Paint Out by other area artists, including the acclaimed (mostly still life) painter Daniel Sprick. "Dan came to paint with us, though he is just enjoying the camaraderie, I think," says Steadman. "He is remarkably generous and modest. Sprick moved to Denver a couple of years ago, I think, and paints with some of us in local figure painting groups, and joins us more rarely when we paint outdoors."

It was a short painting session, from 4 to 7 p.m., and Steadman reports that Sprick paints the same way en plein air as you would expect him to paint in the studio, and that Sprick's effort looked essentially "like a small vignette of a Dan Sprick painting." Plein air isn't Steadman's usual approach, either, although he enjoys it. "I'm a longtime painter," he says, "more of a figure and still life painter than a plein air guy, though I do like to get out regularly, especially in the winter, when snow pulls the shapes and values together and lets me suffer for my art. So much of my art involves looking at beautiful naked people, and I owe some sort of karmic debt for that -- standing in the cold snow for three or four hours restores my sense of artistic balance!"

DieHorrorama A Horror Film Diorama Art Show

held tonight at Eslinger Gallery, 118 South Broadway. DieHorrorama is a group show curated by none other than OptWon, the mastermind behind the 8Bit artshow, and the GutterKids artshow. The theme for DieHorrorama was to choose your favorite Horror movie and recreate your inspiration in diorama format. My favorite horror movie is Rosemary's Baby, Roman Pulanski's 1968 cult classic, in which an un-assuming NY couple are swept into a world of Faustian cults, rituals, and satanism. This movie has so much creepy regalia surrounding it I felt it would be a fitting theme for DieHorrorama. I took a more painterly approach, arranging painted items within my shoebox to create the scene I wanted to showcase. I went this direction because I wanted to create a pop up, paper cut out type of diorama, in which the illusion of 3dimensional objects is felt. If you look closely you can see that the figures are flat but they read like they are sitting on the surface of the box in perspective. This was the overall look I was hoping to achieve, a slight illusion of space utilizing painted objects to create the scene.

The final diorama measures about 18" x 14", and is painted in acrylic, and acrylic glazes. There are some added details to the back of the piece that you will have to check out in person! Many other great themes from a number of other Denver artists will be on display, hope to see you there.

Thanks for stopping by to view the work I appreciate the support.

Ink Monstr Sticky Situation Denver

This Saturday, October 19th Sticky Situation Denver at Cluster Studios. 20 of Denver's premier artists converge for a group show with over 2k in prizes and awards. A "Votes for Notes" event as I like to call them, this should be a great competition and showcase of large scale vinyl mounted artwork. Revealed for the first time is "Pitbull Press" my submission for this competition. I was inspired by the fusion of creature and printing press. With the initial sketches and first block in through Adobe Illustrator I started to shape and mold the character into more of a stout compact shape leading to the title "Pitbull Press". 

The lettering was built by hand and is a custom lettering set. I wanted to keep this years submission more simplified in both palette and execution and I think those goals were achieved. Four color process with some small accents in the eyes make up the color for this piece, the inclusion of the Ink Monstr "Eye" was a conscious decision to include the IM logo in a stylized manner. The final touches were the DMD poster coming off the press to sign the piece, but in a way that does not distract from the overall silhouette of the character. 

The showcase features each artists work in large scale format, often times larger than 4' x 5', then mounting the artwork to the gallery walls for attendees to vote for their favorites. Also included is my submission from Sticky Situation 1 back in 2011. Follow the link to see the vinyl printed artwork from that exhibition, as well as check the link for Sticky Situation NY. I look forward to seeing you all at the competition and please share this post freely, thanks for stopping in to view the work.

Shoeshine 8.5

"On the Wire" Acrylic on Skateboard

the annual installment of custom sneakers, backboards, and skateboard art went on this past weekend. As usual Musa Bailey and Denver's top notch artistry shined side by side with performances by Rahzel, the Godfather of Noyze, and Questlove, the prolific drummer from the Roots. I have had my plate full for quite some time so I only dedicated to paint a skatedeck this year. 

I was inspired by my old neighborhood, the Five Points in Denver and all the sneakers that adorn "the Wire" throughout the area. I am including the color studies for this piece, which were essential in quickly and effectively creating the mood I envisioned for this scene. The final went off without a hitch and I am pleased with the finish. This piece is still for sale, email delton@deltondemarestarts.com if interested in purchasing a painting. Thanks for stopping in to view the work and I will have more info on upcoming shows and events soon.