Friday, March 13, 2009

Faded Glory


I just returned from my third trip to Jacksonville in a week, my second in the last 36 hours. Three trips were plenty but together they don't approach my Orlando-Jacksonville turn-around record. In 2000 I worked on a mural project there and made the 300-mile round trip eight consecutive days. If you think this speaks to my weariness of hotel rooms after the last 20 years, you would be correct. Although I have had to declare anything more than that distance to be officially out of home cooking range, and socks and underwear must be packed.
My Jacksonville client approved the Porsche racer oil painting sketch shown with the last post. The canvas for the final painting was built and delivered to my studio today so work can begin Monday.

When the client originally called about the painting, he asked if I would be interested in restoring the paint on the hand carved mahogany front door of his house. Paint restoration is not my specialty, and I'm reluctant to work over another artist's work, but she lives in Montana and could not be easily brought to Florida to do the restoration.
Even though the exposure to the sun wasn't direct, the glazed paint and varnish had gotten quite weathered. We took it down to the bare wood and working from photos, I restored the design to it's original colors. I'll go back Monday and add a coat of polyurethane with a UV protector. I think it came out great, but I was merely rescuing someone else's good work.

1 comment:

  1. Mr. Bach humble as usual. Anyone in Montana could have "restored" another person's good work. :)

    this home owner insisted on you because you have the talent to create art in symphony with another artist's good work.

    looking at this up close, the dragon fly, the frog, nuanced tones in the leaves and lilies, it is clear that this is BACH work. Whoever the artist was who carved this marvelous door, you have brought it back to itself, splendidly, your personal talents woven in.

    your paint is simple yet lush at one time, bravo and so glad i got to see it.

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