Take Heart
Tuesday evening I had absolutely nothing ready for my demo at Michael’s. Since I had no time to prepare, and since I had quite enjoyed the experience of painting the dove on my ginormous heart for St. Jude’s, I decided to do it again – except this time I chose to do it as one of my Over the Under-Schmeering (OTUS) paintings. Luckily, I had an 8″x10″ ‘pre-schmeered’ canvas ready to go, because I had done the unthinkable and waited until the last minute to grab my stuff and run for the door.
This was the first time I worked on one of my OTUS paintings in public. It was a bit of a strange experience, because people didn’t seem to ‘get’ what I was doing until I was almost finished. I think it was too ‘abstract’, especially in the early stages, for the regular Michael’s customers and associates. We’ll have to see if I decide to do another publicly in the future.
Anyway, here is what I came up with…
Take Heart – 8″x10″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 1/24/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
When I got home from the demo and checked the comments on my blog I found that my friend, Nicki Ault, had asked me to show a closer shot of the dove I painted on Hope, my ginormous heart. So, I thought it would be fun to show both the OTUS version and the heart version in the same post…
Hope –  dove detail – ©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
Most of my day today was spent with my good friend, CJ Boisvert, taking lots of photos of Hope from several different directions and angles. (The dove detail is one of those photos.) While shooting we decided that we needed to get me in front of the heart for the purposes of documentation and perspective. Now you can get an idea of the size of the heart…
Hope and the artist – ©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
Thanks for the great photos, CJ.
Tomorrow will be spent applying the final varnish. I’m not looking forward to the fumes, but I can’t wait to see how the varnish will make this thing ‘pop’ even more. Oh, this stuff is fun!
Happy Creating!
Don, thanks for the detail photo of the dove. It is a perfect symbol of peace and hope and it is beautifully painted. The OTUS dove has a dramatic energy and I love the play of the colour coming through in the feathers. You were brave to demo the OTUS painting… I can’t imagine demoing any type of painting- I’d rather be in the audience!
It is interesting to compare CJ’s photos to the ones you took. In CJ’s I really notice the blues in the sky more- there is a vibrancy that I couldn’t see before which I think helps to pull that message of hope up into the darkness.
Hi Don,
Just a note to thank you for your inspiration. I find your style invokes meditation. Thank you for depth of character that is reflected in your work.
I am enjoying being one of your students!
LJA
The over-the-under-schmeering dove is phenomenal! One of my absolute favorites actually. As for the group not getting it, I’ll bet they must have thought it was like magic, the way it must have just appeared bit by bit out of the OTUS. Excellent!
Nicki… I’m glad you enjoyed the close-up. Thank you. I used to think I’d rather be in the audience, but now I don’t care if anyone else is around just so long as I can paint.
I agree that CJ’s photos are so much better. We had better control of the lighting AND CJ’s camera compared to mine is like a Rolls Royce to a VW Bug. If you think those blues are vibrant now, you’d really love to see it with the final varnish on it. It REALLY pops now. We took photos before I varnished, though, because it’s really hard to photograph very well when it’s shiny.
LJA… Thank you! I’m glad you found my work inspiring and I’m really glad you’re taking my workshops. I hope to see you Saturday.
Dan… Thank you! I don’t think the people watching could get it because they were distracted by the abstract mess of the background and couldn’t visualize what I was going for. None of them stayed around long enough to see the ‘magic’ of the finished dove.
-Don
oh, I just read in the comments that your audience didn’t really stick it out to see the final image emerge—bummer! I agree with Dan, that if they would have seen it all come together they would have been awestruck! It’s really fantastic! Your heart project is gorgeous–you should be extremely proud of it. Bet your family will enjoy getting the front room back too!
Celeste… Thank you, so much! I AM proud of how the heart turned out. Actually, I think the family will miss the heart when it’s gone. They haven’t minded at all that it’s had such a presence in our front room.
-Don