Hotel Key

Below is my hotel key with some red blooming begonias behind it. I forgot that this hotel’s keys have dot holes in them. Last Thursday I switched to this hotel that is in Memphis itself. It puts me closer to places I want to go. Hurricane Ike will make landfall tomorrow. I’m glad it’s not going to hit New Orleans, but I’ll be happier when it is finished.

Dot Pillow

Last Thursday I moved to another hotel in Memphis. This is a shot of a pillow from the lobby of the first hotel. It is one of two pillows. The pillows were on chairs near a big flat screen television. Folks watched the weather channel as the Hurricane Gustav made landfall.



In the meantime I've been taking a lots of pictures while visiting parks and gardens in Memphis. I've been keeping busy, but I've been too agitated to make any art. When I packed, I did manage to take some color pencils, color sticks and water color pencils. Bringing painting supplies was just too involved. Now I'm monitoring Ike's progress. Tuesday is the day that
the forecasters promise to have a better sense of where Ike will go.

Dot Sofa

This is the pattern from a sofa located near the hotel bar. It's one of those long curved ones. There are lots of cool patterned objects in this hotel.

Dot Rug

Currently I’m in the Memphis area having evacuated from the New Orleans area. I’m keeping an eye on Hurricane Gustav’s progress. Here’s a shot of the rug in my hotel room. By coincidence it happens to have dots in it.

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In the mid nineties The Friends of Rivertown Fine Art Gallery opened. There were four permanent artists in the gallery. Every couple of months, two guest artists would show their works. In January of 1998 I was paired with Bill McInnis. In 2006 I was invited to hang art twhen a guest artist needed to remove his work. For a year the rotation of artists was in limbo. On Saturdays, I alternated gallery-sitting duties with a permanent artist. In April of 2007 the gallery was closed.





This painting includes colors from the gallery interior. The leaf shapes come from the artificial ficus trees that were placed near the front windows. The first time I applied the dots, the painting did not work out. I had to go back and repaint the background. Fortunately I had better luck with the dots on the second try.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

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Now I turn to another medical concern with an image from an eye test. Recently I had this test again. You are asked to look at a dot other than the red ones. A picture of your eye is taken when you do so. At least that’s how I understood it.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

For this painting I opted for a dark background instead of just having light red on red. I imitated the pattern of the test that is made up of dots. Sometimes images just handed to me for making my dot art.

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On another medical front, I had a sinus x-ray done. It didn’t take anytime at all. I simply had to lie down on some kind of bench structure that was surrounded by an arch, if you will.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

The machine did not look exactly like this. I made an abstraction of it for the painting and used muted colors based on what I saw. I also used a dotting technique similar to the painting just before this one. While working on this batch, I made a special effort to work on paintings as a group that required the same colors before mixing new colors.

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In 2006 I took a medical swatch test. The results were negative. Anyway, that’s as much detail as I want to say about the origin of this one.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

For my image I did not duplicate the card involved. I just did an interpretation of it in a form of a square design. In this one I used subtle variations on colors in the same areas.

A Few More New Paintings

Painting is going slowly for my new dot paintings. However, I am making progress. Look for more paintings soon. Below are my latest four.

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acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

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acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

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acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

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acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

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Back in the fall of 2006 I started going to a lot of movie screenings hosted by a group of radio stations. I soon learned that the “die-hards” arrive a couple of hours before a show’s starting time in order to guarantee seating. Given the long wait, I make sure I have a book to read or sudoku puzzles to work. The carpet in the lobby of one of the theaters has colorful spirals, triangles, circles and squares on a black background.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

This painting is my dot interpretation of the graphics in the carpet. I wasn’t interested in trying to duplicate its pattern. The carpet is merely the catalyst for my expression. I do see a lot movies at this theater.