Painting Process: The Loss of Virginity

I have had a request to show process shots of one of my paintings, so OK, Terrell Thornhill- here they are.

The Loss of Virginity

oil on canvas

36" x 48"

The whole thing was done in 3-4 layers of  working over a white background. I have no idea why these 1st 2 working images came out so lousy.

Step one- background and roughed in tiles. My black is a combo of Windsor Newton prussian blue and WN blue-black

don't know why this image is soooo bad. 1st rough in of one of the models

middle working- pomegranate is done, melon needs refinement, nagaimo needs refinement and creepy root hair

done

New Work at Atelier Gallery, Charleston SC

Three new Produce Portrait paintings are available at Atelier Gallery, 153 King Street, Charleston, NC.

 Still Lifes, or Vanitas, which is the genre these works most closely fit in with, were originally domestic images containing items symbolic of life and death. The items in mine act out narratives in keeping with human behavior and cultural social structures.

Bokchoy Flipped   oil on canvas   30” x 30”

A Ruinous Weekend  oil on canvas  20” x 30”

Undocumented    oil on canvas    24” x 36”

Commissioned Work for FirstBank

Portal Into Twentieth Century Banking   

commissioned for and owned by FirstBank for their new Green Hills, Nashville location through The Arts Company Gallery.

49.5"W x 77"H x 3.5"D  

Archival stamp ink on rag paper, pigment prints on rag paper and cut rag paper, thread, wood, task board, plexiglass, glass orbs, pigment prints on mylar, leather, enamel paint re-purposed typewriter parts, specimen pins.

Archival prints of original bank ledger sheets from 1916-1947 form a stitched, grid base for the construction of images referencing the function and philosophy of banking from the early 20th century into the beginning of the contemporary era. The roots and growth of the bank, symbolized by the banks tree logo, flow over the tellers desks, ledgers, and state map sections. The original bank location and the new Green Hills location are marked with glass optical orbs in the map section of the western part of the state. The mechanisms and tools of the record keeping of banking are represented by the vintage typewriter parts that appear over the old, handwritten ledgers. The ink found on the ledgers changes by the year, most dramatically in some samples from the 1930 ledger, one of the most traumatic banking years in US history, where pages would fluctuate from full strength ink, to watered down ink, to pencil, then back again to full strength ink, demonstrating the thrift and persistence that enabled the bank to weather even the toughest of times.

detail

detail

detail

There is a really nice collection of art in this new bank. Some of the other artists represented are Andy Saftel, Norman Lerner, Phil Savage to name a few. The commissioned work was from both myself and   Carrie McGee.

Installation

Carrie McGee makes transparent resin sculptural work that is either wall hung or suspended. The imagery in them is from both chemical reactions and photography. 

They are wire hung with some really cool hardware she gets from Japan. This piece fits into the banks rotunda.

The buildings architect,Carin Jeffords of Vaughan Associates Architects, and The Arts Company director Anne Brown look on as Carrie describes the process of getting photographs she had taken of the buildings steel beams in the early stages of construction into the resin.

Both McGee's and my work are just installed, along with some really slick new high tech bank machinery. My piece was an easy install- just a simple oak French cleat hanging bar with 3 screws, and it was good!

New Arts in the Airport exhibit

The latest  Arts in the Airport is up at McGhee Tyson Airport. It will be there for the next 6 months. This program is coordinated by The Arts & Culture Alliance of Greater Knoxville and the Metropolitan Knoxville Airport Authority. This latest exhibit was juried by Jeffery Morton, professor at Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, GA. He selected 43 pieces, both 2D and 3D, from the 523 works submitted. All work is behind security, so you need to be a ticketed passenger to see it.
Morton's exhibit statement:  “In our frenetic fast-paced world of smart phones, on-the-go coffee stops, and continental travel, it seems appropriate to house a collection of artworks in a busy space such as the airport. Art has an ability to capture us in time, and perhaps now more than any other we need to stop, look, and listen. Whatever we feel about traveling to and from places, the art in the Knoxville airport was chosen to give the passerby an opportunity to share the same question asked by these artists: how do I balance a life of speed with a life of pause. It seems that the art and artists in this collection answer the question by looking closely at the world with wonder and delight.”

I've got 2 of my Contemporary Mythology Invention altar series there.

Leaving the 19^th Century : graphite, cut Italian rag paper, paint, and hand built wooden altar   10”W x 16”H x 3”D

Saint Anne Says Not Now:  graphite, cut Italian rag paper, acrylic orbs, rhinestones, metal, ceramic, and hand built wooden altar

Exhibit View- From These Hills: Contemporary Art in the Southern Appalachia Highlands, William King Museum

From These Hills, Contemporary Art in the Southern Appalachian Highlands

at the  William King Museum   in Abingdon, VA opened Oct. 17th with a private reception that included a lecture by Steven Maticjio, who chose the 20 regional artists included in the exhibit. Formally curator of SECCA, Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, in Winston-Salem, NC, he is now curator of the Cincinnati Contemporary Art Center.

This is the William Kings 11th regional biennial of artists working in the Southern Appalachian region of Southwest Virginia, Northeast Tennessee, Western North Carolina, Southern West Virginia and Eastern Kentucky. The exhibit will close February 16th, 2014.

~ 

So- on to images of the exhibit, with a bit of info on some of the artists I know or whom I've met.

My piece that is included in the exhibit is FD&C Red #40, oil on canvas, 4' x 6'

L-R, DonnaCooper-Hurt, Erin Castellan, Michael Murphy

wall, L-R:Denise Stewart-Sanabria, Erin Castellan, Megan King- Floor:Gwen Bigham, Charlie Brouwer, Taliaferro Logan, Edison Midgett video projection

Another Gwen Bigham- wood and crushed glass

Wall: Jim Toub (prof at Appalachian State), Megan King, Floor: Taliaferro Logan, Edison Midgett video projection (prof. at Appalachian State)

Walls: Nick DeFord (director of studios and programs at Arrowmont), Jeana Eve Klein (blue fiber piece), Robin Johnston (behind people). Floor: IlaSahai Prouty (prof. at Appalachia State)

Nick DeFord, Robert Sulkin (3) (prof at Hollins University)

Elizabeth Mesa-Gaido : The media here included manipulated Cuban Government images!

Megan King, Robin Johnston, (at present artist-in-residence at Penland)

Kirsten Stolle

Jim Toub, Gerry Bannon (2) ball point on mylar!

Edison Midgett, Melanie Norris (2)

Callie Hietala, Director of Museum Programming, and Leila Cartier, Curator, have fun interacting crime scenes between the projector and wax paper screen of Edison Midgett's After Here. Part of the dynamics of the piece is the ability of the viewer to insert themselves into the open ended narrative of the 18 minute video loop.

"The Boys". They were excellent

Mixed peach drink made with Virginia Sweetwater Moonshine. Moonshine has recently been legalized in TN and VA, as far as I know. It's always around various places I go so I'm not sure when that finally happened. I don't drink - I just like to look at it. They've got cinnamon and sugar crystals stuck around the rim. I did invent a sandwich that night with the reception food- cream cheese dip and cole slaw. Not bad!

Participating artists

Gerry Bannan, Roanoke, VA

Gwen Bigham, Asheville, NC

Charlie Brouwer, Wills, VA

Erin Castellan, Asheville, NC

Donna Cooper Hurt, Charleston, SC

Nick DeFord, Knoxville, TN

Robin Johnston, Penland, NC

Megan King, Jonson City, TN

Taliaferro Logan, Roanoke, VA

Jeana Eve Klein, Boone, NC

Elizabeth Mesa-Gaido, Morehead, KY

Edison Midgett, Boone, NC

Michael Murphy, Morristown, TN

Melanie Norris, Asheville, NC

IlaSahai Prouty, Bakersville, NC

Katie Sheffield, Johnson City, TN

Denise Stewart-Sanabria, Knoxville, TN

Kirsten Stolle, Asheville, NC

Robert Sulkin, Roanoke, VA

Jim Toub, Boone, NC
~

Exhibit Review from A! Magazine