Scum Choir

Just painting

Rubber finally meeting the road. Once I heard a kid say “this is where rubber meets robes.”

Just going to knuckle down on this painting for the next week or so. Try and get it show ready.

If I can’t, I will just accept that and try and finish it anyways because I’d rather make a good painting than have an okay painting in a show.

I got this far

Happy May 24th everybod...

Abstract Forms and more pancakes

I did a little digital study last night in photo shop. Just trying to create a composition and figure out the best way to organize the values.

Basically thinking about the painting as if it were an abstract black and white painting. If I can make that look good, a lot of other things will fall in place.

The underpainting is always the hardest part for me. so this step will hopefully save me a lot of pain.

2024-05-24 00:00:06 +0000 UTC View Post

Almost done/ready to start

Done with the maquette for the next painting. Now I'm figuring out how to do the composition on my panel.

I took a bunch of pictures of the maquette and I'll bring them in to photo shop, find the one that's closest to the composition I want, and mess around with it in there a little. Do some painting on it, adjust the shapes, stuff like that.

Then I'll start the actual painting when I'm feeling good about it.

It's quite a bit of work but each painting proves to me that I n...

clay play

Playin in the clayin. Here's a picture of what I have in mind for this piece and I'm just trying to mold the big forms into something interesting to paint.

One of the problems I got myself into in that other painting I've been working on recently is that I tried to short cut the clay play phase too much. I overestimated my ability to fill in the gaps.

Mainly, I didn't sculpt the ...

Sluggish Maquette

I went to the doctor today. I have swollen lymphnodes. I got prescribed an anti-inflammatory and a nasal spray. One of them is making me super lethargic. I suspect the anti-inflammatory.

I’m trying to work on this maquette but it’s like watching a video that needs to buffer every 30 seconds. I get a tiny bit of work done then I need to just sit there and stare off into space.

Woke up from a nyquill fueled dream this morning where everything was falling into a whirlpool and the...

I'm Sick!

I used to never get sick. Now I feel like I get sick a couple times a year.

I'm kind of bummed about it because I was supposed to go do my portraits at a gallery opening tonight with a bunch of friends.

But now I'm just here working on this painting, drinking some kind of tea (I never drink tea,) popping Halls, and continuing my rewatch of Curb Your Enthusiasm.

One of my favorite types of Curb episodes are where Larry accidentally does something good and readily accepts the...

Wasn't Feeling right

I took it into photoshop and played around with it and then started changing stuff. Kind of a leap of faith when you get that far into a piece. Even with photoshop to help you do it non destructively it feels weird to paint over stuff that looks done.

Anyways.

Going to drop off a painting to a patron after work today.

I got a matte cutter so that I can start offering mattes on my grotesque portraits when I do them live. figuring out how to use that.

My friend Thayzia ...

Just painting today

I was on the Dark Art Society podcast today! https://youtu.be/KKVWB-IMf4A?si=Z9oxtUfxrt-erW20

This was the first day I didn't have anything I needed to do. So I decided to just work on this painting.

Was originally doing this for the annual group show at La Luz de Jesus. But I missed the deadline.

So I started doing it for my Trickster show.

But then La Luz de Jesus extended their ...

Monster Submissions!!

Finally! But First a quick announcement:

I'm going to be on the Dark Art Society podcast tomorrow. It will premiere live on YouTube at 9am PST. Come on by and say hi and watch it live.

https://www.youtube.com/@darkartsocietypodcast

Now, the Submissions:

Featured art: Kat Strack

@katstrackpaints on IG

"In my research I made lists of monsters based on where they lived, h...

Grotesque Portraits from the other day

I did these at Dark Art Emporium on Saturday.

Happy May 13th Ever...

2024-05-14 00:00:04 +0000 UTC View Post

Vlog thing number 2-Dark Art Emporium

Hey if I do a couple more of these it will be a thing.

I went and did an event in Long Beach at the Dark Art Emporium. It was fun.

I'll post those prompt submissions ASAP I promise lol

Have Fun

Goodnight Sweeties

New Prompt!

Submissions due June 10th.

I'll post the monster submissions ASAP!

Trxtrwxrld: A trickster themed art show

This post is more of an update. I'll be very busy for the next few weeks.

I'm curating a trickster themed art show next month at the Hive

It's called "Trxtrwxrld" (trickster world.)

I don't have any art ready for the show so the image above is something I made in photoshop for the flyer.

I've been thinking about this show for at least a year. I got the idea from reading Lewis Hyde's book, "Trickster Makes This World." Which is all about Trickster Mythology and Tricks...

Little Anthony| My monster prompt Submission

I've gotten busy with a bunch of projects so it was hard to figure out what to do for this. One of the scariest monsters to me is little Anthony Fremont from the twilight zone.

I put him in my shop for choir members only.

https://scumchoir.com/holyholy

Have Fun

Goodnight Sweeties.

Let's Vote!

I'll announce the new prompt on Friday or saturday.

It will be due a month from then.

My first Vlog Thing

I decided to try something new. I brought my camcorder out to the two galleries I went to the other night. I think I'm going to keep doing this when I go to shows or when other interesting things are going on.

I was kind of nervous to be doing it at first. But I'm so glad I did.

The first show at Copro is like a huge deal. Beautiful Bizarre's group show "Fable and Fairytales." It's like some heavy hitter artists from all over the world. It's a great show.

Then I go and han...

Grotesques from last night

From the gallery opening at the Hive in DTLA.

I did my first couples portrait.

Happy may 5th everybody

Cinco de Mayo.

I went to the Beautiful Bizarre Fab...

Commission piece

I'm doing this commission for my friend. It's a birthday present.

I did the study which is on the left in the picture above.

Then I used the grid method to transfer the reference photo to the surface.

the surface I'm working on is clay board. It's my first time using it.

Clay board has a very smooth surface. So smooth that the paint tends to slide around when it's wet...

Grotesques from Last Night

Downtown LA art walk. It was a slow night. So I started off with Choir Member Tia. she sent me a photo a month ago. I started with her to practice and just kill time.

Then I got one customer. She came in and sat right down and said "I want one."

She mentioned something about doing two faces because of being a gemini or something so I just went all in on that.

I sold a few p...

Gammorean in Memorium

I made this little reel of my Star Wars painting. Wanted to share it here before posting on social media.

I’ll probably be making more videos like this intended for social media. Gotta reach more people to get ‘em in the choir.

Thanks choir member DA for the name suggestion on this one!

Happy May 2nd everyone

I saw a lady at a casino who won a $1326.45 jackpot on a slot machine. She had to wait for someone to come and pay her out since it was a larger payout.

The War of Art| Art Life and Lives

Talking about Steven Pressfield's classic book "the War of Art," while working on my self portrait.

First Star Wars Painting!

I'm hopping on the May the 4th bandwagon this year to try and make some money.

I don't know if I did myself any favors by painting one of these Gammoreans rather than a baby Yoda or something.

But I always liked these pig looking guys. And it always made me a little sad when one of them gets eaten by that monster in Return of the Jedi.

So I did this painting to honor that dude's memory.

I also always loved Return of the Jedi because Luke had a green lightsaber and that...

Monster Painting, Time, and Friendship

For my Monster submission I'm trying to paint this little sculpture I did a few months ago.

I started last night. I was so exhausted I was really struggling with it. But I think It's better than I thought it was. It will come together. Or I'll do something else!

Happy April 30th everybody

My good friend Mike Bloch is moving across the country on Thursday.

I wrote him...

Lazy Post: Dead Mermaids, sketches, New Playlist, Milicent Patrick

I took rare form this weekend and went on a vacation. It was my brother's Batchelor party. I'm personally not a big vacation guy. But I think I came up with some good sketches for potential paintings.

I also made a new Scum Jamz playlist

2024-04-29 23:46:32 +0000 UTC View Post

Study for a Commission

Little 5x7 study for a commission I'm doing.

Happy April 28th Everybody

I'm out of town right now.

I don't want to be.

It's for my brother's Batchelor party. I wish I was home.

Have Fun

Goodnight Sweeties.

New Maquette

I started the underpainting for this. When I got to a point where I instinctively started looking around for reference, I stopped and started making the reference.

As I said I have a bunch sketches and reference photos left over from the previous cave painting, so I went into that archive to find the ones that would match this one the closest. My friend who I used for the photos asked me not to share them so I won't.

I traced the picture of the underpainting, so that I could use t...

Cardinal Scan

I'm going to have to clean up the scan in photoshop before I do prints or anything. There's a lot of texture that shows up. Maybe I'll do a video about how I do that.

Have fun

Goodnight Sweeties

Francis Bacon 3: Authentic Branding

After Bacon moved back to London in the late 20’s, after roaming around Europe, discovering gay subscultures and modern artists like Picasso, he took a job as an interior decorator.

Apparently he was good at it. But Bacon was good at keeping the details of this aspect of his story a secret. Almost strategically so.

He probably learned some stuff about drawing there, although bacon did not become the best draftsman, he probably learned some skills in design, composition, contrast...

Bacon 2 Process, Studio Practice and Work Ethic

Of all the artists I’ve talked about, I've found Bacon to have the most interesting things to say about painting.

In his words his goal was trying to “capture the feeling of existence. Without commenting on it.”

He was fond of saying that “one cannot talk about painting, only around painting.”

He talked about his painting method as trying to "deform the figure into truth," and “trap the image at the most alive point.”

His goal was to make the work look li...

Choir Sweeties "Bass" Tier| Painting Timelapse

Interrupting my Bacon deep dive to post the Bass Sweetie timelapse video with music.

I actually added this song to the secret choir playlist! first time I've added a song to it in a while. But as the kids say, issa vibe.

2024-04-24 00:00:04 +0000 UTC View Post