For this post I wanted to suggest someone who directly played an influential role in my art, one of my professors from the Fine art undergraduate studies program at New Jersey City University, Ben Jones. He is having a show now which will run from Sept. 8 - Feb. 9 over at the Jersey City Museum, which is located at 350 Montgomery St., Jersey City, NJ (tel:201-413-0303). Or you can go to www.jerseycitymuseum.org for more details.
Not only is he a good & prolific artist, he’s also a very gifted art teacher. Taking his class was like taking 2-3 art classes rolled up together; there was so much insightful information & suggestions to be taken from his courses and lectures. And although at the time (now looking back), it seemed as if his teaching methods/assignments were a bit of a heavy load to take alongside with other classes, I can now really appreciate what he was trying to instill in me & the other young aspiring artists at the time. That is, clearly a strong work ethic in producing lots of quality art consistently. So thank you Ben, for giving us as much advice, recommendations, criticisms and of course, multiple assignments as only you could’ve.
The following is a brief introduction about this exhibition from the Jersey City Museum’s website:
This major retrospective of the work of Ben Jones features a complete survey of the artist’s work, dating from the mid 1970s through his most recent paintings. “Deliverance” explores various aspects of the artist’s body of work, and delves further into its close relationship to religions of the African diaspora. Many of the artist’s key works are in the exhibition, including the iconic Black Face and Arm Unit, from 1971 (State Museum, Trenton). Organized by independent curator Ed Spriggs, whose relationship with Mr. Jones dates back to the early 1970s, when he was director at the Studio Museum in Harlem and Ben Jones was exhibiting his work there, this survey is an unprecedented examination of this important American artist’s work.
So do yourself a big favor & check out the provocative artwork of Ben Jones at the Jersey City Museum, you won’t be disappointed…
Here is another Abstract painting I did using colors that were left over from my other more figurative paintings. Originally I did these in order not to throw out perfectly good oil paint, I ended up liking them so much that I decided to make a small body of work out of them! Its titled “Left Over Paint Into Abstraction 5.” This specific one is actually painted on my old palette…
“Color is like music. The palette is an instrument that can be orchestrated to build form.” -John Sloan 1871-1951
Here is an update on a commissioned abstract painting I’ve been working on using split-complementaries (i.e. Red, Blue-Green & Yellow-Green)…It’s composition has been totally unplanned & improvisatory. Lets see what happens aye?
Here is an abstract painting I did on a wooden panel….I selected the colors based mostly on colors I had left over from my other (mostly figurative) paintings. I started to do these paintings a couple years ago as a way to not waste the paint that would eventually dry up on my palette (& hence be thrown out). They also have inadvertently become a great way for me to loosen up & experiment with different methods of paint manipulation & application…
“Left Over Paint Into Abstraction, 4th version.”
Ahh…you know, for artists in general, there are two times in the creation of art that are the most enjoyable…the first is the moment right before the artist starts to work on the artwork itself & thus when all possibilities are open to choose from, & the “idea,” or “concept,” that the artist has is still an abstract notion inside of him/her. The second moment in creating art that most artists particularly love, is when the artwork they have been working on is finally finished! Don’t get me wrong, the actual process in creating art is obviously a great feeling too, & sometimes if one is in what I call “a groove or rhythm,” it could verge on being a meditative act or dialogue for the artist. But for the most part, it is like giving birth…there can be a struggle at times, sometimes it goes fast, then slow,…(although I’m clearly not a woman, so I guess that might be an exaggerated & far-fetched comparison,) you get my drift. Well without further philosophical pondering’s on the process of art, here is the finished Double-Portrait commission of Anne & Joe. Which took me 42 hours to complete..! (damn & usually it takes me 24 to 30 hours to finish one of these portrait commissions).Although I do have to admit, I think its the best commissioned portrait I’ve done so far. (Note:to see the drawing below with a better resolution I would suggest you right click over the image, select view image, then zoom in on the drawing to see it better…)
Many of the Masters of the past, particularly the draftsmen, were seriously interested in learning how to depict the Human Form (albeit in an interesting & artistic manner). One of the tried & true methods they used consistently was the habitual practice of doing sketches of Greek and Roman sculptures from antiquity. So about a month ago, I along with a very good friend & artist Ricardo Vicens (www.ricardovicens.com), made one of our routine trips to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (clearly one of the best collections of art in the world). After we looked through the recent exhibit of Rembrandt & his Dutch contemporaries we decided to do some studies of some of the sculptures at the museum in order to exercise our visual perceptions & to improve our understanding of the human form much how the past masters would’ve done. So here are the two drawings(studies) that I did from the Met’s newly renovated Greek/Roman sculpture wing…Enjoy!
I’ve been pretty busy with the holidays this month, & my 30th birthday that just passed, plus I’ve been trying to juggle various drawing & painting commissions & the creation of another person’s website (a local music store, the website is www.Edenmusicalrecords.com in case you want to see its progress). So although I had the photos of this particular drawing commission for about 3 weeks already, I couldn’t find the time to actually post it here on my supposed “Bi-Weekly Paintings & Drawings Blog.” My sincere apologies to anyone who was actually waiting for a new post, in any case here are a few pics of my most recent portrait commission….(so far a little over 9 hours of work done on it)
Here are two more Collages of various Latin albums, the first one is a collage of various reissued Latin CDs, the second one is a collage of CDs from the FANIA record label…enjoy.
So here is my latest Digital collage for the latin music website that I’m currently working on…It’s for the cuban section of the website, it therefore only has a few cuban musicians that Ernesto felt should be included…though there are obviously hundreds more that we could’ve chosen from…the artists in this artwork are Fajardo & his orchestra, Silvio Rodriguez, Arturo O’Farril, Gloria Estafan, Chano Pozo, Juan Formell & Benny More.
So here is a Digital Photoshop collage that I did earlier today for Ernesto (owner of Eden Musical Records), of whom I wrote about in my last post. Anyway the following tango musicians can be found in this artwork: Tita Merello, La Orquesta de Alfredo De Angelis, Julio Sosa, Roberto Goyeneche, Anibal Troilo, Astor Piazzolla & of course Carlos Gardel. I overlayed a transparent yellow-brown color to give the black & white photos a vintage sepia quality…
Here is the main image for the homepage of the Latin Music store website that I’m working on currently for one of the last remaining Mom & Pop Latin Music shops here in the tri-state area, Eden Musical Records (based out of Clifton, N.J)…I basically did a digital collage of various photos,of some historically important Latin-Jazz/Salsa/Cuban Musicians and edited/rearranged their positions/color in photoshop… enjoy! ( Hey and by the way, why not see if you can name all of the musicians?, if you can’t, & are from the Caribbean, then you have to go out and do something really extreme to remedy the sad musical state you’ve attained, e.g. instead of listening to what the typical latin commercial radio stations are playing these days, you could actually listen to good quality old and new Latin music every Saturday from 12pm-4pm on 89.1, i.e. Vicki Sola’s “Que Viva La Musica” show. But, in order for this to work and stick, you would have to do it for about a year to at least counter the sacrilegious musical taste on your present palette …aaahhh!! sorry about the side ranting, as you can see, I’m really into the importance of remembering the musical history of the various Latino cultures……………until next time!……………….. ) 
Hello folks, although I haven’t posted anything new in the past 2 weeks, I’ve been quite busy finishing up a commissioned drawing as well as working on a website for the local Latin music store where I buy all of my Latin music for my ever-expanding Salsa/Latin-Jazz/old Cuban music collection, Eden Musical Records based out here in Clifton, NJ( which by the way, you can actually check out the website in its early stages at www.Edenmusicalrecords.com). The commissioned Drawing or Double-portrait was completed on October 31st. Starting another person’s online music store & getting the drawing delivered to the patron took up most of my valuable time, I therefore couldn’t find any time to post the finished piece when it was done . But I’m finally posting it now, along with the other previous drawings in order for you to see the process of the drawing as it developed from a rough sketch to the completed artwork. Enjoy.
The finished piece after 29 hours & half. 
The End.
..& some close up shots as well…
As a side note, that is actually a self-portrait with my signature on my neck in the painting.
To see more of his work, check out his website at www.Reinaldoarvelo.com
…as you can see I still need to work on all the figures a bit more (i.e. bring out shadows, highlights & detail), especially the faces of Joe. Usually it takes me about 24 hours to finish these portrait drawings, & right now I’m at the 20 hour mark, so hopefully another 4-6 hours should bring this work to completion, oh & I still have to add a few flowers here and there to decorate the piece up a bit. The other commission I’ve posted is the initial stages of an abstract painting using a split-complementary color scheme of yellow-green, blue-green & red.
The image above is the drawing after about 17 hours. 
The drawing’s state after 23 hours & 40 minutes, oh & with the addition of some Mixed De Caen Anemone flowers on the lower left side.
