"ANXIOUS" New Original Oil Painting by Mike Callahan

"Anxious"

Oil on Linen

24" x 30"

I've been working on this one on and off for a while.  I painted most of it last November, but have been fussing with the perspective a bit.  I wanted to paint a figurative piece with a bit more narrative than works done in the past.  We had a beautiful model pose for our painting group last summer and I shot some photos, but I had to find background reference and a public bench reference and then was challenged with making it look like nighttime...blah, blah, blah...anyway, here's the final piece... 

"AGAINST THE WALL" New Original Oil Painting by Mike Callahan

"Against the Wall"

Oil on Canvas

30" x 24"

This past summer my beautiful daughter Bri modeled for an open painting session at my art academy.  Prior to the session I asked her to pose for some photography in the alley behind the academy from which I would create a painting at a later date.  This is the result...

"EVENTIDE" - New Original Oil Painting by Mike Callahan

"Eventide"

Oil on Linen

24" x 20"

I've been looking a lot lately at the works of William Adolphe Bouguereau and how he was able to portray such luminous skin.  I had this nice pose from a model so I decided to see if I could approximate something akin to Bouguereau.  I'm quite sure I have fallen far short of that objective, but here is my attempt.

"POWER NAP" New Original Oil Painting by Mike Callahan

"Power Nap"

24" x 18"

Oil on Canvas

I'm sorry for the delay in sending out the newsletter - I've been pretty busy lately. I have a couple more cowboy pieces I'm just about done with (but not quite) and so I thought in the meantime I'd share this fun little painting of I did of my daughter Brianna taking a power nap one afternoon after a long day of class at the Paul Mitchell Academy in Reno. (By the way, she has since graduated and I'm not just saying this as a dad - she's an awesome hair stylist, so if you live in the area and are looking for a hairdresser, email me and I'll put you in touch with her.) Anyway, when I saw her napping one day, I thought this would be a fun one to paint so I quickly snapped a shot before she awoke.

"ENCHANTRESS" - New Original Oil Painting by Mike Callahan

"Enchantress"

24" x 30"

Oil on Canvas

In sharing my latest painting with you, I thought I'd show you a little about how I conceived of it. First, I'm a fortunate man in that I have two of the most beautiful daughters in the world! Of course they don't get their good looks from me, but from their mother, so that makes me triple lucky...of course, from a father's perspective there have been many a time that I haven't been sure if having beautiful daughter's is a blessing or a curse! Well, enough of my rambling, on to the painting.

My younger daughter Alissa has a friend who is a very talented photographer, her name is Charissa Booher and you can check out her work here. One day, she did a photo shoot with Alissa and got some really great shots! It was suggested that do a painting or two from them, but I usually don't use other people's work for reference. I had to admit it was an intriguing shot so I told Alissa to ask her friend how she'd feel about me using her photo for a painting. Fortunately Charissa thought that would be cool, so I picked one that I felt held particular qualities that would translate well into a painting. While I really liked the shot shown here, I felt I'd like to do a little something special with the background. Last fall, on our way home from a trip to Apple Hill, Alissa could see that there was some great light on the American River from Highway 50 late in the day. She kept bugging me to stop and take some photos, but I was kind of like the horse headed to the barn at the end of the day. Finally, I saw a decent spot to pull over so I stopped, handed Alissa the camera and told her to go for it...but to hurry up, I would keep the car running. She climbed over the guard rail and descended to the river's edge and shot up about half a memory card! When she came back to the car she kept exclaiming that "it's just magical down there!" It looked pretty from my perspective, but when I got home and reviewed her shots, I had to agree, "magical".

So, naturally, I felt this was the perfect pairing just waiting to be painted, a great shot of her backed by the great shot she took!