The Human Canvas - The Importance of Being Sharpied

I recently decided to cancel my plans
of going to LA to see Val Kilmer in his one-man
Mark Twain show, and instead go a community theatre production of Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest. I'm a big val Kilmer AND Mark Twain fan, but
REALLY wanted to see this effort of a friend.

And by the way, some of the best theatre
I've ever seen has been AT the community theatre
level, and one of most BORING shows I've ever seen - was
on Broadway. Now you don't HAVE to be some sort of English lit/theatre geek to enjoy this play (though it don't hurt), but this closing night turned out to be the BEST version of Earnest I've ever seen, or worked on. Yvonne and the cast were able to find humor in places normally glossed over, and make what was already funny - hilarious!

After the show, several of us had an impromptu
gathering. I ended up doing a few Canvases this evening,
for which I was thankful. The above photo is the third piece done this night. It started though, with someone else.
Yvonne - the director of the show. I WAS at their house
after all.

Not too many step-by -step pics on this one. 
It was fairly basic. Yvonne was wanting to experiment with a tattoo idea. Some wings on her ankles.

Only a couple layers of color before being done.

The above shot is better I suppose, but I rather like this one with Hendrix standing in the foreground.

On then to the next ankle...

And a stab at another style of wing.

I like where I was going with this one, but I don't feel like 

it quite got there. We'll be hitting this again.

So on one of the recent sessions prior to this, 

it was Willow - the cat - occupying the attention of the canvas. Remember this? Link to it HERE.

And this time?

Hendrix - the dog - again.

While I enjoyed playing around with the wing idea, 

and definitely want to revisit it, I think this next piece ended 

up being the best of the night.

Meet Sam.

Sam was a wonderful canvas, as anxious as I was 

for another sitting...

And while this session was just one week into April...

Sam's already moved from the area.

So I'm QUITE happy to have gotten this one in.

But I KNOW that San Jacinto area theatre is gonna miss her.

And while there were few step by step 

shots on the three previous pieces this evening... 

There were NO step by steps on the last piece I'd do. 

But it was late. I mean... it - was - LATE. I mean - 

There WERE still 8 or so people there. It's not like I was 

the guy on the floor drawing on people, keeping everyone from going to bed. more accurately, I was the guy on the floor 

drawing on people, keeping everyone from going to 

Denny's. It really all worked out well though, as 

this got Sean to makin' some mighty fine 

breakfast burritos.

MIGHTY fine!

This allowed me to wrap up the last piece, 

another first stab at one of Lewis Carroll's characters. 

Someday we ARE gonna see a BUNCH of 'em assembled at 

the same time. Someday. 

Meantime...

Thanks Sam, Yvonne, and - to make the list short - 

EVERYONE who was a part of Inland Stage Company's 

The Importance of Being Earnest. 

Once again - the best take I've seen on this yet!

And there's been some wonderful Human Canvas sessions since these, and I'm anxious to post. 

So please check back. And there are also the tabs near the top of the page which show the beginnings of all this.

See ya soon!

Finally... A CANVAS Canvas!

This is a first attempt at a Bob Ross painting.

Audrey III            3/23/12              18" x 24"

It's also a first attempt working with oil paint. 

Or paint in general for that matter. Well, paint on CANVAS, that is.  Much of what I tend to work in - that people think are paintings - is with soft pastels...

...or soft pastels combined with colored pencils. 

PRISMA-COLOR to be exact. They're a bit pricey, 

but they really ARE all THAT.

Back to painting.

I've done a lot of set painting in my sordid past. 

Now, one of the aspects of theatre that I've come to love 
happens to also be the name of a text that was used at the university I attended - Process to Product - taking 
in the brainstorming of ideas, the 
research, the auditions, 
rehearsals, and 
of course...

opening 
night! 

But that's not before tech week! 
And then...it closes. You revel quietly... 
and then not so quietly at the cast party...

you do it again.

Process to Product. 

Rinse. Repeat if desired.

One of my favorite backstage painting techniques 
is the use of wet blends. It's this use of smearing a few 
colors together - quickly, while it's wet, to make something 
that looks like wooden paneling, or, say...
 a floor (wood OR marble)... 


or who KNOWS what.


Some of the best theatre sets I've seen were in fact styrofoam, PVC, and recycled pieces of 1/4 ply. Recycled to the 
point of looking like something from Larry Shue's 
The Nerd on one side, and Little Shop of 
Horrors or Cat on a Hot Tin Roof 
on the other.


 It's this same use of wet blends that led me to blending and smearing the pastels when working on paper...

...and eventually the Sharpies, when working on people.

And that's PART of the secret to doing those Bob Ross paintings. 

It's a "wet on wet" technique, allowing for certain blends...smears...to happen in just the right places. Those 

"happy little discoveries" that Bob talks (talked) about in his shows.  Something else that makes it work... and this is true with ANY painting... is to step back and take another look. 

Up close, you smear one color across another... 

And when you step back a couple of paces it's the upper edge of a snow bank.

We do this backstage too.  It's called "The 30 foot rule". That is to say, when you're painting something, and it doesn't 

QUITE look realistic, step back 30 feet or so... 

'Cause that's as close as any audience 

member is gonna get.

And that's when it hit me that I've been doing this kind of painting for quite some time! It's just it was never were on canvas. Well, not unless it was a piece of canvas 

stretched over a 4'x8' frame of 

one by four.  

(((this is the point where once again in the narrative I really regret not having any decent photos of sets I've worked on))) 

When asked what kinda of art I do, 

I generally say drawing. Pencils, pastels, ink... and always 

state that I never painted. Having made now a first attempt at a Bob Ross piece, I now realize that I HAVE been painting... 

it's just that my "paintings" covered a 40'x60' space, 

and were designed to look like something else. 

Until you step back JUST a bit...

and there it is.

It was an exciting, and successful first stab at oils.

There's gonna be more of these. I can feel it in my bones.

And in my Michael's gift card.