Reach For It - by Jeff

Here's another painting for my New York show. I replaced the stuff on the actual billboard with my monkey and an inspirational message: "YES! Reach for it!" Isn't that inspiring? Don't you want to buy whatever it is that the monkey is selling? I certainly do.


42" x 42" oil and encaustic on panel

Terry Rafferty recently asked about my technique for painting on all my little squares. I started doing it a few years ago as an experiment, and I liked the feeling of the process and the finished work so much that I never stopped.

I start with one of my own photos, and I separate it into a grid. Then I view only that part of the photo that corresponds with the tile I am painting. Lately I have been starting with a sketch in black ink, using a Kuretake brush pen. The squares are cut from 1/4" thick MDF, and coated with two layers of grey gesso. I sand the gesso lightly to create a nice, smooth surface for the brush pen.

After the initial sketch is done, it's just a matter of painting what I see: square by square. I'll usually visit each square about four times, depending on the complexity of the image depicted on that square. I let the form and the color values vary from square to square, which creates an interesting effect. I always try to treat each little panel like a painting unto itself. When I put them all together I get the strangest sense of seeing something new, even though I painted each little piece!

Brother Eddie's - by Jeff

Last August my family went on a cruise to the Bahamas to celebrate my parents' 50th anniversary. I saw this funky, abandoned restaurant while walking through Nassau, and I knew I had to paint it. There are a lot of closed businesses there, and a lot of new ones springing up. You get the feeling that people are very resilient in the Caribbean! But it makes you wonder: what killed Brother Eddie's? Was the food terrible? Was it the global economy? I bet it had something to do with the fact that meals are included on cruise ships. Eddie's probably doing a brisk business in T-shirts at the straw market now. I'm sure he'll be fine.


Brother Eddie's - 42" x 60" oil and encaustic on panel

Third Gardenia - by Leslie

This is the third in a series of paintings I have done of gardenias sitting on the counter at my mother-in-law's house at the beach. I can hardly wait for my own gardenia bush - started from a cutting of hers - to bloom this summer so I can get more reference material. There is something about the delicate petals of these flowers, contrasted with their thick, shiny leaves that compels me to paint them. I love the way the light penetrates the petals and the green from the leaves reflects back onto the flowers. This painting was a pure joy to paint, and I had a difficult time deciding that it was finished and moving on to other things.



Third Gardenia - 9" x 12" oil on canvas

Salt Water - by Jeff

Here's a painting that I recently finished of a salt shaker and a glass of water. I like painting simple still life subjects with my Fragments technique (that's what I call the deal with all the little squares.) There's a lot of variety of colors to explore with this kind of composition of relatively neutral tones.


24" x 48" oil and encaustic on panel

TabletDraw - by Jeff

Coffee Pot drawn in TabletDraw

If you have a Mac and a tablet, you really should try TabletDraw. I say this not just because it was created by my son Spencer, but because it really is the best program for drawing on the Mac! Did I mention that it was created by my son?

See, when Spencer was about eight years old, Leslie and I gave him our old Macintosh SE30. It was one of those old, black and white, all-in-one computers, and we had just upgraded to a bigger, faster machine. I told Leslie at the time that my plan was to encourage Spencer to experiment and explore computing at an early age, and then when he was older he could write software for ME! Here's the crazy thing: It actually worked!

A couple of years ago Spencer (he's 22 now) was looking for a simple drawing program that accurately rendered his pen strokes, and he really didn't find anything. He set out to write his own program, and asked me for suggestions about features I would like to see. What followed was a great collaboration: I would say "how hard would it be to..." and Spencer would say, "I could probably do that." At first he would come back in a couple of hours with a working prototype of whatever suggestion I had made, and then hone and perfect it over time. Since then my suggestions have become more elaborate, and the program has gotten much more complex, so it takes a little more time to make major changes. It's unbelievable how well the thing works, and Spencer has far outpaced even my wildest expectations.

He currently sells the software for $35, but you can download a free version that has limited undos and layers. Apple made TabletDraw a Staff Pick on their download site, and they even made it the Featured Download when it debuted. It has continued to receive strong critical acclaim, and it just gets better and better as he works on it.

You can check out and download the application here:

mooSoftware: TabletDraw

Reflection of Autumn - by Leslie

This is a painting of a silver sugar bowl sitting on my front porch. My house faces west, and early last fall I took advantage of the early afternoon light to capture the view of the changing colors in the reflection in the silver as a single oak leaf had blown up on the porch. The backdrop is a vintage metal Coca Cola cooler that sits on the porch to hold my potting supplies (I try to keep a few flowers going through the summer with varying levels of success!) I love the combination of the bright red of the cooler and the earthy tones of the wood and leaves. This porch is my favorite room in my house, especially for those few weeks each fall and spring when the Georgia weather is mild enough to enjoy morning coffee in my rocking chair.


12" x 12" oil on canvas

Stargazer in Light - by Leslie

This is a painting of a stargazer lily sitting on the ledge by the stairs leading up to my bedroom. There is a south-facing window at the top of the stairs where light streams in. I love the way strong sunlight penetrates the petals of a flower, making them glow. I find painting flowers to be an act of pure joy when I have this kind of light to work with. The lily sits in a bottle that I picked up somewhere for a quarter and the bubbles in the water play perfectly in the light. There isn't much to say about this painting other than these little scenes make me happy... happy when I see them, and happy as I paint them.


Stargazer in Light - 8" x 10" oil on canvas