This is my first piece of writing since returning from a two week visit to my mother’s house in Northern Virginia. I painted immensely, making about nine paintings over the course of the visit, everything painted from life. Some of the works are really strong and I am very proud of them. Last summer around this same time I visited her and was comparably productive. However I really felt the difference in my training this year as opposed to last year.
My compositions were substantially stronger and more ambitious. I painted more challenging objects and painted them better than I would have been able to last summer in 2024. My lesser paintings from this trip would have been my major paintings from the last trip. I felt the culmination of both my developed eye and hand during this visit. Some of the paintings I produced during this visit will be available here on this website and will perhaps also be featured on www.maxlowtide.com.
My cu de gras was a plein air painting I made out in the very dense woods off Lawyers Road in Reston, Virginia. Not far from where my mother lives there is an excellent trail and a beautiful creek that runs for miles in relatively untouched, untrammeled woods. I knew this would be an extremely hard painting to make because when you are situated in a space like this there is literally an infinite amount of information to absorb, organize and discern. I brought two 8x10 inch panels and painted them together making a 8 x 20 inch panel that held the final image. My composition was okay but my sense of light was strong. My paint handling and process was strong as well. I used a big fat silly round brush to block in my design with extremely thin paint thanks to some Gamsol equivalent that I bought from Michaels (I decided not to travel with solvent this time, it was a smart move).
After a sensitive block in my thin paint had already dried and my solvent evaporated so I was ready to pile a second pass on top. I tried to be extremely mindful of organizing my information as well as my values and saturation. For the scene furthest away I wanted colors to skew blue and not too too contrasty. I did not want any paint build up (texture) for those distant portions either, nor did I want anything too saturated.
I ate a caffeine gel midway through the production of this painting to keep my sharp and focused. I am always amused when the endurance athlete in me confronts the painter in me, the caffeine gel mid plein air mission always encapsulates these two great loves of mine appropriately. The painting took over four hours and required all my focus so the use of the gel was less cute and more utilitarian.
As I worked from back to front, left to right I built up my textures and my saturations. I also built up information as the scene gets closer to the viewer, much of this is just achieved with texture. Much of my initial washy block-in remained in the final picture. This is my favorite. I love this for multiple reasons and have tried to employ this device in my mural paintings as well. Not only does it save my time and energy but it allows for the painting to tell a story, to exemplify the process. Much of the light and shadow sections of the water were of this initial block in and the thinness and transparency of the initial wash do great justice to the painting as a whole.
It takes a lot of discipline to leave these initial sections that work alone. I used all my restraint to demonstrate this wisdom. I could have lost the entire painting in these final moments when it was time to add or not add more information to the water.
This was my most successful and ambitious plein air painting to date. I do not typically speak so proudly and confidently about a painting process however it’s important to celebrate the small victories because they can be so far few and between.
The entirety of the trip was not spent in such a confident headspace as when I executed this plein air painting. But that's okay. I find myself at a nontrivial inflection point. I am steeped in art theory, reflection and my own painting practice to a larger extent than I have ever been. There is absolutely no going back. I am a painter. The problem I must contend with is how to make money as one. It is possible and I trust in my painting skills, in my intellect and in my capacity to represent myself in the ways in which I will need to in order to make it happen.
There are paintings I need to make and paintings I want to make and the next month or two will be busy delivering on those visions. The gallery needs a painting long overdue, we’ll talk more about that soon. The mural contractors have a small job that needs doing. And I have some applications that need applying for. Some dry and others conceptual and heady. I have ideas and paths of execution for it all. Lastly, there are two murals I plan on executing for my own portfolio in the coming weeks.
Tomorrow I will submit at least three paintings for the Amarillo Biennale. I truly have no idea where my work will stand in relation to the juror and the selection process. I will submit my most recent self-portrait (which I believe is extremely strong), I will submit my photorealistic Whataburger Bag #3 (which Texas people tend to like) and I will perhaps submit Paradise Lost (the strongest composition I have perhaps ever composed) as well as maybe the plein air painting I so excessively discussed above. This small group ranges from the photographically rendered to the naive and almost conceptual (Paradise Lost). It will be curious to see what if any are accepted.
Part of my reinvigorated plan of attack in relation to the problem posed by the commitment to being a painter is to apply for everything. Absolutely everything. I have this conception of fishing lines in the water as representing each application, website, submission, reddit post, Facebook post, message, email, DM, cold call etc etc. What I aim to do in the coming months is to saturate the turbulent waters of the freelance painter with fishing lines.
I have a slightly new vision for this website as well in relation to this general reframing. The paintings will be priced as they deserve to be - which is to say expensive but fair. And this website will serve in equal parts as a portfolio and a shop. And when people ask when, how and where to buy my work I will refer them to this website (believe it or not that does happen from time to time). This will simultaneously solve my problem of pricing my art for friends and family. Everything here will be the price that I deem fair and whoever expresses interest will be referred to this site and can purchase the work for the same price whether they are my family or a stranger from the internet. This is actually a big problem I have struggled with that was going to eventually need solving.
This catalog here on www.shopoilpaintings.com will continue to remain a collection of works painted from life. My conviction and enjoyment in working from life is stronger than ever.
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