Art and Sports 11 – Figure Skating

Figure skating 01 - by Miki

I am still on my sports arts journey, focussing on winter sports for the moment. And in order to paint winter themes I have to set my mind to a winter mood, to feel the cold and somehow romantic atmosphere. Well, we are in the middle of October, so I would say it is quite sensible to think about winter already. There was a time in my life -my Germany time-, when the winter could have started soon, And anyway, especially when I was living in Freiburg,  Switzerland being just around the corner, the snow was never very far away. But where I live now, in Andalusia, in the middle of the Almeria desert, it is not easy to think winter thoughts… although some might say,  I just need to stretch my mind to the Sierra Nevada, which is also not so far away…

Anyway, one of my favourite winter sports disciplines is figure skating on ice .I guess I will spend some time on this subject. I have started the series featuring couples skating, as it is what I most enjoy. I love the basic contrast between man and woman but still in search of unity and , the matching gear they put on are a delight for my eyes, In fact they all generally look like the perfect couples. Although I must say that some couples are veering away from that aesthetic perfection, typically when the guy is immense and the girl tiny, probably for the sake of easing the carrying and throwing. And call me old-fashioned, or  not liberated, but I don’t like it either when the girl looks like the guy , and inversely… In couples skating I especially love the increased tension through the double possibility of failure and the search for harmony and coordination. These guys really have many parameters to master to give a good show and achieve a high ranking.. what a performance really!

Now some words about painting figure skating. It is not as easy as I thought, perhaps because it is closer to dancing than to traditional sport, especially through the elegance and the general body attitudes in search of drama or fake smiles!  I would say it is not easy to escape the danger of kitsch, or at least not to cross the borderline between art and kitsch. When I think about it, I don’t understand why I love figure skating so much. Of course I love dancing, I love skating, but generally I don’t like mixing tastes.. it is like when we eat waffles here: Kevin loves to put chocolate AND strawberry syrup on them, and I can’t stand it, both tastes killing each other: what a sin! Or like in painting, mix too many colours and you get an ugly grey. I know, I am digressing here, figure skating is not at all like that, and yet, as I stated painting it, I felt the danger very clearly….

Figure skating 02 – by Miki

I won’t say anything about the results. As I always state: it is not up to me to judge my work.

I will just say one thing: I will persevere!

These paintings are available directly online as Giclee print in many different dimensions, on paper or canvas, and also as greeting cards. Just click on the widgets below to access my FAA store

And more generally you can see all the stuff I paint by going to my gallery “Miki’s Enchanted World”

Jimmy Page and Robert Plant

Jimmy Page and Robert Plant - by Miki

I thought I would dedicate my post today to that duo of musical giants, Robert Plant and Jimmy Page. In the artwork above they are featured in the classic era of Led Zeppelin. Since I painted it about 2 years ago, this artwork has been a hit and given much pleasure  to the Led Zeppelin fans…. and good business for me of course! In fact, I did the painting because Kevin had asked me to. I personally didn’t know Led Zeppelin very well, had certainly never seen them live. But well, their fans love the painting, I cannot ask for more!

Some fans comments

“…  gorgeous style, I’m your fan )…”

“… thats true!!! they are Zepps!!! it reminds me their song: baby, im gonna leave u love it!!!!!!!…”

“… Saw Led Z. in concert in the seventies…love this…it is gloriously colorful and full of energy,,,…”

I did another artwork featuring Robert Plant and Jimmy Page, interpreting the piece “Stairway to Heaven”, that divine song! An artwork in a very different style from the first one… just tried to paint both as if they were in heaven, not quite defined somehow… like angels perhaps?

Jimmy Page and Robert Plant 02 - by Miki

In the meanwhile I know Robert Plant much better, and I am waiting for the chance to go to one of his gigs, next year probably. But I have seen him on the TV and DVDs on many different stages, have heard interviews, and I think I like the guy. I mean, the musician of course is fantastic and I love him. But it seems to me that the human being behind is a great person too, even humble, considering his stratospheric success… it always fascinates me when famous people stay humble…

Robert Plant 01 - by Miki

Robert Plant 02 - by Miki

I also did a painting of Jimmy Page alone, but Kevin says one does not recognize him. Well, I don’t mind really, I wanted to try another style, and the painting was more meant to represent a guitarist alone in the night. lost in his music..

Lost in music, Jimmy probably lost his face too!

Jimmy Page lost in music – by Miki

These art works are available directly on-line as Giclee print in many different dimensions, on paper or canvas, and also as greeting card. Just click on the widgets below to access my FAA store

And more generally you can see what else I paint by going to my gallery “Miki’s Enchanted World”

Rodeo Time

NEW…NEW…NEW…          Miki’s new artist’s website   www.mikidegoodaboom.com           NEW…NEW…NEW…   

Rodeo 01 – by Miki

(Painting in mixed technique of pastel and digital technique.)

Being specialised in bullfight paintings, I have been asked many times in my artist career to paint rodeo scenes. But to be honest I was never really attracted by that motif. Why not? Well, all the ingredients to inspire me artistically are present: the movement, the colours, the tension, the contrasts…

The reason might be that I have never attended a rodeo myself. Last year as we were in the States, especially in Texas, Kevin wanted to invite me to a rodeo show, thinking I might enjoy it. Possibly…., but we were only one week in Texas (Austin) and we could not find a rodeo show corresponding to our time there.

Also, Rodeo seems so far removed from my culture, I cannot really “feel” it. And I need to feel my subject to be able to paint it in such a way that I am able to put my name under it. Everything else is  fake, kind of!

But well, I have been asked again recently, by different people. So I thought I would give it a go. Of course I enjoyed doing it, and I might do some more, but I don’t know. I kind of feel like a “thief” painting something so quintessentially American, not even having attended one show live! I really feel as if I am stealing their cultural patrimony to the American people, especially to their artists. Probably that feeling is due to my psychological discomfort when some Russian artist, for example, is painting a bullfight scene. Although I must say we have so many Russians around in Spain, they are almost like natives here! But most of them have never attended a Corrida,, the entrance fee being too expensive probably… often they paint bullfighting scenes to try to earn money with it, not because they love it. Well, I won’t blame them. In these difficult times, better to earn the money through art than stealing it from innocent people.. I mean really stealing, not symbolically stealing as I am doing here with my rodeo painting!

By the way, I was quite amazed to hear, the other day, that rodeo shows are regularly broadcast in the UK. I wonder if people there feel closer to that tradition, than for example, French or Spanish…. and if yes, why… I should research it perhaps…

Anyway, this art work is available directly on-line as Giclee print in many different dimensions, on paper or canvas, and also as greeting card. Just click on the widgets below to access my FAA store

And more generally you can see what all I paint by going to my gallery “Miki’s Enchanted World”

Art and Sports 05 – Watersports

Water Fight - by Miki

(Watercolour painting)

It is Sunday today, and the Sports Art week is coming to an end. I will finish with water sports, which is certainly one of my favourite sports categories, to practise and to paint. I love the water,  I love to move in the water, and I love the way I feel after having been in the water, so fresh one feels newborn…. well, at least I suppose one feels quite fresh when one is resuscitated… might depend on as what we come back as though!

Unfortunately I had no time this week to make some water sport painting in the new technique I used for cycling and skiing, but I will probably do some next week and add them to this post. For now, I will present only older paintings here.

The painting above was one of my most successful, having been chosen many different times for websites and magazine covers.

Love is The Seventh Wave - by Miki

(Pastel painting)

Surf and Windsurf are certainly my favourite water sports. With swimming of course, and scuba diving,  but it is not that easy to paint, with almost everything being under water.. in fact I have never tried, Perhaps I should one day!

Personally I have been doing some windsurfing, and just adored it. I learned it in Congo, Africa, in the bay of Pointe Noire. I was on holiday there by my parents who were living there, and a friend of theirs had a windsurf board. He taught me the basic technique and I was invited to use the board as often as I wanted. It was tough to learn, I continuously fell back into the water. but I am quite focussed when I want something.. not to say stubborn! But what a feeling the first time I could glide on the water!!! From that moment the learning process went quite smoothly and I surfed every time further and further from the beach. I couldn’t stop really, never thinking that I would have to come back. And one day what was bound to happen happened: I almost lost my life there! I was some kilometres away from the beach, and in the meanwhile, a strong wind had come up, parallel to the coast. Of course  I had not learned how to surf in these conditions! Luckily for me, I have got a brain, and I am quite fit, so I was able to find a way to come back, after hundreds of turning manoeuvres. It was almost dark as I reached the beach, totally exhausted. There had been a moment out there, where I had stopped to do anything, had laid down on my board and decided to let myself die, physically and psychologically unable to go on. But it is not that easy to die when you have decided to, and the way I tried that day was really very boring! Anyway the survival instinct won out, as you can see! After that day I was a little bit more prudent … but not much really, I suppose I felt invincible!

Some years later I was surfing in Spain, and again far away from the beach, a strong wind was blowing and my mast broke.  I had to bring my board back to the beach, about 2 kilometres away, swimming against the waves.. it was tough! This was in fact the last time I surfed. Many years later, in Germany, I bought myself a surfboard, but  I was working very intensely these days and somehow I could not find the time to go and surf! The thing is probably still there somewhere…

Windsurfing - by Miki

(Watercolour painting)

All these paintings are available directly online as Giclee prints in many different dimensions, on paper or canvas, and also as greeting cards. Just click on the widgets below to access my FAA store

And more generally you can see all this stuff I paint by going to my gallery “Miki’s Enchanted World”

Arts and Sports 02 – Golfing

I decided yesterday to have a sports art blog week, and started with cycling. As I said, I love sports and have practised many of them. One of my favourite sports is golf. Some people might say this isn’t a sport, but they haven’t got a clue what they are talking about. When you  play in Spain on a course which goes up and down all the time and under a very hot sun, then your body bloody knows that it is a sport! I never was a fan of using a buggy, because in golf what I really love is the mix of walking in the nature and hitting the ball between.

So today is golf art on my blog menu.  “Earn Your Stripes” is one of the first I did of Tiger Woods, as he was still a real tiger, on top of his form, before all the stuff about his unfaithfulness came out. Honestly, I don’t care about his private life. And I don’t even care about him as a human being, probably because he does not seem to be the most sympathetic guy in the world… but he was a great golf champion, and whatever people might think or wish, I believe he still is. He just needs to get his act together again. Winds of marital changes are not strong enough  to blow down such a monument of a person, only some hurricane could… so I say: one day he will be back!!! And I am not expressing here my wishes, just my thoughts… I would add though that if he was a little bit more humble, he would be back earlier…  and I would like him much more as a person!  But would he be still Tiger Woods if he was humble? I guess not…

Anyway, the thing with the tiger inspired me to do the painting above, which I personally like quite a lot!

Golfing in Club Fontana 03 - by Miki

Painting inspired from a scene of the PGA tour in G0lf Club Fontana in Austria. I don’t remember though who the player is… just loved the contrast between the green and the orange of his shirt. I was also inspired by the light and shadow contrasts.

Golfing in Crans-sur-Sierre 01 - by Miki

Crans-sur-Sierre, in Switzerland,  my favourite golf course from the European PGA tour. I guess my painting of the grass is a little bit too untidy and wild, but I love it like that. Just taking advantage of my artist’s freedom!

Looking at my cycling paintings yesterday, I thought I should try the same technique in golf (and other sports too). I wanted to try quickly to see how it works on golf, and simply took a nice photo from the net to base it on. Now, I am probably not allowed to sell this painting without the authorization of the photographer, but well, I do like the result, and perhaps some others will, and it might even be that the photographer takes pity on a poor artist… if not, he/she should contact me! I will probably do some golf art in this technique these days, but based on my own material.

Golfscape 01 - by Miki

Enough golf for today, although I have dozens of art works about them. Another time perhaps. But of course, if you insist, I will show you another one.. some golf fun.. the ultimate golfer’s gift!!!

The Ultimate Golfer's Gift - by Miki

You can purchase prints of these paintings (on paper or canvas) in many different sizes, or a greeting card, in my online gallery. Just click on the widgets below

 

And more generally you can see many of my dreams, nightmares, passions, loves and hates by going to my gallery “Miki’s Enchanted World”

Art and Sports 01 – Cycling

Le Tour de France 05 – by Miki

This artwork is meant to represent only movement and colours, hence the little details, just colours stains and lines moving with high speed through the frame…

After all that dreamy esoteric stuff from my posts last week, let us come back to more real things. In fact, I think I will make a sport art weeks. As I often said, I love sports, as well actively as passively. Sport is vital for my whole well-being.. so much that if I spend one day without any sport activity, I feel like dead! I know, it sounds exaggerated, but I am an exaggerated person all over, with huge attraction to all kind of extremes… not extreme sports though!!! 

And of course, i love painting everything which inspires me passion. So here we go with the sports art week! I am not sure I will have enough sports paintings for a whole week (from different sports I mean), and I might have to create again.. But I feel lazy right now, so let us start with what I have.

In July I made a series of art works featuring the Tour de France, and they have become  quite popular. I presented the first four of the series in an earlier post,  “The Tour de France 01″, Here are some more.

Le Tour de France 06 – by Miki

It was raining that day as the bikers crossed that village in the North of France.. On the painting I wanted to feature both aspects: the grey rainy weather, and the colour wave of the racers . I did not put too many colours in that wave though, it did not look right, or at least it took over the whole atmosphere of the art work, and nothing was left from the rain.

I was asked if I would paint La Vuelta too, but well, it finished yesterday, and anyway: I didn’t really fancy. The Tour de France is for me THE RACE, I can’t think with passion of any other one. And when there is no passion, I can’t paint it. Anyway, guys racing on their bikes look all the same, in France, Spain or Italy. This would be only a repetition, and I hate repetitions! Perhaps next year, I will paint the Tour de France again, but in another style and technique, if some come to my mind.

Le Tour de France 07 – by Miki

Always loved the red dotted shirt, rewarding the best mountains climber it makes such a nice and funny contrast to all the other ones!

So, I think it is enough cycling for today, I feel exhausted! 

You can purchase prints of these paintings (on paper or canvas) in many different sizes, or a greeting card, in my online gallery. Just click on the widgets below

And more generally you can see many of my dreams, nightmares, passions, loves and hates by going to my gallery “Miki’s Enchanted World”

The Forbidden Fruit and so on…

Le Fruit Defendu - by Miki

Yesterday afternoon, tired of all the travel sketches business = finishing, photographing and publishing works from Portugal, Italy, Spain, Republic Czech – I spent some hours in my atelier “for the dirty work”, as I call it. This is a place specially designed for my colour wildernesses, and believe me, after such a seance, the room is a total mess! I play with colours, instruments, waters, knifes, needles, sprays, whatever comes undo my hand and my inspiration. The result is quite random generally. Then I just let my fantasy free with the task to make something artistic out of it. Later on with help of the computer if necessary. In the above piece I incorporated within the acrylics chaos a tender pastel portrait of that beautiful girl called “Tara Summers” , whom I discovered in in one of my favourite TV shows “Boston Legal”

Eternel Feminin - by Miki

Similar technique for this one, with a pastel portrait of one of mu nieces… the result looked pretty feminine to me, hence the title…

These paintings  (and all my work too too) are available as Giclee prints in many sizes and as Greeting Cards. If you are interested to purchase some,  visit my Fine Art America Gallery or drop me a line

Cycloscape 01: The Lonely Rider

Cycloscape 01 - by Miki

Some days ago I posted here “Blues United”, my latest acrylics cycling painting, and announced some new works in my “scapes” technique, that mix between classical and digital art. A technique I quite love because it is faster (and I am an impatient artist…), but also because it allows to add some structure and colour effects, more difficult to reach with traditional pens or brushes.

Concerning the results, some people prefer a full classical technique, because it looks more real, has  more physical substance. Truth is that a paints structure on a canvas is something very beautiful, sensual even. For the eyes, and also for the fingers when one is allowed to touch the painting… which I allowed myself… and my closest friends perhaps! 

On the other side that mixed  technique allows more vibrancy. The artworks look often quite surreal, like from a dream world, or a parallel world to our normal reality.. in fact exactly like something from the cyberspace, what it is, somehow! And some people love everything cyber… personally I love all techniques, and which one I prefer depends only on my daily mood and my actual connection to the real world, which I sometimes like to lose…  

If you want to purchase a print of my lonely rider (on paper or canvas and many different sizes available) just click on the widget below

Sketching Trip to The Sierra Nevada – 03

27th of July 2010

Capileira

We drove from Trevelez to Capileira, on the other side of the valley, on a road hardly safer than the one on which we had arrived. But when the sun is shining and no black clouds are hanging over the gorges, it looks less dangerous.. But still, at many points,  great chunks of the mountains had fallen down onto our side of the road, while the other side of the road had collapsed into the gorges. That day I took it with a laugh but only as long as there was  enough road left to allow us to pass!  The laughing stopped when we suddenly saw a lot of cars and lorries stopped by the roadside, including the Guardia Civil, and all the people somehow looking down into the gorge… I guess a car had gone off the edge as it collapsed…  scary stuff, really!

The town Capileira. is certainly less impressive than Trevelez, much smaller and without the ambition to reach the sky! Quite cute though, full of cool shops along the main road, good sketching motifs everywhere. But here again I faced some unexpected problems. In fact it is the problem which many artists face when they start painting  Andalusian villages: white houses, red flowers in pots hanging from balconies, green leaves, blue sky… very attractive and refreshing for the eye, but , in my humble opinion, a trap for the artist: kitsch is never far away! Sincerely, I think these villages are not really adequate for good oil or acrylics paintings, except if one can find some kind of abstraction where one is able to artistically reconcile all the basic elements involved. Total realism doesn’t do it for me, not even by the hand of skilled painters.

Here in Capileira I tried myself to ‘fight the kitsch’ using pastel chalks, but pastel is a dangerous tool in itself, easy to fall into triviality., and again, as in Trevelez, I failed!!! In my defence I must add that in my travel set the chalk pieces are all mixed and it is almost impossible to recognise which colour they are.

Eventually I came back to my usual sketching ink and watercolour technique, which at least normally renders the lightness and freshness of the subject quite well.

But still: although it was better than in Trevelez, I didn’t feel comfortable sketching. I felt tense, nervous… perhaps there were again too many people around, and a “snobbish” atmosphere pervading the town. Somehow the feeling that the people here, above all the foreigners, thought they were something better for being here, all wandering around in their expensive climbing outfits with a walking stick in hand! Do they feel so superior because they climb some mountain in the Sierra Nevada? Or is it me, who feels so inferior, just sitting down on the road , in my dusty trousers, my sketch book and my little magic wand in my hand? The times are long gone when being an artist brought you some consideration…

And if somebody does take some notice of you and stops by, it is just to tell you that he paints too, or somebody in the family does. Or a friend. The distance between an artist and a normal person is minimal nowadays.

Like the woman who saw me drawing and stopped by for a while. No interest whatsoever in what I was doing. She simply started telling me that there was a wonderful exhibition in one of the local restaurants..A Japanese painter had arrived once in Capileira  and started painting the villages around, just for bread and bed.

Later on I went and had a look. I was extremely curious to see how a Japanese artist dealt with the Andalusian kitsch… well, he didn’t really, the kitsch is there, omnipresent, but at least sometimes he had managed to rescue it, adding some Japanese traditional elements to the paintings like a naked black branch with a bird on it….

But you know, some people love that Andalusian kitsch, Like that woman who sent me to the exhibition.  Commenting on my paintings, from which she saw some on the gallery leaflet I gave her, she just said,

“They are very romantic…”

No idea if this was meant as a compliment. But judging from the expression on her face, I guess not. No wonder actually: Spaniards seem to live on the other side of romanticism, as eager as possible to avoid it!

By Miki

The Alternate Realities of a Restless Plein-air Artist

” …. We spent many of her holidays in the Spanish fields together, painting among olive and almond trees in front of these weird Spanish mountains which seem to stand on old elephant legs… “

Altea La Vieja, Spain, January 2008

This is a post I wrote yesterday in our New Travelscapers blog, the blog of all artists travelling around the world in Arty Days…

If you want to red the entire post, which is about the alternate realities of a restless plein-air artist, come here