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Rube's Lures1995 Oil on linen 12.5" x 18.0" Private collection This is a study of a chrome fishing reel and some old lures that belonged to my Uncle Rube and that are in the lower left corner of Big Strike. Taking a very complex part of a work and blowing it up so that I can draw it and paint it with confidence really helps me achieve the realism I'm looking for in the larger piece. Drawing is the skeleton, the underlying framework of every painting. To achieve the degree of realism I aspire to, every object must be drawn precisely and correctly. I use any tool I can find - plastic templates, parallel rules, plastic container lids, French curves, graphite and tracing paper - that will help me make perfect circles, ellipses, parallel lines and the like. I really study each item I paint in order to understand how it is constructed and how it fits together. |