Hot Tamale
For the past year I have been treating my mask Fenix (shown below) like a hot potato. Every time I’d prepare to use her as a model for one of my paintings I’d find a reason to work on something else.
Fenix – ©2011, Don Michael, Jr.
Now, she’s a Hot Tamale…
Hot Tamale - 5″x5″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 3/15/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
Here we are with March half over and this addition to my Eye Candy series is only the second painting that I’ve completed this month. For the first time in a long while I took several days off from painting. It wasn’t something I planned, it just happened. During that time I also found myself away from most of my social media outlets. As I listen to the birds chirping outside my window and smell the blossoms in the air I come to the conclusion that I must be experiencing a full-blown case of Spring Fever.
Speaking of Spring Fever, here’s a painting I did using that name several years ago…
Spring Fever – 20″x24″ – Acrylic on canvas – Created 3/13/08
©2008, Don Michael, Jr.
(Hey! I just realized that I finished this painting 4 years ago this week. Hmmm… it’s amazing to me that 4 years can seem like a lifetime ago while seeming like it was just yesterday.)
Anyway… Spring Fever can be considered a ‘stepping off point’ in my painting progression. She was one of the first paintings in my mask series that was larger than 8″x10″. She was also a fun color experiment that had me looking at my masks in an entirely different way. I’m glad I pulled her out of the archives to give her another look. I guess a bad case of Spring Fever can sometimes be a good thing…
Happy Creating!
Bo Peep
Last night when it was time to head for my Tuesday Night Demo at Michael’s I suddenly realized that I was totally unprepared. With several irons in the fire I’d allowed the day get away from me. (I know, that’s no excuse…) Anyway, in a fit of panic I reached into a stack of previously rejected designs and pulled out one that I’d come up with about 5 or 6 years ago. I still didn’t care too much for the composition so I cut it down to a much smaller size. What was originally an 8″x10″ design was now fitted for a 4″x4″ canvas. I then rushed out of the house with the design, my paints and my trusty palette knife – making it to Michael’s just in time. Here’s what I did over the next 3 hours…
Bo Peep – 4″x4″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 3/6/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
I almost named this painting “Peeps” in honor of those squishy, sugary, obnoxious confections that we are inundated with every year about this time. But, then I realized that the painting is too different from the other members of my Eye Candy series in too many ways for me to make it a part of that family. The biggest difference and the deciding factor in this internal argument was that the model for this painting is not of my own creation. As soon as I came to that conclusion the name Bo Peep popped into my head. I stopped right there. It was perfect.
Happy Creating!
Weekend Events
In the midst of my many projects I took time out last week to prepare for and then take part in the downtown Las Vegas art event, First Friday. Here is what my wall inside of the Blue Sky Yoga Gallery looked like…
And here’s what my wall in the gallery outside of the Blue Sky Yoga Gallery looked like…
We had a pretty decent turnout this month which always leads to some wonderful conversations on art. I even made a couple of small sales – which almost garnered enough to pay the rent. 
The highlight of my night occurred when my friend, Cheryl, noticed that there was a painting of her hanging on my wall. I think the highlight of her night was when she found out that the painting was in fact hers to do with as she pleased. Here she is with her new painting…
Cheryl with Cheryl
I didn’t get home until quite late Friday night, but there would be no sleeping in for me on Saturday. I had to get up and prepare for a ‘Meet and Greet’ at the Michael’s Arts & Crafts store where I teach Acrylic Painting Classes. This was an opportunity for all of the Michael’s instructors to spend time with the customers, letting them know about our classes. Happily, I ended up with 3 new students, two of which have already signed up for two classes. So, I’d call that a couple hours well spent.
The rest of the weekend was spent with the family and on freelance projects. One of those projects is approaching the halfway point which is where all the real fun begins. I’ll share more when I can…
Happy Creating!
Lemon Spree
This little palette knife painting is the last installation in my Eye Candy: Spree series…
Lemon Spree - 4″x4″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 2/28/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
I thought that it would be a fun exercise to look at all five paintings in the series together in one grouping. Even though the same mask was used as the model in each, it’s really interesting to me how the differences in color, shadow pattern and angle seem to give each painting a unique personality.
The Eye Candy: Spree Family Photo – Clockwise from upper left: Lime, Grape, Cherry, Lemon, Orange
If anyone is interested, all the paintings in this series are available at $60 each. Each is painted on 4″x4″ gallery-wrapped canvas with the edges painted black. All are signed on the right edge. Should someone wish to purchase the entire series I’m willing to offer a special discount. Just drop me an email at: don@donmichaeljr.com.
Speaking of painting sales, I’d like to share a photo sent to me by my online artist friend Robin Samiljan. Last year she added my mask Swirls to her collection. Now she has added Heath. (Thanks, Robin!) I think they go quite well together on her wall. Don’t you?
Swirls & Heath hanging out together in New England
As I’ve mentioned before, I’m in the middle of a couple freelance graphic projects. They are coming along nicely, but since I still have a lot to do I’d better get back to it…
Happy Creating!
Cheryl
Last night for my Thursday demo at Michael’s Arts & Crafts Store I decided to experiment with another Over the Under-Schmeerings (OTUS) painting. The last time I did an OTUS for a demo the reception was less than enthusiastic which made me a little apprehensive about trying again. Interestingly enough, the reception this time was completely different. I don’t know if it had to do with the subject matter, the ‘schmeerings’ or different customers, but I had several people come by and hang out in wonder as I painted. This usually leads to some great conversations and I ended up having some great ones last night.
Cheryl – 10″x8″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 2/23/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
The subject of this painting is the wonderful lady who runs the Blue Sky Yoga Studio & Gallery inside of the Arts Factory here in Las Vegas. She is a former dancer whose career took her all over the world with gigs in Greece, Aruba, Puerto Rico and Las Vegas. Her dancing career culminated with a long-running stint as one of the dancers in the Stratosphere’s “Viva Las Vegas”. Cheryl now focusses her energies on Yoga instruction and raising her family. You will never meet a kinder, more generous person. I have never seen her greet anyone without a big smile and a kind word.
Well, I got several irons in the fire and nothing seems to want to do itself. I’d better head back to the studio…
Happy Creating!
Heath
About a year ago I started creating some masks to use as ‘models’ for future paintings. At the time I had no idea where this might lead me, but I knew I needed some new inspiration and thought that it could be fun to create my own. The paint had barely dried on one of these masks when my online artist friend, Robin Samiljan, decided to add it to her collection…
Swirls – Acrylic on paper mache’ mask – ©2011, Don Michael, Jr.
As I had done with all of those new masks, I took a bajillion photos of Swirls before I sent it east to its new home. I often looked through the photos I’d taken, but had put off creating a painting from any of them. (Go ahead, you can add chicken sounds here…)
Anyway… a few months later my explorations with these newly created masks led to the beginnings of what was to become my Eye Candy series of palette knife paintings. When I posted about the 60th of these paintings recently, Robin asked me if I had used Swirls in an Eye Candy painting yet. Well, at that point I knew what I had to do. In the infamous words of Barney Stinson from the CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother, “CHALLENGE ACCEPTED!”.
Please welcome number 61 to the series…
Heath – 5″x5″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 2/21/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
FYI, after I had painted almost 1/2 of the swirls in this painting with my palette knife I decided that I had shown off long enough and used a brush to finish. My eyes thanked me…
Happy Creating!
Threshold
This has been an artfully busy week which has kept me from spending much time online. I’m sure many of my blogging friends have probably noticed my absence and I apologize. I went online for a little while tonight to try to get caught up and realized just how unsociable I’ve actually been. Oopsy! Needless to say, I am still not caught up.
Art-wise, I am in the midst of two graphic design commissions which I hope to be able to share by the end of March. I also continue to prepare lesson plans for my Acrylic Workshops while doing demos to promote them. For those interested, this Saturday from 2-4pm we will be painting a landscape featuring elements from our local Red Rock Canyon.
Even in the midst of all this busy-ness I still made sure I had plenty of studio time. That is a MUST for me. It keeps me sane – and is so much fun. Here’s the result of this “me” time…
Threshold – 36″x24″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 2/16/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
Some paintings happen so effortlessly that it almost seems like magic. The first two-thirds of this Over the Under-Schmeerings (OTUS) painting was like that. But then everything came to a screeching halt when I realized that the remainder of my original concept was just not going to work. It was too safe and too boring. It was nice enough, but it just didn’t mean anything to me. So, after a couple days of contemplation I came up with something completely different. Something which tells a story… but a story with a twist… a story that must be finished by the viewer. In other words, my kind of painting…
Here’s a closer look at that final element…
Threshold – detail – approximately 12.25″x8.25″
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
Now it’s time for me to get back to those other projects…
Happy Creating!
Grape Spree
With this painting I am now 4/5′s of the way through my Eye Candy: Spree sub-series…
Grape Spree – 4″x4″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 2/9/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
Recently, I commented that I was wondering if my Eye Candy series had about run its course. Upon further consideration, I don’t necessarily think it’s the series that I’m tired of as much as it may be the mask I’m using as the model in this sub-series. Her name is Nelli and I have now used her in a total of 12 paintings with one more on the way. Don’t get me wrong, I still love that mask. In fact, it’s one of my favorites. (I wrote about creating it here.) I just feel that it may be time to take her out of the ‘model’ rotation for a while.
Hmmm… Maybe it’s time to create a new mask from which to model…
Speaking of creating masks, today I committed to creating 2 masks this year to be auctioned off at the 4th Annual Un-Masking the Mind charity auction. (Here is a post from one of the previous auctions.) My mind is already starting to percolate with ideas. Oh, boy!
Happy Creating!
Gum Drop
As I mentioned in my last post, I’ve been doing some rearranging in my studio. Thankfully, I can now get back to my easel. Goody, goody Gum Drop!
Gum Drop – 5″x5″ – Acrylic on canvas – Completed 2/8/12
©2012, Don Michael, Jr.
Happy Creating!
Adventures of a TV Art Director
I’ve not touched a brush or paint since my Acrylic Painting Class this past Saturday. Instead, I have been reorganizing my studio a bit. Due to a long-running set of circumstances, all of my art books had been relegated to storage for a while. I was missing them tremendously, so I am in the process of getting them out and onto some shelves. Needless to say, there’s a lot of perusing going on at the same time, which seems to slow down the process.
So, for today’s blog I thought I’d tell of a serendipitous tale from my days as an Art Director in television. It’s a circuitous tale that could take days to tell, but I think I can streamline it nicely into just one day. 
Many of my long-time blogging friends may remember the photo below that my good friend, CJ, took of me back in 2008.
Don with some Statuettes
Most people immediately notice the EMMY trophy, of which I am quite proud. Few notice the slender trophy just a few inches away from it. That is the trophy for which I am most proud from my days in television. What’s fun is, it’s got a cool story to go along with it. (at least I think so…)
The story begins in a totally different TV station on the opposite side of the country. I was at the tail-end of a 3 year contract with a station that never could get a sense of who they were. I’d already changed the graphics package 4 times and was in the process of creating a 5th package. This time I was also working on a new logo, which I’d been wanting to do from the beginning. During the process, a new Creative Services Director (my direct boss) was hired (the third during my 3 year tenure). Before I had a chance to finish the logo and before I even had a chance to get to know my new boss, she decided that the company would not be renegotiating my contract. Now, this came as a total shock to me – here I was in the middle of creating a new look and brand for the station and it was being RIPPED right out of my hands. Needless to say, all work on that new logo ended for me on that day. The design I started was finished out by someone else. I never claimed any part of it because the final result was nowhere close to what I was going for. I left that company afraid that I’d never get another chance at creating a station logo, which is really a rare opportunity.
Now we’ll fast-forward almost 3 years. During that time I had accepted the Art Director position in a TV station over 2000 miles away. Immediately upon starting at this TV station I was given the task of redesigning the graphics package. Thankfully, they also gave me the responsibility of designing a new logo. What makes this a big deal is that rarely is a new station logo created in-house by the local art director. Usually it is ‘farmed out’ to companies that specialize in creating logos and graphics packages for local affiliates.
Upon rolling out the new logo and graphics package we immediately started implementing it into our promotions projects, as well. Then, the new logo, the accompanying stationery (that I also created), and some of our promotions projects were submitted for award consideration by Promax (Promotions Managers Association) and BDA (Broadcast Designers Association). These are both international organizations that represent pretty much the entire creative side of television. Every year both organizations jointly hold a huge convention where marketing, promotions, graphics and other creative managers from all over the globe spend 3 days together reveling in the love of what they do, which culminates in huge awards ceremonies for both BDA and for Promax.
My logo won BDA gold! My stationery won BDA silver! The promotion (that my boss, and great friend, Dale Wyman, submitted with me) won Promax Gold! Needless to say, we were ecstatic and were walking on clouds at the ensuing post-awards party. Below is a photo of me with 3 of my Promax friends in the midst of the celebrations…
Ben, Peggy, Don and Mike at Promax/BDA post-awards celebration
Ben is holding the trophy that Dale and I won together. (Regrettably, Dale didn’t get into this photo, because I think he took it for me.) You may notice a shoulder on the right side of the photo in the background. I had not noticed before the photo was taken, but upon turning around I discovered that my really good friend, Lu – who is also one of my longest-tenured relationships in television – was sitting there. I immediately went over and plopped down with her so we could celebrate my moment together.
Don and Lu at BDA/Promax post-awards party
Now, it was really dark in the room, so I didn’t get to see who the woman sitting beside Lu was. I wasn’t really paying too close attention anyway, because I was so happy to see my old friend. After the photo was taken, I turned to this woman sitting by Lu and said, “Excuse me for just barging in. My name is Don.” She looked at me funny and said, “You don’t remember me, do you?”. Immediately I was taken back to 3 years earlier sitting across from this woman as she said, “We will not be renegotiating your contract.” I know it’s hard to imagine, but my grin got even bigger…
How’s that for serendipity?
Oh look, my book on Georgia O’Keeffe is the next one to be put away. I think I’ll go peruse it for a minute first…
Happy Creating!