Falling Light and Poetry

Falling Light

Acrylic and Charcoal on Canvas

30" x 24"

1950.00

I have a firm belief that my paintings are visual poems. What I am trying to convey is a feeling. I give just enough information to catch the viewers attention and then allow their imaginations take them away.

I belive I have succeed with Falling Light.

Where does it take you.

More than a Feeling

Pasture Mates

Oil on Canvas

34" x 34"

3750.00

Starting a painting is easy! I begin with colour washes. I layer them. I manipulate the colour by placing one on top of the other. I let gravity play a part in the pigments settling and running. Most of the time I'm delighted. The work comes in the next stage.
                                                                                                                                       
 I am an intuitive painter. A lot of what I do is that I allow myself to be guided by what I have already painted. I respond to the color, and the line, and the shapes.

What I am moving towards is a feeling. This particular painting was motivated by that feeling of joy, and peace, and of that full hearted love you feel when you see your horses content in the pasture.

If I have succeeded, you will feel it too
.

Titled

Against the Wind

Unofficial Photo until I can get to the Photographer

Against the Wind

Acrylic, Charcoal, and Graphite

17.5" x 23"

Sold

Official Photograph

Titling a painting is a funny thing. I never want something to be too specific as I don't want to constrict the viewers experience, I want to enhance it. So it needs to be a open ended.

I usually think of the title hours after I have left my photographers. He will ask me for the title and I don't have one, so we will reference it by materials and subject or color. I have quite a few files titled blue pony or red horse.

Everyone once in a while someone will be taking to me or I'll be listening to the radio and a word or phrase will catch my attention and that's it! The title of a work I have just completed. Or it will lead me on a little course of seemly random thoughts that bring about the title.

Last night via email chat someone asked me the title of this painting. I didn't have one yet. During our exchange she mentioned that her horses' Jockey Club name was Against the Wind. Voila! Titled!

Thank you Anne.

Farming and Painting

Spring Romp

mixed media on paper

Framed 

34" x 42"

4250.00

I have long believed that I have the heart of a farmer. I love the smell of the soil and planting things. I can send hours choosing seeds, and bulb, and trees from catalogues and spend countless more drawing diagrams for where to plant them.

How to amend soil fascinates me. What to add to your compost to make it better for area is intended for is a subject I am enthralled with, and lets not even get started about my love for my earth worms.

Why do I think this gives me the heart of a farmer and not a gardner?

Well it's only those things in part. You see like a farmer I work tirelessly at what I love. I choose colours and canvas with care. I spend hours noticing which paint brand has more transparency than another. What happens when I mix this with that. How do get this effect or that on this surface.

And then there's light. I can become quite delirious when describing light. The mere thought of good light makes me swoon.

A farmer, you must understand is also a gambler. Willing to put all of their hard work into what they do and be at the mercy of external forces. One good hail storm will flatten a wheat field. New mown hay lies there at the peril of rain until it is baled. It's biblical in nature, all the misfortune that call lay waste to good crop.

And then there is the market. You have the most beautiful crop of white peaches that you have ever seen. People, however are buying strawberries. The peach buyers  ask "Do you have any cling free peaches? I am not sure I will like white peaches, even though they are beautiful and fragrant." You smile and know they are missing something, something you possess in spades, you are will to take a risk!

Days, weeks, and months may go by without a sale, and you are nagged by that practical voice in your head regarding why you keep at it. The answer is simple, and clear. I do what I do because it is what my heart desires and when it is good, it is glorious!

I have the heart of a farmer.

In the Still

In the Still

Acrylic, Charcoal, and Graphite on Yupo

20" x 26"

Sold

I usually don't have a plan when I started working on a painting. This was clearly the case when I started working on this one. I would just apply a layer of acrylic paint down, wait for it to dry and apply another layer.

After awhile I was satisfied with the result. I set it aside. Every day or so I would pull it out and look at it. After a few weeks of this I decided I was going to finish it.

 I gathered my materials and was about to set to work on an entirely different image when I notice the first horse emerging out of the field of blues and greens. Gradually they all made their presences known.

This is the result of wandering and allowing.

To purchase please contact me or go to my Etsy shop https://www.etsy.com/listing/457615114/in-the-still?ref=shop_home_active_2

Kentucky Derby Today!

Acrylic, Charcoal, and Graphite on Yupo

17.5" x 23"

Sold

So today's the day! At the moment I don't have a favorite, I wish them all the best and a safe trip.

I love Thoroughbreds. I learned to ride on them. My first horse was a TB, and in fact the majority of the horses I have owned have been Thoroughbreds.

I also believe in giving back. So in celebration of the bred that has give so much to me 20% of all art purchased from between now and May 8th, 2016 I will be given to ReRun and to Remember Me Rescue. Both of these organizations do an outstanding job in giving Off the Track Thoroughbreds a life after racing.

My original artwork may be viewed at www.tannerjensenfineart.com and in past blog post.

As an added incentive I will be providing free shipping in the contiguous U.S.

If you have any questions, please email me at ctannerjensen@gmail.com

Thank you.

An Artist Statement

Foundation Stock

Acrylic, Charcoal, and Graphite on Yupo

17.5" x 23"

875.00

I am constantly evaluating my art and studio practice. Trying new media and experimenting with different applications. Working to improve my skill set. Playing with different ideas and approaching the same problem, question from different angles.

As a result of this my artist statement changes. The changes are subtle as I move closer to my own truth.

This is the latest.

I paint horses.

I paint them because I love them, and this love has led me to spend thousands of hours with them, learning about them, and coming to an understanding of them.

There is a moment when I sense an ineffable something that dissolves all the boundaries of my prescribed being, and I am filled with a joy that verges on heartbreak— a feeling so overwhelming that it takes my breath and all my words away, and I am only left with marks and color.

It is in these moments that I feel the most authentic, and want to share what I have felt.This is what I paint. This is what I have to share.

It's Nothing Personal.

I am fascinated by the arrangements in medicine cabinets and junk drawers.

Leave me alone with your personal correspondence, a diary, journal, or stack of open love letters and I'm not going to read them. I not even tempted. In fact I probably won't even you if ask me to. However, I am going to open your medicine cabinet or pull out your junk drawer.

Oh don't worry. I'm not interested in exactly what you're taking. This isn't about learning anything about you. It's about me, I am interested in the shapes, colors, and composition of things.

Medicine cabinets, in most cases appear to be ordered. Tooth paste and dental floss sharing the same shelf. Bottles of medicine line up, their round and oblong pills inside. A razor lying next to a comb.

And the junk drawer. Heaven! A pair of scissors, one rusty nail, spare change, a piece of red twine curling around a toy giraffe. Wine corks, rubber bands, a shoe horn, measuring tape, a solitary lego, the plastic clip from a bag of bread. The colors and the random way they seem to have been shoved together to spend and undetermined sentence until the are needed.

They tell stories, these places where the things we don't consider until needed reside.

This is why I love creating collages. I like arranging color and shape, bits and pieces taken out of order and assembled into the beginnings of a tale.

Once upon a time there was a sheep who fell in love with a fish.


My collage may be viewed and purchased at my Etsy Shop

https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheSuperlativeHorse?ref=hdr_shop_menu

Fresh off the Easel

Ghost Horse

Mixed Media on Panel

15" x 15"

1250.00

This painting took years and moments to create. 

I had a panel that I had been adding and subtracting color to for years. Literally years. I have memories of this particular panel that are at least 8 years old.

Sunday I was looking at it. I really like the color. I started adding lines with a pencil that became the outline of a horse. I started mixing paint and applying it to the surface and then removing it. I added more lines with colored pencils, I added more paint, and so it went on.

Yesterday morning I looked at it and thought it was finished, so I left it alone. Today I believe it is ready to share with you.

A Garland of Flowers

I am never quite sure of where I am going or what I will find. I was surprised and delighted to see this garland of flowers turn up.

Ready to start.

The canvas has been stretched and three coats go titanium buff gesso have been applied. This is the first feathered coat of white gesso. I will do this again and then start applying colour.

Reclaimed!

The stretcher bars have been reclaimed. Four sets have been stretched with new canvas, gessoed and sanded three times, and now they await fresh marks.

My studio smells of gesso, slightly acrid and clean.

Now to dream.

ECU School of Art Alumni Exhibition

Bittersweet

 Oil on Canvas

34" x 34"

This is the painting that was in bondage and shipped across the country. It will be part of the East Carolina University School of Art Alumni Art Exhibition. The opening reception will be Friday, September 4th, 2015.

There are four venues for the exhibition The Wellington B. Gray Gallery, The Greenville Museum of Art, Pitt County Arts Council at Emerge, and the Janice Hardison Faulkner Gallery at the Joyner Library. My painting will be on display at the Greenville Museum of Art.

Unfortunately I will only be there in spirit.

Lying in Ruins

After weeks (over 2 years for two of the culprits) of struggling with about 8 canvases I am ready to toss them in the bin.

While two have questionable composition, that is not the case with the others, it's the paint! I have either been to heavy handed, choose the wrong colour, the wrong hue. The brush work is awkward, there is to much medium in this area or that. It's a wreck! They all are wrecks!! I am a wreck!!!

So now here I am. I have been trying to figure out how and where I went wrong. Was there a sign I didn't heed? A point at which if I had slowed down or sped up I could have pulled these paintings back from the brink? Were they over thought, under thought? I simply don't know.

I do know I will start again. A bit more humble and unsure of myself, but this is not a bad thing it just is. I don't know where I am headed, but I know where I will start. As always the start will be a clean unmarred surface that I will have prepared for my first mark.

Ocean Oracle II

from the"Ocean Oracle" series

Mixed Media on Paper

15" x 22"

750.00

from the"Ocean Oracle" series

Mixed Media on Paper

15" x 22"

Sold

Two more from the series "Ocean Oracle" that my wonderful friend and photographer Tom Alexander shot. He is such great guy! I am very fortunate that he works with me.and is the consummate professional.

This series is inspired by the beauty and magnificence of sea turtles. Each painting is archival and created on Saunders Waterford 300 lb watercolour paper with watercolour, ink, asian papers, acrylic lifts, 23 karat gold leaf, and graphite.

Ocean Oracle

from the "Ocean Oracle" series

Mixed Media on Paper

15" x 22"

750.00

from the "Ocean Oracle" series

Mixed Media on Paper

15" x 22"

750.00

I think there is something magical about sea turtles. They are ageless and mysterious to me, living in a world between the water and the air. Returning to land bask in the sun and lay their eggs. I am fascinated by them.

These paintings are part of the "Ocean Oracle" series. Composed of watercolor, ink, acrylic lifts, asian papers, and 23 karat gold leaf on 300 lb Saunders Waterford watercolor paper.

Cantering Chestnut

Cantering Chestnut

Oil on Cradled Artist Board

12" x 16" x 2"

$575.00

This painting is ready to go to a new home. Painted on cradled artist board and ready to hang on your wall.This painting is ready to go to a new home.

Bittersweet

"Bittersweet"

Oil on Canvas

34" x 34"

Sold

I finished this painting earlier this week and had Tom Alexander photograph it for me. He does  beautiful work and I am able to see the painting square inch by square inch it I wish.

There is something bittersweet about finishing a painting. You are ending your involvement with it as an artist, as a creator. The new relationship with it is hard to describe. There is a good deal of satisfaction in gazing at the finished work and a bit of pride, but there is also a edge of sadness, of longing to be involved in the process of painting and creating. 

And so, there is only one cure for this malaise, today I start a new painting.

Monoprint

Untitled Monoprint

11" x 11"

on 15" x 22" Stonehenge

$295.00

This is an original hand pulled Monoprint. It reminds me of summer here in the high desert. Everything bakes in the sun and then suddenly the rains come. Everything become quite verdant in a matter of hours and we are renewed, refreshed, until next summer.

Collages

Collage on Wood

4" x 4" x 2"

$65.00

Collage on Wood

4" x 4" x 2"

$65.00

I love making collages! It is part play, part problem solving, and part hide and seek as I search my studio for the perfect image or element. I am always delighted with them and hope you will be too!

These collages are available. if you are interested and would like more information or to purchase, contact me a tanner@ctannerjensen.com

Collage on Wood

6" x 6" x 2"

$135.00