View From the Stone Doorway Size:  510 x 405 mm (20 x 16 in) Medium:  Acrylic Support:  Canvas Notes:  This started as another heavily treed landscape. Not satisfied with that, I added some distant mountains to give some context and interest. More important was the addition of the doorway. I wanted this to feel like something tangible and to give the viewer a bit of context of being there instead of just looking at a painting. What could have been a generic landscape is now a a place where stories are born. Many images by CJ Carter are ready for purchase in a variety of formats: prints, canvas prints, phone cases, and so much more. Help support this site and the artist by dropping by the store and getting gifts for yourself, for family, and friends.

Verdant Venture Via Bicycle Size:  35.5 x 28 cm (14 x 11 in) Medium:  Acrylic Support:  Gessoboard Notes:  — I’m not a landscape painter. Even so, since I like my backgrounds to look interesting, I do, from time-to-time, have to paint landscapes. In order to do that well, that means actually painting them to exercise one’s painterly muscles. I found this reference image that required a lot of work doing trees. It also incorporated a small figure, which I like to add to landscape or architectural pieces if they aren’t already there, just so there is some enigmatic story that goes along with the picture. Being a storyteller, it’s little elements like that which make a work such as this eternally interesting to me. Why is he on the road? Where is he going / where is he coming from? Why is he on a bicycle? Is this someplace familiar? Is he pressed for time? And so forth and so on. This image and many other images by CJ Carter are ready for purchase in a variety of formats: prints, canvas prints, phone cases, and so much more. Help support this site and the artist by dropping by the store and getting gifts for yourself, for family, and friends.

Autumn Park Empty Seat Size:  30.5  x 30.5  cm (12 x 12 in) Medium:  Acrylic Support:  Gessobord Notes:  Cradled 3/4″ I’ve made it fairly common knowledge that I’m not the first to volunteer when it comes to landscapes. While I appreciate them in real life and when they are executed well in art, it’s just not something that I’m compelled to do for my own satisfaction. That said, unless you are determined to either do still lifes or portraits with indistinct backgrounds, landscapes will be a significant part of every painter’s work. I chose to do this painting because of the challenge that all of those autumn leaves presented. The range of colors and values despite the largely overcast day offered up something that never failed to demand I pay attention to what I was doing. I put in the seat because I love to at some enigmatic element to entice the viewer to come up with their own stories — whether drawn from real life or imagination. This image and many other images by CJ Carter are ready for purchase in a variety of formats: prints, canvas prints, phone cases, and so much more. Help support this site and the artist by dropping by the store and getting gifts for yourself, for family, and friends.

Desert Morning Landscape Size:  50.8 x 40.5 cm (20 x 16 in) Medium:  Acrylic Support:  Stretched canvas Notes:  Mostly airbrushed Landscapes really aren’t my thing. But because they are an element of so many images, I still have the need to do them. This particular landscape gets worked on and then shoved back into the cubbyhole over and over again. If I’m not airbrushing something specific, it gets hauled out for some work, and then when something else comes up, it gets put back. I get to play with this canvas. I try a lot of different techniques. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t. Desert foliage can be troublesome so I’ve recently been using different methods to get the results I’m seeing in my mind. While it would be great if it looked good overall, that’s not really the point of this. Many images by CJ Carter are ready for purchase in a variety of formats: prints, canvas prints, phone cases, and so much more. Help support this site and the artist by dropping by the store and getting gifts for yourself, for family, and friends.