Today I wanted to showcase a piece I did to round out our Southwest style living room and dining room. It's suitably titled, "Apache Man." (a picture of a man from the Apache Indian tribe).
The Backstory; My wife and I moved back to the southwestern United States about a year ago. We lived out here many years ago, and have always liked the southwest style, with the pueblos, cactus, cowboys and indians, etc...so ultimately, we wanted some southwestern art in the house.
Now, I'm the artist in our partnership, but she's the interior designer. She listens to some of my input (and I occasionally have a good idea), but it's something she has a knack for, and it's her "baby."
One of the features we have in our house is a front living room with an adjoining dining room and we decided to go southwest with it. Sue had found great living room furniture and I'd eventually do some artwork for the walls. A few months ago, we took a day trip up to a town called Payson. It's an old Arizona cowboy town up at higher elevation where it's cooler and has trees (as opposed to the hot Phoenix desert). While up there we poked around some of the local antique and art stores, and found the frame that we had to have. It's a great frame made from reclaimed wood with old barbed wire around it...perfect for the dining room theme. We hung the frame, before the artwork was done.
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| Frame close up - the inspiration for the picture - reclaimed wood with barbed wire...love it! |
Next we needed a picture to fill that frame. I wanted to do something very Arizona-ish. The southwest themes usually include warm colors like oranges, yellows, browns. I wanted to hit that color pallet, and wanted to find just the right subject. I already had an acrylic painting of a native American woman in the living room. When I found the photo reference of this Apache man, I knew I had the starting point for my picture.
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| Apache Man - colored pencil, airbrush on Canson paper; 18 x 24 |
I started with a piece of peach/orange colored Canson paper. I love the way it takes a nice soft colored pencil and graphite pencil; it has a great texture. I worked the picture with colored pencil, using a warm pallet that complemented the background. I used some very dark graphite black pencils for the blacks. To finish, I added some airbrush colors, adding some dark tones and shading. I tried to be subtle with the airbrush, so it didn't become an "airbrush" painting, but just to add some smooth colors and dark background.
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| Hanging on my wall |
When I was done, I trimmed it up and mounted it in the frame. And, it now graces our dining room wall. I'll be doing more southwest style fine art in the future and will share with you.
If you need artwork to decorate your place, let me know -- I can help.
Have a great week all...Summer is here, so stay cool.
Till next time,
Tom
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