Stacy Weitz Minch

We're spending the week in Southern Arizona with family. It was a chilly morning while I was attempting to paint this barrel cactus (painting fail :P). Plein air painting is hard.

12 5/8 x 8 1/4", pencil on paper, 12/20/15 Another infamous Madame X sketch. I'm not usually much of a perfectionist, but doing these Sargent copies definitely brings it out in me. I could probably make corrections forever! I guess I don't know how hard I should try to be absolutely exact with my copying, but I do know that doing these copies has really helped me learn how to approach a drawing and become more effective and accurate from the start. I got dark with my pencil lines a little prematurely here, and if I try to erase it will look a mess. So I'm going to call this one done, even though I can see (especially looking at this side-by-side on the computer screen) that there are plenty of errors I'm just itching to fix. I'm tempted to try again tomorrow (maybe make a copy the same size as my intended finished drawing--I think that would help a lot).

12x12", water mixable oil on board, 12/17/15 December is so crazy busy. It feels impossible to get anything done--between dance recitals, holiday gatherings, gift shopping and wrapping--all that on top of the usual piles of laundry and daily life with the little ones. Whew! I really had to force a little painting into my day today because there are just so many other things I could be doing... but I'm glad I did. It always makes me feel better to use up some creative energy and refocus, even if it's just for a short little hour here and there :)

16x20, water mixable oil on panel, finished 12/13/15 I've been in the mood to finish old projects lately--the dress I started sewing for my daughter (which I'd like to get done before she grows out of it!), a quilt I started 6-7 years ago, and this painting. You can see which of my projects got first priority. An unfinished painting sort of gnaws at me, and I don't really know why... from what I've heard, DaVinci carried around the Mona Lisa for 25 years while he was still working on it--25 years!!! Ha, I don't think I could do it. Anyway, it was that silly white blanket and the proportions on the woman that kept holding me back, and while I am not perfectly satisfied with everything about this painting, I'm calling it good enough (mostly so I can feel good about starting on something else--I really don't like unfinished projects, and this one's been dragging on too long). So I guess all there's left is to do is sign my name ;)

I currently have a whole bunch of my little paintings hanging at a coffee shop called the Coffee Pod in Provo, UT! If you're in the area, check it out! Thanks to a good friend, the opportunity just fell into my lap a couple weeks ago, so I couldn't let it pass by (even though I didn't quite feel prepared... but I wonder if you ever do?). Anyway, this is exciting stuff, guys--it's so fun to see my work hanging in a public space. The show should be up for at least a month :)

10x8", water mixable oil on linen mounted on gator foam, 12/9/15 "Give a tree its gesture... in a tree there is a spirit of life, a spirit of growth and a spirit of holding its head up." ( The Art Spirit , Robert Henri). I love Robert Henri... a lot of his paintings are really great. I really like the laughing children he started doing later in his career--his quick, bold brush strokes really capture the feeling of the moment. Some of his stuff doesn't really do much for me. I recently saw one of his quickly rendered street scenes in the Portland art museum, and was like, hmmm... but really, I find that encouraging. Everyone has their failures and triumphs (not saying he would have considered it a failure--he was so instrumental in championing art as an individual mode of self expression and a way of living a life, so I appreciate his work anyway, even if I don't find some of it particularly beautiful). Anyway, his passion and enthusiasm for painting are c

12x9", pencil on paper, 12/8/15

6x6", water mixable oil on gessobord, 12/6/15 My daughter really wanted a watermelon when she saw them at the grocery store the other day, and it really wasn't very good... but at least the color was nice ;)

Both 6x6", acrylic on canvas panel, 12/3/15 5AM is too early to be painting (or doing anything for that matter), but when the baby wakes me up at 4 and I can't fall back asleep (worst time of the night to wake up, dontcha know?--fyi, I have lots of Minnesota relatives ;), well I might as well take advantage of the quiet house. These little studies were exercises in speed, really. They are both in acrylic, which is some crazy weird stuff. After painting with oil for a while, acrylic really throws me for a loop. You have to race the brush from the palette to the canvas, just so it doesn't dry in the meantime ;) And the paints I have aren't the heavy body kind, so they seem to have almost the consistency of, maybe mayonnaise? It's a whole different animal. But it does force me to go for just the essential values and colors and stop right there--acrylics are also very shiny and hard to get a good shot of without glare, sorry (some pretty distracting glar

6x6, water mixable oil on canvas panel, 12/2/15 I don't know why I keep trying to paint these roses--the color is impossible. It's making me think I should start on one of those massive color chart projects to see if I can figure out a way to duplicate what I'm seeing ;) Yes. I should, I should, I should. But I don't waaaaant to. It feels too much like homework ;) On another note, flowers. And painting in general. I'm starting to realize that it's all about simplification and holding back (hmmm, not so successful with this painting--I got a little stroke happy with those petals). Which before this year was something I would have never really supposed (doesn't it seem like when you look at a very realistic painting, that there is so much detail work?). But for the painter, it's all about leaving things out and only putting what is absolutely necessary--eliminating the details (where possible) and simplifying the scene into distinct masses for the v

6x6, water mixable oil on gessobord, 12/1/15 This little apple balanced better on its side than upright--which somehow reminded me of that silly spin the bottle game I heard all about in jr. high, but never actually played ;)

Last night's figure drawing. This was a two hour pose, and well, if I don't get slower at drawing each week! I think it's because I'm becoming more and more aware of my accuracy errors and caring more about fixing them. Probably not a bad thing ;)

18x24", water mixable oil on board, 11/30/15 I don't know... I think I'm about done with this one (maybe a few more touch ups?). This is probably the biggest I've ever painted with oil, and my goal was to be loose and fast. I feel like I've been a little tight with my painting lately. I really want to be able to accurately represent reality, because once you can do that, I think it gives you a great freedom to be able to do whatever you want to do with your art. But at the same time, I don't want to get so caught up in accuracy that I lose the fun. So I pulled out the really big brushes on this one, and didn't let myself get too caught up in any of the details, drawing or otherwise ;) I'm okay with that; it's basically what I was going for. Loose, fast, fun :). This is the view from the post office parking lot to the southwest of the building (the gray on the bottom is a big cement wall, ha. I left out the wrought iron fence and row of bush

My older sister was in town for Thanksgiving, and she agreed to hold still for a little bit while I sketched her :) This is not a perfect likeness, but it reminds me of her anyway... I filled in most of the values after she had left, so had I had a little more time, I may have been able to get a better likeness. Next time she's in town ;)

12x9", pencil on paper, 11/24/15 This one got a little messy ;) I wasn't quick enough to get the pose right in the first 20 minutes (why do I draw so slowly when I'm standing at an easel??? sketchbook on my lap, I feel like I can get a quick basic sketch done pretty quickly). And it was the same story after every break (and the pose shifted ever so slightly each time). So there was a lot of erasing and redrawing. I was using different paper this time (more textured than my usual), that also made my lines softer, which I'm not so sure I like. This model has such a beautiful nymph-like quality that I didn't quite capture (she's much prettier than I made her here... just started refining the features in the last 5-10 minutes and didn't quite get there). So overall, some room for improvement :) But when I feel bad about my most recent drawing, all I have to do is look back at the first night I came out to draw in March... haha ;)

Okay, I have a goal this week to draw for at least 10 minutes a day. I don't want to go days without doing something art-related, because it feels like I come back rusty when I do that. So here is a tiny sketch from last night (this head is about 2" tall, not including the neck/braid). The subject was my daughter, but I didn't quite get her likeness. She probably moved about 57 times in the 10 or so minutes I was drawing--a few more still moments might have helped. I think the trick to drawing kids is to get a super fast, but accurate basic outline, then watch and wait until they get in a similar position again and quickly put down another line, and just keep going like that--the trickiest part is getting that super fast (I'm talking, like, less than 10 seconds if you're lucky) and accurate basic block-in. Still working on that ;)

5x7", water mixable oil on linen panel, 11/20/15 I bought a few of these cute little indian corns (not sure that's a proper pluralization, but oh well) in all different colors at the grocery store a few weeks ago, and just got around to painting one of them last night. It's almost Thanksgiving!!! (I have some family coming into town next week, so I'm getting excited :)

I'm still trudging along on with this painting. I went at this poor lady's head again this week, and I'm feeling a little better about it now (though next time I paint a face, I will make it a much bigger face. 1 1/2 inches is just so small, and if something is off by the tiniest bit the whole face just looks horribly deformed, ha).  Since the picture above, I've scraped out the blanket (again!) and am going to give it another try sometime (maybe soon?). I've had a hard time creating the illusion of depth with this silly blanket, and I think part of the problem is that I'm working from a photograph. The camera exposes for only one gray value, and this blanket was just a little blown out, so I'm having to fudge the values, which I'm not really that great at. So I'm going to try pulling it up in Photoshop and reducing the exposure for the blanket and see if that will help. I may need to bring her feet a little more forward/elongate them b

12x9", pencil on paper, 11/17/15 This was a two-hour pose, but I didn't get very far on it :) For one, I was standing up, which always throws me off a bit. I've been trying to figure out why that is, since standing definitely does make it easier to quickly compare your drawing to the subject. I think it's because I don't have something to rest my arm on, and it makes my fine motor skills a little less... fine. Also, one of the students there at the CAS was trying to help me approach the drawing the way they do there at the school. Which is a slightly different way of looking at things than I usually do (though really pretty similar, if a little more structured than my usual way of working), so it threw off my groove just a little bit (not a bad thing). I redrew those legs about a zillion times. It didn't help that I had been up half the night before (my baby has decided about 1-4am is a great time to be awake, ha).

8x10", water mixable oil on canvas panel, 11/13/15 A quick plein air sketch I did yesterday afternoon (about an hour or so). It was so sunny and beautiful and peaceful out in the crisp fall air. And then I came home, turned on the 5:00 news, and learned about all the tragedy in Paris. :'( "You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty." -Mahatma Ghandi

6x6", water mixable oil on gessobord, 11/12/15 I could probably paint a pomegranate every day of the year and not get sick of them. I love their rich colors and textures, individual shapes, and characters. I haven't done a lot of painting or drawing the past week... not really sure why. Maybe it's the time change, the change in the weather (brrrr), or burnout from trying to finish that bigger painting last week (I like to start something and get it done ;), or something else altogether, but I've been in sort of a funk the past little while. Having a daily painting habit has made me much more aware of my mental and emotional state, which is probably a good thing... but makes me feel a little neurotic, because I'm much more aware of my shifting moods. It seem like the balance of my life has to be somewhat aligned before I feel like painting, which makes it all the more obvious when something is off (and I've learned it's never a good thing to try

Since I didn't make it out to drawing last night, I asked my husband to pose for me while he was watching TV. Well, he definitely does not have a future career as an art model--he moves just as much as the kids, ha! Anyway, it's hard to draw something that moves a lot. But I got better with each attempt (I think). With my first one, I WAY over exaggerated the size of the features (why do I do that!?). The second one got super messy because of all the constant motion ;) and the third one I might have had a solid 5 minutes on before any major movement, so it was a little better. And then my daughter fell asleep on the couch, so I had a little bit better luck with this 10-15 minute sketch (though she still didn't hold still, ;).

6x4", water mixable oil on linen panel, 11/8/15 Today I decided to do a quick sketch of a sunflower for a nice diversion. I don't think it's productive to work on something once you've gotten sick of it, so I'm going to let that other painting sit until I feel like picking it up again (maybe I never will, and if so, I'm okay with that). This one was just fun :) I think flowers are excellent practice for shape, value, color... everything.

The mother's head just kept looking worse--it was too small and was getting smaller the more I worked it (which is a new one for me--I usually exaggerate heads ;), overworked, dull colors, etc. I read in an oil painting technique book (I think Harold Speed's?) that you can put a thin layer of white paint over an area that needs to be reworked, so I'm going to give this one a rest for a few days while it dries and try again. Maybe it can be saved :) I might scrape out the white of the mother's blanket (for maybe the third or fourth time) and try again. Getting those subtle gradations of white to appear three dimensional is really difficult :/

Currently dangling precariously between #3 and #4 in the sequence below (and I don't always make it to #6 ;)

12x9, graphite on paper, 11/3/15 My figure drawing from last night's session. I was trying to focus more attention on mass than I usually do. My drawings tend to be a bit cartoon-y sometimes. Looking at this, I can see that her left hand is a little too big and far from her body. Should've stepped back a little more to compare, but I was tired and didn't feel like standing last night... so I sat to draw.  Funny--it's almost the exact same pose as last week's model. Weight on a different foot, though (and a different model :)

I'm trying to get the trickiest pieces of the picture out of the way first... And also calculate the order in which I lay on the paint. It takes some strategy. Faces are always the trickiest... especially little faces. Every tiniest deviation makes such a huge difference in appearance! Still not done with these but they are getting closer. So far so good, I suppose. I'm not racing to the garbage can with this one (not yet anyway ;) As much as smaller daily paintings fit my schedule right now, Its probably good to experiment with larger paintings here and there, so I don't get too dependent on working small--even though it can be a little exhausting (and hard to find the time)!

16x20, water mixable oil on board, 11/1/15 I'm just getting started on this larger painting (I know that relatively speaking, 16x20" is not that big! but it's bigger than I usually figure I have time for). I stumbled across this couple in the foyer at church a while back, and I just had to snap a stealthy photo on my iPhone :) Working from a photo is always more difficult for me than working from life, but I do have access to the very spot where this photo was taken, so if I need to I can zip over there some afternoon to study from life. Starting something new is always a little scary--there's always the very real possibility that it won't turn out! But if so, I'm sure I will learn something important from the experience, so here I go. Wish me luck ;)

6x6", water mixable oil on gessobord, 10/30/15 "Every artist was first an amateur" -Ralph Waldo Emerson. This was one of those paintings where what I was trying to do came pretty close to matching what I actually ended up doing... which is how I envision the creation of art by the masters of this craft. They envision a painting, think through the necessary steps necessary to execute it (drawing on their previous knowledge and experience), and then carry out those steps, making something pretty close to what they envisioned. Precise control. I'm sure the only way to get consistent with that kind of mastery is by putting many miles of canvas behind you.  I've occasionally been told that I am  too  hard on myself. Reading through a few of my blog posts, it's clear that I am critical of my work. I don't gloss over my imperfections. This doesn't bother me. I like to be realistic and authentic. If I feel dissatisfied about something in my p

Some quick plein air studies from yesterday afternoon.

12x9", pencil on paper, 10/27/15 I was a little more caught up on sleep than I was at figure drawing last week, thank goodness. Same model as last week, and a two hour pose.

9 5/8 x 10 1/16, pencil on paper, 10/26/15 I loved this drawing the first time I saw it. It has such a spontaneous quality, and you can really see how Sargent broke up complex subjects (like shiny black fabric and hands) so simply and effectively. Doing these copies is helping me realize a lot of things. One, I always make heads and facial features too big. Including in this drawing. If you compare it to the real one, it's very obvious (also the tilt of the head is a bit off. see below). It's strange because I think I measure everything out and get it in the right place, and then it's not. Two, capturing a likeness takes ultimate precision. It is not easily done. Three, the details make a huge difference--type of paper (mine was too rough in this instance), sharpness and hardness/softness of the pencil, etc.  I almost want to try this one again to see if I can get the head/face more in proportion... but I probably won't, at least not right this second. Dr

7x5", water mixable oil on linen board, 10/24/15 I found this beautiful rose growing in our front yard and brought it inside to paint, but I had a really hard time matching the color I was seeing in person. If I made the lighter values as light as they appeared, the saturation of color was completely gone. If I made the saturation as intense as in person, the value was too dark. Then I ended up adding too much in the petals, breaking up the masses too much, and it definitely weakens the rendering of the rose. So I'm not sure how people do this whole flower painting thing. Flowers are tricky little things. Anyway, I do still have this rose sitting in my little painting corner, and maybe I will try again later today. There definitely are things I like about this little painting, and I learn something new each time I paint, so it was not a waste of time. I just think I could do better :)

5x7, water mixable oil on linen panel, 10/23/15 The clouds have been unbelievable lately here in Utah--so big and billowy. Whenever I go outside, I have this urge to paint! But I'm not a landscape painter (yet)... not that I wouldn't like to be. I'd like to be able to paint whatever I want :) However, I used to have this idea that I just couldn't paint landscapes (after a couple of miserable failed attempts).  But now I'm thinking, "Why not?" I'm sure I can learn how with some practice, and I do want to. I'm finding lately (especially since starting this blog and recording some of my thoughts as I go along), that I have this constant inner dialogue regarding my art. There's always a voice saying "you're not any good and you might as well not bother." I don't like that voice. And since I'm more aware of it, I'm becoming more effective and pushing it away. Who really cares if I'm not any good anyway? No on

5x7, water mixable oil on linen panel, 10/22/15 Same one, actually :) I decided to take Richard Schmid's advice (I read Alla Prima II earlier this year), and try out painting on a surface primed with an oil ground instead of acrylic gesso. Still getting used to it, but the oil ground seems nice--the paint doesn't get absorbed as much as the acrylic stuff (so I find myself painting a bit thicker than is probably necessary). As usual, all I had time for was about 30-45 minutes on this. I think I might get started on another one of those Sargent drawings tomorrow :)

6x4", water mixable oil on linen panel, 10/21/15 Just playing around with some new brushes for a few minutes yesterday afternoon :)