Do you need gallery/studio space?

This is the building my new studio is in and I am loving it!

Quaint adobe building right in the middle of picturesque Heritage Square in Oxnard, the Carnegie Art Museum our neighbor.

The good news is the owner just opened up a new studio space there. Great light, great price. Not huge but very workable.

There are also two small GALLERY spaces for rental in the building, available on a month to month basis. Great price too.

Let me know if you are interested and I will give you more info...

My Student Show - Wine and Cheese Moment!

I was thrilled to see so many great artists put in their work for my student show at Graphaids in Agoura Hills, CA. THANK YOU. 

I love the diversity of the work and individual style of each artist.  That has always been important to me as a teacher, that a person develops his/her own individual style and voice. Ones' own personal art voice IS the most important thing and the hardest thing, I find, to develop. It is what separates the men from the boys!

This show showcases  students of mine from the last three years from various venues where I have taught in L.A. many of them now enjoying success in their own well-deserved right. I have learned as much from my students as I have taught them, for sure!!! They push me just as I push them. That for me is the point of teaching. I am also thrilled I remain in contact with so many and count them among my good  friends.

 I think the work looks great on the wall. This pix shows a small sample of what's up there. Thank you to ALL.

We will have a Wine and Cheese moment:

Graphaids,  30135 Agoura Road,Agoura Hills, Ca.

Thursday July 23rd, from 4 to 6pm.

Thanks also to Nicole at Graphaids for all her hard work and support. She is a delight!

Darling Dixie..

One of my favorite students, and a talented painter herself, Dixie, is returning home to Texas after a year studying at The Los Angeles Academy of Figurative Art in Van Nuys http://www.laafa.org/

DIXIE, now a grandma,  had a life-long dream after a long graphic design career, world travels,  and raising kids, to immerse herself for a whole year in fine art instruction at the best school she could find.

She did her research from afar and LAAFA was her chosen school. No small wonder as the faculty is great and I am proud to be part of it. So she packed up her home, rented an apartment here and came out west with her cat.

She signed up for as many classes as she could fit into a week studying with many teachers at the school. See her journey on her blog at...http://dixiekeestudio.blogspot.com/2009/04/old-dream-comes-true.html

Dixie is one reason I like to teach. Gracious as a student, patient with herself, and always thoughtful about the process... and very fun! 

I got to paint her at my studio this week in Oxnard, a three hour head sketch,  as a kind of 'farewell 'til we meet again' moment. 

It sure was fun. 

Dixie said while I was painting her, she is going to hang my head sketch 'pride of place' at her memorial. NO PRESSURE or anything. See, I told you she was funny!

Safe travels dear Dixie and PAINT PAINT PAINT every moment to delay getting to your memorial! 

Apres Gnat Bite...

Yes, this little girl really did climb into that boat and sit and look at the waterfall in the middle of  howling winds.

What are the chances of that? Catch it while you can - and quickly.

The benefits of a regular life painting discipline meeting the huge challenges of en plein air painting. One has to work quickly and not under the best of circumstances.

This sketch was done amid heavy winds, I had to hold down my sun hat and pochade box to continue, and swarms of gnats which stuck like molasses to my sun-screened arms.

A crowd also gathered to watch in those quiet mountains. There were a lot of distractions one way and another including the amazing mountain waterfall vista which seemed just too magnificent to even contemplate painting.

I was glad for those boats in the foreground. Almost like a still life. I just kept saying to myself "Just put down what you see"....and then you can go for a nice lunch! Which I did..splattered gnats and all. Washed them off with a nice Rose wine.

Mountain Shorthand...

I think I like painting in the mountains... wow...

Pix are from my weekend painting trip to Mamouth, with some lovely non-painting moments with dear friends in their amazing log cabin which I SHOULD have painted.

It was pure bliss...and immediate painting satisfaction unlike painting something, say, a portrait,  for six weeks or so,  in your comfortable air-conditioned studio. Your only real personal worry (NOT ARTISTIC) ...what's for lunch? Eat out? Order in? Is the sandwich  already wilted from home?

In two short hours, in front of those majestic mountains, sun blazing down, wind blowing, getting thirsty and hot, you  artistically have to put it down in a painting 'shorthand' writing kind of way...your own personal vision of them...good or bad.

And that is what make it fun. 

It's A Dog's Life...Snooky

I am thrilled to present my most recent sitter...Snooky. Top image...how I wish it was the one below!

Sadly, Snooky passed away a while ago, the dear pooch pal of a dear friend of mine in NYC and her family.

He was as much the part of her family as the husband, and kids. And had SUCH a personality. The loss of Snooky was painful for all who knew him. And I knew my dear friend was crushed. We all were.

I started this portrait just after his sad passing promising my dear girlfriend I would try and paint him for  her - during her grief.

I am not a dog painter. Look to Terry Stanley, http://dogdaysofpainting.blogspot.com/, for how it should be done. Terry is doing some amazing dog portraits for an unbelievable price along with helping dog charities. She is a wow. So I put Snookie to one side...for a long while feeling a bit embarrassed that I hadn't delivered to my friend.

It was in my studio for close to two years.  I didn't think it was good enough. For many months I was wondering if I should go back in or start all over again. So once again it was turned against the wall.

Somehow today, in my new studio,  with a new energy that a new studio provides, I picked up my painting of Snooky and realized I had caught Snooky. And I really realized I liked what I done. Not perfect but I liked it. Just a few strokes more,,, and I knew I was done.

Funny how that happens after a long passing of time. My original plan was to paint him in a very classical way and that is what held me back.

The two days I painted this from my heart, I did it with a palette knife, orange and blue color harmony, just trying to go for the shapes of his head, not details....painting is all about the shapes, values, color vibration and losing detail. A dog, a tree, an apple, a human face. All the same really. 

But my rendition of Snooky wasn't classical. It wasn't like those incredible Victorian dog paintings, (like Sir Edwin Landseer, 1802 -1873, see above painting) I had seen in her husband's yummy art collection. 

I think I got intimidated. But as my mentor, Everett Raymond Kinstler, N.A., says, it IS important to paint in YOUR own time period. That is also of the reasons I like Terry Stanley's current dog portraits. They are fresh and modern. And who should even try and paint like Landseer? It has been done and DONE well.

Anyhow, I am glad the passage of time helped me see that a painting done from the heart on a certain day with a certain contemporary vigor, has value. And I am glad I didn't mess it up today when I added those few last touches. I was mindful of that!!!

Hope you like Snooky! My friend has yet to see it.

He was a darn good pooch!

This is 12" x 12".

Another Head Sketch Clunker...

Another head sketch clunker from life that failed to do it for me.

I am referring to the bottom one.  I must have a room full of ravishing rejects now which is hard when you are trying to sell your house and clear out the studio decks which I did last week prompted by a new studio move.

I was left dissatisfied after an open house painting session at LAAFA yesterday. I didn't hate what I did but I thought I could have said it better and maybe in a more 'artful' way. So today, I did another sketch from yesterday's one, trying to work out my "issues" and spare the $$$ on an art therapist. And I liked how it came out. I like a more muted look in my paintings these days and am striving for that in my life-painting. But sometimes, too much OOOMPH and SIZZLE comes out of me.

I find this re-sketching  from a life study to be quite a cathartic learning experience actually. To really look at something I have just done, paint it again on a separate canvas, and work out what you feel you could have done better. What was it that you missed? What to take to the next...

The top is today's version, 9 x12. The bottom, yesterday's, 18 x 24, about three hours with plenty of breaks and, dare I say, interruptions. It was an open house and as a teacher at the school I expected that. But I know I didn't get into the art zone at all. Today I did.

Does anyone have any good ideas for all these reject head sketches that are taking over my house and studio? 

I am starting to put the ones I really like for sale on Ebay. Visit here:

cgi.ebay.com/Family-Jewel-Fine-Art-Oil-Painting-by-Johanna-Spinks_W0QQitemZ200357755464QQcmdZViewItemQQptZArt_Paintings?hash=item2ea640ba48&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14&_trkparms=65%3A12%7C66%3A2%7C39%3A1%7C72%3A1205%7C240%3A1318%7C301%3A1%7C293%3A1%7C294%3A50

This one is called "Family Jewel"...

11 x 14, oil on linen.