Joe Hautman

All images © Joseph Hautman

THIS WEEK ON THE EASEL...

July 26, 2010

Last week I was up at beautiful Lake Vermilion in far northern Minnesota. The fish were not biting but I was able to go swimming off of the rock that inspired this loon painting (which I just finished the week before). The painting is simply titled "Northern Wilderness" and is meant to capture a place beyond where the roads and people go. Obviously the latter is not true of the swimming rock, but it is true that there are no roads within many miles of the place...and we did see many loons diving, running on the water, calling and generally acting goofy within a hundred yards of the rock.

June 25, 2010

I have been raising ducks instead of painting them. One of my wood duck boxes was viscously ransacked by some animal and I salvaged a few intact egss. After about 15 days of incubation in a cardboard box with a light over it, and spraying with water to up the humidity......and getting up in the middle of the night to check the temperature (more fussing than I imagined when the project started), we have a duckling. This one, and the remaining unhatched egg, have been taken to the Wildilife Rehabilitaion Center of Minnesota where they will have company. The lesson - Just say no to putting a wood duck box on a tree, even if it is only a few yards from your bedroom window. Here is a link to better ideas for putting up a wood duck box.

(Photograph)

May 5, 2010

This is the final whitetail deer painting. I spent a lot of time working on the background. As I look at it now it seems that none of the changes are very obvious. The most significant was the repainting of the background in the middle to make it darker.

April 21, 2010

Here I have filled in the background some more, and I changed the position of the buck:

April 13, 2010

I am working on a new whitetail deer painting. It is a misty morning under the oak trees. There happened to be some turkeys in the photos of oak trees I was looking at and I ended up leaving them in the design. Here is how it started:

March 2, 2010

Here is the completed fox family painting " Venturing Out"

February 1, 2010

Last spring we had a litter of baby foxes on the property. I hesitate to call it "a litter" because there were at least three different ages of kits, and all ten (or more) of them seemed to emerge from the same den! Anyway, I've been meaning to paint them. Here is a finished detail:

January 7, 2010

I had bluebirds raising a family in the back yard this summer, and for a long time I have wanted to do a painting of a songbird on the wing. Here is the result- "Summer Morning - Bluebirds":

October 13, 2009

This painting of horses running free in the mountains is finished.....until someone tells me that "horses don't do that"... or "mountains don't do that!"

September 23, 2009

I have done a little article for young people in the current issue of Minnesota Conservation Volunteer magazine called " Have Fun Painting Ducks". This is a great "donor supported" magazine published by the Minnesota DNR. This is the painting that I used to demonstrate how I paint a duck stamp. The original is available for sale at the Collectors Covey gallery.

August 24, 2009

I've been experimenting .. This "painting" of a grey squirrel started out as a pastel. In order to get more detail I sealed the pastel with acrylic medium and painted over it with acrylic paint.

July 13, 2009

The "jungle painting" from last year has finally been completed. It ended up having 14 different Indian animals in it - and took about 14 times as long to finish as any other painting I've done! The last thing I did is replace the spotted deer, which was originally the central peice of the painting, with a tiger. I like the result better compositionally and it also makes it clear that this is not a realistic scene but more of a fantasy or dream scene.

April 21, 2009

The swan - finished.

April 13, 2009

Here I tried a wild color in the background, then had to tone it down quite a bit:

....

March 30, 2009

I have started a swan painting. Just sketched and the basic lights and darks blocked in. Not very nice at the moment but, hopefully like the ugly duckling!

February 24, 2009

The final painting - except for a title..Chickadees often seem to be the first things to check out something new, like a new bird feeder for example . Here I imagined that the chickadees have just discoverd this antler and are curious about it. Maybe "Curious Duo" or "Dicovery Team" or "Early Explorers"...I think I like the last one. ( October 2009: This original painting can be purchased through the Collectors Covey gallery.)

February 16, 2009

The Chickadees have arrived. Mover the mouse over the antler to see them appear.

February 9 , 2009

OK - So I missed the first week of my resolution. Maybe bi-weekly is better anyway. The new website is back up and, I hope, running smoothly. I have started a new painting using a new kind of paint ( Golden "Open" acrylics). It seems to require a little different technique and a little more patience on my part. The plan is that this whitetail antler will be visited by a couple of curious Chickadees.

January 20, 2009

I have been working on a redesign of the Hautman Brothers website! Notice the new resolution to update at least weekly. Things may be a little disorganized as we try to rearrange the site, but hopefully in the end it will make sense.

October 16, 2008

We are in the middle of "Federal Duck Stamp Contest Week" . The contest is being held at the Bloomington Center for the Arts in Minnesota. Thank you to all who attended the Wildlife Forever event last night at the Center. The actual judging starts Friday October 17th and concludes with the announcement of the winner around 1pm on Saturday the 18th. I will be signing posters on Friday and Saturday morning. Be sure to say hello if you stop by.

July 14, 2008

Thank you to all who came out to the Home State ceremony for the 75th Federal Duck Stamp in Owatonna, Minnesota. We raised some funds and, hopefully, lots of support for the building of a museum at the Gainey Center in Owatonna. The museum would showcase wildlife art and its role in educating and raising awareness of nature and the conservation of natural resources.

Now, maybe you will see a few more "paintings in progress" at this site!

March 27th, 2008

More of the jungle painting. There is now a great hornbill sitting in one corner

and a peacock in another

March 5th, 2008

I am working on a painitng inspired by a my travels to India. Some detail is shown below. The final will include 8 or 9 different kinds of animals.