"Little Miss Muffet, along came a debt collector"

Started painting "Little Miss Muffet, along came a debt collector" Base, Miss Muffet head, and spider legs tomorrow. On a roll.....

I knew spiders had 8 legs but I didn't think it would take so long to cut them out and paint them. Uggh

Spider face done. Be careful Spiders bite!

Miss Muffin, where did your hair go?

Here it is!! She washed and dyed it and can't seem to do a thing with it!

Spider is done. Looking quite funny!

Spider is now on a stick

Miss Muffet is done! Looking quite fetching!

"Mary had a little school loan" part IV

Well its all done and ready for the show. Here is the video and some more detail shots of
"Mary had a little school loan".

"Mary had a little school loan" - 19 x 12 x 5.5 inches

Painted a sheep to mark the end of the poem on the front

Smile for the close up Mary!

Detail of the axle stop

"Mary had a little school loan" part "trois".

So now I have Mary and the Lamb (Wolf) all put together and painted and I will be working on the mechanics and the box next. Should be done today. I hope. More to come as I move ahead.

Lamb (Wolf) Kabab

Mary is looking  quite fetching!

Been working on the base. Glued, stained and painted. Just waiting to dry.

I have carved the poem onto the base and then highlighted it with black. Tell me if you like it!

Top of box

Side of box

All set with the parts cut out for "Little Miss Muffet, along came a debt collector". Need to finish up "Mary had a little school loan" and then paint Miss Muffet.

"Mary had a little school loan" part duh.

I have cut out all the pieces for the figures and now to start painting etc.

I have finished the lamb (wolf in sheep clothing, get it?)

The Lamb (Wolf)

Here is Mary. She is missing her neck right now but I will have it attached in the morning. Her hair should be dry by then. :-)

"Mary had a little school loan"

OK! Going to start on a new sculpture today.

"Mary had a little school loan"

Mary had a little loan,
little Loan, a little loan,
Mary had a little loan,
whose fleece was white as snow.

And everywhere that Mary went,
Mary went, Mary went,
and everywhere that Mary went,
the loan was sure to go.

It followed her to work one day
work one day, work one day,
It followed her to work one day,
which was against the rules.

It made the bankers laugh and play,
laugh and play, laugh and play,
it made the bankers laugh and play
to see a loan at work.

And so the boss turned it out,
turned it out, turned it out,
And so the boss turned it out,
but still it lingered near,

And waited patiently about,
patiently about, patiently about,
And waited patiently about
till Mary did appear.

"Why does the loan love Mary so?"
Love Mary so? Love Mary so?
"Why does the loan love Mary so,"
the eager bankers cry.

"Why, Mary hates the loan, you know."
The debt, you know, the loan, you know,
"Why, Mary hates the loan, you know,"
but it still follows her everywhere.

The boy who cried Banker (Wolf)

On a roll here this week. Just finished another kinetic sculpture called "The boy who cried Banker (Wolf)".

This was fun since the mechanics went together rather fast. Thank god for all that automotive valve work that I used to do. Seems that cams need to have a large round surface to have contact with. Stops all that binding.

Here is the video and some pics. I have the next one going in my head already.

"Mary had a little Debt (Wolf in Sheep's Clothing)"

Here is the boy. I had repainted some sections and had to hang it up to dry. Seems that the nose works great!

Wolf detail showing carving and joints.

Here is the finished sculpture. 

Carved lettering in the wood.

Detail painting of sheep on both axle ends

Here is where the cam and valve solution got me over the hump of  the dowel rod binding on the cams.

The Dancing Congress Man

OK so I watched this video late at night before I went to bed on Wendsday last week.

http://vimeo.com/31262642

Then just before I got up from the computer my niece who is a dancer posted on Facebook this commnet "You do an eclectic celebration of the dance! You do Fosse, Fosse, Fosse! You do Martha Graham, Martha Graham, Martha Graham! Or Twyla, Twyla, Twyla! Or Michael Kidd, Michael Kidd, Michael Kidd, Michael Kidd! Or Madonna, Madonna, Madonna!"
-The Birdcage. 

Then I went to sleep.

I had a dream that night where my niece and I were dancing together and she turned into a martinet dancing with wires coming out of the floor. I stopped dancing and looked through the floor and saw wires and gears and axles that were spinning and giving her movement.

I woke up and went AH AH!

Kinetic Dance Sculpture.

I will do the Maasai Jumping dance first. turn a crank and make the dancer jump up and down. 

It will be out of wood so it will not take to long to put together.Then I can work on Martha Graham next!! 


So it took me a while to figure out the mechanics of the whole thing. The Maasai Dance thing went out the window since it was too hard to pull off without a drill press.


On to plan B!

Here is how the magic is done.

Off set cam and axel with a Limberman out on the end of the stick.

From the front

So I worked out how to make the mechanics and now how to do a dance.

Well I watched 60 mins with the interview with Jack Abramoff and was shocked with what he had to say about Congress and how its just a money machine and getting worse.

So the next morning while walking the dog I came up with an idea to show a dancing Congress Man.

Here is how it developed.

All the bits and pieces 

I spent a lot of time doing design work and finally got everything together and cut out all the pieces as shown above. Then I spent a lot of time tweaking the design until I got it all to work the way I wanted.

Then took it all a part and started painting.

Here I have started to paint the Congress Man and the Money Bags

Close up of painted Congress Man

Here it is all together and ready to show

Here is the video of it in action.

So explain your "Crucifiction On Wall Street" painting.

I'm trying to show what Wall Street has done to our economy and everyone in the world that has worked hard and watched a minority of others gain over 200% in wealth from those that got nothing or little at all. 

My daughter was screwed over by a bank due to an over draft and even when the issue was explained and fixed they still black balled her from getting a bank account anywhere else. Why? So they could make even more money off of her for overdraft insurance that they could still charge her because she could not move to any other bank. I would call that extortion if anyone else did this.

My son should have gone to the local loan shark for money to go to collage. The interest that they charge for private school loans  is insane. The fact that they can add your interest payment for the month to the principle (if you don't pay it) and then charge you interest on that amount again next month makes me wish that the mafia would come back. They at least were upfront about it.

Crucifiction On Wall Street

Worked for 2 hours on "Crucifiction On Wall Street" 50 x 48 inches and here is were I was at. You might recognize the model. :)

Crucifiction On Wall Street Stage 2

Worked some more for about 3 hours and then had to go home for dinner. Not a bad start for someone that had painters block!!

Crucifiction On Wall Street Stage 3

Public Painting today

I will be painting in the house artist gallery today from 12 noon till 5PM. Come on by and see how I work. I like to have discussions while I'm painting. Hope you like jazz music in the background.

The Shoe Factory Art Co-op 250 N. Goodman St. Studios 212, 212A & 215 Rochester, NY 14607 (585)732-0036

What do you do with a birch tree that has to get cut down?

So we had to cut down some of our clump Birch trees. They were overhanging the new addition and made me nervous. So I used some of the wood for the legs of the new harvest dinning table. The rest became firewood after I stripped the bark off of them. I had some large pieces that I'm using to make a birch bark moosehead sculpture for the wall of the cottage. In the process I ended up with a bunch of little scraps. So I had a goose decoy that my neighbor gave me that he did not want, that I fashioned into a loon with a new head etc.

Old head with new head that I carved

 So I ended up with a nice base to start to create a sculpture of Loon. Got out the glue gun and got to work. It was fun to work with a new material.

Here are the finished products.

First Loon that I did

Second Loon.

 I will put these up for sale at the http://www.facebook.com/HouseArtistsGallery

What is the path to becoming a well known artist?

Popescu Feldberg Imola  says

"Becoming known has nothing to do with what you choose as your topics or style. It has everything to do with a good marketing and making contacts with the relevant people, shortly to have the mindset of a business person. 
Unfortunately most of the artists do not have that kind of personality and they are mainly concerned with doing their art. There is no such thing like making what many people would be drawn to. That is not art anymore and we were here talking about art that is good and artists who are talented. In this category artists simply do what they feel compelled to do, by their own imagination and personality. 
The question was how to make talented artists' brilliant works sell, not how to make "paintings" in conformity with people's taste. 

Answer: By smart marketing. Look at art as a business.As an artist, face the reality and do your second set of homework: learn marketing, learn internet marketing, learn PR, learn computers, learn how to do your own website, how to promote it, how to blog and write, self promotion tricks, go to galleries, be nice, be charming, be active socially, smile a lot, meet people, invite people, talk to people, like people, make them like you and all of this time don't forget to keep up the good paintingBecause one thing is sure: with a smart marketing, even the brilliant and good art will also sell! It might take some good years though, but it is possible."

At the Cottage having fun

Well its been a fun couple of weeks here at the Cottage. I have gotten all the siding and soffets done and Mary and I have painted the entire Cottage and it looks great! See the pics below.

I have also  been working on a painting or two during the rainy bits and I have just finished "Busy Bee"

Busy Bee - 24 x 30 inches

Fridays show opening and working at the gallery

Well yesterday was Gallery sitting at The Shoe Factory Art Co-op. So rather than read 

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine book on my Kindle I brought along my latest social commentary painting about how we older workers got screwed by the creeps on Wall St. 

A few folks came by from the Clothesline Art Festival to see what was going on in the gallery. I was a nice day and it was fun painting with people about.

Work hard and get rewarded - 50 x 47 inches

The "Exposed!  The Nude Self" opening was a big hit and lots of people showed up and a good time was had by all!

Nice crowd at the opening

Nice crowd at the opening

Kathleen Kosel (Gray Hair) with one of her two works at the "Exposed! The Nude Self" Art Exhibit last night

"Exposed! The Nude Self"

Hey if you are in town... please come to the "Exposed!  The Nude Self" show tonight!
I will be clothed and in the House Artist Gallery helping with those that faint or are overcome by the lack of clothing next door. Hope to see you there and will be glad to show you my art work.


The Shoe Factory Art Co-op 250 N. Goodman St. Art Studio 212 Rochester, NY 14607

Gothise.com Avoid!!!

Spam/Hackers---Information Post

Beware---Do NOT Click on the Site Mentioned Below

Hey friends! Many of you have been asking about the Gothise.com site where you look at your stats and see where your traffic is coming from and their site happens to be first on the list. This site is hacking our blog links to get us to click on their site and become a member. I guess they think that is the best way to grow a site and to try to be a million member site, for what? I don't know, but NO THANK you...I'm NOT interested! If i want to join your site, I will by word of mouth NOT you spamming/hacking my blog to PRETEND like I'm getting views from you! You are not really getting those views because the blog links are NO WHERE on their site....it's just some computer hacker.

SO, DO NOT CLICK ON THIS SITE and IF EVERYONE REPORTS it we can get them to STOP this NONSENSE. Because I have been getting so much SPAM/HACKING and have had to change my passwords a million times even on twitter! Change your passwords and DO NOT CLICK ON GOTHISE site! 

Introducing the House Artists Gallery at The Shoe Factory Art Co-op! The work of these local artists is on permanent display. Exhibit hours coincide with art shows across the hall in our Main Gallery.

Shoe Factory Art Co-op House Artist!!

Click on the link above to go to the Shoe Factory Art Co-op web page.

 View of my art in the House Artist Gallery 

Back from the cottage so we could move our children. Exhausting.

Well been up to some big En plein air work while up at the cottage, got some of the bathroom done and got to do some large-scale woodworking.


First up the painting stuff.

Here is my new easel on the OUTSIDE of my studio at the cabin
6 x 4.5 feet 

Roughed in color

More work done

More detail and now its back in the home studio for finishing

Here is the start of my dining room table top. Dado and splines to hold it all together

Here is the top on the legs and I added a breadboard piece to the ends to give it a nicer finish

BTW This is the wood that I used. We had to cut down some trees to do the cabin  so I got them  turned in to planks and now I make furniture from my very own trees!