"Highway 20 Sky"

It's my painting I can change it if I want to. The version above is the latest. I wanted to make the road a little more interesting and break up the mass of trees. It worked I think. (If I didn't think it worked I would have gotten rid of it.) What do you think?


16 x 20

I take regular trips to Panama City in my other business. I think the fastest way from Tallahassee is on State Road 20. It's a two-lane trip right through the middle of rural North Florida. There are a lot of acres of planted pines and scrub oaks. If you have driven it enough times you remember previous views that are now obstructed by rising pine trees. This is one of those areas where the trees were harvested and not replanted. Its a different kind of composition. I want to believe that it is not bad to be different.

I was reading one of my favorites blogs by a successful artist and he explained that people don't want to visit your blog just to have you talk about your art. They want instruction or something. Unfortunately, that assumes I have some gem of instruction. Since I don't, and since I'd like people to visit I've decided I would try include gems of instruction from other artists. Like a hall of fame of meaningful quotes. That way you can be assured of finding something worthy when you visit.

This one is from Robert Henri. He is a famous American painter and teacher.

"A landscape has got to mean a great deal to anyone before it can be painted in any worth-while way. It is harder to see a landscape than to paint it. This is true because there are lots of clever people who can paint anything, but, lacking the seeing power, paint nothing worth while."

From The Art Spirit page 209

Hmmm? When I read something like this I wonder where Professor Henri would come down on "Highway 20 Sky"? Am I seeing? Or, am I clever?

Thanks for looking.

"Morning Haze"


14 x 18

This is St. Augustine Light from Vilano Beach on a hazy morning. I really like this one. I like it's simplicity, and I also like it's complexity. After painting it I thought about making that idea my trademark. You know, like Thomas Kincade is "the painter of light". (Okay don't get me started). Well my trademark would be "the painter of subtle complexity" or "the painter of the subtley complex". (I'm working on it). It is sad that in today's world you feel like you have to be better at marketing something than you are at doing something. But anyway, back to the painting, it's just a strip of land, some depth, a lighthouse and a reflection. Does it need more? It's my painting and that's all your getting. If you want birds and clouds, a bouy and a sailboat in the foreground set your GPS for Vilano Beach inlet and take your canvas and paints. When I was there that day . . .

Thanks for looking

"At the Dock"


24 x 30

This is a large painting from a photo taken in Apalachicola. It's a great coastal town on the "forgotten coast" of Florida. Still has a lot of fishing industry there, with shrimpers and oyster boats. I took a trip down there a couple of weeks ago. Got some great photos. Also got a fabulous basket of fried shrimp at the Market Street Grille. This painting was about 95% done and in my office for about six months. I didn't like the lower water reflection and changed this up recently. I like it better now.

Thanks for looking.

"From Guana"


11 x 14

The is from a photo I took during my afternoon at Guana State Park just south of Ponte Vedra. This is that cypress/juniper (?) stuff. I like these trees because they have nice gnarly branches and a great deep olive color.

There is a lot of life between where I'm standing and that line of trees in the background. One of the cool things about being out in the outdoors while painting is all the neat sounds. As the tide was either coming in or going out (I'm not sure which one) I started hearing all these clicking sounds. I think it might have been oysters shutting. It was like a wave coming across the marsh. Is that possible?

Thanks for looking.

"Red Truck"

20 x 24

More in that theme of rural scenes of everyday life. "If a tree falls in the forest, and nobody is there . . . If a slant of light hits an awning just right, and nobody is there. . ." These are questions for which I have no answers.

Thanks for looking.

"St. Marks Morning"

5 x 7 (plein air) postcard series (SOLD)

Painted on an early Saturday morning in November. "Early bird gets the worm" as the saying goes. This was painted with the crys of wild hogs rising from across a ditch nearby. They too were looking for the worm, or whatever it is that wild hogs eat.

Thanks for looking.

"Storm Coming"

5 x 7 postcard series

Sometimes it really does look like this mass of darkness pushing forwards and getting ready to engulf the lake. That contrast of sunlight on treetops and dark fury behind is magical. You have to paint fast when one of these is coming.

Thanks for looking

"Tractor Tires"

5 x 7 postcard series

Driving the backroads of rural Georgia. This one is from a photo that I used to do another postcard. The title was "Quiet" and it is back about 10 or 20 posts. This is just a close up of that corner of the building. One of the best things about modern digital photography is that you can zoom in and see those things in the shade.

Thanks for looking.

"Near Landis"

5 x 7 postcard series (plein air) (sold)

This one was painted on a Saturday morning. I drove my daughter to FSU to take the SAT test. It made sense to paint rather than go all the way home and have to come right back. This is the arches that connect the dorms around Landis Green. It was fun to paint.

Cool thing about this painting is that it sold to someone who was giving it as gift to an administrator at FSU who was retiring. I hope he liked it. (It wasn't Bobby Bowden. I've got a special one for him. All he has to do is ask.)

Thanks for looking.

Crabs

5 x 7 postcard series (Sold)

This was sold at the Plantation Wildlife Show. From a photo from Appalachicola. The sign was made up. Just felt like they probably sold crabs there at some time.

Thanks for looking.

"Where Water Meets Land"

5 x 7 postcard series SOLD

A plein air study from Palm Beach. What you paint when you are sitting under an umbrella looking out at a flat calm ocean. This one sold to a friend from high school who I ran into at a another friend's kid's wedding. I guess that signifies some kind of stage of life. You know you are older when you start going to the weddings of children of people you went to school with.

I like this painting. It is simple and direct, but it is complicated. That color of the breaking wave on the shore is pretty darn close to right. With plein air you don't get to take a photograph and ask the camera what color that split second is. It's just observation and hoping you get it right. Charles Hawthorne, a famous artist and teacher, talks about this in his book. The artist first job is observation. Learning how to see.

Thanks for looking.

"Late Light"

5 x 7 postcard series

I am going to post some from the postcard series. Remember I did slightly more than 100 of these 5 x 7 paintings for the show in Thomasville. After that show I moved them to my gallery in Tallahassee and they sold really well there. I have sold about half of them at this point. If I know its been sold I'll indicate it on the post. Otherwise you can snatch up a nice little painting for the low price of $110.00. They are painted on linen mounted on board.

My New Studio


One way


the other


I finally moved my stuff up to my oldest's old room. It's a really cool room that is above the garage. It has dormer windows and neat angles. My oldest was married last May, and just this week he started his first real paying job as an accountant. Yeah!!!

Well he has obviously been out of the room for a lot of months but I was holding off thinking that there wasn't enough wall space because of the dormer windows and just being lazy. Well about a month ago I moved his furniture out and decided that I would make this the creative part of the studio and the room attached to the garage would just have all the junk. This weekend I went and got some cheap indoor/outdoor carpet and put it over the nice pine floors so I didn't mess them up. I put a big four blub neon light and put in natural light blubs. I am trying to keep it simple. I am a firm believer that clutter expands to cover all the shelves and desk space so I am trying to keep that at a minimum. I am very lucky.

Now I am trying to come up with a good plan for the new year. I like to start with some goals. I have some in mind and I resolve right now to write them down sometime this week. How's that.

Thanks for looking.

"Propane"

5 x 7 postcard series

From the camera while riding down a blue highway in South Georgia. Blue Highway from the book by William Least Heat Moon. Blue highways are those that show up as blue lines on the maps. "Blue Highways" was a great travel book. Check it out.

This is one of my favorite exchanges that is appropriate for the new year.

"What kind of work you in?" he asked.

That question again. "I'm out of work," I said to simplify.

"A man's never out of work if he's worth a damn. It's sometimes he doesn't get paid. I've gone unpaid my share and I've pulled my share of pay. But that's got nothing to do with working. A man's work is doing what he's supposed to do, and that's why he needs a catastrophe now and again to show him a bad turn isn't the end, because a bad stroke never stops a good man's work. Let me show you my philosophy of life."

From his pressed Levi's he took a billfold and handed me a limp business card. "Easy. It's very old."

The card advertised a cafe in Merced when telephones were four digits. In quotation marks was a motto: "Good Home Cooked Meals."

" 'Good Home Cooked Meals' is your philosophy?"

"Turn it over peckerwood."

Imprinted on the back, in tiny faded letters was this:

I've been bawled out, balled up, held up, held down, hung up, bulldozed, blackjacked, walked on, cheated, squeezed, and mooched; stuck for war tax, excess profits tax, sales tax, dog tax, and syntax, Liberty bonds, bady bonds, and the bonds of matrimony, Red Cross, Blue Cross and the double cross; I've worked like hell, worked others like hell, have got drunk and got others drunk, lost all I had, and now because I won't spend or lend what little I earn, beg, borrow or steal, I've been cussed, discussed, boycotted, talked to, talked about, lied to, lied about, worked over, pushed under, robbed and damned near ruined. The only reason I'm sticking around now is to see WHAT THE HELL IS NEXT."

Thanks for looking.

"Yellow"

5 x 7 (sold)

From Canaveral National Seashore. Yellow is always popular in paintings. Why is that?

"Cloud Forming"

5 x 7 plein air

Another from the end of the dock. (You can tell I like it at the end of the dock, can't you?) One of the things I set out to do this year was paint more clouds. You really need to be able to use clouds for compositional elements in Florida. But clouds are really tough to paint "en plein air". Why? Because painting clouds outdoors is like going to a preschool at recess and trying to do paintings of the preschoolers on the playground. They just don't hold still. For this one I studied the cloud for about 2 minutes. I started with the part that was most dramatic and would likely change first. That was the sun peaking over the top of the cloud. Once I got the value of the cloud I put a spot in the water that corresponded to the correct value for the water at that time and then finished with the things that would not change as quickly. Bottom line you have to paint fast and you have paint from memory. You can't chase the cloud from one formation to another. So before you start, take some time and study what is happening with the idea of the elements that will make up your composition. Two minutes doesn't sound like a lot of time, but right now walk outside and look at a cloud for two minutes. You will be surprised at how much it changes.

Thanks for looking.

"Quiet"

5 x 7

From the postcard series. A quiet farm in south Georgia.

Thanks for looking.

"Heading North Near Guana"

18 x 24

From the trip to Guana. From a photo and the plein air reference stuff I did there during the Crescent Beach Paintout. This is Florida. Flat Florida. I took a plein air workshop with a well known California plein artist at St. Simons Island a couple of years ago. It was the first workshop he had done in St. Simons Island. I remember him walking around and scanning the horizon and saying "what do you guys paint over here, everything is so flat". Yeah. It is.

Thanks for looking.

"Storm Chaser"




6 x 8 (plein air)

I've been watching the reality show on Discovery about the storm chasers out in the Midwest who follow storms to capture tornadoes on video. It's very interesting with lots of different personalities and crazy gadgets. There are two guys with specially designed vehicles that they drive right in the middle of a tornado and take photos and make measurements. Check it out.

Maybe its just a guy-thing, but I love watching big storms develop and roll in across the lake. This one was painted from the end of the dock. There are certainly people who see me painting in this kind of situation and think "what kind of crazy idiot is that". But . . . I'm careful. Now I don't use the NCAA rule of no-play-if-the-lightening-is-within-10-miles rule but I do count the seconds between the flash and the thunder. In the end this is just a great answer to the composition question of what do you do to break up the horizontal bands.

Thanks for looking.

"Road to the Red Roof"

5 x 7

From state road 84 on the way to Valdosta. From the postcard series.

"From Vilano Beach"

5 x 7

Painted at the Crescent Beach Paintout from the water looking back over the dunes to the St. Augustine lighthouse on the other side of the inlet.

"Inlet Fishing"

5 x 7

Done at Vilano Beach during the Crescent Beach Paintout. Only thing better than fishing was painting.

Photos from the Plantation Wildlife Arts Festival

The photos aren't good but this gives you an idea of what I did. I got very positive feedback from the patrons. If I had an unlimited budget I would have framed everyone of them but that would not have been practical. I sold 21 of the paintings, and I consider that a success during a year that sales overall did not appear to be that good. I am glad I did it. Next time maybe only 25. I will be posting some of them over the next weeks.

Also I am taking the remaining 80 with some additional new 6 x 8's to my gallery in Tallahassee for a December Minature show. So check out Signature Gallery on Capital Circle NW in Tallahassee.

"Wind and Light"

16 x 20

Another from the Crescent Beach Paintout. This was a hard painting to photograph. Darker paintings cause problems for me. It's hard for the automatic light meter in the camera. You have shoot at a bunch of different exposures. Plus the lighting for the photograph isn't regualr. At plein air shows I usually shoot with the painting in the shade. This also isn't exactly the final painting. I think I took this photo early in the week. After looking at the painting a couple of days, I decided the third tree needed to be changed and I also softened the edges on the tree with frons (?) sticking out. Finally, on the last day a gave the painting the a light spray of varnish. When you are dealing with darks the colors tend to dull out in about a week. Because the painting is on a support and not on stretchers a light coat of varnish is not a problem. It was a pretty painting and not your typical plein air piece.

Thanks for looking.

"Bridge"

8 x 10

From the boat ramp on the way to Vilano Beach. Simple. I won an Award of Merit from fellow artist with this one.

"Distant Light"


11 x 14

This is from the boat ramp on the way to Vilano Beach. Great place to paint. Headed over in the morning on a great clear day. About the time I got to the Vilano Bridge this giant fog bank moved in. I'm not sure what the weather issue was, but it made for some tough painting conditions. By the time I was painting this one there was just a haze over the landscape. This is not a great photo. I like the idea of keeping thing simple, but also subtly complex. Does that make sense?

"Intercoastal Palm"

18 x 24

This was done at Summer Haven. What a great little park. It is part of the Matanzas Fort National Park. Looking north up the intercoastal waterway. Just a little palm with gnarly wind swept bushes.

"Shade"

8 x 10

This is an old house at the fishcamp we painted at a couple of times during the week. It was a great place mainly because there was a lot of great shade and a nice cool wind blowing off the river. This was one of those plein air things that depended on the proportions and perspective. I got pretty close. I changed the trees to better show the corner of the house. I got some nice compliments on this one.

"Guana Looking North"

5x7

Second one of the morning. After a one mile hike, I knew I had to stay a while.

"Guana View"

5 x 7

After the hike this was painted at the picnic table.

"Guana Jungle"


5 x 7


This is from Guana State Park between Valano Beach and Ponte Vedra. A neat place that really made me wish I had my bike. I hiked about a mile on paths through pure Florida jungle. At the other end of the trail is the intercoastal waterway and a picnic table. After hiking the mile I finished four paintings. Three small ones and the 11 x 14 below.

"Big Guana Sky"


11 x 14

"Looking South on the Intercoastal"

8 x 10

At Summer Haven on Sunday morning.

Wind and Light

16 x 20

My computer is finally back in business. I got a new one from Dell. When I turned it on out of the box there was a clicking noise. "This can't be right." says I. I talked with Jorge at Dell and he said it was the hard drive. He would send me a new one. Next day I get a hard drive open the box and it says "refurbished". I call Dell and speak to Sonja, then Bradley, then Jose, and they finally agree to send me a new one. Three weeks later I have a new hard drive and it is working great.

This week I am at the Crescent Beach Paint Out in Crescent Beach just south of St. Augustine. Having a great time, but working hard. Getting up early for that morning light, but it sure beats hanging around at the office.

This one is from a palm hamock near Marineland at the University of Florida Center.

"River Bend"


14 x 11


Sorry for the lack of posting. I have been humbled by technology. My computer died. The diagnosis was hard drive something. Not working, I can't even can get all my old files, including photos of my paintings. Well that's not totally true. Apparently I can send it to some outfit in California that will retrieve everything for cool 1K. Oh well, my biographer will have to do that. I'll save the computer and this will make a nice introduction to the book. I thought my office server was copying all this stuff so it wasn't so stupid on my part, but it was only copying work stuff. I guess my computer guy is not an art lover.

Anyway, I am trying to get back in the grove of posting for those few fans out there. (Thanks Mom and Dad) This is from my favorite river of all time the St. Johns River and this is down by Lemon Bluff. Beautiful stuff in real life. I hope I have done it justice.

Thanks for looking.

"Quiet Stream"

20 x 16

This is from a photo of a stream in North Carolina. The stream runs through a field near Camp Ridgecrest. I took some photos while Kendall ran. What is it about streams? Kids love them. Kids paly in them all the time. I remember as a kid going to North Carolina for Christmas. We stayed at a cabin that had a small stream running near it. By the time the week was over me and my 3 brothers had all fallen into the stream at least once. And I remember it was really cold. So I am still drawn to streams and water.

Thanks for looking.

"In a Florida Jungle"

20 x 16

"Stopping by the Woods on the way to Orlando"

Whose woods are these

I think I know

His house is in

Orlando though.

My little truck

Must think it queer,

To stop without

A gas pump near.

I cut the motor

And open the door

And view with my camera

The woods before.

The only sound

The silent love

Of light wind

In the trees above.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep

But I have promises to keep

And miles to go before I sleep

And miles to go before I sleep.

My apologies to Robert Frost. This is why I am a painter and not a poet. But these woods are much the same as Robert Frost's woods. There just isn't any snow and there is no horse anymore. But I have tried to capture that same idea of woods being lovely, dark and deep. I hope I succeeded.

Thanks for looking.

"Well Worn Path"

18 x 24

I'm not sure if I have already posted this painting before. I changed it recently adding the path across the field. I thought it needed a lead-in to the painting. This is more of the farmland around this area that I am looking at more and more for painting subjects. I know this barn is kind of smack dab in the middle of this thing, but sometimes you just have to do something different and try and make it work. Conventional painting wisdom would have you put this rusted red roof closer to one side in the magic one third area. So . . . maybe there is a reason for conventional wisdom . . . and maybe not. I recently listened to (yes, I am not a reader, but a listener (unabridged only)) a book about Edward Manet called The Judgment of Paris by Ross King. Really interesting historical book about Manet's rise and the impressionist. At that time everyone was painting really intricate paintings of war scenes and mythological settings and Manet does something different. And it is ridiculed and criticized and nobody wants it, until somebody decides they do want it and suddenly there is a new style of painting.

So therefore be it resolved that Steve Andrews will now only paint . . . . hell I don't know. I think Manet was just trying to make good art. He thought there were too many war paintings. "Yeah, no more war, I'm going to put two guys out in the woods in business suits with two naked ladys. Yeah that will work." (For my wife this is Manet thinking. It's one of his famous paintings.)

So therefore be it resolved that Steve Andrews will just try to make good art and leave it at that.

Thanks for looking.

"Florida Palm"

30 x 24

Florida palm trees against a blue sky.

Thanks for looking.

"Three Fishermen"

5 x 7 (plein air)

Another from Palm Beach. From the beach under the umbrella. There was a grey lavender sky from a storm brewing south of us. These three guys all had white t-shirts on, but they only stood there about two minutes. They caught my eye because of the bright white t-shirts against the storm clouds. Sometimes the painting paints itself.

Thanks for looking.

"House by the Railroad"

5 x 7

Can you imagine how loud it is in the bedroom when a train rolls by at 1 am? And how does someone go about getting a loan to build a house that close to a railroad. Or imagine the day the lawyer knocks on your door and says "you know that easement that was on the deed that you signed. Well that notation "RR". That actually meant railroad, not rest and relax. But the good news is they are building a slick new railroad crossing gate with a fancy bell. Some people are just lucky."

But really, I'm sure you get use to it. There are all kinds of noises in our life that we simply accept and ignore. My parents have a house that sits up on a hill above a beautiful swampy lake and about one quarter mile across the lake is Interstate 95. And you can difinitely hear cars and trucks, every day and every hour, but it is, no kidding, kind of like waves crashing out in the water when you are at the beach. I mean by that, it is soothing and not aggravating.

Now, on the other hand, I remember the first night on the seventh floor of our hotel in mid-town Manhatten. It was loud with horns honking and sirens in the middle of the night. And there was nothing soothing about it at all. But New Yorkers probably don't even hear it.

And so, the owners of "house by the railroad" probably talk about the soothing sound of the 4 am express roaring through the Georgia backwoods.

Thanks for looking.

"Georgia Field"

5 x 7

This is from the postcard series of landscapes of Florida and South Georgia. I have completed about 60 of these so far this year. The plan is to do 40 more and exhibit them at the Plantation Wildlife Arts Festival in Thomasville in November. They should all be 5 x 7 and will sale for only $110.00 each. I'm putting some of them in floating frames and I think it will be pretty cool.

This is my sixth year at the show and it is a great event that helps raise money for the Thomasville Cultural Center. They treat the artists very nicely and the people of Thomasville are great supporters of the arts. I really don't consider myself a wildlife artist, but landscape can be wildlife, and they keep asking me to come back even though I rarely paint animals. There are some really talented people at the festival and I always come away motivated to keep getting better. I'll keep posting more of them on the blog.

Thanks for looking.

"Where Water Meets Land"

8 x 10 (plein air)

From the trip to Palm Beach. This is what happens when you sit under an umbrella at the beach looking for something to paint. There is point where you just decide to paint what is right in front of you. And, what is right in front of you is the lapping waves that edge up and recede. Down at Palm Beach there are great colors in the water. If you study it long enough you find colors based on reflections of sky and wave foam and everything else. I think it makes for an interesting painting. It is just an ordinary scene that happens millions and millions of times a day, everywhere sand meets water, and in every situation it is different.

Thanks for looking.

"Mountain Above Ridgecrest"

5 x 7 (plein air)

From Royal Gorge looking east above Ridgecrest. Went with Zack, who took his guitar and went to a deck that overlooks what my kids call Royal Gorge. Had to work fast because the sun was setting. Great colors in the sky and the distant mountains. Hope I did it justice.

Thanks for looking.

"Bridge to West Palm Beach"



6 x 8

I am back from a vacation to South Florida. These were painted from the bike trail on Palm Beach. I took my daughter, Kendall, every morning to the trail that is on the intercoastal side on Palm Beach so she could run in the shade of the tall hedges between the mansions and the water. She is a serious runner on her high school cross country team. Palm Beach in the summer is a hot place, so you look for shade and run early. The trail is a beautiful and peaceful place. It is very well maintained almost like a nice golf course. In morning you hear the sound the gas powered lawn equipment. You don't get to see much of any of the houses unless you can find an empty spot in the hedges. The people on the trail are generally older and nicely dressed and more than a couple women smelled of expensive perfume. Everyone was very friendly. Kendall's workouts lasted just about an hour, so these got done quickly.

"Across to WPB"


5 x 7

These were a great way to start the day. I wish I had had more time, but I was glad to be able to wear the Dad hat, and coach hat, for maybe the last time after ten years of helping kids run during summer vacation. Kendall is a senior this year and over the last ten years I have gotten up with Stephen and Zack and Kendall, and helped make sure they did their summer training. If you think that is crazy, then you are probably right. Having been a runner myself, I know how tough it is to get this done, even when you are not on vacation. And the fact is, looking back on all those years of riding bikes and searching for trails, and early morning wake ups, and after run coffee and donuts and conversations, I would definitely do it again.

Thanks for looking.

"Swimming Dock / Ridgecrest"


5 x 7

At Camp Ridgecrest near Balck Mountain, N.C. This is a big hunk of poured concrete. They have changed the swimming area over the years and I think they call this the old swim dock.

Thanks for looking.