Shop on Break

The casting shop is on break for a bit while we get some much needed projects done around the place. The casting is never ending, so we had to just pick a place on the shipping list and say that after those were shipped Todd would take some time to do other things. Sorry for any inconvenience this is causing anyone! 

As most of you know I am a wheelchair user, and not having an accessible bathroom was getting ridiculous. During a short break in January Todd demo'd the old bathroom, and there it sat for months, the 'bathroom hole'. We have a second, much uglier and not accessible bathroom that we are using, and I will be SO glad when I don't have to go in there anymore. 

The old bathroom, a thing of beauty:

Demo Day (too bad you can't hear my gleeful laughter):

To the left is our bedroom closet, which graciously donated 6" to make the bathroom wide enough for a wheelchair:

Hideous old bathroom BUH BYE!

Bender releases a chipmunk into the wall, never to be seen again. Thank you Bender :)

Window installing day:

Since then a bunch of stuff has happened that I either forgot to take photos of, or it was stuff that just doesn't lend itself to interesting photos. I forgot to take photos when Todd built the new wall and put the closet back together. You can't even tell it used to be wider, it just looks like a normal closet now. He  has put a lot of time into research and acquiring all the new bathroom fixtures and hardware. The bathtub plumbing is done and tested. He just came out and said dry walling is going to be happening for a few days. Here is a photo from yesterday:

So, this is why nothing has been shipped for a few weeks, and won't be for a few weeks more, possibly longer. It always sems like these kinds of things take a lot longer than you think, especially when you haven't done them before. Todd is having fun with it, though! I am very excited about it, and looking forward to being able to easily get my chair in there and even be able to turn around, no more scraped knuckles and tramatized door frames :)

2014 NAN wrap-up

NAN has come and gone again, and here's the wrap up of champs and reserve champ horses sculpted by me:

Artist Resin Performance classes (with tack):

Other Scene:

Reserve: Lone Man Out
owned by Karen Meekma
Lonestar painted by Liesl Dalpe to an appaloosa

 

Other performance: Huntseat Pleasure Stock/Longears:

Reserve: Tardis
owned by Nichole Hertzog
Reiner painted by Nan Wagner

Stockwork QH:

Champion: Hollywood Hillbilly
owned by Laura Skillern
Lonestar painted by Laura Skillern

Look at ALL THE COWS in this setup!

Stockwork all Other Breeds:

Champion: Lone Man Out
owned by Karen Meekma
Lonestar painted by Liesl Dalpe

Western Arena Trail:

Champion: Sharpshootin Cody
owned by Mandy Yontz
Lonestar painted by Charlotte Donahue

Western Pleasure all Other Stock Breeds:

Champion: Lone Man Out
owned by Karen Meekma
Lonestar painted by Liesl Dalpe

Reining/Western Dressage:

Champion: Waukesha
owned by Val Tudor
Reiner customized and painted by Lyn Norbury




Artist Resin Halter (breed) classes:

American Pony:

Champion: Dew
owned by Karen Beeson
Rasam painted by Karen Beeson

Appaloosa Stallion/Gelding:

Champion: Roadhouse
owned by Sommer Prosser
Little Lonestar painted by Sommer Prosser

 

Gypsy Cob/Irish Tinker/Gypsy Vanner/Drum Horse:

Champion: Riverrun
owned by Colleen McNamara
Tiny painted by Karen Zorn

Reserve: Raggedy Man
owned by Melissa Hart
Tiny painted by Karen Zorn

Other Pure/Part/Grade/Light:

Champion: Kamadeva
owned by Melissa Hart
Marwari painted by Mindy Berg

Reserve: ES Up All Nite
owned by Erin Corbett
Jezebel painted by Tracy Eilers

 

Other Pure/Part/Grade/Stock:

Reserve: Dun In Squiggles
owned by Jeni Lambert
Lonestar painted by Danielle Feldman

Purebred Arabian Mares:

Champion: Ma-Ajmala
owned by Karen Jensen
Jezebel painted by Sommer Prosser

Reserve: Sadira
owned by Jackie Arns-Rossi
Jezebel painted by Sommer Prosser

 

QH/Other Solid Colored Stock (Excludes Mustangs) Mares:

Champion: Silver Drift
owned by Carol Johnson
Working Girl painted by Josine Vingerling

Reserve: Red Light District
owned by Karen Meekma
Working Girl painted by Sommer Prosser

 

TWH/Other Pure/Part/Grade Gaited Mares:

Champion: Memphis Lace
owned by Randi Brazil
Mindy painted by Sherry Clayton

Reserve: 24 Carat
owned by Sharon Mossy
Mindy painted by Karen Giesbrecht
   

TWH/Other Pure/Part/Grade Gaited Stallions/Geldings:

 
Champion: Anglo-American
owned by Nicki Collins
Independence painted by Carol Williams

Reserve: Shaman
owned by Sharon Mossy
Independence painted by Carol Williams

Purebred Arabian Stallions:

Reserve: Khassanova
owned by Sharon Mossy
Mini Nahar painted by Rayvin Brewer

Part Arabian:

Champion: Amir Mirage
owned by Margaret Suchow
Nahar painted by Myla Pearce 

Morgan: 

 

Champion: Twilight Waltz
owned by Karen Jensen
UVM Yesteryear painted by Chris Nandell-Flint

Reserve: Rogue's Gallery
owned by Christine Rieger
UVM Yesteryear painted by Tom Bainbridge

QH/Other Solid Colored Stock (Excludes Mustangs) Stallions/Geldings:

Champion: Sharpshootin Cody
owned by Mandy Yontz
Lonestar painted by Charlotte Donahue

Reserve: Gunning It
owned by Sara Kucharski
Little Lonestar painted by J. Kira Hamilton

Paint Stallions:

Champion: Air Force One
owned by Caroline Boydston
Reiner painted by Caroline Boydston

Reserve: Lonesome Dove
owned by Sharon Mossy
Lonestar painted by Caroline Boydston

American Mustang Mini/LB/Classic:

Reserve: Tiburon
owned by Vanessa Dahl
Cheveyo painted by Stacey Tulminson


Besides the champions and reserve champions there were numerous Top Tens, congrats everyone!

This year Nan Wagner and I teamed up for a 100% donation to the NAN auction, our combined efforts raising $1000.00. Here is my Andre resin painted by Nan:

I haven't been to a NAN show in many years, but thanks to the generous sharing of photographers and fellow hobbyists like Heather Morton-Abounader I can have a 'virtual NAN' right here in my office. If you have a moment check out her 2014 NAN galleries:

Artist Resin Performance (under tack)

Artist Resin Halter





 

Mini Marwari edition ends August 7th

It's already been almost a year since I released the mini Marwari, time sure flies! The very last day to place an order is August 7th. You can do this by sending me payment in the form of PayPal in full or in part, on or before August 7th. You can also send snail mail payments, in full or in part, postmarked on or before August 7th. Or email me letting me know you want to order a Marwari (or two, or three!) on or before August 7th. I happily accept time payments, in whatever amount and whatever frequency works for you, just let me know when you place your order. The mini Marwari's webpage with handy PayPal buttons is here

Here are a few Marwaris all painted up:

Above painted by Mindy Berg of Spruce Mountain Studio

Above painted by Lauren Davis

Above painted by Mel Boynes

A Bevy of Burros

I haven't done any mustang paintings in awhile, so recently I visited the online adoption gallery of available horses on the Bureau of Land Management's website. I go through a lot of photos to find the few that 'speak' to me. I look for lighting, for emotion, movement, color, something that will work well in the formats I like to paint in. I went through all the horses, saving a few aside, and then.....there were burros! Lots and lots of burros. Unfortunately most had their photos taken in flat light (either a cloudy day or after the sun went down, so no shadows, nothing to suggest form). That is fine for potential burro adopters, but not so great for me, the painter.  I did find a few, though. Their cute furry burro faces lend themselves well to paintings, don't you agree?

The first, a jenny. Photo reference for this and the next one are courtesy of the Bureau of Land Management. Their description of her is "#4558 - 6 yr old gray jenny, captured 10/2011, from outside an HMA, California". Outside of an HMA-Herd Management Area means technically she is not protected by the Wild Horse and Burro Act, but she has found her way to a facility anyway. I am not sure exactly how that works, though. 

The second painting, this time a jack. His description is "#3952 - 4 yr old gray gelded jack, captured 11/2010, from Cibola-Trigo HMA, Arizona".  Both these, and many other burros, are available for adoption throughout the Bureau of Land Management's Wild Horse and Burro program

Both of these paintings are 8X8 in soft pastel and are not currently for sale, I am building up inventory for a show at the end of July. After the show any that are not sold will be made available here and elsewhere.

Painted Andres!

We have shipped out a bunch of Andres in the last 6 weeks, and some painted ones are showing up here and there, how exciting for me as the sculptor to see him brought to life! The following silver bay was painted and photographed by Tammy Myrold:

Dramatic sooty bay painted and photographed by Sara Gifford:

 

An ethereal star dappled gray by Mindy Berg:

  

Andre is available for ordering until April 30th 2014. Sales info on his webpage here

Andre in Primer

Sometimes I can skip the primer step if I feel confident that I have gotten every little imperfection sorted out to my satisfaction, but will all of Andre's feathers I felt I had better not skip it. The other advantage of primer is it makes it far easier to get decent photos, since a white object is really hard to photograph. One of the drawbacks is I now have to wait a few days for the primer to completely set before I can resume work on him, so it looks like his release is going to be in February as opposed to my optimistic estimation of January. I struggle with my model horse photography, and am going to try to get more photos together, but so far, after two photo sessions, I have a small handful of ones that show him pretty well:

Andre coming soon, and Tiny ending soon!

As it turns out we are having a non-winter here. In fact there is almost no snow, so instead of skiing we resumed riding. There are flies out now, so wrong for January in the Colorado mountains. Perhaps February will bring much needed moisture. Speaking of February, and I can hardly believe it has almost been a year, Tiny's edition closes on FEBRUARY 12TH! His webpage with ordering information is here.

A few photos from the gobs of awesome ones people sent me of their painted Tinys:

 Painted by Tammy Myrold

 Painted by Billie Campbell

 Painted by Jaime Baker

 Painted by Stephanie Michaud

 Painted by Lauren Hoeffer

Painted by Mindy Berg

And, yes, Andre is coming soon! I don't have an exact release date or price set just yet, but it is going to be before Tiny's edition closes, so best to get those Tiny orders in ASAP to avoid being stuck behind the Andre orders.