OIL PAINTINGS
Harris Harvey have produced a lovely video walk through of my paintings. For details, prices and availability see harrisharveygallery.com/ . Exhibition on view at Harris Harvey Gallery through September 28, 2024.
Velvet Sunset (feat. A.I.) by Sascha Ende
Free download: filmmusic.io/song/12033-velvet-sunset-feat-ai
License (CC BY 4.0): filmmusic.io/standard-license
I’m thrilled to share that I will have paintings on view at Harris Harvey Gallery from September 5 – 28, 2024. I’ve been working on getting ready for the show for a while and it’s wonderful to finally see it come together. Please go the gallery website to see what is still available.
I paint objects of intimate familiarity—fruits and florals from my garden, objects handled in my time as a mount maker for Seattle Art Museum—in compositions inspired by the Dutch Golden Age. Much as the Dutch masters would compose seasonal impossibilities, I bring together inspirations separated by time, space and tradition. My work is a reach for a childhood of birds’ nests and frogs, a longing to grasp that wonderment yet reconcile with isolation and loss. It is a meditation on the comings and goings of life, the closeness and distance to kin of all kinds.
A group exhibition celebrating 10 years of Antler Gallery
Antler Gallery in Portland, OR is celebrating their tenth anniversary with a huge group show “Untamed Splendor”. The show opens tonight, January 27th at 5pm. I’m so happy to be a part of celebrating the gallery and hope for their continued success.
My painting, “My Grandfather’s Poppies” will be in the show along with works by 60+ internationally renowned artists. oil on aluminum, 12” x 16”
October 7 – 30, 2021
Celebrating their 5th year as Harris Harvey Gallery and 37 years since the gallery’s founding, the gallery is hosting a new exhibit. This group show features a selection of artist that the gallery represents and I’ll have one painting in the show. The exhibition highlights a long-standing commitment to artists of the Pacific Northwest and West Coast, as well as reflecting the diversity of technique and creative vision that has been vital to the gallery’s history.
Artists: Kathryn Altus, Carole Barrer, Joel Brock, Mark Butler, John Cole, Peter de Lory, Charles Emerson, Gary Faigin, Terry Furchgott, Christopher Harris, Richard Hutter, Hart James, Ed Kamuda, Karen Kosoglad, Gregg Laananen, Kent Lovelace, Rebecca Luncan, John Lysak, John McCormick, Richard Morhous, Linda Jo Nazarenus, Royal Nebeker, Kim Osgood, Noelle Phares, Hiroshi Sato, Robert Schlegel, Christine Sharp, Lois Silver, David W. Simpson, Lisa Snow Lady, Wendy Thon, Emily Wood, and Thomas Wood
“In the months of July and August, Harris Harvey Gallery is pleased to present new paintings by Terry Furchgott, Rebecca Luncan and Noelle Phares.”
Miniatures have a special magic to them, but it’s been quite the luxury to dedicate some of my studio time to larger paintings. If you’re in the Seattle area and you’ve never seen my work in person, please stop by! The work is always so different in person than on the screen. You miss the subtle textures and any ares of transparency (where I’ve used glazing techniques) are completely flattened out in the photograph.
The largest painting I’ll have in the show is the one pictured above of different citrus fruits in a porcelain bowl with monarch butterflies. I’ve been studying Dutch still life paintings for several years and I’m experimenting with different tricks that I’ve discovered.
One is the distortion of the bowls. Did you notice? I was struck by how perfectly the different artists of the 17th century would render perspective in the tables and the rendering of the fruits, insects and flowers are nothing short of astounding. The bowls, though beautifully painted, are surprisingly at odds with natural perspective. It’s not accidental or an oversight in the artist skill, however it is done with purpose. The distortions show details of the bowls to their best advantage and bring the priceless and treasured pieces to the forefront of the compositions.
My bowl for this piece follows that technique. I choose a bowl that was very deep with beautiful brush work but the rim of the bowl was not as beautifully painted. Instead of using that rim design, I choose one of my favorites from the Seattle Art Museum collection. If I had used natural perspective for this one, even through the bowl was quite deep, the rim would interfere with the beautiful design along the side of the bowl and you wouldn’t see it in it’s entirety. It’s pretty fascinating to see how natural it looks in the completed painting.
What do these two paintings have in common? They’re both finalists in the Richeson75 Animals, Brids & Wildlife 2020 Competition! Visit the online exhibit to see all of the work included in the show.
Jack Richeson & Co. is a fine art materials manufacturing company and part of their mission is to directly support the visual arts community. They operate the Richeson School of Art & Gallery and have created a series Richeson75 International Art Competitions.
“The Richeson75 competitions are meant to offer a venue in which established and emerging artists may show their latest, best work to a wide and appreciative audience. The 75 finalists for each regular contest will exhibit their work in our beautiful Richeson Gallery and in the online exhibit. The Richeson75 online competitions also reach a wide audience with online exhibits of the 75 finalists’ work.”
All Richeson75 competitions are accompanied with the publication of a collectible, limited-edition, full-color, hardcover exhibit book which includes the artwork of the finalists and other meritorious entries from the competition.
The competitions showcase artwork made in the realist tradition. I’m honored to have two pieces among such a technically well-crafted mix of styles and subjects. Congratulations to everyone in the show!!
I was invited to participate in a three person show at Antler Gallery alongside Thomas Jackson of Australia and Vasilisa Romanenko who is based in New England. It’s pretty incredible that three artists that come from all over the world have so much in common! It was great to see my work alongside such creative and beautiful pieces. The show is up from October 29th -November 22nd.
I think it’s important to see your work outside the bubble of your studio. It helps me understand my perspective better, when seen alongside other contemporary artists, especially when those artists are investigating similar topics (in this case, looking at the natural world). It’s particularly exciting to see the dazzling technical care put into the artwork. Some people may see the word “technical” and think it’s cold and uncaring, but when in context of painting, I find it to be intimate and incredibly tender.
I’ve been working on miniature still life paitnings for almost two years now with my Monthly Miniature project. For this show, I have made three new larger pieces within the still life genre. I love making miniatures, but it’s great to be able to expand on my ideas. Both literally and figuratively! I’ve added some in-progress images at the bottom of this post so that you can get a sense of scale. Even though two of the paitnings are still quite small at 10″ x 9″, they’re just about twice the size of my miniatures! So you see how much more detail I can get into my insects and furit.
I hope you enjoy the new paitnings! Please take a look at Antler Gallery’s website. They have a great variety of beautiful and interesting work.
Antler Gallery in Portland is hosting their ninth annual group exhibition, Unnatural Histories. Artists are asked to depict mythical creatures from existing lore, or their own imagination, with reference to traditional natural history paintings, drawings and sculpture. When invited to make a piece for the exhibit, I had no choice but to make an oil painting of a unicorn.
I have a four year old son who is obsessed with these horned beasts. Unicorn drawings and parts of unicorn costumes have found their way all over my house and my painting studio.
I wanted ground my fantastic creature in traditional equine painting. I love the full body paintings of horses that were popular in early Georgian England. The masters George Stubbs and Jacques-Laurent Agasse are particular favorites of mine with their mix of landscape and formality.
The model for my unicorn was my sister in law’s Polish Arabian horse Vibey. Molly used to spend one day a week with Isaac until he was two years old and I wonder if she my have influenced his love of unicorns? When she saw the painting, she said, “you’ve painted the unicorn horn that I could always see”. Vibey was a rescue horse and she and Molly were very close. When asked to write a story about the painting, I imagined a fantastic setting with a little Molly saving Vibey, mirroring the true story between these two. Go to the galleries website to read my story.
Vibey was born on Whidby Island here in the Pacific Northwest. Placing her in a setting where she could see and hear the water felt like I was paitning her at her home.
Summer’s End
oil on aluminum, 11″ x 14″
Forgotten Garden, oil on aluminum, 9″ x 16″
In my “In Season” Monthly Miniature still life series, I studied and paid tribute to different artists of the Dutch golden age of still life paitning throught the year in which I completed that project. One of the artists I stumbled upon was Otto Mardeus van Schrieck. He created these incredibly detailed paintings that so perfectly contrasted the dark and light of the natural world. For that series I made a painting titled, “Forest Floor with Rabbits“. This painting was quite different than the others in the series that were more tradidional table top still life paintings. I think it was an important one to make for me to understand more fully the genere of still life in the 1600’s though.
I’d been toying with the idea of dedicating my next series of miniatures to “forest floor” paintings and decided on something different. When I got the invitation from Antler Gallery to participate in their Poison Garden exhibit I immediately knew exactly what I wanted to paint.
Years ago, I invited my neighbors foxglove flowers into my own garden when she was digging them up in fear that her dogs would eat them. The poisonous but beautiful flowers quickly bagan popping up in new places throught my garden and I encouraged them. When I had my son, however, I began to question that decision. Especilly since he loved foraging for different edible berries on his own. I began pulling them up, but there was no way I could get them all. The model for his painting is one of my survivors. My son still forages, but he’s a quick leaner and is very careful around the flowers. He actually held up a huge sheet of black paper behind the plant for me while I photographed it for reference for this paitning so that I could make the shadows and highlights more accuratly.
I included insects that are also poisonous, some with stings, others bites and I didn’t know this, but most butterflies are also toxic. Not that I’ve ever tried to eat one.
I hope you enjoy the painting and I hope you’ll go to the Antler Gallery website to see some of the other artists beautiful pieces for the exhibition.
Come wish me happy birthday at the opening of “Small Works Show”, Thursday, December 5th! The exhibition includes a wide array of subjects, styles and mediums including: painting, photography, printmaking, and mixed media works. I’ll have four painting in the show.
Harris/Harvey Gallery
1915 First Ave, Seattle, WA 98101
Tues – Sat 11:00 am – 6:00 pm; Mon by appointment
206.443.3315
December 5, 2019 – January 4, 2020
Opening Reception: Thursday, December 5, 6 – 8 p.m.
I’ll have two still life paintings in the show that have never been exhibited before. One is a painting of raspberries and insects that is part of my Monthly Miniature series form 2019, In Season. You can learn more about this painting on my blog. The other is from an ongoing larger still life series.
I picked dozens of bartlett pears from the garden this year and we hatched painted lady butterflies from a kit my friend gave to my son for his birthday. I choose the a bowl from the Seattle Art Museum collection that I used in a still life earlier this year Brussels Sprouts and Porcelain Bowl . I spent a year making mounts for the porcelain room at the Seattle Art Museum and fell in love with porcelains. This bowl features “three goats (yang) and the Three Friends of the Cold Season (pine, blossoming plum, and bamboo) all carrying a message of renewal appropriate to the beginning of the new year. Winter ends and spring arrives; yin is on the wane and yang is on the rise, heralding the rebirth of nature.” I chose a different goat for this painting.
I have two rabbits and have done more than a dozen painting of them. They were the focus for my first Monthly Miniature series and, years after finishing that series, they still find their way into my work. My indoor rabbits moved to an outdoor run last year and my rabbit paintings have likewise gone from interior settings to the wild outdoors.
