Don't get me wrong, I love my oil paints and wouldn't think of changing to another medium but with that comes certain frustrations. One of the main ones that I face on just about every painting is the slow drying time of oil paints. Many times I would like to put my hand down on a certain area of my painting in order to paint something else near it in a detailed manner. The problem arises when that area under my hand is not dry yet. I know what some of you are saying "Pat, they make this thing called a maulstick", and yes I know [...]

Today I thought I would go over how I handle, and what I go through with my business e-mail. When you are an artist, the most common type of e-mail you get is spam. You need to put your business e-mail on your website so that people interested in your art can get a hold of you, but at the same time that makes it easy for the spammers. I just consider it one of the "evils" that you must deal with on the internet and go forward from there. Several months back I even did a post on handling it in an amusing way [...]

Hands down, the number one question that I get asked when someone looks at my artwork is "Do You Do People ?". A bunch of different feelings always come to mind. The first one is the "smutty" adult answer as it seems to always be phrased this way but I don't. The second is that fact that they must find my artwork competent and professional to ask me so I'm flattered. Third is having to tell them "no, not at this time" and today I will share with you the irony of why that is such. As you know I don't paint full [...]

Now that the weather is nice I'm looking forward to getting back out on the trails. As many of you know this is where I take most of my own reference photos. Speaking of which, I noticed how much digital cameras have come down in price. For what I paid to get a nice 4 megapixel camera you can now get an 8 megapixel or better! I might get one so I can get that two camera "back-up" thing going this summer. When I'm out on the trail I relax and focus on the beauty of mother nature as I haed out on [...]

Today I want to thank all of those that have given me positive feedback on the newsletter. I launched it a couple of months ago, number one, to give people a way to see what I'm doing with my art without having to follow the blog. Number two, to share interesting art and sometimes funny stories about art from around the world. Number three, to structure it in a way that was easy to read, (none of that scrolling to the right stuff! I hate that!) and so that the reader could make their "read" as short or as long as they wanted by the amount [...]

Today I'd like to go over why I developed the practice of framing my own oil paintings. Back in the early ninetys when I was a "serious hobbyist" with my art, I entered juried shows at the local art center that I was a member of. All artwork had to be framed and as a young man in my early twentys I didn't have huge sums of money to work with so I looked for ways to do my artwork in a quility manner and save as much money as possible. My art teacher framed my first couple of works and I noticed how [...]

My sister Jenny (who does craft work of her own), recently shared with me that she told a local merchant in town about my artwork and that they might be interested in it. This would be a great way to "get the foot in the door" in my local community of Bellevue. I had my first art show last year in the local art center "Matthews" and was grateful to get two new collectors so this is a get chance to shine as a place to see my artwork for sale all year long so I will definitely keep you posted as to how it comes [...]

As you may know, last week I decided to switch my routine around. I decided to paint before going to work and taking care of my blogging and other computer work when I get home in the evening. So far it feels good, I start the day off right by playing to my strengths and not my weaknesses. I want to create when I wake up in the morning and now I do. When I'm at work I have my "business mindset" going so it's easier to do my business efforts when I come home. The great thing is that I can still paint [...]

Today I decided to share with you how much my new synthetic brushes are working out for me. At the beginning of the year I wanted to see what I could do with non-bristle brushes and found a nice line of them at my local art store. They are made by "Darice" and are very affordable. I love how the paint flows from it, almost like watercolor if the paint is thin enough. The edges stay nice and crisp and they clean up very well. If you are an oil painter and have wanted to try a synthetic brush assortment, I don't think you [...]

Today after work I was thinking of ways to improve my "routine" when it comes to painting. I have tossed around ideas for months as to how to maximize my chances to produce new artwork at a more consistent pace. I have decided to try one of them and see what happens. Instead of taking care of my "computer stuff" in the morning before work, I am going to paint in the mornings and do my business tasks after work. One of these things is the blog so look for my posts to come in the evenings now instead of early in the morning, such as [...]

I have decided to share some information with all of you. I am not yet a full time artist. Yes I work a very demanding day job and paint mostly in the evenings and weekends. I went about following the advice of being as professional as possible even when you are not maybe to a fault. I've had a feeling from time to time that most people who check on my website have figured it out by now. I work as a detail shop superviser for an automotive dealership and spread the word about my art there as much as possible. As a [...]

Today as I look at my commissioned work in progress I can say one thing for sure, how lucky I am. What do you mean Pat? I'm lucky in the fact that I know exactly what my role is in the "art world" is about. A good many of artists rack their brains over feeling a calling to be an artist and at the same time wondering what makes them different from the great big "mass" of artists out there. I knew from almost day one that my job was to help people out that felt uncomfortable talking to artists and/or talking to people inside a [...]