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Post #1078 • October 24, 2007, 4:50 PM • 12 Comments

New at The Moon Fell On Me.

I drove down the Pacific Coast Highway coming back from work. The sea and the sky look like someone dumped an ashtray into a glass of milk. The sun shone through a blanket of smoke, casting an orange sunrise light all day long. Ash fell like a light and cheerless snow. But we are fine. The closest fires are 28 miles away, the temperature will drop ten to fifteen degrees tonight, and the air is holding still.

Comment

1.

beWare

October 24, 2007, 5:16 PM

The others never really hit me, this one is simply striking.

2.

J.T. Kirkland

October 24, 2007, 7:22 PM

Agreed. From the initial load this one simply pops. The extended length also helped build suspense. I had a feeling where you were taking us but I couldn't wait to get there. Once there, the reward was great.

The best to date, in my opinion.

3.

MMM

October 24, 2007, 8:32 PM

Simply lovely-i agree it is the best to date

4.

ahab

October 24, 2007, 8:48 PM

Very enjoyable. The rhythm of the poetry led me to expect an earlier ending, but towed me through to an even better conclusion. And I liked the simple variations of the diagonal-quadrant format for the colour studies.

5.

opie

October 25, 2007, 7:10 AM

These are nice. Strong color in watercolor seems to work for you very well. They are very painterly and abstract but you never lose the sense of the landscape. Once again, I would like to see something like this 6 feet square.

6.

Franklin

October 25, 2007, 7:25 AM

Watercolors six feet square? Is that even possible?

7.

catfish

October 25, 2007, 7:31 AM

Rives BFK (unsized, so it is very absorbent) comes in rolls 300 feet long and 42" wide. I have done "watercolors" as large as 40 x 60 with it, stretched on masonite panel. One of them wound up with 4 inch thick paint on it, but that is a different story.

8.

Darren

October 25, 2007, 8:12 AM

If it was possible it would be worth a try! Maybe you could do as large of a square on paper as possible, 42 x 42 perhaps. I would be interested in seeing that. One possibility would be to paint them on textured clayboard, then you could go 6 x 6 feet.

catfish, out of curiousity, who has stretched your "watercolors" on baord for you? I am talking to a framer in Delray Beach who has done it well, but is a little far for me.

9.

ec

October 25, 2007, 8:26 AM

Franklin, I made some 36 x 60 stretched w/cs with Arches 140 lb hot press (not usually my favorite but malleable and when stretched behaves like rice paper). The issue was finding a tub big enough to soak the paper; otherwise, it stretched, as smoothly as canvas with the extra advantage of drying taut as a drum. Pouring paint on the dry surface de-stabilized the surface temporarily but dried well. It is really fun. There is the thrill and danger of potentially puncturing the surface. Probably best to put something beneath the paper, but without such a surface the work is feathery light and receives the brush with delicacy.

10.

catfish

October 25, 2007, 8:48 AM

Darren: I do my own stretching, build the masonite panels myself, and cross brace them with diagonals on the back. BFK is a very strong paper and exerts tremendous force when it shrinks. There is no danger in damaging it after it dries, as far as I can tell. I can use trowels on it with no bad effect and also dump lacquer thinner into a wash to perturb it by breaking up the surface tensionof the water so that dry areas are created right next to wet ones. Some paper will tear in that circumstance, but BFK does not. Nor does it display any tendency to form hills and valleys when it is re-wetted.

Unsized BFK is also good for lithographs that have large flat areas of black. The absorbency keeps the black from forming metallic flashes - of course, if you like the metallic effect ... don't use it.

11.

opie

October 25, 2007, 9:41 AM

When I said "something like it" I was thinking of simple thinned acrylic on canvas but fortunately the idea has unleashed a flood of very interesting technical suggestions which never would have occurred to me.

12.

wwc

October 31, 2007, 9:04 AM

Another good one Franklin. The lack of text at the end drives home the actual experience you're describing, or to say it better, making. The "rolling in" lines are just wonderful.

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