Here's Rufus w/ a 40 oz.

Wine Bottle Painting

On Sunday, my wife and sister had their first craft group meeting. I had some time to work so decided to paint some wine bottles, as we had been talking about crafts all week. We had also joked about a series of fish paintings with different food choices. Here it is, step by step...

Supplies

You can hold the corks and turn the bottle to paint the entire area at once. Acrylic first coat dried in about 5 minutes. Then I added the grass and poured myself a glass of wine

 Finished front view- "Fish With Drumstick"

CHOMP!

The bottles give you 2 sides to work with so you can go wild!

The End

DIY Easel

Now that I have a studio, I needed a sturdy easel. They usually cost $200-$300 and up but I made this for $5. (I actually saw this setup at my uncle UJ's friend's house out in San Fran) I got 2 studs at Home Depot cut so they can lean against the wall.

Then I drilled a couple holes and added these bolts.

 Now I can adjust to standing or sitting height, and the to the width of the canvas as well. 

Studio Space

As you may know, we recently moved back to Lansing. Not only does our new house have a craft room in the basement, there is a loft above our bedroom for a studio. Finally! Here is the view and the (almost) finished space.

Fish with Ham

I decided to do a painting for fun last week in my new studio space (more on that to follow). I did a sketch at the CCL and when I had a free morning, put on some Sublime and got to it. I realized I had never done that before- probably because canvases have been hard to come. Also, I haven't had a space to paint and so all the time I spent working was on "serious" pieces.  Here it it...

View from REO Town of The Three Sisters

Here is a piece I did last fall for the "Showdown in REOTown." It was cool because a couple of my boys (Slim Chili and Stoneface Kermiet) were there, but the "judging" and "contest" were incredibly lame.

Art Show

The art show was a great success! I sold some paintings (The Coffee Table, The Corner Table in the Bar, and The View of the 18th Green) and we had a awesome time. Thanks to everyone that came out, Mr. Abood for the amazing dinner, Carol and Rachel for setting everything up and Michael for coming through with my favorite wine- the Beaujolais.

Final Paintings

Here are the paintings I finished before the show...

Paintings for my show

So here are the latest pieces I finished (I have a few more in the works). They will be on display at my first art show, Dec. 15th at the Country Club of Lansing from 5-7:30 p.m. It should be a great time!

Sammy J.

Here is my piece of Sam behind the bar at the Country Club where we both work. I have wanted to have a real showing for a long time and this painting sparked the idea of having it at the club.

Painting Away

After finishing a self portrait I started about, oh, three years ago, I worked on portraits of my wife Jessica and my friend Griffin from The Macpodz.

Two Turntables and a Microphone

Next I painted two pieces of three other musicians, my good friends the Malik bros.- Shoaib and Zeb of PO PO and Hassan of Sunny Ali and the Kid.

Here I am working on it. Thanks to my beautiful wife for keeping me company!

It's official!

I sold my first painting this year! Back in June I participated in a event at the Rizzi Design firm in Old Town Lansing. It was an open house with a Parisian theme and they were asking for artists to paint on their lawn during the afternoon. I had a project I had wanted to work on for a while and I knew a couple of the guys who worked there through my sister Claire. The painting was based on a promo photo of Nirvana that I made look similar to Picasso's "Three Musicians"-one of my favorites. It was sold later in the afternoon during the silent auction for a undisclosed amount, but apparently there were a couple of bids on it. Check it out!