Saturday

I did a little Christmas shopping early this morning, much better than waiting till the afternoon. I made that mistake yesterday as I drove into the masses at Sugarhouse shopping district. A simple five minute project turns into a two hour ordeal, especially when you throw snow in the equation. 

So to relax I did this small 6x10 sill life of some citrus fruit, spending just about an hour on it. The orange was eaten for lunch. 

Richard Boyer

Wednesday

Just for fun I decided to buy a bunch of pears and paint them before it was too late, you know, before they all started to go over ripe.  I set up a little model stand next to the easel and arranged them on a white cloth with some leaves from the backyard.

This first one is a 6x10 inch

The next a 5x8 inches

And finally a 6x8

These quick studies are actually a blast to do, I can just get thick with the paint and play a little. I kept the sizes small enough so that I could get much of it done within an hour. Next up will be oranges, limes and lemons.

Richard Boyer

Monday, Dec. 16

The painting is coming more together now and I'm getting the light to do what I want. This is where I get excited about the work, that morning light will make for a great subject matter. With all the boats can see the business of the morning rush hour.

Richard Boyer

Saturday

Just another progress report as they say. I've been working more on the left side, especially the boats. And, yes I know, the one boat down at the bottom has a funny angle problem with it. I took the image from another photo where I was on a higher bridge looking more down. So tomorrow I'll have to stand back and figure out the correct perspective for the boat. In this case just to widen the stern end of the boat would help immensely. 

Richard Boyer

Wednesday

I blocked in more of the boats now, which will give it more life. The two figures there are waiting for the water way to clear out under the bridge before proceeding, a regular occurrence in Amsterdam with all the water traffic. 

I won't be able to get this finished for the crit session tomorrow, but hopefully I can get enough done to give it a sense of how it will look. 

Richard Boyer

Tuesday

This cold spell is getting ridiculous. Last night it was down to 4 degrees…

I moved back to the larger 30x40 Amsterdam painting again. Working on the main architecture - the hotel in the middle there. The light is blasting in from the right side, so I want to make sure to capture that effect.  The trees there will be back light from the sun as well. So the blues really need to be played up in the shadows to contrast the warmth of the light. 

Richard Boyer

Thursday

Here is another southern Utah painting I finished off. It was sitting in my studio for the longest time until I figured out what to do. I originally had the painting in Spring colors, rather subdued shades of light green. Then I figured why not try the Cottonwood trees in their fall colors, thats usually the nicest time of season down there. This view is Polly's Island down in Grand Gulch.  We just finished a long three day hike going down Bullet Canyon and coming up here. From this point we still had two miles to walk up out of the canyon to our shuttled cars.

My daughter and I are going skate skiing this afternoon up at Mountain Dell. She is part of the Utah Nordic Alliance, I'll do a few laps there while she trains. It's going to be a cold event no matter how you slice it, last night it went down to 6 degrees. I'm thinking a little red wine tonight at the crit session should warm me back up.

Richard Boyer

Wednesday

I worked on this southern Utah painting today, adding some green bushes on the left. I also changed the direction of the light source. The sun now casts a shadow across the water and adds a bit more excitement. I'll take it to the crit tomorrow and see if I can get some more feedback, the figures I added in, not to sure about them though, they might not even be needed.

Richard Boyer

Wednesday

Time to move on to the next show at the May Gallery in Scottsdale. I started this 30x40 inch painting today of Amsterdam. My first step was to block it in and figure out the composition. I'll have a few boats traveling down the canal also to add some interest. The light is from the afternoon sun off to the right, so I'll try and play that up as well.

Tomorrow is the big day, dishes have been planed and I'm off to pick up the turkey. Tonight I have Nick and Rose coming over to help make the stuffing and pies. The rest will be made tomorrow morning for the big feast; it will end up being the usual over the top kind of dining with good friends. 

Richard Boyer

Tuesday

Well today I haven't even started to paint.  

The Volvo didn't pass inspection because of a check engine light. so I had to take it down to the dealership, where they found out its the Catalytic converter,  $1800 to fix and a week out to order the damn thing.  

So then I figured I'd head to the Apple store to fix our laptop that doesn't work. My son told me the Gateway mall is where they are, well turns out the store is boarded up and they have moved to the new City Creek Mall. Half hour later I'm in their empty store with them telling me, one can not just walk in and expect service….you need to make an appointment…"but their is nobody @%#@ here, why would I need to make an appointment?"  I couldn't argue with their business model.  I'm figuring it might be cheaper to fix the stupid thing than to buy a new one.

So last night Rick Graham decided to stir things up a little at the model session and we had half hour poses. So with such short time one doesn't have the luxury of fiddling about. I had to blast in as quick as possible what I saw. It is a good exercise in how quick you can measure up your anatomy.

Friday

I sent off the image to my friend and got a small critique on some changes. Less yellow on the right side and tone down the green of the grass. So I cut down a few large Aspen trees and put some frost on the grass in the foreground.

Tonight I am having a show at Southam Gallery with three other artists; A.D. Shaw, Kimball Warren and Jerry Hancock. Time to get dressed up and hang around the gallery for a few hours. Actually it's kind of fun to meet the clients and other artists. Kim told me they have already sold an 18x24 painting

Richard Boyer

Wednesday

I worked some more on the commission piece here, finishing off the foreground and adding some more fall colors. The Aspen trees were made up, I figured it needed a little more autumn flavor. The problem with the predominant pine forests up there is you can't tell what kind of season it is. The Aspen help there, along with some ground colors.

I worked some more on Lillias, bringing the water to the left side of her legs and defining the reflections more.

Richard Boyer

Monday, Nov.18

Well Ken, who is a local tech expert was able to fix the problems with the blog site.  They had put a calendar at the bottom of the page which pulled the viewer down and also was responsible for misdirecting the links to a spam site.  

An old friend of mine contacted me a while back and wanted a painting done of the Wind River Mountains up in Wyoming. They use to go camping there every summer and he wanted a little 12x16 for the wall. I did a quick block-in over the weekend and started in on the background mountains today. The high peak in the middle there is called Flat Top Mountain, not too inventive with the name!

Richard Boyer

Thursday

I decided to have fun and paint a figurative piece here. Last summer we did a photo shoot with Lillias up in the Uinta Mountains. So I tried one of the images of her by the water. It still could use some tweaking here and there, so I'll bring it to the crit session tonight. 

My blog site is still being sabotaged by some advertisement on the links. So it looks like my option is to try and find a number to call for Google tech support..which will be impossible.

Richard Boyer

Tuesday

So now I've had it, some idiot has sabotaged my blog site with spam. Seems that every time you click on a link it takes you to an advertisement with no way of clicking out of it. I called a friend who is wise in the ways of "html" and he said he could look at it when he has some time. Personally I would love to send some kind of really nasty virus back to the clown who waisted their time putting it on my blog site. 

I did find out if you right click and scroll down to opening the link in a new tab, it will work. 

We had a figure painting session at Bryce Liston's place a few days ago and here is my result. Just wish I could get more done in the allotted time. But I figure if I keep doing them I should eventually learn something.

My next project was to add a small boat in the canal here to see if that would take care of the empty space lower down.  It does seem to help, but will be one of those things where I have to set it aside and look back into it later on. Maybe I'll see a different solution.

Richard Boyer

Thursday

I finished more off on this piece, but am still undecided if I want another boat going down the center of the canal or not. I know that would help to balance it off better, but maybe there is another solution I'm not seeing yet…Ah you say..That's why we have the crit session, and speaking of crit sessions, we have one tonight!

So I figure, let them give a little feed back, perhaps they might come up with a different idea.

Richard Boyer

Tuesday

When I woke up this morning we had snow on the ground, the first snow of the year in the valley. So with coffee in hand I took a few pictures from the porch at 7:30 of the first rays of light hitting the clouds.

We had a model session last evening at Rick Graham's house. Lillias was the subject; so for around two and a half hours we tried to capture as much on paint as possible…never an easy task!

Here is my result.

This morning I was back on the boat painting, mainly the front boat which will require some detail and care.  Two more days to get it all done, so we shall see..the pressure is on.

Richard Boyer

Monday, Nov. 4

Its snowing out the studio window today, yup…winter has arrived.

 I've been working on the row of boats, methodically moving forward along the dock, as each boat overlaps the next. I can see this piece will require a lot of time to complete with the rigging and architecture. I also need to address what I will do with the water; all of which needs to be done for the Thursday crit session.  Rick will be having his model session tonight, so I'll have some more evening painting.

Richard Boyer

Thursday

Its sunny again, just right for this evenings events. my daughter is dressing up really bad, old jeans, black shirt and leather jacket with a clock around her neck..She's going to have a "Bad Time!!!"

I worked so more on the architecture. So now its done enough so I can start to fuzz some of it back out as I work on the rigging. With the boats in front they can not compete with the background buildings. That will require some brush strokes over some parts of the architecture to push it farther back into space. 

I'll need to also do some thinking as to the right side of the painting.

Richard Boyer

Wednesday

I forgot to post the result of our pumpkin carving session from Sunday night; now we are ready for Halloween on Thursday. After the trick or treaters we will head up to Nick's place for a Halloween crit session.

Well once again I started a painting that is far too complicated. Here is the start as I work my way down the row of buildings. I never seem to learn from the torture session of perspective, architecture and boats. Maybe I just like the finished product so much; the last one I did sold direct to the client!.

Right now its raining outside, so the studio is dark. This morning when I got up it was dark. It seems we are heading into the grays of winter. Would be nice to sleep in until at least the sunrise, but with school and getting the kids out the door, that won't be happening for a while. This is where you start dreaming of lying on a tropical beach with not a care in the world…:-)

Richard Boyer

Monday, Oct. 28

So this is the final version on the cafe painting. Not much was need from the crit session last Thursday. They wanted the foreground potted plants subdued a bit, along with the caulk-board menu sign over to the right. Some of the umbrellas were also blued down a little on the shadow side and made brighter on the sunny side.

This mornings project was to fix up two small 11x14 paintings I got back from Howard/Mandville Gallery. This first one from Stockholm I re-worked some of the pylons to the left, which added some more dynamics.

This other cafe piece I added some more color, flowers and an umbrella to the left side.  All of these pieces I will be sending over to Southam Gallery here in Salt Lake City.

Richard Boyer

Thursday

Today I hoped around here and there on the painting, orchestrating as I like to call it. Trying to pop areas with more contrast and adding color to other parts. It's now done enough for the crit session, done enough for them to find small faults to fix for tomorrow.

In the afternoons I have been moon-lighting at another job, helping to renovate a place. Yesterday I was sanding and cleaning some old baseboard trim we were re-using; running the wash cloth along the old oak in a hastily haphazard sort of way, when I felt the sharp jab of pain.  An old oak splinter shot into my little finger about a quarter inch, buried deep and visable under the skin on the other side of my pinky.

I can't really complain too much since I have had my fair share of splinters. Its just nice when you can take them out in a timely manner. This one I had no tools to get out and had to keep working until I was picked up for a ride home in the evening. 

Once home I went to the local doctor, my son Victor. At age 18 he is into anything medically related and loves to take out splinters. I was given a shot of single malt as he took a razor blade to my finger and finally after a lot of digging around he was able to pull it out. The patient survived, as well as the doctor. 

Richard Boyer

Wednesday

I hate the feeling you get after you photograph the painting, put it in the frame and are just about ready to deliver it to the gallery. You take one last look at it and the feeling hits you, that it's not just there yet, another words the painting could be better.

So I took it back out and re-worked the entire foreground.

here is how it looked before

and now after lightening up the grass and some of the village.  Now I feel better!!!

I worked on this piece afterwards, mainly the plants and foreground cement. Tomorrow I'll finish it up for the evening crit session. The crit session where I take notes to find all the things that need to be re-worked and re-painted the next day... 

Richard Boyer

Tuesday

Well I figured out what to do on the right side, adding a few tables with guests and a waiter. So now it will be the plants and lead in with the foreground, maybe some thick pallet knife there. that will be tomorrows project.

Last night we had a model session at Rick Graham's place. Sitting next to Robert Duncan I feel like I'm always playing catch-up. I look over and he is so much farther along on his painting. Well I just need to practice more I guess, a lot more!!!

Richard Boyer

Monday, Oct. 21

I'm back in Salt Lake City, back to the daily grind as they say, the nine to five….. Okay I admit I don't look at it that way, I actually look forward to work, addicted as they say.

It was good to see the folks again and visit people back east. The experience of showing the kids where I grew up and how it is back in that part of the country was priceless.

This morning I worked on this older painting Jim sent back to me from the Mockingbird Gallery. The gallery here is Salt Lake saw it and said they wanted to give it a try. So since its been in Jim's gallery for a year and a half, I touched it up a bit and decided to let the Southam's have a go with it.

In the afternoon I was back on this piece, defining some of the figures better. Tomorrow I'll need to contemplate what to do with the right side. I know it will need some people there at a table, maybe more off in the distance. 

Richard Boyer

Saturday

Yesterday we did the trip with Captain Rob Powell out into the open water of the Niagara River, then back up the Erie Canal for a bit. The weather was sunny but cold,

but our salty sea-dog kept the course straight and true. Nobody had to walk the plank!

Later in the afternoon we took a drive out to Akron state park to check out the fall colors. My family had this desire to walk in a typical deciduous forest from the East coast. They are deprived living in the pine forests of Utah.

We walked along the muddy path up to the main falls that gives the park its claim to fame. One of the things the newbies found out about was how the leaves cover over the water and muddy sink holes. Several shoes were covered in black mud by the end of the hike.

We reached the falls at last for this view and then hiked up the steep muddy incline to the top, grabbing onto the trees as belay points on the way up.

Tomorrow we have a 6:10 am flight to catch out of Buffalo...:-/

Richard Boyer

Tuesday

Today we did the epic trip to Niagara Falls. They wouldn't let us take the barrel across the bridge, maybe they were a bit suspicious. We did park the car on the American side and walked across the Rainbow Bridge, recommended by many as a way to avoid long lines at the customs and parking problems once over there.
The wind was blowing the mist over the walkway so we did get a bit wet near the edge.

We walked around in the sun to dry off and then took the elevator down for the tour under the falls. "Cave of the Winds" they call it, as they hand you a plastic poncho to cover your body. A short trip down about one hundred feet and the temperature drops about twenty degrees..

One path lead outside to a side platform next to the falls and yes the water was flying everywhere. I had to get behind a pillar to keep the water from landing all over the camera.

The other tunnels took you to a spot behind the main Horseshoe Falls, there you could see the force of the water thundering over the edge.

From the side of the falls I was able to get this view looking across to the American side.  We headed back up to the top for a very over priced lunch at the local tourist trap and headed over to the wax museums.

We had a small problem with some of the local reptiles there. But soon we were wandering around the Disneyland part of Niagara Falls, the area where they pack all the wax museums, curio shops and tourist shops together and cover them with neon signs.

We picked the largest wax museum and had a meeting with some famous people, my daughter had coffee with with Elvis here. Humpfry Bogart is in the background.

Richard Boyer.