Little Town

The Census at Bethlehem, 1566

Peter Bruegel The Elder, 152?-1569

Color on Panel

Link

This post was first published in 2011.

Seven Years at The Colorist!

Merry Christmas!

Have a blessed holiday season, and a merry Christmas.

~KC

13 Small Works from 2013

Casey Klahn Art - Intimate Sizes

Juniper Dance

@10 x 7

Pastel & Charcoal

Casey Klahn

Blue Water

10" x 5"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Granite State Light

5" x 7"

Pastel & Charcoal

Casey Klahn

High Draw

5" x 7"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Black Earth with Yellow

4" x 3.75"

Pastel & Charcoal

Casey Klahn

Rock Group

6" x 9"

Pastel & Charcoal

Casey Klahn

Shoulder at Twilight

5" x 9"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Fog

3.5" x 4.5" (4x6)

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Late Winter

3.5" x 4.5" 

Pastel & Charcoal

Casey Klahn

Tracks

@5" x 6"

Pastel

Casey Klahn 

Sky Window Prairie

@7" x 10"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

The Feathers Shadow

4" x 6"

Charcoal & Pastel

Casey Klahn

Upper Church

4" x 6"

Pastel & Conte Pencil

Casey Klahn

Bonus Four Images!

Rocks Vignette

4" x 6"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Green Sky, Pink Field 

6" x 10.5" 

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Iridescent Horizon

4"x6" 

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Overcast Lumens, Fall, 2013

@7" x 7"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Inquiries welcome.

Mad River

Illuminated Mad River

@12" x 11"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Contemporary Christmas Chorale

***

We stood on the hills, Lady,

Our day’s work done,

Watching the frosted meadows

That winter had won.

The evening was calm, Lady, 

The air so still, 

Silence more lovely than music 

Folded the hill.

There was a star, Lady,

Shone in the night,

Larger than Venus it was

And bright, so bright.

Oh, a voice from the sky, Lady,

It seemed to us then

Telling of God being born

In the world of men.

And so we have come, Lady,

Our day’s work done,

Our love, our hopes, ourselves,

We give to your Son.

Bob Chilcott.

Time and Grace

Saying Grace, 1951. Norman Rockwell.

I'm proud to describe myself as mostly self-taught.  My only formal art schooling was the unusual program founded by Norman Rockwell and his peers: the Famous Artists School for Talented Young People.  It was a matchbook correspondence course, but I noticed, to my lifelong delight, that the courses placed a high premium on the finer qualities of art, both contemporaneous and historical.  I recall that the first leafed picture in my big binder was a landscape by Vincent van Gogh.  

Norman Rockwell has enjoyed the popular confidence of the American public, but his narrative style has also been roughly handled by gatekeepers of the fine arts.  Turns out Rockwell is more eclectic than they.  Here is a quote describing his take on larger place in art:

I don’t see things the way modernists do, even though I enjoy studying their work.

He studied their work?  Go on!  I can tell, because he organized his paintings with incredible intelligence and an eye for the formal elements of art.

Norman Rockwell's painting, Saving Grace, 1951, achieved the mammoth auction price of forty-six million dollars at Sotheby’s on Wednesday, December 4th.

Rockwell agonized over his painting; he probably lost money on it, but he was the only one who did.  - David Apatoff.

Can illustrative art rise to the heights of the numinous descriptor "fine art?"  What about representational work, which has also been denigrated as too pedestrian for upper-strata tastes? The best commentary I've read is by blogger David Apatoff.  You will find some depth to this story at Apartoff's blog; do have a look. This sale is indeed a newsworthy event, and it is a thumb in the eye of Rockwell's host of detractors over the years.  

When will we ever learn?  The subjective parts of painting are important, but should they consume our every critical thought about a painting?  Even a formalist can appreciate, and indeed love, the form of Norman Rockwell's brilliant work.  His keenly observed art rises to the fine, and challenges the boilerplate of how art "must" be done. 

Norman Rockwell sells for $46 Million.

WARRING WITH TROLLS, part 5.

Illustration Art, by David Apatoff.

About the Famous Artists School Founders.

Top 13 of 2013

<><><>

Here are my favorite artworks from 2013.  It is never easy to self-select or judge, but it is a rewarding process.  I hope you'll try it for your own artworks, or perhaps for your Pinterest Board on art.  

The blue lettered images are still available.  Inquiries here.

Long Remembered New Vision

Net House Glare

Alders on Winter Ground

Off The Shoulder

Darkly, He Writes

The River Blue

Canola Panorama

Vardøgr (Forest Vardogr)

Green & Gray Forest

Japanese Garden






Illuminated Umber Slope

Slope with Light Splash

Madison River Turnout

Art & Ideas

W O R K S H O P S

Banners & Graphics Revealed

This post is updated from 2012.

Placing a new banner on your blog is the fastest way to brand your blog.  Why do this?  Because you want (I think) to make your blog instantly recognizable for the "click-through" audience that you are reaching.  The banner should identify you, and set up the visual character of your blog and your art.

This post features my new e-mail banner, and at the top of The Colorist you will see my newest blog banner.  I used Photoshop to create these, and I recommend that you get good with whatever design tool you have and learn how to work with layers.  Once I cracked the code on layers, my design life improved dramatically, and I have fun making these things, whereas before it was like pulling teeth for me!  The links at the bottom of this post shed light on using Photoshop: working with layers and making graphic products.

There are so many You Tube vids for this topic, that you ought to be able to find one that makes sense for you.  My only advice is that you match the tutorial to your design software.  Many videos show how to make a blog header with freeware, but find one for your tool.  Also, if the tutorial shows how to upload the banner to Blogger, realize that the latest version of Blogger is dirt easy to use for headers. Just open Design, and use the widgets at the top of the template.  You should do fine.  I use the header widget, and then I add a banner photo below that.

The widgets for your header or banner offer three options: 

Behind title and description

Instead of title and description

Have description placed after the image

For Pastel Workshop, my instruction blog, I chose the "Instead of..." option.  I created it this way so that clicking on the banner brings the reader back to the home page.  Here at The Colorist, I add the blog title and description above the header.  This makes it clear that the reader is at my flagship blog, and clicking on the title and subtitle/description brings one back to home. The oversize header works as a logo for The Colorist, and lets the reader understand instantly what blog they have landed on.

Experiment with different settings for your header.  Many bloggers choose a low profile header, which gets the content on the screen and above scroll.  Have fun!

35 Best Photoshop Tutorials For Beginners.

Make a Business Card with Photoshop.

Simple Photoshop Header Tutorial - You Tube.

    Your version of pse may vary from the video.

Note:  I took an online workshop to learn how to make a business card with Photoshop.  It was inexpensive and has served me in making all of my graphics.  I think that instructor has moved on to other tutorials, but I recommend that type of thing for those of you who, like me, aren't completely computer savvy.

Update:  I am now using Creative Cloud, which is much more powerful than my old Elements platform.  It puts me into a new learning curve, but it is very fun.

1 minute, 37 seconds you'll never have back

I need to re-think my statement.

2014-2015 WORKSHOPS

<><><>

Some of these workshops are already full, or are reserved.  When you contact me, I will usually refer you to the hosts of the venue.  If it is a proposed workshop, meaning I haven't got a date or a venue yet, then when you contact me I will put your name in a file and get back to you when the event gets firmed up.

Fire Dreams / Turkey In The Straw

In the name of the iron-jawed men I will stand up and say yes till the finish is come and gone. God of all broken hearts, empty hands, sleeping soldiers, God of all star-flung beaches of night sky, I and my love-child stand up together to-day and sing: "Thanks, O God."

Fire Dreams, Carl Sandburg

This post is formatted for the Mac.  Click on the video to view on other platforms.

Northwest Pastel Society

Casey Klahn deliberates among the final eleven pastel paintings at Everett's Schack Art Center.

The annual Holiday Art Show for the Northwest Pastel Society is ongoing in Everett, WA, from November 21st through December 28th.  I judged the awards and conducted a demonstration of a large artwork, which featured the subject of my barn.  I may have more photos in the near future, so please return here for those.


Holiday Art Show.

Northwest Pastel Society.




Photo: Jude Galbraith.

High Draw

High Draw

5" x 7"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Granite State Light

Granite State Light

5" x 7"

Pastel & Charcoal

Casey Klahn

Glare

Net House Glare
11" x 13"
Pastel
Casey Klahn

Remember 100 Things

This is a re-post from 2011.  I still love these 100 Things About Art.

River Land in Diffusion

7" x 5"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Why a hundred things? Because it is an interesting exercise in editing.

These are not listed in any order.

1. Color
2. Graphite
3. Willlem de Kooning
4. Paper
5. Art Studios
6. Galleries
7. Pastel Sticks
8. Outdoor Art Fairs
9. Art Societies
10. Form
11. Charcoal
12. French Easels
13. The Colorist Blog
14. Italy
15. Open Air
16. The Figure
17. Landscapes
18. Proportion
19. Collectors
20. Children
21. Henri Matisse
22. Cartoons
23. Wolf Kahn
24. Rocks
25. Jimmy Wright
26. Artist's Models
27. Wood
28. Trees
29. Blue
30. Sculpture
31. Love
32. Black
33. Pigment
34. God
35. Unity
36. Courage
37. Emotion
38. Mass
39. Mary Cassatt
40. Andrew Wyeth
41. Gesture
42. Books
43. Contradiction
44. Museum Collections
45. Weight
46. Patronage
47. Illumination
48. Rosalba Carriera
49. Florence in 1504
50. Flow
51. Instability
52. Countenance
53. The Agony and the Ecstasy
54. Balance
55. Bob Dylan
56. Lines
57. Creativity
58. Plastic Space
59. Analogies
60. Pollock (Movie)
61. Gray
62. Artist's Traits
63. Sketch Books
64. Abstraction
65. Realism
66. Helen Frankenthaler
67. Art History
68. America
69. Intuition
70. The Golden Rectangle
71. Pablo Picasso
72. New York in 1950
73. Master Copies
74. Art Stores
75. Edgar Degas
76. Exhibitions
77. Mark Rothko
78. Optimism
79. Rome in 1512
80. Dimension
81. Leonardo da Vinci
82. The Palette
83. Studio Easels
84. Paris in 1904
85. Taborets
86. Architecture
87. Caravaggio
88. The Twentieth Century
89. Scale
90. Openings
91.  Vincent van Gogh
92.  Artist's Blogs
93.  Water
94.  Clay
95. Cigar Boxes
96. Influences
97. Yellow
98. The Colorist Daily
99. Erasers
100.  Vision

What are your 100 things?

Red On Red

Long Remembered New Vision

13" x 21"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Available

Mad River

Madison River Bend

@9" x 20"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Available

Madison River Turnout

@9" x 20"

Pastel

Casey Klahn

Private Collection

C'est la vie

Slope with Light Splash

@ 9" x 9"

Pastel & Charcoal

Casey Klahn

I spent the day cleaning my studio (if tape wads were quarters, this would've been a fine day). I look forward to photo sessions the next couple of nights, and you should see some new images posted here and Facebook. Might have to have an event.

Painting Outdoors

Janice Wall

Artist Janice Wall following her pastel muse in Gig Harbor, WA, October 28th., 2013.  This image needed to be posted now, because the frost is on the ground, and for many of us this last season of outdoor painting is in the memory books.

Typical for me, I just did a few plein air sessions.  I did paint a number of images out the window, though.  Does that count?