Thursday, October 22, 2015

Frank's Tundra


We pick up our son Dan at the airport and head into the mountains. There we meet our other son Frank. He's a glassblower and a tiny-house builder in Salida, Colorado. 


I sketch his portrait in watercolor at a restaurant while we're waiting for our soup. 

Frank's Tundra, gouache over casein, 5 x 8 inches
Frank owns a Toyota Tundra 4-wheel-drive pickup. I do a portrait of that, too, because it's about to take us on an adventure on some of highest and most perilous roads in North America. 


The blinding highlights are what attracted me and struck me. The whole painting is a setup to be able to paint them. First, stone and metal, then light. Painting is a journey from the material to the immaterial.
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Video tutorial: "Gouache in the Wild"
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7 comments:

HNK said...

This looks wonderful! Fantastic. I love the portrait and a car.

Ernest Friedman-Hill said...

Have fun and stay safe on your adventures.

Fabio said...

The gouache one is simply wonderful. Being new to gouache I am really impressed by the way you can bend it to your needs. Everything I can get is a series of "unblended" dirty/faded shapes :D Did you scratch out the gouache to get those highlights?

James Gurney said...

Thanks, everyone. Fabio, the highlights are both painted and scratched through. There are little droplets of water on the top of the hood that I scratched out to the level of the white casein beneath the gouache.

mikeyzart said...

Awesome. Can't wait to see more Colorado adventures! I wonder which trails you're going on....

mikeyzart said...

Awesome. Can't wait to see more Colorado adventures! I wonder which trails you're going on....

Rich said...

After the predecessor's ease of mild and mellow tones, here come the blinding highlights and "the tyranny of torrid light"-) so well caught.

You're just covering the whole range.