1st day back: girl with a glass / by Philip Tarlow

girl with a glass, oil & collage on linen,8 1/2 x 11”- day 1

2:46 PM: after driving an hour each way to alamosa this mornig to have the bone graft/extraction site checked by my dentist, i went to the studio for the first time since the procedure last friday. it felt so good to be back! but i was feeling tired from the drive & had some elevated pain in the area. i wanted to do something, so i took an older small (8x10) unstretched painting on linen and worked into it with oil & collage before returning to the house & lying down. so i’m typing this from bed, while the unending political coverage plays on the tv.

the photo i worked from was shot about 5 years ago at an outdoor event with high school kids. there was a freshness & innocence about this girl holding a glass of water that moved me, and transformed this everyday moment into a timeless experience. i collaged two pieces; a map of australia, which appears on the upper right, and a bold series of marks made with a bamboo quill in ink on paper. i worked into it with a fan brush loaded with oil paint & oil sticks, and then scraped with one of my palette knives.

at this stage of my career, roads i have travelled, the development and ripening of my mark making merge with the influence of the great masters i’ve studied and integrate into my current work. there are references to: diebenkorn, matisse and dekooning. can you recognize them?

BELOW: top row left: dekooning: montauk II, right: diebenkorn: ocean park #72

bottom row left: matisse: the goldfish, right: diebenkorn: interior with vire of the ocean

BELOW: RECENT PAINTINGS OF MINE