I'm really happy to announce the sale of not one, not two but THREE of my abstract landscape paintings from several years ago to a single collector! While I haven't painted in this style for a while now, I'm so thankful that this buyer sees the beauty and value in these paintings and decided that she wanted them in her home! I'm always appreciative of art buyers but I'm especially thankful that many people are still seeing the value of art in these uncertain times.
Newest Terra Human in the Works!
Hi friends, while I was working on my recent commission I was just so inspired by the large scale of the piece that I decided to painting new newest Terra Human piece in a huge canvas! (24”x48” to be exact) Recently I’ve been in the habit of creating small to medium sized paintings because they can act of faster studies and they will be more affordable but I also think there is something to be said about investing a lot of time in a big project and using it to push your skills forward.
So here is a progress shot of this awesome project! This piece is almost complete as of now and I’m really excited to share it with you all soon!
Daily Figure Studies
Hi friends, so recently I was inspired by another artist to aim for painting a figure study everyday in order to push my skills and experiment with new techniques. And while I haven’t been able to create a new one everyday it’s been a great way to take a break from a long project and work on my rendering skills. Here are a few pics of my recent studies along with time-lapse videos showing their process!
"Between Worlds" A New Terra Human Painting
Hello everyone! Here is my newest Terra Human painting titled “Between Worlds.” I’m very proud of what I’ve accomplished in this piece and I would like to share a little bit about the process with you! Overall visually with this piece I wanted to approach it like a classic portrait and then let my imagination have some fun with the surreal and abstract aspects of the painting. This process and visual composition is fairly different from my typical approach to figures because I usually show the whole person and they are typically in a dynamic pose within a large landscape scene. So I thought a change would be nice in order to try something new.
In terms of concept I wanted blur the line between humans and nature. I wanted trees and grass to be seamlessly growing on this figure as if it was a completely normal thing to see and understand. I wanted this very unrealistic dreamlike image to somehow make sense in the viewers mind so that the concept can come across effortlessly. A big theme in this piece is humility and a strong respect for the nature that surrounds us and I wanted this image to be a visual representation of that . You can read the full description of this piece by clicking HERE!
"Rise and Fall" New Terra Human Painting!
I’m very happy to have finished my newest Terra Human piece called"Rise and Fall." This is a piece about facing challenges. We all have difficulties in our everyday life that can rob us of positivity and leave us with little hope for improvement. And at the end of each day our personal challenges can leave us exhausted and drained and yet we find the courage to wake up every morning to try again.
Every person on this planet has seemingly microscopic battles that they fight every day in order to live the life they love. We are all facing hardships in our own ways and knowing this can make us more accepting and understanding of others.
In terms of process this painting had a lot leading up to it. I create a photoshop rendering early on but I wanted to create a study for each aspect of the piece so that I could really do the image justice. I never used to be much of a fan of working on studies because I felt like it was just taking away time from the final product. But I’ve realized more and more how important these studies are to the final painting and how much you learn from them. The two images below are the two studies for this Terra Human painting.
Creating these two studies helped me notice small details in each image that I could apply to the final product. Studies are where you can make mistakes and learn from them in order to improve the final piece.
Below you can see the final product! Some obvious improvements from the studies are the more accurate and warmer colors, the perspective of the figure and better more 3D shapes in the cliff.
This piece is currently available to purchase for $700. CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE!
Overall I’m incredibly proud of not only the final result but also the process behind this painting. I always want my paintings to portray a certain complexity that cannot be put into words .
30th Terra Human Piece!
I have just finished my 30th Terra Human painting! So I thought it would be a great opportunity to reflect on this series as a whole and discuss why it is so important to me. While growing up in Maui I was constantly surrounded by nature and I loved to experience it in a very immersive way. My mom has many embarrassing stories of me as a toddler climbing in trees while still wearing diapers trying to keep up with my older sister. As a child I felt the most like my true self when I was experiencing nature, I was able to move and climb and be athletic while also appreciating the lush greenery that surrounded me. Beyond nature’s inherent value it felt like a mirror to me, reflecting my true identity right back at me whenever I got off track and started to loose myself.
And now I find so much irony in the fact that I spend most of my days indoors trying to illustrate the outside world that is so dear to my heart. These days I frequently observer and appreciate nature from a distance but less frequently experience it and get immersed in it whole heartedly. Due to work and life, many of us have trouble experiencing nature in a way that is best for us and this is why I love creating my Terra Human paintings. I love creating these dream-like images that illustrate a literal relationship between humans and nature in a way that prompts tranquility and self reflection. I hope that my Terra Human paintings can serve as mirrors to those of us who may feel separated from our true selves, a reminder that your truth has value, your identity has worth and our world is a better place because you are in it.
This 12”x16” oil painting is available for $300. Click HERE to purchase!
New Painting!
I’m very happy to have just finished this piece titled “When We Fall.” The process for this painting was difficult primarily because of the head/face that is slightly tilted downward. I didn’t quite notice this detail at first so in my first two tries of rendering her face I made her head at the wrong angle so the facial features just didn’t look right.
As you can see in my first and second attempts I was not only misinterpreting the angle of the face but I was also wrong with the size. What I finally realized (far right image) is that because the head is tilted down, the eye-line and other facial features should be much lower on the face and you should see more of the top of her head. And this tilt would also make here ears slightly higher than her eyes.
I don’t enjoy starting over sections of a painting, but I’m realizing more and more how necessary it can be to create the image I’m visualizing in a convincing way. I’m very happy with how this piece turned out and it’s nice to see my hard work paying off!