Below is a picture of "The Green House" that I took this morning in my studio. This house is kind of typical of houses that you might see in central Ohio. I am not sure that the painting is totally finished yet; there may be some editing yet, but I wanted to put this version out there. The original is sized at 22 x 28 inches, and it is "multi-media" on canvas. Just created in March, 2015

A new acrylic painting is featured below. I call it: "Villagescape". The idea for the painting came from a nice small picture of Stuttgart, Germany, that my wife inherited some years ago. Somehow, at the beginning, this painting took on more of a "cityscape" look about it, complete with a skyscraper or two.  I worked very hard to obliterate that image and finally got the "village" that I was looking for. The dimensions of this canvas are 18"x 28". I was hoping to achieve a standard size, but the picture also needed considerable "cropping" from its original form.

I have been working on a couple of new bird paintings. The first one, below, is a barred owl, and it is acrylic on linen canvas. The dimensions are: 13"x 17". I had wanted to get it at 12" x 16" so it would be a standard size, but sometimes, these things don't work out the way you want.

The second new painting is from a photograph I took aboard a ferry in the Norwegian fjords, I believe, several years ago. I call this painting "Flight" and it is also acrylic, but this time on cotton canvas.

Don't forget to come visit us at the Mohican Valley Artists' "Gallery on Main" in downtown, Loudonville, Ohio. Friday and Saturday hours available this winter. 

I know my friend and colleague in the Mohican Valley Artists, Bob Walker, is a renowned wildlife artist. His work speaks for itself, and is even better in person. You can see much of it at the “Gallery on Main” in Loudonville.

Prior to the “Wildlife Weekend” at the Wolf Creek Grist Mill in Loudonville last April, I was inspired to do some wildlife portraits, myself. I do not consider myself a wildlife artist, but I have always been impressed by the work of some famous wildlife artists such as Robert Bateman, Carl Brenders, Ray Harris-Ching, and the Canadian great, George McLean.

Several of my wildlife portraits currently hang in the Gallery on Main in Loudonville, to include: “Polar Bear”, “Cougar”, “Gray Wolf” and “Fox”. There is always something exciting about trying to get the fur and texture and look of these wonderful animals just right. I have also done portraits of a grizzly bear, a moose and Dall and Bighorn sheep that can be seen on the Mohican Valley Website.

In order for you all to get a chance to see these, and other paintings in person, we are making every effort to stay open with weekend hours through the cold winter (weather permitting). We figure if our friend below can stand it, maybe we can too! Looking forward to your visit!

Ed Hayes, Mohican Valley Artists

I was the visiting assistant professor of Chinese at Kenyon College (Ohio) in the late 1980s - early 1990s. I spent the summer of 1988 in Beijing as a visiting professor at the Foreign Languages Normal College. The college was close to some of the wonderful old alleyways (hutong) in Beijing. Some years later I painted this oil painting of one of the nearby alleys. I also had a show in Mount Vernon in 2008 featuring other alleyway paintings of old Beijing that I subsequently made.

Just for fun, I thought I would post a picture of a still life I did in oil back in 1999. This painting is currently on display in the kitchen area of Stone Lion Studio. If I am not mistaken, the brass pot depicted to hold the flowers is actually a spittoon. I guess I needed to "re-purpose" the pot!

If you live in, or are anywhere near Knox County, OH, please come out an visit me this weekend at the  Knox County Barn Tour. I will be at the Randall barn on Sparta Road, and will be the featured "plein air" painter (weather permitting.) To get there, just follow 13 north out of Mount Vernon to Fredricktown, and take a left on Sparta Road. Follow it along a couple miles until you see the barn below on the left. The painting below is a studio version I did recently in oils, but will be working on finishing a colored pencil version on site this Saturday at the Randall barn.