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WildArt I
I’m putting a Roman numeral after the title because I hope we can do it again next year. Good times and lots of money raised for the Appalachian Wildlife Refuge. Bye the way, if anyone has 10 acres or so to donate for their wildlife rehab facility, look them up: you can write it off: http://www.appalachianwild.org/donate.html.
From the after-event press release:
Asheville, North Carolina – The inaugural Wild Art event held Saturday August 6, 2016 raised funds and friends to help native wildlife thanks to support from regional artists, Addison Farms Vineyard, dedicated volunteers and the community. Guests enjoyed meeting with artists to learn about their work created at the vineyard and other pieces inspired by nature. Artist Tony Corbitt was set up next to the Animal Ambassador tent during the event and painted the visiting Eastern Screech Owl from the May Wildlife Rehabilitation Center in Banner Elk.
The event was a fundraiser and outreach opportunity for the nonprofit Appalachian Wildlife Refuge working to open a facility to help injured and orphaned wildlife. “We are so thankful to John Mac Kah, Paul Blankinship and all the other artists that attended and donated a portion of the art sales to Appalachian Wild,” shared President and Co-Founder Kimberly Brewster. The nonprofit also held a raffle and had items available for purchase that raised over $1,500.
Nb, the baby robin spotted on the ground by gimlet-eyed fellow Saint of Paint, Dana Irwin. As he was too young to fly, he was returned to his nest instantly.
I asked how common it was for robins to breed this late in the year and was told by a show attendee, “if it required permission, wouldn’t none of us be here.”
Sense and Suspense
Getting a model up off a table top, especially if it’s a living thing, is fun.
It’s slightly less fun to watch the color fade and the leaves curl as I work. Makes me grateful for classical training. It takes flexibility to learn what the Victorians meant by “paint in a broad manner” and their grandsons, my teachers by “don’t just paint the object, but paint the air around the object, too.”
I’ve got another bough stuck upside down in a Mason jar of water that may retain some color for tomorrow’s session, but I’m not counting on it. I mixed up a local color as part of a string from shadow to highlight. It mostly matched, so that’s what I’m going with tomorrow.
Art lets one test one’s logic by one’s senses.
Ensconced at 191 Lyman St., No. 249
From this:
To this:
Few things satisfy like making good culture, and propriety forbids crowing about them in public.
New studio
I have rented a studio in Asheville, NC’s River Arts District. It’s in Riverview Station at 191 Lyman St., # 249.
Normally I push paint around for fun and profit. For the past week, it feels like I’ve done it for the sake of character-building.
I expect to open for art classes by July 1 in basic drawing, ink drawing, oils and pastel.
The Saints of Paint
My collaborators and I are forming an association to continue our work of mounting benefit art shows for non-profits.
Together, we are the Saints of Paint: John Mac Kah, our visionary; Christine Enochs, our internet publicist; Dana Irwin, who makes us look good; and me, the chief cook and bottle-washer.
Our first show produced under this name will benefit Appalachian Wildlife Refuge and will be held in early August at Addison Farms Vineyard, a beautiful site just northwest of Asheville in Buncombe County, North Carolina. The Refuge is raising funds for a new rescue facility for the treatment and release of injured wildlife.
Details on the show to come.
We were inspired (and advised, too!) by the Oak Group, a few landscape painters in California and SCAPE, a larger group which works in the same area. Both groups have contributed mightily to the stewardship of the landscape they paint.
Like them, we aim to continue paying bills, making culture and doing good.
Today I’m in Edenton, painting to benefit The Cupola House, a 1758 landmark. Wish us luck, and stop by.
Northeastern NC imagery:
Farmhouse outside Edenton. Oil on paper. 12 x 16″
Photo by Mary Kay Coyle at http://cupolahouse.org
In due time
Almost there.
There’s a little too much imprimatura peeking through at lower left. And a dozen other things.
Oil on paper. 18 x 24″
Making statements
One of my teachers, Rebecca Hawkinson, used to remind me, “every time you touch your canvas, you’re making a statement.”
That’s true whether one means to state anything or not; it holds true for statements good and bad alike, accurate, inaccurate, considered or careless.
What, then of all those lines that surround whole bodies or body parts in master drawings and are clearly not part of the figure at all?
They are questions, or better yet, statements reconsidered.
Four figures in walnut ink. 13 x 19″
Easels in the Gardens, April 15-16
It’s time for Easels in the Gardens, the biennial benefit for the Cupola House Association of Edenton, NC.
Both the town of Edenton and the event have enjoyed a stream of good press in the last decade, including Forbes Magazine, Smithsonian, Coastal Living and Our State, which aside from this mention, has run a paid ad for the event in the April 2016 issue. The July 2015 print issue offers a wealth of photos of Edenton, too.
The town really is as beautiful as the hype. Fortunately, the strong agricultural economy, which surrounds the town has damped down any centrifugal concrete that has been the ruin of so many beautiful American places.
The Cupola House, which was rescued from neglect almost a century ago, is a monument to craftsmanship, design, and people with enough good sense and love to value such things.
The Cupola House (left) in the middle of Edenton, and Martinique Plantation(right) about ten miles north of town in Chowan County. Both were built in the 1750’s. The town and environs abound in 18th- and 19th-century architecture.
The event itself offers access to artists, abundant food and a band that does justice to Charlie Parker and Stan Getz.
All during a beautiful April weekend
Out of due season
Behold the Great Dismal Swamp, a sodden near-wilderness between the James River of Virginia and the Albemarle Sound of North Carolina.
In the swamp are the origins of the Pasquotank River, which drains into the Albemarle Sound at Elizabeth City. Along its upper reaches, there will appear wind farms, where the ground is too low and wet to till.
But upwards of these new-minted towers of virtue about to built on sand, the ospreys play, the snakes climb the trees, and even the insects keep silent at noon.
This painting is about a third of the way done. Already it makes me feel warm during the short days of the year.
We set some wild places aside and feel proud; we fail to wreck others, and fee humble. Rightly so.
Paul Blankinship Fine Art 