Neil Scanlan

Santa Reba

2010-11-15T17:16:00.000-08:00

We're just back from an emotional trip to West Texas. We were invited to participate in the spreading of the ashes of one of our dear friends and fellow travelers to Big Bend. Lynn Bell was a wonderful lady who loved this part of Texas--the part that appeared in the movie Giant. Lynn was the epitome of a Texas gal--strong willed and spirited, not afraid to tell it like it is. She was also a redhead. Which inspired me to do a retablo for her in which Reba McEntire appeared as Saint Reba. That further inspired me to do a portrait of Santa Reba. I wouldn't ordinarily present someone living as a saint, but as you all know, Reba has been enshrined in the Grand Old Opry and that is as close to sainthood as you get in this world. Pray for us, oh patron saint of redheads.

The One and Only

2010-10-31T14:36:00.000-07:00

Well, after getting five portraits in last year's Frisco City Hall show, only one got into the new show. (I think they're getting bored with my reductive mug shot approach.) I was happy they picked this "self-portrait" of Modigliani. I also did one of his companion, Hebuterne, but that didn't make the cut. For those not familiar, upon his death she threw herself from a high-storied window to her death. In photos, she looks pretty but intense, her face drawn, even before M. got his hands on it and stretched it out even further. In real life, she does not have tiny red eyes like a rat. What do you think he meant by that?

Capturing Jesus

2010-07-28T15:44:00.000-07:00

When I was a kid, I used to ask my Mom "What color is God?" Well, of course, God's son, Jesus, was blue eyed and fair skinned--at least he was in our church. I've attached a picture of another Jesus, the Mexican revolutionary, Jesus Rodriguez. He was not blue eyed nor fair-skinned. Like all good Mexican revolutionaries he was captured and later released. I originally did this portrait without the banner but added it later in honor of present-day Mexican votive paintings. And, hey, I got to use the GOLD paint because of it. By the way, "Gold" was the first answer my Mom gave me to my childhood question. God, Jesus and Buddha all deserve gold, don't you think?

Nostalgia Show

2010-06-04T11:53:00.000-07:00

An artists' organization in Dallas was having a Nostalgia Show which puzzled me for awhile as to what I could enter. Portraits are portraits and tend to be timeless. So I didn't think I had anything in my inventory to enter. Then I thought of a photo I took of Jan when we were staying in a bed and breakfast in North Carolina back in the 1990s. The B&B was said to be haunted which seemed to add some weight to the image the camera picked up. Anyway, the photo was accepted to the show which will travel to Frisco in July. In all my years of picture-taking, I have had only a handful of "winners" but I think this is one of them. You can decide for yourself. Regardless, I don't intend to trade the paintbrush for the camera anytime soon.

Me and Modigliani

2010-05-20T16:27:00.000-07:00

Took a fabulous book out of the library the other day with big reproductions of Modigliani's portraits. The book talked of all the influences on his work from Italian painting to African sculpture. It also talked about how his portraits came more from inside him than from the person sitting across from him. (I'll remember to tell that to the next person who doesn't recognize themselves in one of my portraits!) Also back from North Carolina where I stumbled on a landscape painter with a great style, Janet Green Jacobson. Kind of a cross between Hopper and Benton. (She's got a blog if you want to check out the work.) And a final congrats to one of my teachers, Margaret Scanlan, whose show of landscapes opens in Charlotte, NC, this week.

New Work

2010-04-09T02:33:00.000-07:00

Finished two recent commissions. For my grandsons, I painted a fire truck racing to put out a house fire. It's hanging in the art room where they work on the easels. For Jan, I finally finished a landscape that's hanging above the fireplace. Jan tells me she really likes it which is high praise. I've done a pretty good portrait of Modigliani and attached is one of Ed Ruscha. This is the second time I've painted him and I think this one's better than the previous one. Tax season ends for me Tuesday and I hope to start spending more time in the studio. Do your taxes!

Think Small

2010-01-22T08:06:00.000-08:00

The new year started with the arrival of five big canvases from Utretch. This was following the arrival of my very large easel, a present from Jan. That spurred a resolution to go big this year and try to complete about twenty more large portraits. Like all resolutions, this one hit a road bump when I found some small 8 x 10 canvases in the closet which I promptly gessoed and painted over. Here's one to the left. Now I am envisioning about twenty of these as a series. (Hey, they take less time to paint.) So I guess the bottom line is that I am not quite sure the new year will bring. Maybe a little bit of both.

New York Trip

2009-12-30T13:24:00.000-08:00

A little late in posting but we had a terrific visit in New York to see Christie and the Christmas lights. We walked the new High Line trail in lower Manhattan which is terrific. Then we looked in on David Hockney's landscapes of Northern England. Wonderful big bright pieces of representational art. (I'm a fan as you know.) Then we saw the Tim Burton show at MoMA. Now there's a guy with a vision--one that could keep you awake all night! Came back to set to work on my new easel--a Christmas present from Jan. Here's the first work using it. An awful lot of red, you say? Hey, it's Christmas. I'll get back to my earth tones after the first of the year. And a Happy New Year to you as well. Made your resolution yet?

Billy is in the Building

2009-11-14T14:12:00.000-08:00

The Art in the Atrium Show is up and my five paintings are strewn throughout the Frisco City Hall atrium. "Billy," featured here, is in the lobby just inside the front door. Three of my ladies are on the second floor in a good position. "Leah," who is Billy's counterpart, is in the second floor hallway, hanging alone, looking forlorn. Perhaps the Hanging Committee saw that in her look. Over the next eleven months many people will pass her and the other works to pay their water bill or visit the library so I welcome the exposure. It's nice of the city to hang local artist's work. I'm told our city has a bigger budget for public art than Fort Worth, a city known for its support of art. Oh, well, enough narrative. Time to get back to work doing my vague resemblances.

A Hanging in Frisco

2009-10-26T07:41:00.000-07:00

Got word this week that five portraits of mine have been accepted into the Arts in the Atrium show here in Frisco, TX. Paintings will be showcased throughout the five-level city hall for about ten months. As I've said before, it ain't the Louvre, but we'll take any exposure we can get at this point in time. Of course every jury is different, but it is nice to get some feedback on what work catches the judges' eye. Two of the paintings (including the one appearing here) were done on wood which is a technique I like and plan to continue. I just returned from a trip to Home Depot with 24 new 11 x 14 pieces of wood cut from one piece of 4 x 8 ply. I guess that means I should get back to work!

From Horses to Puppets

2009-10-13T06:45:00.000-07:00

In highlighting artist Susan Rothenberg's work at the Modern Museum in Fort Worth, Texas Monthly remarks that "horses launched her career but she's since turned to dismembering puppets." Wow, talk about a style change. Do you suppose the puppets all look like one of Susan's ex-boyfriends? May have to check the exhibit out. I don't plan to bring any small children with me however. I don't think dismembered puppets is something they should see before junior high. I myself am experimenting with a much less radical change in my painting. I am adding a narrative panel to my portraits. I'll post one as soon as I get around to photographing them. In the meantime, please bide your time by watching the paint dry on this barn wall.

That Terrible Word: Submission

2009-09-25T10:18:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I submitted ten portraits to the City of Frisco for inclusion in their "Arts in the Atrium" Show. Winners get their work hung (another interesting art word) in the imposing new city hall for about eleven months. Of course, we'd all rather be in the Louvre or some tony NY gallery, but we'll take what we can get. Like most artists who make a submission, I dread the other terrible word: rejection. But as art history tells us, don't worry too much about it. Just keep painting. You may get your revenge after you're dead. I've included one of the ten portraits submitted. Feel free to reject it. It will do me good.

Sweet Sistine

2009-08-19T06:15:00.000-07:00

As another birthday rolls around and my fear of Italian pickpockets has yet to subside, it becomes clear that I will probably never visit Rome and get to view Michaelangelo's work in the Sistine Chapel. So I'm doing the next best thing--painting faces from his ceiling. I'm working from a marvelous book on the restoration of the ceiling and some of the faces are very compelling. I've attached one to this entry. They are part of my continuing experiment of acrylic on heavily gessoed wood. If I get enough of them done I may panel our living room ceiling. (I may first have to pass this idea by Jan.)

Knock on Wood

2009-07-27T14:43:00.001-07:00

I am continuing with my program of portraits on heavily gessoed wood and/or canvas. I actually prefer the wood surface as a foundation. To that end I made a trip to Lowe's, whose slogan is "Let's Build Something Together." (Gene Hackman says it so cheerily you just want to go out to the nearest big oak and construct a playhouse.) In my case, I grabbed a big piece of thin plywood and had the lumber guy cut me twenty 11 x 14 wooden rectangles. Total cost: $18. I really do like the combination of wood, gesso and rubbed-on paint. The crude relief surface seems to match up with my crude, primitive portraits. Jan had me put eight of them on one of our walls. (One of them is included here.) I think eight is a bit excessive. But Jan seems quite happy. (I should marry this girl.) Excited about the next series I plan to do on the wood backgrounds. With any luck (knock on wood), I'll report back shortly.

Community College Dropout

2009-07-05T18:19:00.000-07:00

Since my last posting I signed up for a course in Classic Portraiture. My good painter friend, Mary Baxter of Marathon, TX, warned me that it may be detrimental to learn the right way to paint portraits. She was right. The teacher was great but she wanted us to paint as if every square inch was a mosaic, a tile, with a different color setting. I'm too ADD for that. So back to my experiment with portraits on wood. I am still trying to figure it out but that's the fun of it. Here's a sepia portrait of a young girl from a photo by Michael O'Brien. Thanks, Michael. More to come...I hope.

New Patron

2009-04-14T08:45:00.000-07:00

I'm delighted to announce that I have a new patron who has agreed to deposit $1870 a month into my bank account with the understanding that I do more painting and less work. In late March Jan and I applied for early Social Security benefits and on April 1st our first deposits arrived. The only caveat with retiring early is you have to watch how much you earn. I plan to do that. With a few exceptions, I'll be devoting more time to the artwork. (By the way, if any of you would like to pay me NOT to paint, I'm good with that, too.) In the meantime, here's a new heavy gesso/rubbed-down paint portrait that I was pleased with. Hope you enjoy it, too.

It's a Dog's Life

2009-03-23T16:52:00.000-07:00

I've finished gesso-ing all the old portraits from last summer's show so now I have to decide if that's actually a style or if I am going exploring again. I was able to put the decision on hold while I did a more conventional portrait of Parker dreaming about her favorite treat--cow ears. No, those are not real cow ears in the painting--although I am sure the real ones are hard and petrified enough to outlast the acrylic paint--they are just small gessoed pieces of plastic. The painting was well received as the recipient recognized it as her dog or at least one of the litter she came from. The nice thing about painting dogs is they never complain about whether the likeness is accurate or unflattering. They just sniff and wonder why those are not real cow ears at the top of the picture.

Gesso You Know

2009-02-02T08:13:00.000-08:00

With the new year, I decided to recycle many of the canvasses that were part of my July "Faces" show. Looking them over, I have to admit that maybe four-to-five of them were worth keeping. (Two of the best sold to friends.) So I got them down from the attic and gesso-ed the hell out of them. The excess gesso created a very interesting surface on which I decided to do more distressed portraits with color rubbed in by hand. I'll attach one to this entry. The style is looser and more spontaneous in some way. I'm going to stay with it until I've recycled most of the canvases. What comes next is anybody's guess.

A New Year

2009-01-01T12:08:00.001-08:00

Where has the blogger been? Happy to say painting some. I did two commissions for Christmas. One shown here for Jim A. It's a picture of his girlfriend Nancy. Word back is that Nancy likes it and intends to keep it. Second commission was a portrait of four grown kids. Each had his or her own quadrant. Word back is that one is a go, too. On the last day of the year I submitted a few portraits to an upcoming Texas Guild Show. I'm hopeful one or more may get in. New Year's resolution is to turn my web page which currently displays advertising to one that shows my growing gallery of art. My daughter Christie has agreed to help out with the design. Still have many of my "Faces" canvases left to recycle. I have been gesso-ing them generously and then rubbing paint down on the uneven surface. I'm liking the results and will post one of them soon. If anyone's reading out there, Happy New Year! And if you're a painter, well, squeeze your tubes and get back to work!

Painting with Guinness

2008-11-16T17:00:00.000-08:00

It's been awhile since I last posted. My excuse? Well, I was busy doing some new paintings for an occasion dubbed "Libations" scheduled for the new room at Lochrann's Pub in Frisco. In honor of the venue, I decided to work in a palette of Guinness colors--from white and Naples yellow to burnt umber and black. I enjoyed preparing the work--seven paintings in all. The big disappointment came the night of the fete when we learned that the new room was not ready. What construction project ever is? I had a pint of Smithwick's so that I could cry in my amber. And now it's back to work to do, I hope, nine or ten more of these buff portraits. Will report back later!

Starving Artist

2008-10-06T13:11:00.000-07:00

This will be the first year I will get to claim some earnings from my paintings on my federal tax returns. I know, should have asked for payment in cash. What can I say? The checks I did cash amounted to $375 so far. $300 of that came from sales at my one-man show in July. The other $75 was from an honorarium from a show in Tulsa last December. So it was with some dismay that I read an article in a recent New Yorker about Elizabeth Peyton, a portraitist. Her works currently sell in the three hundred-thousand dollar range with re-sales going as high as one million dollars. Why so high? Well, Elizabeth can sure draw good. And she's classically trained with a degree from the School of Visual Arts in New York. But I think her big secret might be that she's a Proust fan. Never having read him, I have no idea what lucrative clues to portraiture might be contained in his prose. But you can bet your next tube of cadmium yellow I'm going to find out. I'll keep you posted.

By the way, the above featured portrait is part of Sandro and my trip to the mall. (It's for sale, Proust-lovers.)

First Commission

2008-09-30T18:05:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow I am delivering my first commissioned portrait. Since it's a Christmas present I realize I can't say much more than that, much less show the work in question. (This gives you a great reason to check back into the bog on December 26th.) I think the canvass I am delivering is a good meeting of the lady's likeness and my style. I worry a bit because, as the great portrait artist John Sargent said, "every time I paint a portrait, I lose a friend." I hope that's not the case here. Otherwise I will have to find someone else to lunch with every Wednesday. Since you are reading this, I figure the least I can do is, in place of the commissioned work, show a "non-commissioned" piece. Here 'tis.

Leftover Landscapes

2008-09-20T10:20:00.000-07:00

One of the side benefits of buying big sheets of canvas is that after I have completed an 11x17 portrait for my friend, Botticelli, I have a narrow strip of canvas left. These strips provide a painting area of approximately 5 x 14 which seemed right for a panoramic landscape. So that's what I've begun to create on these little leftovers. I'm finding that it's fun. Also the size dictates that they be simple paintings with not a lot of detail. Right up my alley, you might say. The one featured here is being given away at an upcoming auction. (I'm expecting high six figures, how about you?) Also, while I'm here I should report that my Botticelli channeling has peaked at eight. I'm waiting for feedback from Sandro (or his foundation--see previous blog) before I proceed. I was comforted to find out that the new fall fashions are bringing back the hood (see previous blog). I know Sandro will be pleased. The update seems to be working.

Channeling Botticelli

2008-08-21T10:45:00.000-07:00

And odd thing happened to me as I searched for a new project following my disastrous "Faces of Frisco" project. O.K., not disastrous. Just disappointing. I thought people would like seeing their visage on the wall and want to give my over-sized acrylics a permanent home in their media room. Regardless I had fun. And isn't that what it's all about? Two people who know a lot about art bought two of the portraits. God bless them. But getting back to Botticelli...here I was searching for a new project when Sandro Botticelli came to me in a dream. "Caio, Neilo," he said. "I need someone to update my portraits. I want to give them a contemporary twist. I want to see them in the latest from the GAP." So at Sandro's behest, I have started updating his portraits. I haven't heard back from him, but I think they look better already. I mean, the clothes that they were wearing in the sixteenth century now look so, well, dated. I hope to continue this project until I run out of images or someone from the Botticelli Preservation Society approaches me with a cease and desist. Believe me, if the price is right, I'll consider it.

Patrons Found

2008-08-15T19:51:00.000-07:00

The deadline has past for the subjects of my paintings to purchase their likenesses. Only one subject came forward. Bea, a strong supporter of the arts and key member of our artists' guild. Thank you, Bea. (Her portrait is shown nearby.) Two more portraits were purchased by old friends. Thank you, old friends. All got my special "Back-to-School" discount. I guess the newspaper circulars had an effect on me. The best news about the sales is that they legitimize my tax return where I will claim expenses for canvas, paint, post cards, wine for the reception, wine for my patrons and wine for the artist himself. (I find I get more inspiration from Cab than Merlot. How about you?) Oh, yes, and a portion of my earnings return to the artists' guild to fund future projects which is a good thing. By the way, there are still 21 portraits without owners and if you send me a copy of your passport photo there's a good chance I can doctor one of them to look just like you. Think about it. My "Back-to-School" discount runs out August 25th.

Don't Quit Your Day Job

2008-08-07T15:33:00.000-07:00

Well, the clock is ticking. And so far only one of my subjects has come forward with an offer to purchase their painting. The price is $100. A wise person might make a gamble on the fact that the value could increase once I die and am finally discovered via my letters to my brother Theo, er, Donald, asking for money. I believe a van Gogh recently went for $66 million at Christies. Come on, people, take a chance. Anyway, today I moved the exhibit to a retirement community in Frisco where we fill the walls with art. The activities director, on seeing my work, was speechless. She's either in the "this guy will be very valuable when dead" camp or in the "this is a terrible mistake" camp. If she's in the latter, I will have some more work to do taking down paintings soon.

Breaking Down the Show

2008-07-30T15:35:00.000-07:00

Today marked the last day of my month-long show, "Faces of Frisco," a series of 23 oversized acrylic paintings. We had a good range of subjects from the town, including our past Mayor, the Manager of our Double AA baseball team and the Snow Cone Lady. What took hours to put up came down in about seven minutes. It's all packed away in my studio. The people in the paintings have been offered a chance to buy the portraits for the cost of materials and a six-pack or two. This was the first time I had undertaken a theme for my paintings and I found it eliminated one of the hardest parts of painting for me--what to paint. I just moved on from face #4 to face #5 and so on. I've got another theme picked out for a series of paintings but I will keep that under my hat until I see for myself that it's extendable.

Sketchy Thinking

2008-07-29T08:20:00.000-07:00

This is my first blog. My daughter, C., is helping me with it. Next, I plan to get a cell phone. I hope to post some art and some thoughts about it. Stay tuned.