Tom Bombadil and the Walking Man

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This week I wanted to focus on a piece that exemplifies my process of constructing an artwork.  I think that this drawing, Tom Bombadil and the Walking Man Enjoying a Cup of Morning Tea, does just that.

Tom Bombadil (pictured below, on the left) is one of my favorite characters from the Lord of the Rings, which I reread while living on the Thai-Burma border this past year.  The Walking Man is a character borrowed from my good friend, the painter Jack Baumgartner. Upon reading the trilogy this time around, I was moved to make a series of drawings of Jack’s Walking Man character doing a walking-tour of sorts, of various locations in Tolkien’s Middle-earth.

 

Tom Bombadil and the Walking Man Enjoying a Cup of Morning Tea, Ink on Paper, 9 x12", 2011

 

Pictured below are the original sketchbook drawings of the visual, where I worked out the general idea and composition of the piece.

 

Composition Study from Skecthbook, Graphite on Paper, 2011

 

Original Sketchbook Drawing for the Image, Graphite on Paper, 2011

 

Here, in order to have a better understanding of what the morning light would look like upon two separate individuals, I posed for photographs in the characters’ general positions, and then built the composition for the final drawing in photoshop.  For this drawing it was important to me that the lighting was consistent on each figure, and that the size ratio of characters made sense, as physically, Bombadil is a much larger being than the Walking Man.

Also, I should add that in order to get my legs in the right position for the Walking Man’s pose, I had to sit on top of our small Thai fridge.

 

Light Study Mock-Up, Digital, 2011

 

In my opinion, Peter Jackson made a poor choice to edit out a pivotal character like Tom Bombadil in trade for lengthy, crowd-pleasing battle scenes.  For me, the books are more about the beauty of language, legend, poetry and song, and essential characters, like Tom Bombadil, who inhabit Tolkien’s narrative.  For this, Peter Jackson, ye are a hoser.

 

Preliminary Drawing, Graphite on Paper, 9 x 12", 2011

 

To see more of my artwork, please visit MikeSchultzPaintings.com.

 

Bygone Works

After going though my digital archives, I wanted to share four quiet landscapes, painted in 2007-2008.

Mount St. Helens Erupting, Oil on Wood, 6 x 8", 2004-2007

In March of 2005, Mount St. Helens had another in a series of minor eruptions.  At the time, I lived in the hills overlooking Portland, Oregon, and had a great view of St. Helens from my studio window.  One evening, the plume looked like a bizarre, cartoonish tube, floating above the mountain.  That visual inspired this artwork.

Moonlight on Cayuga Lake, Oil on Panel, 5 x 7, 2007

This painting began as a plein air study from a dock on Cayuga Lake, during one summer in Ithaca, New York.  Later, I finished it in my studio as a night painting. For me, this work has always held an odd quality that I like.  Perhaps it is the light pollution on the clouds?

Stars Over Cedar Mountain, Oil on Panel, 5 x 7", 2007

Stars Over Cedar Mountain was painted after visiting my grandmother, who now lives in Cody, Wyoming. On her property, there is a small log cabin sauna next to a babbling brook.  When one takes a break in the middle of a sauna to cool off, this is the view of Cedar Mountain from the hillside.   The air there is dry and clear and smells like sage brush.

Lawrence of Arabia, Oil on Panel, 5 x 7, 2008

This last work was inspired by one of my favorite scenes from the 1962 film epic, Lawrence of Arabia.

To see more of my artwork, please visit MikeSchultzPaintings.com.

Goodbye Blue Monday, for Kurt Vonnegut

Mike Schultz, Goodbye Blue Monday, for Kurt Vonnegut, Oil on Panel, 5 x 7", 2007

In the spring of 2007, I made this portrait of Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. in the days following his death.  Vonnegut’s book, Slaughterhouse-Five (1969), influenced my personal philosophy, and remains one of my favorite novels of all time.

Saddened by his death, I wanted to honor him with a painting.  So, I made an imagined portrait of a young Kurt Vonnegut looking out over a bleak, war torn Dresden, Germany.  In real life, Vonnegut had been captured by the Germans and locked inside of an underground meat locker called slaughterhouse-five, and so then serendipitously survived the fire bombing of Dresden by American forces in February of 1945.

Earlier this week, I came across this painting while going through my digital archives.  Five years has passed since I made it, and although my visual aesthetic has shifted, I believe that as an image, it holds up.  I know that if I made it now it would be a very different painting, but for me, that is the reason why revisiting one’s work from the past can be so interesting.

To see more of my artwork, please visit MikeSchultzPaintings.com.

Retrospect 2011

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In 2011, I made hundreds of drawings, paintings, and designs while living in Mae Sot, Thailand.  Many of these works served different purposes.  Some were made for a job or were part of the process of making a commissioned piece. Other images were personal notes, sketches, or were part of a larger body of work.  I’d like to share a small selection of images, from various points in the year, to celebrate the end of 2011 and the beginning of 2012.

Dream Drawing, Bear Attack, Graphite on Paper, 11 x14", 2011

When I have vivid and significant dreams, I like to record them with a drawing.

Sistine Sunrise, Watercolor and Gouache on Paper, 5 x 9″, 2011

This western landscape contains the basic composition from a section of the Sistine Chapel.  I always enjoy working hidden secrets into my artwork.

Sketchbook Drawing of Mae Salong, Thailand, Graphite on Paper, 7 x 8″, 2011

I made this drawing from our balcony, overlooking a valley in my favorite place in Thailand. Doi Mae Salong is a small Chinese founded town located high in the mountains.

Ceramic Box in Process, Clay, 2011

Memory Drawing, Barefoot Burmese Child Collecting Bottles, Mae Sot, Graphite on Paper, 8 x 10″, 2011

Memory drawings are quick sketches that are drawn after the fact, to help me remember visuals that I would see every day.

Design for Ceramic Sacajawea Tile, Digital, 2011

While working with the Puzzlebox Art Studio in Mae Sot, Thailand, I made over 70 designs for sculpted ceramic tiles.  The finished tiles are being highlighted in themed rooms in a guesthouse being built by the Puzzlebox Studio’s parent NGO, Youth Connect.  For the themed room called the “Map Room”, I wanted to honor a personal hero of mine, Sacajawea. This is the preliminary design for that tile.

Preliminary Drawing for Radio Lino-Cut, Ink and Gouache on Paper, 5 x 7″, 2011

When I was young, I would fall asleep to the crackle of my bedside radio playing AM Talk, love line call-in shows and oldies stations that played music from the 1930′s-1950′s.  This is a design for a lino cut I would like to make of the 1970′s hand me down radio that I had.  While I do not want to romanticize the past, as I cherish the extraordinary, unparallelled importance of the Internet, it does seem like it was a simpler time.

Preliminary Drawing for Hare and Stump House, Graphite on Paper, 9 x 12″, 2011

This is a sketch for an ink drawing.

Joseph Tile in Sculpting Process, Clay, 6 x 6″, 2011

In 2011, I made several ceramic works based on themes from my paintings. This is one such tile in process.  I found the carving and sculpting aspect of working with clay to be wonderful and very much like drawing in the third dimension.

Cobras and Poppies in Burma, Sumi Ink on Paper, 11 x 14″, 2011

This image is one of a body of work I made as a meditation on the current, ongoing humanitarian crisis in Burma.

Memory Drawing, The Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Archway in Brooklyn, Graphite on Paper, 5 x 7″, 2011

While teaching Foundations Drawing at the Puzzlebox Art Studio, I had my apprentices make a memory drawing of a specific moment and place from their lives in Burma.  I asked them to draw themselves into the image, and have the viewer looking over their shoulder at the memory with them.  After seeing how much they enjoyed the process of this exercise, I was moved (read as: I was jealous) to make one for myself.  I chose to remember a moment of my life in front of my favorite visual in New York City, the fantastic archway at the head of Prospect Park in Brooklyn.

Painting Glaze on Heart Tiles, 2011

To see more of my artwork, please visit MikeSchultzPaintings.com.