Last year I had started a painting based on the Sunset Heights area of El Paso, focusing on the Sunset Grocery:

While working on it, I had to put it aside to work on getting our bathroom/bedroom project finished.  I stored it in my garage and subsequently the canvas got damaged.  I wasn’t very far along so it wasn’t a huge loss but I didn’t want to start from scratch on a new one using the same image.  I tweaked the idea some and set out to have another go at it:

The Sunset Grocery building has been photographed, drawn and painted by many others so its familiarity makes it difficult to come up with a fresh take on it  I think this layout is unique and will make for a stronger image than my first attempt.  We shall see…

Cadmium Yellow takes eons to dry, its like a watching snails race in tar.  Yes, I could add cobalt dryer but long term that can lead to cracking so I try not to do that.

Ages ago I posted a pic of a painting I was working on.  Unfortunately, it met an untimely end… it got wet in my garage.  I scrapped it and focused on another project at the time, finishing up our demolished bathroom that had been idle for the greater part of a year since the February 2011 freeze.

Anyway finish bathroom, Christmas, New Years, my birthday, all of February 2012 and a quick trip to Lubbock passed by. Well I’m back on track and just recently started a new painting:

It’s moving along pretty quick and I already have a couple of ideas stacked up behind it.  I’m still photographing interesting/weird stuff that I come across and will continue to post those mini adventures as well.  Finally I brought back from the dead my previous Blogger blog, the j10chronicles about my J-10 Jeep truck and moved it to a wordpress site, the NEW j10chronicles.  Right now its just an archive of the previous site with a new theme. There is some activity going on with the truck that i’ll be updating soon.

Lots going on, stay classy El Paso!