Layer 100
It's almost done. I guess. Please compare to earlier stages of this painting in earlier posts, Layers 4 and 8.

Shir's Hands


I thought that I would be drawing a full model. (I was making up for a class that I had missed, and sat in on another.) Little did I know that the challenge would be even bigger. Hands. This actor has the big expressive hands and toes like fingers

Softly Spoken - Experiment in Low Contrast



Oil on Canvas, 60 x 70 cm

Often the strongest statements are understatements.

I had to adjust this in Photoshop, to reach the quiet colors. The camera saw right through the grayish thin layers of paint, to capture the stronger shades below.

Self Portrait 7.10.2008
pencil, 35 x 50 cm
I started this intending to work in a very stylized, cubist manner. I skipped getting the proportions right, and tried to make my face look like a Frank Gehry building. Well, the final result may not look much like the Pritzker Pavilion in Millennium Park. That shimmering construction of metal got lost under the debris of eraser dust and pencil smudges. But I like it and the way I used the background so effectively.

Self Portrait in Gray #2
Oil on canvas, 50 x 70 cm

An artist from Iowa City commented on this watercolor:
"Wonderfully bright. A happy scene, full of growth." (Thanks Phil)
Anyway, that is what I hoped to express. Growth.

I think that I will ask him to borrow that line, for its name.

I particularly like the accordion effect on the bottom left.

Excercize. Self portrait in chalk. Working in negative - that is drawing the light instead of the shadow, was innitially a challenge for my brain. I will work more on self protraits (Heh, I'm always available to sit! On the other hand,, the choice of compositions and expressions is limited by the placement of the mirror and by my concentration.)

Zig Zag
I used color to create the effects of perspective, even when the preliminary drawing is totally flat. I hope to do this with greater intention and experimentation in another painting. The idea is so appropriate for Jerusalem - a city that can be viewed from so many angles, physically, symbolically and spiritually. The Cubists used multiple points of view, to investigate depicting space. Maybe I will use it to investigate meaning.

And Your Children Shall Return to Their Borders
ושבו בנים לגבולם

The original was painted in goache, and has been printed by giclée.
The painting contains a mixture of significant historical and schematic buildings.

Israeli Story
סיפור ישראלי

I've always loved architecture, and I've always loved history. Like for the classic small child, who always draws face-like houses with two window/eyes and one door, houses embody for me, the souls of their residents. And they have souls of their own as well.

This painting tells the biography of Israeli architecture, during the romantic period of the first Aliyot. It begins with the local Arab vernacular, nouveau Shtetl elegance, and the red tile roof of Provence. The black basalt comes from the Kinneret. The pink stucco from the coast.

Sold, Private Collection, USA