"Sour Milk Gill" Oil Painting by James Swanson
"Sour Milk Gill" From the award winning painting series.
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Tuesday, September 9, 2014
A Dog Day Month
 Day #28 "Chester" a 12" x 12" oilChester's owner is Christie McMahon |
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Day #29 "Charlie" 11" x 14" oil
Dog owner is Alex Page
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Day #30 "Brodie" a 14"x11" oil
Brodie's owner Jane Crise
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Day #31 "Lexus and Company" 24" x 18" oil
Dog Owner is Sandi Schulze.
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Day #32 in A Dog Day Month "Maggie" 12" x12" oil
Maggie's owner is Suzanne Rose.
This is the last day of my dog day painting a day.
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| These next paintings have been added to the Dog Day Month show. They were done as commissions from the project. A New Day meet "Zeke". Cheryl Spran |
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| Another day another painting. "The Snow Walk" One of the last winter walks with my Amber. It was a good one. |
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| "Nantucket Red" The last of the dog painting series " A Dog Day Month" It was started as a painting demo in front of a crowd at the Westend Art Festival in LaGrange and finish up at home. |
This is the all of the paintings from the 32 days of work made into an invite for the show.
Friday, July 4, 2014
A Dog Painting a Day for a Month
A Dog Day Month
The Dog Days of Summer are upon us, and the Artist and the Traveler Artist James Swanson will be celebrating them by creating a dog painting a day for a month. Starting July 7, James will be painting mans best friends from photos that are sent to him at
TheArtistAndTheTraveler@gmail.com.
You see a few months back James lost one of his best friends and walking companion Amber, so he’s paying tribute to her and to others friends pets by starting this series of paintings. The paintings will be made into a small gallery exhibit, sale and a self published book with a portion of the proceeds going to local animal shelters. Thanks and good painting!
TheArtistandtheTraveler.org
20 Painting days into the month
20 Painting days into the month
Day 1
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| The start of the painting. |
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| About half way. |
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| "Amber" 12"x16" oil by James Swanson Dog Owner James Swanson |
Day 2
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| "Atticus" 12"x16" oil by James Swanson Dog Owner James Swanson |
Day #3
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| "Hey There Dadio" 14x11 Oil painting by James Swanson Dog Owner Cheryl Spran Day #4
Day #5
Day #6
 "Otter" !4" x11" Oil by james Swanson Dog owner Eric Sandquist Day #8
Day #10 "Cowboy Bob"11" x 14" Oil Painting By James Swanson Dog owner Jeri Davis
Day #11
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Monday, April 14, 2014
The Mack Way
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| A New Season 20x 16 Oil by James Swanson Traveler for the painting was Heather May |
Being creative and staying that way are two different things. In my world keeping inspired and motivated to create art is a full time gig. Finding new ways to push yourself is a battle in it's self. That is why one of the ways that I keep pushing is to enter juried exhibitions. These exhibitions are where you are really being judged by your peers. To be accepted into one of these shows can be exhilarating to your work, but not being accepted can be a little devastating also. At least for a little while. 
Mackinac Island is off the Northern coast of state of Michigan. It's a place where time stands still. No motorizes vehicles are allowed on the Island. Everyone there gets around by either their legs or by horse draw carriages. The place is vintage.
This year the art exhibition on the island is about the places on Mackinac Island. I know a few travelers who have been to the island, but I wanted a different view for this one.
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| Photos from Heather May's Blog |
Meet a New Traveler to the project Heather May. My inspiration for the painting "A New Season". Heather has a wonderful blog "mackinacislandgal" that she does about the island from a locals view all year around.
" I live on Mackinac Island year-round, and work as a candy maker in the summer and a fine arts teacher in the winter, capturing memories through a blog as I go along."
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| Heather's photo from Mackinac Island |
Heather takes some fabulous photo of her Island and I was excited when she said she'd be honored to be apart of the painting project. Thanks Heather.
The photo I chose of hers is this one from her blog.
An early spring morning before the tourist season starts. I loved the light in her photo and the dramatic shadows from the pier posts. I new this would be interesting to paint and was special. Only someone who lived on the Island could see this at that time of year.
Here are the painting steps to "A New Season" |
This is the start of the painting done after a sketch and the design were figured out.
It's just a little bit of Burnt Sienna and oil brushed on a linen panel with the design painted in.
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| As always with my paintings I start painting in the darkest colors first. Here I have started painting in the structure of the ice and some of the water around it. |
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| Here the painting has progressed quite quickly. Knowing that the sky and water are reflections of each other helped speed things along. I try and stay as loose as possible at this point in a painting. I look for brushstroke energy. Big strong meaningful strokes that have tons of character to them. The sky is almost done just with them. |
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| Next I put in the ice. Using the greyed out part of my palette colors I was able to loosely brush them in. |
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| Now the work begins. Everything up until now could be loose and goosey, but now I had to lay in right where all the posts and shadows needed to go. Knowing how to brush one oil color over another wet oil color is one of the hardest things to learn in oil painting. Especially a light color over a darker one and not having them mix too much or vice versa. |
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| This painting is getting close to being there at this point. I like a lot of what is happening, now all that is needed is some small color corrections. A couple of the posts in the front aren't dark enough, the ice at the bottom of the painting seems to bend downward, the building needs help and paint edges need to be taken care of. So I'm going to do all those things and the painting should be there. |
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| Done. With the few corrections made the painting is finished!
Details from the paint
   
I love how this painting turned out. I think it's very exciting and has a lot of beautiful color movement to it.
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A great BIG thanks goes out to our Traveler Heather May for this one! I couldn't have painted this one with out her.
The only sad note about this painting is that it didn't make it into the show there on Mackinac Island. I was hoping that Heather would have been able to see the painting from her photo up close. I did have another painting make the show, but I'm sorry that it wasn't one of hers. But like a Cubs fan there is always next year!
Thanks for taking a look! To find out more about Mackinaw Island or Heather May see her blog mackinacislandgal and to see more of this painting project go to- theArtistAndTheTraveler.org
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